I Played Final Fantasy 4 So You Don't Have To
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- Опубліковано 2 сер 2024
- Wherein we experience my second playthrough of this game, together, because the people are hungry for why I didn't like it the first time.
Music used: FF4 OST, arrangement by Jerry Bear Music, and some original tracks
Footage used: Final Fantasy 4, confusingly, not the playthrough being talked about
Song Recommendation: Bugs by Khai Dreams - Ігри
Most of the criticisms of the game basically boil down to "it's not as refined as it could be."
Not an entirely unfair stance, but context matters. If you pick FF4 up in 2022 thinking of it as a brand new game and holding it to modern standards of refinement, you're right. But that'd be like calling Die Hard dumb because a hostage didn't live tweet Hans Gruber's attack.
For 1991, this was really refined for a video game and you can really only get a fair judgment viewing it through that lense.
I ate a good meal today, so you don't have to
Final fantasy 4 was my first RPG, and my favorite game growing up. It's still my favorite game in the series and still one of my favorite games.
I greatly enjoyed your video, and you make some great points, but it doesn't change my view of the game. At all. I accept this game, warts and all. This game set the template for the final fantasy series for the next decade afterwards, and many rpgs as a whole. It was the first game (that I can recall) to take on such an ambitious narrative, and does a great job for its time depicting emotions from short little stacks of pixels. Has it aged? No question...but most rpg cliches that everyone is so tired of started here. They weren't cliches back then. I'm sorry you didn't get the enjoyment out of it that I did, but I'm glad you gave it a chance and see the historical impact it had and the influence it still has to this day. Subbed.
i was cackling throughout this whole video. there were so many funny one-liners. i think my favorite was 37:37, i was not expecting that callback and callout
also, i managed to count two extra imagines for the counter.
So I'm born 84' and saw Final Fantasy and Dragon Warrior 1 and 2 before the SNES released. Final Fantasy 4(2 US) was a huge leap in both content and story. I defen it to the point that it was the easy entry that Squaresoft thought they made with Mistic Quest. I am also from an Era that didn't have as many re-releases and remakes of games that were far more rare before the GBA and PSP would shower us in classic JRPGs. So nostalgia and member berries lol.
I was born in 80 and I'm right there with you man. At the time there was really nothing that could compare to the storytelling and game play.
I was born 96' but this was still my first final fantasy. (I grew up on this, 7, and 8, and much later 6 because my uncle introduced me to some of the first super nintendo emulators)
It really has to be seen within the lense of when it came out. This guy has some valid points within the confines of modern media but...
If you know, you know, you know?
Hi I haven't even finished the video and I barely ever comment on UA-cam videos, but I'm a huge fan of Final Fantasy III as well as Final Fantasy IV, it makes me really happy to see another fan who doesn't think that III is a piece of garbage. It's also really interesting to see someone have an unorthodox opinion of IV. As while I like the game I have some of the same complaints. I would absolutely love to see you do a video like this for Final Fantasy III. Preferably the 3D version just cause it has some more thematic elements compared to the PR version but either one is fine. But yeah, I really like your takes on this game and it's always great seeing someone who doesn't just write FF III off with the same tired and boring opinions.
Do people think III is bad? I’m new to the series (just beat IV today) and I think III is a very strong entry. It might be my favorite of the four.
This was a great video, but I respectfully disagree with your verdict.
You also missed quite a lot, but given only these bits of story, and in a modern context, this is a totally valid conclusion to come to. It was very entertaining to watch nontheless.
So Rydia absolutely has the least amount of story, but she has some. If you adventure around underground you can find the land of the summons, who actually saved her in the whirlpool and raised her (time flows differently in other worlds). That's why she learned so many summons and black magics.
Yang is in a different underground cave he got saved by some fairies but is unconcious and injured, if you find him, go to his wife, then go back, you can wake him up with a frying pan.
Also, if you travel under baron castle very late game, you find barons ghost and he basically tells Cecil (one of his two adopted sons *cough* kain) that he's gonna be the next king, and that he trusts him to do it.
There's a few things to keep in mind as well. This is a quarter of the script, they over-planned the dialogue capabilities and had to cut most of it, and while that doesn't excuse some of the poor beats in the story, it makes it make a lot more sense to me. Things are wild because they didn't have time to explain it. But... a neat trick in writing is that you can get the reader to fill in the gaps themselves.
