Hironobu Sakaguchi did not, in any way, shape, or form, expect his 'final fantasy' to become such a huge hit. So, what's a game company to do when they have their first real hit? Why, cash in, of course! But how do you follow up a game changer like Final Fantasy? Well, if you ask Squaresoft, the route they took was to make a game that had NOTHING to do with the original, recycled some graphics, and called it the second game in the series. And then, they gave that name what was most likely the least sensible name that the gaming industry must have seen in the entire decade: Final Fantasy 2.
Wait, so this is the second Final Fantasy? So the first one wasn't final at all?
The story of Final Fantasy 2 opens up with four people being chased by soldiers of the Palamecian Empire. They are our heroes: Firion, Guy, and Maria, and her brother Leon. The four get attacked by the knights, and promptly get their butts handed to them, almost dying. Luckily, the mage Minwu and Princess Hilda of the kingdom of Fynn manage to rescue Firion, Guy, and Maria, healing them with Minwu's magic. Leon was nowhere to be found. Angered by the fact that their home, the kingdom of Fynn, was destroyed by the Palamecian Empire, the three beg to be allowed to join the rebellion, but are refused due to their inexperience.
Determined to prove their worth, the three manage to sneak into Fynn, going past the enemy soldiers, to rescue Prince Scott of Kashuan, an ally of Fynn and Hilda's boyfriend. The three find the young prince on his deathbed, begging them to convince his cowardly brother, Gordon, to aid the rebellion, as well as the news that Fynn was betrayed by their chancellor, Borghen. Scott gives the three heroes his ring, as proof of their allegiance, and then dies.
Giving Hilda the ring, she makes them official members of the Wild Rose Rebellion, entrusting them with their first mission: go to Salamand, and gather Mythril for the rebellion to make powerful weapons. While there, they encounter the population had been enslaved by Palamecia. Freeing the slaves, Firion and the rest return to Hilda and give her the mythril.
But suddenly, the city of Altair, where the rebels were hidden, is attacked by the Palamecian's secret weapon: the airship Dreadnought! Figuring that the only way to destroy the ship was with Sunfire, a secret fire that only Kashuan possesses, the three heroes embark on a journey to the destroyed kingdom, along with Gordon, Scott's brother. retrieving the Sunfire, the party heads out to the Dreadnought, ready to destroy the ship.
Sneaking into the ship, which by then had already ravaged several cities, the group aim to put an end to Palamecia once and for all. Throwing the Sunfire into the ship's core, the group hasten to escape, but not before being confronted by a new enemy: the Dark Knight. No, not Batman. Knowing that time grows short, the heroes simply make a mad dash for the exit, barely escaping the explosion.
Returning to Altair, the King of Fynn lays in his dying breath the plan to take out Palamecia once and for all: a three pronged attack. The idea is that Minwu would cast Ultima, the ultimate magic spell of destruction, with Gordon leading the joint forces of Fynn and Kashuan in an all out attack. Meanwhile, Firion and his crew would recruit the dragon riders of Deist in an aerial assault.
Making their way to Deist, Firion makes a horrifying discovery, all the wyverns have been killed by Palamecia. There is but one egg left, and Firion leaves it in the magic springs of Deist, so it may hatch soon. Returning to Altair, the group finds that Hilda had been kidnapped by the Emperor of Palamecia, Mateus, and that she was being held in the Coliseum of Palamecia. After a daring rescue mission, the party returns to Altair, ready to take on the Empire once and for all.
However, Minwu is nowhere to be found, having last been seen in the Mysidia Tower. The group heads there, finding a dying Minwu, who gives them the Ultima Tome, the book that will teach them to use Ultima. Returning to Altair, the heroes discover that Mateus had summoned a powerful cyclone that had destroyed not just the city, but several others as well!
With the help of the last dragon rider and the newly hatched Wyvern, that somehow grew up really quickly, the group heads towards the cyclone, where Mateus himself is found, and kill him, stopping the cyclone once and for all!
Hooray! Game over! The world is...actually it turns out the Dark Knight has made a claim to the Palamecian Throne and is trying to continue Mateus' work. Also, it turns out the Dark Knight is really Maria's brother Leon. Refusing to listen to reason, Leon steps down from the throne once it's revealed that Mateus was back from the dead, he managed to take over all of Hell and now commands an army of demons!
OK, that's pretty bad ass.
