What games truly captivated you? For me, Final Fantasy 3 was one

There are a lot of games that I have enjoyed somewhat but very few that I can say really were amazing to the point where I wanted to 100% the game and read all of the dialogue. Perhaps it was because he had fewer options back 1994 when this game was released, or it might have been because I was more willing to tolerate huge amounts of dialogue back then and no longer feel that way now. Either way, for the most part games that spend too much time talking to you and not enough time having you involved in the action get on my nerves these days but I really feel like Final Fantasy 3 had such a great story that I absolutely loved the story.

By the way this game was only called "3" in North America, for Japan and as far as I know the rest of the world, this was actually Final Fantasy 6. I have no idea why they decided to do this in just North America.

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If you follow me or read my stuff you probably already know that I borderline loathe Square Enix these days because I feel as though the market is rigged to always give their games stellar reviews even when they don't deserve them. The last 3 Final Fantasy games they have released have been real duds in my book but when I picked up this game from Montgomery Ward's nearly 30 years ago I was hooked from start to finish.

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The game was graphically simplistic even for 1994 but they were able to make up for that with solid scaling of difficulty, a great soundtrack, and a really fantastic story. To this day I still remember the theater scene that if that were replicated on modern-day consoles, it would probably just irritate me.

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The SNES couldn't do voice so it was just MIDI sounds (I think) for the vocals but it was still awe-inspiring at the time. I haven't been back to give it another try but I am pretty sure I wouldn't like it today as technology and standards have changed a great deal since the early 90's.

I remember really enjoying all of this game including the times that I would have to grind for XP because I was getting my ass handed to me by a boss. I loved this game even though one of the most irritating aspects of RPG's ever was prevalent in it.... which is the random encounters that were determined by some sort of randomized math going on in the cartridge. Sometimes you would have 30 steps between fights, sometimes you would only take a few. It was kind of maddening at times how many fights you have to get into while you were exploring a dungeon but since the XP was very necessary for progression, you didn't really mind.

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When you got to the final boss you had a lot of options for how you could approach the battle because while we all had our favorites, it was up to you (to a certain degree) which members you were going to have in your party and in a lot of battles certain characters' strengths were better than others. As any old-school RPG fan is no doubt aware, the major bosses tended to have a rather irritating number of status effects they could cast on you and therefore turn management was vital to victory.

Even though it was a long time ago I am sure that I lost many times to various bosses and when this happens you simply change your strategy or take the sissy way out and grind for xp to get a few extra levels on ya before you have another try. I normally took the sissy way out :P

This is one of those games that pretty much solidified what has remained a favorite genre of mine over all time in gaming. I still love turn-based RPG's and in many instances, prefer them over newer methods of combat. Namely, the change away from turn-based in recent Final Fantasy games has been a disaster in my book and they would have been better off just sticking with the tried and true method.

I wouldn't actually recommend going back and playing this because it is a bit too dated. For me, this game is one of those things that will forever live in my memory as one of the greatest gaming memories I ever experienced on any console... and for me it is probably better to leave it as a memory.

Do you have any games that you can say truly captivated you? If so I'd love to discuss them!