I'm playing through all of Final Fantasy, and everyone is invited (Playing Lightning Returns now)

[Peklo]

In the DS game stat gains at 70 turn from pre-determined to entirely facilitated by the currently equipped Augments per character, each of which adds their own sum to the resulting level-up gain. They're only additive so no one's losing stats, but unless you have people equipped, they're not gaining them either. It doesn't really interfere with the reading I have for Fusoya and so on because realistically only the final five are ever affected--and even then Zeromus is pretty reliably fought around that 70 mark. They're considerations reserved strictly for preparation for the few superbosses that one can fight in New Game+.

 

[MetManMas]

You're more or less railroaded directly to the Giant of Babil as soon as you get FuSoYa, so I doubt anybody would get him above Lv70 outside of cheating devices and ROMhacks where he could potentially replace Cecil or one of the other final characters in the final endgame party.

 

[conchobhar]

Good wrap-up, Felix. I completely agree with all your assessment of the cast. It's funny though, until you laid it out, I don't think I quite realized how strong the supporting cast of the game is relative to the main players; I bet you could get a pretty decent game with a party of Edward, Cid, Yang, Palom and Porom (though obviously not this one).

Kain
Why is Kain so popular? I'm not judging, it is just confusing to me. He is shown to be rough and unlikable (I never got over how he tried to kidnap Rydia against her will, after he helped, unwillingly as it was, destroying her home town and killing her mother), he is easily corruptable, due to his feelings for Rosa and he just seems to miss willpower? I guess?

I chuckled at this, because I had the exact same reaction when I first played IV. That was one of my biggest disappointments, actually: I've always thought (and still do) that Dragoons are cool as hell, and was excited to see the archetypical Dragoon in action in his own game… and then he ends up being a complete and utter tool.

Rydia
And, while I like her coming back grown up as a twist, it also feels kind of irrelevant? I never thought about this, but it doesn't fulfill any real purpose, right?

It's basically a way to quickly move Rydia's character forward; had she still been seven when she returned, you would expect her to still be nursing her trauma, but now that she's ten years older it's easy to rationalize that she's made peace with it and become a stronger person in the intervening years. It's absolutely a cheat, but I do like that it implies off-screen growth (ie: that everyone's lives don't revolve around the hero and his journey), and— on a meta level— it's a funny way to literalize the idea that she "grew up too fast". But it's also really uncomfortable how it sidelines Rydia's trauma in her own character arc, while being absolutely critical to Cecil's arc— as if the real tragedy isn't losing your mother and village in one fell swoop (and also then having to pal around with the guy who did it), but the uncomfortable situation of having done that! I doubt it was intentional, but it's another example of the short shrift that IV gives to its female characters.

Golbez
I feel like he should be effective, but wasn't really, for some reason? He felt too cartoony, with his Evil Lair scenes, and the tied up Rosa. He is over-the-top, until he isn't. Similar to the rest of the story, he feels split in two halves that don't quite work together. I feel the natural comparison is the Emperor from FF II, and that guy still feels better done than Golbez.

The Emperor rules, you'll get no argument from me.

But I think Golbez's natural comparison is Exdeath in Final Fantasy V: both are big, armour-clad knights who harass the party and boast about their misdeeds. One interesting thing about this comparison, though, is that Exdeath is significantly more cartoony… but also significantly more effective, and ends up being intimidating despite metaphorically twirling a moustache in every scene. (← not really a spoiler, just a broad description, but I'm tagging it just in case you want to go into V completely blind.)

I would have prefered to go to the Moon immediately, and make that a bigger place. Give me a real town there, and story stuff. Let me start exploring the relationship between Golbez and Cecil from the start of the second half, and tell me more about Golbez's past, and also about KluYa. I would have loved to explore this in more detail, and maybe get someone from that alien race as a final party member. Or let me just keep Yang, that works too. But there would have been possibilities here to extend the story part of the game, and maybe play around a bit more with new party compositions. Maybe split up the party, and give them aid from aliens as party members?

