Final Fantasy Downhill?
 

Woa... i can fell the rage of some members and mods already... but calm down a sec and read, 'kay!?

i was just wondering about that... sure, Final Fantasy is the most Hyped-out series of RPG's ever... but, what really happened?

i mean... "good" FF games on the old ways were 4,5 and 6... (And 4 still is "not so much all that")

Then, there was 7, which is nice... is 3d, has a nice story, decent characters, fun system... not all that joygams, but there is fun in there...

Then, we have 8... not as fun, kinda dull... a "meh" story... but decent effort...

and then, came 9... not REALLY a final fantasy game... more like a Homage to the series... not a lot of story... decent system, nice graphics... just "decent enough..."

but it came with the next Gen... the 10th one... really... not so great... mild story, voice acting is always good now... fun system... still, is easier to find people who remember the names of all playable characters from FF6 then to find people who know about the characters from FF10...

And then, Square decided to experiment... to see how people would react to a sequel, and we had FFX-2... not to be taken seriously, but a decent effort...

Then, S.E. lauches FF 11... which just isnt a fucking FF game at all... (Hell... they could take Tactics, the exact same game, with the FF11 graphics, and -call it- FF 11... it would still be a better choice!)

and now, FF12, innovative... looks fun, complex, seens like it has a good story... and next year we will have FF13... looks even more innovative, crazier, and "actiony"... but still needs more info to be taken seriously...

So, really... its like we had FF5, FF6, FF7, these are solid games... and before that, square was trying to figure it out how to do this... and after these 3, is like square is looking AGAIN on how to do this... no wonder we have mixed fellings about the FF series!

So, i dont see the FF series as a milking cow... i just wished that Square-Enix could stop being so unstable about it!

Nothing happened. I think your argument for "Square experimenting" works against you. Final Fantasy Tactics isn't at all like any other Final Fantasy game, but it's probably my favorite, tied with FF7. A lot of people love FFT.

Hell, after those two, 10 is probably my next best. I thought 9 was great.

Also, Square is a company out to make money. I imagine FF11 is just that: trying to capitalize on the MMORPG market. It's no WoW, but I think they've done all right. Some friends have even told me they enjoyed it.

FF12, isn't out yet (in the West)? Irrelevant to critique? FF13, definitely not out yet anywhere, even more irrelevant to critique?

I get more out of the recent editions to the series story wise because the characters can express feeling and even more recently, complex body language and facial expressions. Sprites...don't always do it for me. But even in that vein, FF6 and FFT ("3d-ish," I consider 'em sprites though) still do a great job at communicating to the player.

Another problem is probably just nostalgia. Someone plays one FF and is blown away. They go to play another, find out it isn't the one that blew them away, and therefore it blows, why couldn't Square clone the one they liked first?

While FFVI wins my title for the best FF game ever, I have to disagree with you. The whole series is kind of up and down if you look at it.

FF1 is a solid game for its era (although playing it now, I find it kind of boring, to be honest).
FF2 is an abysmal game: the leveling system is horrid and pathetically east to twink; the story's a damn mess; magic is pretty much useless; and the dungeons are horrendously long (although not difficult, if you're twinking your characters).
FF3 I've never played (like most Americans), so no comment.
FFIV is a solid game, with a good story (that has kind of a poor translation).
FFV I haven't played, again.
FFVI is my favorite, and many people (including the original poster) seem to agree.
FFVII is fondly remembered by most everybody (I'm pretty sure, Bellsouth Minion, that you're one of the few people I've seen who doesn't immediately lump the game in the "great game" category...not a criticism, because I don't either), and is definitely a good game.
FFVIII is a huge point of contention: I'm firmly of the camp that it's one of the worst RPGs ever made, while I know some people think it's really good. But it seems that generally it's viewed as a step downward in the series. (This is my impression. I'm sorry to you FFVIII fans).
FFIX I haven't personally played, but it seems to be another point of contention: I know people who love it and people who hate it.
FFX is a great game in my opinion: I found the changes to the battle system to be a good idea, I liked the story, and thought that overall it was done well, although it is a bit on the easy side. In my experience, more people think it's a good game than a poor one.
FFXI I've never played. The MMO aspect of it didn't appeal to me, and also to a lot of other FF fans, it seems, but some people like it.
FFT is a phenomenal game, definitely among my favorites, while FFTA is pretty disappointing, IMO.

