Retro Gaming Australia

Final Fantasy IX was a return to the more traditional roots of the early Final Fantasy games when compared to Final Fantasy VIII. Series creator Hironbu Sakaguchi has referred to FFIX being his favourite as it was the closest to his ideal view of what Final Fantasy should be.

Reprints ho!

The Final Fantasy Legend is probably better referred to as Makai Toushi Sa·Ga, since it’s technically part of the SaGa series rather than a Final Fantasy game. Anyway, Squaresoft originally released three Legends games in the early 1990s, but Sunsoft decided to take the oportunity to cash-in on the success of Final Fantasy VII and VIII and re-release them and Final Fantasy Adventure (the first Mana game) in 1998.

God bless the ring!

Ehgreiz is a 3D fighting game developed by Dream Factory and brought to arcades by Namco and Squaresoft. The game gained fame for featuring Final Fantasy VII’s Cloud Strife and Tifa Lockheart as playable characters – Squaresoft published the PlayStation port, where even more FFVII characters were added into the mix.

Final Fantasy’s 25th anniversary will occur in December, if I am not mistaken, and Square Enix is intending on making the most of the celebration throughout the year.

The first thing they’ve announced is a pair of piano opera CDs – in other words, piano orchestrations of classic tracks from the Final Fantasy series.

The first CD, PIANO OPERA FINAL FANTASY I/II/III released today in Japan. It features 13 tracks from the first three games in the series and will set you back 2800 yen. The second CD PIANO OPERA FINAL FANTASY IV/V/VI will be out on May 16. You can buy the first CD here.

CG sells, evidently.

Final Fantasy VII was the game that turned the tide of the fifth generation console war, bringing the underdog Sony to the top of the gaming market. With the game’s 15th anniversary coming up, you’d think Square-Enix would be looking at doing something special, but evidently not.

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Square-Enix has announced via their Facebook page that the iPhone version of Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions will be available this Thursday for $US15.99. Quite a bit steeper than your usual 99 cent distractions. You’ll need a 3GS or better to play the game.

The game is not a universal app, so an iPad version will be coming out later in the year (at least one month later, according to SE).

Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions was developed for the PSP and released in 2007. It is a remake of the original Final Fantasy Tactics, released on the PlayStation in 1998. Apparently much of the slowdown from the PSP version of the game has been corrected, and an autosave function has been added (in case someone has the audacity to call you while you play games on your phone).

Arguably the last Game Boy Advance release of significance.

Final Fantasy VI Advance was a port of the classic SNES game to the Game Boy Advance. The port was handled by Japanese workhorse TOSE. It features a couple of extras that weren’t in the SNES or PlayStation versions, including slightly revamped visuals, a new translation and a new location called the Soul Shrine, where you can fight monsters continuously. Being one of the last Game Boy Advance games, it wasn’t printed in big numbers, so you’ll have fun finding a copy.

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A nice minimalist ad

Final Fantasy VIII was one of the most anticipated releases of 1999, with hype at an apex after the explosive success of Final Fantasy VII. In true Final Fantasy style, the game uses completely different systems than the game before it - something for which it was somewhat criticised for at the time. This advertisement comes from North America, where the game launched on the same day as the Sega Dreamcast.

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Posting these ads wouldn’t be much fun if we didn’t post ones for the games we all love;

Click the image for the full size ad

Final Fantasy VII was developed by Squaresoft and published outside of Japan by Sony Computer Entertainment. This particular advertisement comes from the United States. The game is credited with turning the tide in the fifth generation console war, putting the PlayStation far ahead of the Saturn and Nintendo 64, and bringing Japanese RPGs to a mainstream audience. The game is now available as a PSOne Classic on the PlayStation Store.