Think of what other fantasy stories were around in 1991 when this came out. Labrynth, Star Wars (idk if you noticed but the plot is also star wars), lord of the rings, dungeons and dragons, the neverending story...
You played this game because you liked things like that, usually. Ludiscere has a good video that notes a lot of similarities similar to these, where he also notes some major developmental issues that contributed to the plot.
Also, I've only played 1, and a tiny bit of the beginning of 2, but not 3. So, as far as I'm aware at least, this is their first real attempt at making a Final Fantasy story *with characters* this grandiose. There really wasn't anything like it at the time, and it definitely defined the genre.
I love this game. Is it perfect? not at all, it's little, and it's broken, but it's still good.
Thanks for watching! I skipped over the side quests in this playthrough but I did experience them my first time through. I chose to leave them out this time around partially because I didn't feel that they added all that much. The land of summons hand waves Rydia's growth so the story itself doesn't have to do it, waking up Yang is a good joke, and while I remembered that the ghost of Baron's original king became Odin and chilled in the basement I didn't realize he passed on the crown which is a neat detail. Primarily I left them out because this video is a direct response to a few comments on my previous video which were upset I didn't defend my stance on Final Fantasy 4, so I wanted to get it out as soon as I could.
I have watched Ludiscere's video, it's very good and does help paint the game in a more favorable light, but I think our conclusions are ultimately rather similar, with a key difference being his suspension of disbelief held out longer than mine. He states that you can't really compare this game to any of the others given that it's wildly more ambitious than the first 3 and similarly far behind 6 and the ones that came after. That the game can only really be viewed in the context of its release. That's the other key difference, while it can be interesting to consider art in that context, for 4 it shows us how much it contributed to the genre, I don't believe it to be a necessity. It can be just as interesting, if not more so, to see if a work still holds up today and analyze why or why not that is. With 4 I don't think it's stood the test of time for the very same reasons that made it so important in 1991: it was attempting a lot of new things for the medium. It walked so titles like 6 could run. This makes 4 important in the genre's history, but does not make it good.
There are two ways to declare art good, first and foremost is the subjective experience, art is good if you like it. In this way you can say 4 is good despite its flaws and I can say it's bad because of them and we can both be saying true statements. The other is on the technical side, you can say art is good if it is made well. Picasso, for all his faults, was good at making art. While I don't like most of his work I can still recognize the skill that went into them. In attempting to pioneer the genre and discovering the limits of the SNES I don't think 4 succeeds enough on a technical level to be called good either.
A few last errant comments, Golbez made it abundantly clear that this title drew inspiration from Star Wars, but I was already being harsh enough without pulling that particular thread. You cough about Cecil and Kain both being the adopted sons of the late king and I'm not sure why, I mention that plot point a couple of times but the game was rather uninterested in exploring that particular part of its own story. From Ludiscere's video it seems like the 3d remake did a better job exploring this, but I played the most recent official release of the game, and my experience is based on that. On a related note, you mention that readers can fill in the narrative gaps of a story. Even on a quarter of the script, I can see that Cecil and Kain are adoptive brothers, recognize the painfully obvious biblical reference and realize that Kain will betray Cecil at some point in the story without the story having to spell it out. I can also notice how Kain acts around Rosa and realize that he has feelings for her that she does not have for him and fill in the gaps that this imagined love triangle is the cause of his betrayal, or more specifically the darkness that Golbez was able to exploit in order to do a mind control. This example, in my opinion, falls apart at the end. It's setting up an interesting story where Kain, in his love for Rosa, betrays Cecil as he believes that Cecil's actions are putting her in danger, and despite the lack of an actual relationship he, for whatever reason, puts her before Cecil. But at the end they make it mind control, which makes it easier to forgive Kain and accept having him as a party member, but also makes all that setup amount to nothing. They do the same thing to Golbez. Gaps are fine, not everything needs to be explained and sometimes leaving things open can help a reader connect more deeply with a character. And a reader who is enjoying a story will, as you say, fill in the gaps which are maybe there as a mistake, or possibly in 4's case due to technical limitations. Those gaps are a gamble. To go back to Ludiscere's experience, his suspension of disbelief held out and he enjoyed the classic wild final fantasy ending, he was a reader who enjoyed the story and filled in the gaps himself. My suspension fizzled out before that point, however, between narrative pitfalls and boring gameplay I stopped enjoying the story and didn't fill in the gaps, instead just kinda looked at them, not sure where the metaphor goes from here really. A reader can fill in the gaps but you shouldn't bank on it. Odds are a person reading your story or playing your game does so because they like similar titles, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they will like yours, you still have to write a good story.
