Another Classic Reborn Again

A remake of Final Fantasy II is, like the remake of the first one, hard to review. It's a good game for the time of it's release, but a lot of its elements just don't hold up well by todays standards by any means.

Let's clarify one thing, however, the original Final Fantasy II you find on the Super Nintendo is actually Final Fantasy IV. The real Final Fantasy II was not released until the Final Fantasy Origins on the Playstation, which it was then packaged with the first one. The game was also released a second time on the GBA in a package called Dawn of Souls. This is the third time the real Final Fantasy II was released in America. The unfortunate thing is that even when it first came to the states in the Origins release, it was dated, and they didn't do much to it in Dawn of Souls and now we've already got a third release of the game, and they still haven't done much to update it. In a sense you want to forgive the old gameplay mechanics. When the game was originally released (in Japan) it was the standard for the time. However, in some ways you wish that Square-Enix would've done more to update this thing.

The game gets off to a fantastic start, at least. It begins with an entire village being burned down as the Emperor continues to take over the world. As the village is burned to the ground, four youngsters managed to escape and are then pursued by the Emperors knights. They're far too weak to take him on and just barely escape death. They're then given the chance to help a resistance group bent on stopping the emperor. For those who played through the first Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy II is a big step forward for the series. Your characters, for one thing, actually have names and talk. While the game doesn't focus too much on the storyline, it's nice that there's some exposition, as well as a sense of direction. In the story department, Final Fantasy II is certainly not bad for the time in which the game was originally released. Final Fantasy II's driving force (that either kept you there or drove you away) was the gameplay.

Final Fantasy II was, much like the first one, entirely turn based. That means battles are pretty long and slow. Again, it's standard fare for the time, but it's actually not so bad even by today's standards. It's completely simple, you enter in each characters command then watch them carry it out. The battle system throws in some interesting (and somewhat annoying quirks). For example, a character placed in the back row takes less damage can only damage the enemy with a bow or by using magic. If a character in the back row is using a sword he/she will miss all the time.

Final Fantasy II also breaks tradition. While most RPGs have a level up system of some kind, Final Fantasy II has no such thing. So how do you raise characters? By using them in battle. Depending on what they do, certain stats increase. A character who keep using physical attacks for example, will eventually see an increase in his strength. If you keep taking damage your defense and HP will increase. If you keep using magic, your magic will increase. The game will tell you when stats go up. This system sounds like its awesome, but it has its drawbacks. For one, when certain stats go up, other stats go down. For example, when your strength increases, your magic might go down. It's almost impossible to have a well balanced character if that's what you're going for. It's also annoying because your stats don't increase that fast and it's sometimes hard to gauge just how much time you'll have to spend increasing your stats.

Your weapons and magic have levels though. Keep using a spell and it'll eventually level up. Keep using a certain weapon type (swords for example) and it'll eventually level up. The purpose is simple: A weapon at a high level will hit an enemy several times and the chances of missing become slimmer. Once you give a certain weapon to a character however, you might as well keep them with it. Weapons and magic, like your stats don't increase often or fast, and lower level weapon types often miss a lot.

For some RPGers, this huge focus Final Fantasy II puts on increasing the stats of your characters while leveling up their magic and weapons spells fun. However, at the same time, its dreadfully time consuming. Final Fantasy II isn't a long game per se, but you'll spend a ton of time just wandering around and raising stats. It's also to no consolation that the game is very challenging. And when I say challenging I'm not kidding. The random encounter rate here is ungodly high and its way too easy to get lost when going to your next destination. The good news is you'll know when you get lost: the enemies are too much of a challenge and will often kill you in one shot. The problem, however, is this completely takes the fun out of exploring. Just going as little as five steps in the wrong direction on the world map could be fatal, and what's worse is that the game often doesn't tell you what direction to go. So if you're not accustomed to losing in battle, prepare to do so here. You could try running away, but even if you select for your entire party to flee, you'll often fail. Likewise, most of your enemies will attack before you do.

It's the gameplay that can make or break Final Fantasy II for you. With the challenging difficulty and unbalanced character raising system, some gamers who were introduced to the series with later games (particularly the Playstation era games) will find themselves in frustration. This may be on the PSP, but beneath the surface this is still an old school NES RPG complete with all the limitations and challenges. So it isn't unrealistic to expect the same limitations and challenges, and this in and of itself could completely turn some gamers away.

On the bright side, the PSP version is the best looking version yet. It doesn't take the PSP to its limits, and it's still 2D but the artwork and designs of the monsters and towns is pretty good. So it isn't an overhaul in graphics, but it still looks pretty. Unfortunately, for some, this isn't enough to save the near 20 year old gameplay. The game also sounds really really good, and the reworked soundtrack here sounds even better. It's a fantastic piece of eye-candy on the whole.

The problem with Final Fantasy II is that it's the third release here in the states and it really doesn't add a whole lot of new stuff that you can't get in the GBA version: Dawn of Souls. The fact that you also have to buy this separately from Final Fantasy I doesn't help its situation any.

In the end, if you haven't experienced Final Fantasy II and you absolutely have to, I highly suggest going to your local used game store and picking up a copy of Dawn of Souls on the GBA. It may not be as pretty as the PSP version, but you get it for cheaper and you also get the first Final Fantasy included with it.

Pros:

+It's really pretty
+Great sound
+Not a bad story for the second Final Fantasy
+Exhausting gameplay, there's a lot to do

Cons:

-The character raising system makes it impossible to have a balanced character, and it's also very time consuming
-The challenge may be a bit too steep for fans who began with later Final Fantasy games
-If you've got the Dawn of Souls remake or even Final Fantasy Origins, the PSP version doesn't offer enough new content to justify another purchase, and even if you haven't played the game before, the GBA version is cheaper and includes two games

FINAL RATING: 6/10