I hadn't considered this before, but it really would have been a much better direction for the game to go in. After all, the Moon looms large in the backstory and mythos of the game, so dedicating more time to it would have made sense… and a Lunarian warrior as the final party member would have been much more interesting than another royal (ninja or not). And spending more time on the Moon is clearly cooler than futzing about under the earth's crust (or maybe I just like space)!

 

[FelixSH]

Say what you want about FuSoYa, but his contributions to the Super Mario World hacking community are foundational. What a legend.

My curiosity is peaked. Please tell me more.

I was 11 when I first played FF2 US, a few months after it was released, and I was absolutely captivated. I had played nothing like it, didn't suspect anything like it was even possible. It's hard to put into words the kind of mark it made on me and how I would have likely ignored the entire RPG genre - at least until FF7, which seems to have its own gravitational pull - if not for Cecil and Co.'s exploits. It was a stunning work that left me gobsmacked and entranced in that special way good media can. So I guess take the next paragraph with a grain of salt.

I think FF4's relative simplicity re: storyline is a benefit rather than a detriment. To me, it is the last FF game that felt like a fantasy, which is to say, a fairytale (even if FF5 comes close and FF9 makes overtures). I'm a big fan of fairytale-style stories, where there is a kind of frankness that betrays an elegance underneath, eschewing complication and thickness for something more primal and immediate. Striking the tone of a fable is not the only way to tell a story by any means, and the narratives of FF games eventually go to many different tonal places, but "a simple story, simply told" works for me here, with all of its surface-level light/dark dichotomy, damsels in distress, mustache twirling, and man-behind-the-curtain-isms. It feels like something out of storybook, like something the Grimm brothers would have concocted, albeit something more long form compared to the shortness of those stories. Still, when taking the fairytale view, I think some of FF4s "narrative proclivities", especially in relation to its characters, become more understandable and palatable. In any case, that's the way I've chosen to engage with it. YMMV, as always.

The way I see FuSoYa articulate is one that I think gets lost when you only look at his as a gameplay element, that is how effective of a party member is he. 4's strict party structure means you get FuSoYa when you get him and so comparing his to say, Yang, is irrelevant. (And I want to be clear I'm not trying to accuse anyone here of doing that, I just mean in general about how we usually talk about these games). Instead, we can look at how he appears in the experience of the game. He comes with the introduction to this, frankly, incredible moment when you get to fly to the moon. He gives you the true cosmic backstory of what's going on and elevates the game to Final Fantasy proportions. This is the moment in 1 when you go to the floating temple and everything's all computery. That is to say, Final Fantasy has always been more than dragons and magic, and that 4 is continuing and reaffirming that identity. That FoSoYa get's to be a playable character gives this emphasis. It elevates this aspect of the story. FuSoYa gets cools spells, even though they aren't efficient, they get to be big and different and preview of what you can obtain. He's mysterious and weird and otherwordly. He is a mop. This all gives this aspect of Final Fantasy's unique identity emphasis, and at the same time is 4's unique expression of it.

Plus he is a mop.

To be clear, had I played FF IV as a child, the moon would have been AMAZING. As would have been FuSoYa. When I played the game for the first time, I didn't realize that he and Tellah were kind of weak (and granted, FuSoYa is fine for the time you have him). I just accepted, that these two guys were these super-powerful mages. Considering that I didn't use magic in random battles (have to conserve those MP), I didn't even realize that their MP weren't that high, and I probably didn't look too close at the damage either. So, if you aren't trying to look closer, FuSoYa works totally fine. And the Moon is a great setting, and getting there would have blown my mind. Aside from the fact that you get there, it reminds me of old Sci-Fi anime. Which isn't a surprise, considering that the whole game feels very much like an anime, and is from the early 90s. The Moon reminds me of that old anime, Ulysses 31, which retold Odysseus' travels, but in a space setting. I saw only two episodes, as a kid, but I was enthralled. The Moon reminds me of that.