Having had enough, the group make their way through Mateu's new demon castle, and kick the Emperor's ass once more, this time saving the world for real. Leon's back to normal, but he decides to leave his friends, never to return, even though Firion assures him that they will wait for him to return, when he is ready.
Final Fantasy 2 was the first Final Fantasy, and one of the first RPG's in general, to be very story heavy. This was a game that tried to tell a more complex story than, say, "princess got kidnapped by giant lizard, plumber saves princess." Because of this, Final Fantasy 2 is a very important game to the industry; it was a trailblazer in the growing RPG genre, and it helped define what the series would be best known for.
Sadly, it has to be said. The game has been surpassed in story telling several times over; which means that the story has aged very, very poorly. The story itself is, by today's standards, sub par. Let's see, we have a standard story of good versus evil, a saintly rebellion versus a very very evil Empire that may as well call itself the Evil Empire. We have heroes who are the absolute epitome of virtue, while we have villains who may as well eat kittens and rape babies because that's how evil they are. This is Saturday morning cartoon level of story telling, fit more for children than hardcore gamers.
Gameplay? Well, this is Final Fantasy 2's biggest weakness. The game had decided to eschew the experience based system of its predecessor, opting instead for a skill based system where every stat would grow the more you used it. The more health you lost and healed, the more your health increased. The more damage you received, the stronger your defense would get. On paper, this is a fantastic and innovative idea. In practice? Not so much. When I came to, I found myself directing Firion to stab Guy with a sword, both to increase Firion's mastery of the sword, and Guy's defense, because I could do that and the game actually rewarded me for it. I literally rolled my eyes at what I can only call idiocy on not just my part, but on the part of this broken system that clearly needed to be thought through more thoroughly.
Final Fantasy 2, graphically speaking, was on par with Final Fantasy 1, which means zero improvements were made. Actually, there were SOME improvements, like a smoother battle screen.
The main difference between this battle screen and one from Final Fantasy 1, is that this one doesn't have a line separating the player characters from the enemies.
However, there is a lot to love in this game. The story may be simple, but it DOES entertain. Battles are fun, even if they can get intense, and repetitive. All the dungeons offer the player tough battles, hard bosses, and ample rewards. The villain was good enough, being more of a "hands off" villain, akin to someone like Emperor Palpatine from Star Wars. But in my opinion, the best part of the game is the music.
Nobuo Uematsu, the main composer for the series, really brought his A Game in this installment. There are several tracks to love here, but my personal favorites are the theme for the rebellion, and the battle theme. Allow me to share with you just one of these:
OK, OK, I know what some of you are thinking: "Hey! These are just a bunch of beeps and boops!" And yeah, that is what they are. See, this was released before video game music could have instrumentals, where game cartridges had little data room, and consoles weren't that powerful. In this day and age where it is fully expected to be able to listen to Queen's "Radio Ga Ga" on Los Santos Rock Radio while flying around a crop duster shooting cops, it is difficult to imagine, or appreciate, just how little game developers had to work with thirty years ago. In fact, there is the same theme, as reinterpreted with more sophisticated sound systems:
And I just hit the nail on the head back there! The thing with this game is that it has aged poorly, specifically because everything it did has been surpassed. Story telling has become more sophisticated in gaming, music has become more sophisticated, writing has become more natural and less exposition oriented. Even future Final Fantasies have surpassed this game, leaving it in the dust. Thing is, this game is the one that started it all! THIS is the game that actually started the Final Fantasy tradition of diabolical villains, determined heroes with their own histories and personalities, with worlds that had their own History, unique geographies, and internal politics and cultures!
This game was made in a time where video games were just starting to get some respect again after the Crash of 1983. During this period, video games were still making a comeback, but they were decidedly kid's stuff. Music was just beeps and computer chimes, graphics were tiny sprites that could be made in MS Paint (literally), and yet Final Fantasy 2 was doing something unheard of: telling a real, original story.
Final Fantasy 2 may be a bit of the black sheep of the series (thanks to its gameplay), but it is a historically important game, and a good one at that as well. This is a must play for every die hard fan of the series, but it's recommended that you be well prepared for a hardcore gaming experience.
Final Fantasy 2 paved the way for future games to be able to tell stories, by proving that a game actually could tell a story that took more than one paragraph to summarize. And what did its successor do? How does Final Fantasy 3 honor its predecessors? Well, tune in next time to find out!
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