These days I have had a falling out with Final Fantasy and honestly, with Square-Enix in general. The latest game that came out, Final Fantasy 16 I didn't even look at, was not going to pre-order or even buy at release and I don't think I will ever buy it until it becomes something that I get for free with my PS Plus account. If things go according to how almost everything Squenix releases does, it will be in PS-Plus for free in a couple of months anyway. That is how the past two FF releases have worked anyway and I can't imagine why they would change this.
The reviews for the game are looking about like I expected, with people giving it glorious number 1 best game ever! reviews from the usual big companies that I suspect are paid to say nice things and then when it comes down to the individual or small time critics they are mostly sayin the game is good, but as is all too common with new gen FF games, it has a lot of flaws and things that irritate players.
There was a time though when Final Fantasy was something that people hadn't really heard of but every now and then you would hear someone raving about it. This was a time in the early 90's when the internet was something that very few people even had access to and if they did, it certainly wasn't going to contain a wealth of information about the latest video games, let alone videos and unbiased reviews of it.
src
It would be many years later when I would find out that Final Fantasy 2 in the USA was actually Final Fantasy 4 in Japan. I don't remember exactly why some of the earlier games were not released in North America but it had a lot to do with the fact that Final Fantasy as it was known in the USA was actually meant to be the FINAL game that Square made because they were failing as a company. It ended up being a big enough success that they have made tons of games since then and are one of the juggernauts of the gaming industry now.
src
The game looks rather silly by today's standards but that is to be expected of any game that is over 30 years old methinks. At the time our standards for graphics was very low but even by SNES standards this game looked very basic. However, this was one of the first games where the story and how the game functioned made up for any lacking in visuals. To this day I appreciate a well-made game a LOT more than a game that is graphically amazing and it is a real shame that the first game I ever recall approaching the "good gameplay, not necessarily good graphics" standard is now a company that seems to be interested in the opposite.
I did not own an SNES at the time of release but my gaming neighborhood friend who I spent a ton of time with did, and one day when he was of driving age and I was not, we found ourselves in a local department store in a shopping mall looking at the games they had available for sale at their glassed in jewelry counter that had been converted to where they keep their video games. It was a different world back then.
Anyhoo, neither one of us had ever heard of Final Fantasy in 1992 and it was his money that we were spending and we were pondering which game he should buy. I don't recall what other titles were available under the counter, but I was intrigued by the game and I can't even imagine what I was basing my enthusiasm off of when I was adamant that he purchase this game instead of the other options that were available that day.
I must have been rather convincing because I recall that at first he looked at the box back and was not at all enthusiastic about the rather basic graphics that were on it. He did in the end, listen to my reasoning because he more or less capitulated but his decision to purchase it came with a rider. He said "if this game sucks, you are going to pay me back for it." I wanted to check it out badly enough that I agreed to this even though I almost certainly would have reneged on the offer later.
What followed was something that absolutely blew our minds. Never before had either of us played a game with such an amazing story, such incredible writing, and also a ton of different options as far as how the game could be played. While I am not 100% certain about this, I think it was the first time for both of us that we had ever played a truly immersive RPG that was 40-50 hours long. Prior to that you could say games like Zelda had already done this, but anyone who knows anything about early RPG's knows that there is an absolutely massive difference between walking around with Link on your own and commanding a team of fighters who needed to use their individual strengths to get past certain parts of the game.
Only one of us would play at a time but we basically had all nighters where one of us would be at the controls and the other would be the copilot and drink and snack acquirer.
I don't recall the name of the store that we bought it in that day, but I do know that it was just dumb luck that it happened to be under the glass that day. There weren't a ton of options about where you bought your games back then and the idea of getting a digital download is a concept that wouldn't exist for decades. We were truly at the mercy of what the stores happened to stock in our rather tiny town and in this instance, there was only ONE copy of the game in the store at all. A lot of things had to happen in order for Final Fantasy 2 to end up in our machine that day and while I am certain we would have gotten around to it anyway in the future, we accidentally ended up being early adopters of what would become one of the most applauded RPG's of all time.
Since that day and until recently, I have been at the forefront of nearly every Final Fantasy release. I'm not happy with the direction the company has taken these games but back on that day in 1992, it was truly an amazing thing that I will remember forever. It was all and accident too!
Did you ever "accidentally" end up with a game that absolutely blew your mind? For me this is the biggest instance of that ever happening.