I haven't had an opportunity to play FFXII (and outside of the demo, what American has), so I can't pass judgement on that. But it seems to me that if you look at the history of the series, it's much more of an up-and-down thing from game to game than it is a steady decline from a certain point. Although really, like most everything with entertainment, it comes down to a matter of personal opinion.

And with that last sentence, I negate this huge post. I am such a fucking idiot sometimes.

Whether or not it's going downhill is really irrelevant, if you think about it. Aside from things like magic names, monster types, certain rules, and the trademarks, most Final Fantasy games are completely differently different games in many ways, from game mechanics and storyline.

They really could all be just named something other than "Final Fantasy" and no one would really think of them as a series. There actually were several Square games that were considered to be called "Final Fantasy:____" before being renamed something else, like Bahamut Lagoon. And some games were renamed Final fantasy just to help make people buy the game, like Final Fantasy Adventure (Seiken Densetsu)

It'd probably be more logical to compare the whole of Square RPG's from the beginning to the end, and determine whether or not Square has gone downhill through the years.

And if we think about that we will have Fifhtfiend coming here to make a speech about how after Chronno Trigger, everything Square made was anal.

No one wants that.

...really.

But, if you think abotu it... Square did some bets and took some risks on the Playstation era (they MADE a Racing RPG afterall... and chocobo's mystic dungeon...), not so much on the PS2 age, and now with the PS3, maybe they will try again with FF XIII versus...

What? Forget that old Chrono Trigger nonsense, you've all got to get with the now.

And the Now is with the Soul Blazer.

But yeah, any RPG made after 1996? Eff that junk!

(Start of Rant)

In my personal opinion, Square reached its heights in the late SNES era, and continued to produce great games (for the most part, with some exceptions that were obvious experiments) in the PS1 era.

FFVI was a good game, but in my opinion not a great one; but it definitely laid a solid foundation for the excellence that was to come. Chrono Trigger was freakin' amazing. It never ceases to blow my mind.

But in the PS1 era, I still felt like Squaresoft was riding high. I enjoyed FF7 more than FF6, and I consider FF7 the most innovative in the series (but certainly not the most polished.) FF8 was a totally different genre than FF7 and FF6, and it attempted to tell a different kind of story, but it still succeeded overall for me. FFT wasn't my kind of gameplay -- I'm not into those kinds of strategy RPGs -- but I still enjoyed the story. Even Chrono Cross, despite an abysmal storyline, managed to (almost) be redeemed with a brilliant musical score, some sweet graphics and a few memorable characters.

Heck, even FFX, the first serious PS2 offering from Square, was well worth playing.

Let's not forget, by the way, that each Final Fantasy has its own genre and storyline, and subsequently it's difficult to definitively say whether one is objectively "better" than the other. FF6, for example, is more epic than FF8, so if you're a fan of LoTR-style storylines you're probably going to dig the good VS evil thematics of FF6. FF8 is more a romantic love story and, because of the particulars of that genre of storytelling, you subsequently have characters like Seifer and Edea, and the morality is more shades-of-grey than black and white like in FF6.

Is FF6's story better or worse than FF8's? That's going to depend on what kind of story you tend to like. FF6, with its larger cast of characters and its greater scope is more a sprawling epic; FF7, with its emphasis on Cloud and Sephiroth, is more a personal tale of revenge with some technology VS enviornment, new world VS old world thematics thrown in; FF8 is a love story and a tale of maturation and thus more emphasis is on Squall and Rinoa's relationship than the antagonists or the supporting characters, who are just there for comic relief and to further develop Squall's persona; FF9 is a comedy that reminds me sometimes of "The Princess Bride" and is more cute and innocent of an adventure; FF10 is almost the exact opposite of FF9, in that it's a sinister and grim world and the ending is one marred by tragedy.

So which is better? That will depend on your personal preferences, but a good argument could be made for any of those games, because the production values for every one is pretty top-notch for its era.

But anyway, the PS1 era had not only great FF offerings, but some pretty sweet non-FF games worth a purchase. We had Vagrant Story, the best Front Mission in FM3 (and a strategy RPG I could tolerate surprisingly well), Chrono Cross (again, great graphics and music regardless of what you can and should say about the story), Parasite Eve, Threads of Fate.

But most importantly, you can't possibly mention Square in the PS1 era without mentioning Xenogears, a phenomenal work of art in its own right, and definitely a good example of Square maintaining its mark of quality post-SNES. Sure, Disc 2 of Xenogears was a letdown of sorts, but Disc 1 may be the single greatest disc of RPG-playing you're going to find. Epic storyline, great characters, crazy plot twists, sign me up. I miss the Squaresoft of the PS1 era just because back then, Square was making these kinds of original offerings and actually taking worthwhile risks.

