A welcome trip down memory lane and a fantastic re-introduction to a series that somehow changed my life.

• Overall Score: 3/5 (+1 for nostalgia)

---

Final Fantasy has been a part of my life for decades, and the original Final Fantasy forged a big part of my identity as a gamer (whatever that even means). I fondly remember taking turns playing it on a crappy old television with a loose antenna adapter in a hot garage in the middle of the summer with my friend Mike as we pored over the Nintendo Power guide he'd gotten in the mail. I remember leaving the game on just to listen to the music in Matoya's Cave, because it was oddly magical and inspired me to keep writing my ripoff mashups of The Hobbit and The Legend of Zelda in my math notebook so I could submit a story for Young Authors. Final Fantasy - perhaps especially this one - is a weirdly-large part of my story, and I'll never forget it.

This Pixel Remaster version is pretty fantastic. Graphics are updated about on-par with mid-life SNES aesthetics, the soundtrack is remastered and (with a couple exceptions) remains fantastic, and the sound effects are actually great to boot.

Story content has been re-translated and augmented to offer a more coherent tale in a game that was previously lacking. It doesn't make the story good (groundbreaking as it may have been for the medium at the time), but it's a definite improvement that helps it age more gracefully.

It's easier - remarkably, drasticly easier - but this works for modern audiences and (especially) newcomers.

Despite the streamlined gameplay, we lose the original game's unique(-for-the-time) strategy element. In the original game, players would need to acquaint themselves with the strength of each enemy and enemy formation and their own party's relative strength to optimize performance, otherwise attacks would miss; for example, setting the entire 4-man party to attack one target, then the target dying after the first or second hit, would result in the subsequent attacks missing because the target was gone. Frustrating as this mechanic was, it made being mindful of each encounter a necessity, and even made some random encounters ostensibly more difficult than some of the bosses! I thought it was pretty cool, and it would have been neat for this to be a toggle-able option in the remaster. This also means that mindlessly auto-battle to fast-grind levels beyond necessity for any upcoming encounters is super easy (barely an inconvenience), making the latter parts of the game of questionable difficulty at best. Sadly, the Peninsula of Power does not exist in this version; given the ease at which you can grind, though, it doesn't really need to.

Thankfully, community-generated challenges will always exist. Despite my little tirade, it's a minor complaint.

Final Fantasy will always have a special place in my heart, and the Pixel Remaster is a great way to revisit it; perhaps it lacks the original's challenge, but it's also sans the inherent frustrations those challenges brought.

• In-Game Purchases: None
  
• Learning Curve: Easy; much easier than the original game!
  
• Replayability: Medium-low. The only replay value is in experiencing the game with different party configurations, which can change the way you play parts of the game pretty drastically (albeit less so than in the original version).
  
• Recommended Purchase Price: ~$10. Depending on how attached you are to owning the game in the first place, it's still a remaster of a (now) 35-year-old game with a lack of options to vary the experience.

[h1]#tinygamereviews[/h1] A welcome trip down memory lane and a fantastic re-introduction to a series that somehow changed my life. [list] [*][b][u]Overall Score[/u][/b]: 3/5 (+1 for nostalgia) [/list] [hr][/hr] [h1]Full Review[/h1] [table] [tr] [td]Playability[/td] [td]4/5[/td] [td]Classic JRPG turn-based combat isn't for everyone, and even though streamlining it helped it age more gracefully, it still makes for slow-paced gameplay.[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Graphics[/td] [td]4/5[/td] [td]Looks pretty good, but for whatever odd reasons, Square-Enix didn't opt for the best-looking version of FF1 for this release (or, better still, options to switch between them).[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Sound[/td] [td]4/5[/td] [td]Most of the updated music sounds great (there're a couple exceptions). Again, for mysterious reasons (even though it's an option in other, non-FF rereleases...), we don't get the option to hear the original music.[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Story[/td] [td]2/5[/td] [td]Final Fantasy's story was groundbreaking for videogames thirty-five years ago, but it hardly stands up today. Some added content makes it a whole lot more coherent, but it's still not [i]great[/i].[/td] [/tr] [/table] [i]Final Fantasy[/i] has been a part of my life for decades, and the original [i]Final Fantasy[/i] forged a big part of my identity as a gamer (whatever that even means). I fondly remember taking turns playing it on a crappy old television with a loose antenna adapter in a hot garage in the middle of the summer with my friend Mike as we pored over the [i]Nintendo Power[/i] guide he'd gotten in the mail. I remember leaving the game on just to listen to the music in Matoya's Cave, because it was oddly magical and inspired me to keep writing my ripoff mashups of [i]The Hobbit[/i] and [i]The Legend of Zelda[/i] in my math notebook so I could submit a story for Young Authors. [i]Final Fantasy[/i] - perhaps especially this one - is a weirdly-large part of [i]my[/i] story, and I'll never forget it. This Pixel Remaster version is pretty fantastic. Graphics are updated about on-par with mid-life SNES aesthetics, the soundtrack is remastered and (with a couple exceptions) remains fantastic, and the sound effects are actually great to boot. Story content has been re-translated and augmented to offer a more coherent tale in a game that was previously lacking. It doesn't make the story [i]good[/i] (groundbreaking as it may have been for the medium at the time), but it's a definite improvement that helps it age more gracefully. It's easier - remarkably, [i]drasticly[/i] easier - but this works for modern audiences and (especially) newcomers. Despite the streamlined gameplay, we lose the original game's unique(-for-the-time) strategy element. In the original game, players would need to acquaint themselves with the strength of each enemy and enemy formation and their own party's relative strength to optimize performance, otherwise attacks would miss; for example, setting the entire 4-man party to attack one target, then the target dying after the first or second hit, would result in the subsequent attacks missing because the target was gone. Frustrating as this mechanic was, it made being mindful of each encounter a necessity, and even made some random encounters ostensibly more difficult than some of the bosses! I thought it was pretty cool, and it would have been neat for this to be a toggle-able option in the remaster. This also means that mindlessly auto-battle to fast-grind levels beyond necessity for any upcoming encounters is super easy (barely an inconvenience), making the latter parts of the game of questionable difficulty at best. Sadly, the Peninsula of Power does not exist in this version; given the ease at which you can grind, though, it doesn't really [i]need[/i] to. Thankfully, community-generated challenges will always exist. Despite my little tirade, it's a minor complaint. [i]Final Fantasy[/i] will always have a special place in my heart, and the Pixel Remaster is a great way to revisit it; perhaps it lacks the original's challenge, but it's also sans the inherent frustrations those challenges brought. [table equalcells=1] [tr] [th]BEST[/th] [th]WORST[/th] [/tr] [tr] [td]The spirit of the original endures, despite all the (mostly-good) changes.[/td] [td]Lack of options to experience the original, in part or in whole - gameplay, graphics, sound...feels like it could've been done without much trouble, but what do I know?[/td] [/tr] [/table] [list] [*][b][u]In-Game Purchases[/u][/b]: None [*][b][u]Learning Curve[/u][/b]: Easy; [i]much[/i] easier than the original game! [*][b][u]Replayability[/u][/b]: Medium-low. The only replay value is in experiencing the game with different party configurations, which can change the way you play [i]parts[/i] of the game pretty drastically (albeit less so than in the original version). [*][b][u]Recommended Purchase Price[/u][/b]: ~$10. Depending on how attached you are to owning the game in the first place, it's still a remaster of a (now) 35-year-old game with a lack of options to vary the experience. [/list]