Thanks again for watching, I'm glad you were able to enjoy the video despite our differing conclusions
@@prjctmutt all valid points. I will say though that despite being characters with proper names and stories, you can still name them whatever and give them some added context like in the original. I know when i was a kid i would name the characters after other characters just for fun. Heck, my most recent ff1 playthrough i named them after characters in my d&d campaign and just having that context entirely changed the game for me. Obviously 1 is a but different, but the same thing still applies to an extent.
I started with 1&2 on the gba.
I got 4 for the ds that Christmas.
The ds version is way harder, and it's been the only version I've beaten.
While I always enjoy alternative opinions on things I enjoy. However, I think maybe you're being a bit too harsh on the story? You have to remember that when the game released is important. Im curious what your opinion would be on something like Dragon Quest 4 in comparison. I still enjoyed the video
I think within the context of its release you're right, it was leaps and bounds beyond anything else out around the same time. While I do personally prefer the first three Final Fantasy titles over the fourth I can still see and appreciate how it collected the best of what came before and laid out the foundation for later entries. It was also far more ambitious than any of the first three. But I don't believe it stuck the landing or that it has stood the test of time. Oddly enough, the simplicity of those early titles make them more digestible for me; it's probably just that there are less windows into what went wrong, like 4's many fake out deaths to hide the party shuffling which I imagine was either a poorly planned design choice or a technical limitation. I've not played Dragon Quest 4, or any of them really, but I agree that it would be interesting to compare them. Thanks for watching!
I think Nomura was pretty open about planning on multiple kingdom hearts games by the time they were done with the first at least.
"Could very well be learning the ATB system for the first time"
It's literally the first FF with ATB.
But..... I want to...... I know the story is kind of weak and rushed..... But I've got so much nostalgia wrapped up in it.
25:15 Get a better attitude my man, you reap what you sow in this youtube arrhythmical system. I enjoy you when you aren't so cynical. Appreciate the story for what it's doing to expand the genre.
People confuse this game with its legacy. Its legacy is great. The game is not. Not anymore, at least.
BUT huge potential in a remake. I would love to play it.
That's why i'm starting to like FF6
I havent played the pixel version, but considering the other 2D versions I played I found to be stupidly easy, I sugest you try the 3D one. That have some level of dificulty.
Hahahaha, just remembered something else. If you think the story is bs with this game alone, try FF4 The After Years and have a blast. 😂😂
If you are a fan of Final Fantasy 4, and still are after watching the video, let me know what you like about it! I would genuinely like to know.
I think you're being fair but you have to remember this hit shelves in the US in 1991. 31 years ago.
Also, it just hit me. I'm getting old 😂🤣😂🤣😂
😟
I got a SNES for Christmas in 1991. It was called Final Fantasy II in the west. This is the game that got me into RPGs. This was an era when we got very few games in the genre, so I had to have them all. We had garbage like Arcane and Drakkhen, but Squaresoft was putting out game after game of compelling stories, sweet monsters named after actual mythical creatures, an easy to learn battle system and seemingly endless dungeons loaded with treasures. I loved the medieval theme, the magic, the character development, and an unstoppable lead antagonist. Sure, there are better Final Fantasys, but one can't forget where their journey started. I've played it on the SNES and the PlayStation 1, and finally the PSP version containing FF IV, Interlude and the brand new After Years. I passed on the GBA and Nintendo DS offering, like a fool, but I'll be purchasing the forthcoming FF 1-6 Pixel Remasters
After FFII, I bought Secret of Mana, then Breath of Fire, then Final Fantasy III (now, VI), then Chrono Trigger. Then, I found the time to go back, take on Final Fantasy I, the Dragon Warrior series. In short, if not for FFIV, I may not have discovered these other great titles. It was kind of hard to listen to you shit on this game, but opinions aren't wrong
What about ff6? that ff deserves a “the after years” game
What do you mean by what about ff6?
I'm about three minutes in and debating continuing. Kingdom Hearts isn't just bad in my book. It's AVGN levels of bad and for someone to love it and dislike FFIV is like someone liking Ghostbusters NES but not the 2009 Ghostbusters game. KH music is enjoyable but beyond that, 💩💩💩💩