Review

I enjoy how the world map unfolds in FF3. It seems big, but you get access to each area at a time in some clever ways. Having the choice to choose where to head off to could be nice, but these early FF games are effectively linear anyway. So I'd rather the games just more directly hold your hand like in this game. Compared to FF2 where there were some moments where wide swathes of the world opened up to you. But there's just really no reason to even go there. Enemies are too difficult at the moment. You could potentially skip the power curve by getting some weapon or spell. But again, there's really no need. You're given exactly what you're expected to have at any particular point.

I also enjoy the dungeons. They're shorter than anything in the previous games and are also mostly linear. So you can just pull up a map to see where the chests are, pick those up, and then head on to the next level. I tend to prefer that. Otherwise, I do just turn off encounters when I'm doubling back on my path to avoid repeat encounters.

Was disappointed this version dropped the specific party characters and just went with orphans. I get that the remit of the whole Pixel Remaster project was as definitive versions of the original 2D releases. But I appreciated the tiny bit of characterization having Luneth et al. brought with the 3d release. Rather than just {ORPHANS x4}. It's very weird when we speak to NPCs as a collective conscience. I think I would care far less if FF2 had not gone with specific characters. So why are we going backward to the FF1 Warriors of Light approach?

FF3 would be the second Final Fantasy I played (the DS version), FF4 being the first. So I do have something of a soft spot for it. I would generally divide the Final Fantasy series into 4 eras. You've got 1-3 (the classic era) which is where we start establishing a lot of the general mechanics the series would use as well a number of creatures, classes, items, spells, etc. The overall iconography that would come to make up the series' dictionary. The games are all so simple, however, that I'd generally say there's less reason to revisit these games than there is any of the subsequent ones. We don't have all that much going on in the gameplay department. And we don't have much of a story. A lot of the reason for visiting these games is if you have already played them and want to revisit. Or just as a tourist seeing some of the sights before going home. I could most definitely make a stronger case for visiting one of these early ones, seeing a couple dungeons and checking out.

The other eras for reference, would be 4-6 where we take some of those simple mechanics that were introduced in 1-3 and actually start iterating on them. In addition, we start to have an actual story. This is the Melodrama era. Next we have have 7-10, the 3D era. Where we start defining what Final Fantasy was going to be in the modern world. I would then lump everything post 10 into another era which is "I don't know." We start doing MMOs sometimes I guess. Also, the anime contagion has leaked in and ruined everything. Nothing about any of the early games really implies the presence of anime. You can start to see it in 7. That hair...But all I've seen of the later games is that they're totally filled with anime trash. I've played most of 13 and beat 15. No experience with anything else post-10. And I just am not interested.

But going back to FF3, this is certainly the best of the classic era. It's the friendliest in terms of its design. Not spectacularly advanced with its job system, we'll get there with FF5. I would say that the DS version was better, though. I think the remake's visuals are definitely additive. The world feels so much more in it.

On to Final Fantasy 4.