It wasn't until sometime after FFX, and around the time of the Square-Enix merger, that Square really fell apart for me. FFXI the MMORPG was tolerable, I suppose, though as I'm not an MMORPG fan it was the first FF I didn't buy and had no desire to play. But the real signs of bad things to come began with Kingdom Hearts (surprisingly good game, actually, but KH established a foundation of Square selling its game-making capabilities to the highest bidder, and in this case the highest bidder was Disney.)

Then Square began selling everything they could to make a quick buck. We had the first direct sequel to a Final Fantasy (horrible desicion in and of itself, but then Square made it even worse by turning FFX into an MTV-era estrogen empowerment festival). We had Final Fantasy VII, a great game that should have remained untouched after its creation, tarnished with spinoffs up the wazoo. Soon I'm sure we'll have FFVIII and FFIX spinoffs of some sort, too, because Square has determined that this sells and making original, innovative storylines really doesn't sell quite as much by comparison.
And so these days, we have a Square-Enix that's taking less risks, trying to cash on in its pre-established SNES and PS1-era storylines, and subsequently producing less quality products and more shit. DQ8 and KH2 are the only two Square games I've been buying lately. DQ8 was definitely worth it, but I'm not sure how much of that I should attribute to Square; KH2 was also actually worth the price, though it wasn't nearly as good a game as it could have been.

Though I will buy FFXII, I'm not going in with huge expectations. FFX-2 pretty much destroyed my previous faith in the FF series; (before FFX-2 I almost knew beforehand I was buying a quality game whenever I picked up an FF title, and I was always right.)

So for me, yes, FF and Square in general has been going downhill lately -- but not for as long as you've been saying. For me, FF's downhill slope began around...what, 2003 maybe? Around that time period. Whenever KH and FFX-2 and FFXI came out.

(End of Rant)

Final Fantasy is the slapped bitch of videogames. Everybody loves to fuck her, but there is always somebody who prefers to spank her until she cries like the little overgrown baby she is.

The point? FF has been going uphill or downhill depending on who you ask. For me, it is a rollercoaster, and right now we are riding to the climax of awesomeness (!).

You filthy heathen. Soul Blazer? Is that like some new kind of dope for the dumb masses or something? Oh, 1996? I've never heard of it, maybe because it sucked. Hard. Bannination!

I am in more of an agreement with the "rollercoaster" idea more than the "downhill" idea. For me, the series goes up and down, but you are going to have that with pretty much any lengthy "series" (certain ones that are better than others). Snake is completely right that it all depends on what kind of story/gameplay/whatever you personally like. For me, the FF series is pretty up there, they had a period of low, but for the most part, it has been on the upward trend.
I loved all of the pre-playstation FFs, with FF6 being my favorite of all time. FF7, while many many people love it, was... not my cup of tea (it is near the bottom of my list of good games), same goes for FF8. I absolutely loved FF9 and FF10. FFX-2 was fun. It wasn't really what I was expecting and I think I would have prefered if they had done a more story-based approach, like FFX was, but I enjoyed playing it the way it was. (I really enjoyed the battle system). I was sad they made FF11 online, but I can't blame them for trying something new. Mostly I'm disappointed that they are trying to milk their older series for all they're worth (like Snake pointed out).

But yeah, for the most part, as far as I'm concerned, all of the Final Fantasies (save for maybe 2) are up there on my list of good RPGs, so I'm not seeing too much of a downward trend unless they continue milking it out for all it's worth.

FF is definitely a series with many triumphs, but at the same time, many low spots. I'm part of the "younger" generation of gamers that grew up playing mostly the PS1-PS2 FFs(except for 8, 9, and Tactics), but I've gone back and played the older ones, except for 3(which I'm going to play when it comes out for DS) and 5(I'm going to pick this one up on GBA when it comes out). Honestly, I think that 6 is the best, with 4 and 7 as runner-ups.

10 was mixed, honestly. The graphics, battle system, and music were all excellent, but I loathed most of the characters, plus it was far too easy. However, it is still better than X-2, which was, IMO, was bad on so many different levels. FFTA was crap as well(I hope FFT was actually much better than this pathetic spinoff), and one of the primary reasons why I love Fire Emblem.

Overall, most of the "real" FFs I've played were enjoyable, except for 2. Oh, and Chrono Trigger pwns all of 'em except for 6. :)