He does not, and what he does have in its place is one of the most interesting things about him: level-ups don't boost his stats at all, but neither do they diminish them as with Tellah. He is the previous wizened man's analogue in mechanical function, down to co-opting an unusual interaction with genre conventions like levels, but it's not a hollow repeat of an earlier hit, as his rendition communicates something else altogether: where Tellah's advanced age was the mark of his mortality with his body and mind increasingly failing him, Fusoya's inability to grow mirrors his people's long slumber and the evolutionary plateau that he represents. He is ancient and not affected adversely by that fact, but neither does he have anything more to offer beyond first impressions--rather exactly summing up the character as a whole.

That's another very cool read. Thanks!

Good wrap-up, Felix. I completely agree with all your assessment of the cast. It's funny though, until you laid it out, I don't think I quite realized how strong the supporting cast of the game is relative to the main players; I bet you could get a pretty decent game with a party of Edward, Cid, Yang, Palom and Porom (though obviously not this one).

Well, you would have a White Mage, a Black Mage, a Bard, a Glass Cannon and a Tank (I think? If not, you could easily give Cid some heavy armor, I bet he can pick up a ton). Yep, would be a great party, and, honestly, would be way more fun from a character standpoint (well, for me, I love the secondary cast of this game, these people are a lot of fun).
This has to be intentional. The five main characters (plus Tellah) are all the driving force of the plot, and have to carry the dramatic weight, so they aren't allowed any levity (seriously, the only one who makes any jokes is Edge, right?). So that job lands on the side cast, and makes them all the more fun for it. But than, that cast wouldn't fit the dramatic tone of FF IV, they would probably feel more at home in a game like FF III or V.

It's basically a way to quickly move Rydia's character forward; had she still been seven when she returned, you would expect her to still be nursing her trauma, but now that she's ten years older it's easy to rationalize that she's made peace with it and become a stronger person in the intervening years. It's absolutely a cheat, but I do like that it implies off-screen growth (ie: that everyone's lives don't revolve around the hero and his journey), and— on a meta level— it's a funny way to literalize the idea that she "grew up too fast". But it's also really uncomfortable how it sidelines Rydia's trauma in her own character arc, while being absolutely critical to Cecil's arc— as if the real tragedy isn't losing your mother and village in one fell swoop (and also then having to pal around with the guy who did it), but the uncomfortable situation of having done that! I doubt it was intentional, but it's another example of the short shrift that IV gives to its female characters.

Yeah, it's just...her arc just stops. Or, she never had one. It's not like she does anything, except for her great entrance, when she helps defeat Golbez and saves everyone. I wished she had done something, but even if you go to the Land of Monsters, you don't really learn anything about her. As a character, she is basically done, except to show some reactions to Edges nonsense. You are right, of course, having her grow up is nice (and was always something I really liked about this game). I just wished she actually did something, after returning. Oh well.

The Emperor rules, you'll get no argument from me.

I really find it fascinating, how much gravitas this guy creates, while being on screen for less than 1 % of in-game time. FF II did really well with him, it's fascinating.

But I think Golbez's natural comparison is Exdeath in Final Fantasy V: both are big, armour-clad knights who harass the party and boast about their misdeeds. One interesting thing about this comparison, though, is that Exdeath is significantly more cartoony… but also significantly more effective, and ends up being intimidating despite metaphorically twirling a moustache in every scene. (← not really a spoiler, just a broad description, but I'm tagging it just in case you want to go into V completely blind.)

I'm very much looking forward to meeting Exdeath again. I remember liking him a lot, so that should be interesting.

Oh, and don't worry about spoilers, I have played all of these games already. Sometimes I wished I didn't - it would be really interesting, to just play them all for the first time, one after the other, and watch the series develop without any baggage. But it's still fun, the way I do it now.

 

[RT-55J]

My curiosity is peaked. Please tell me more.

The chap who made the SMW editor Lunar Magic goes by the name FuSoYa. It's over 20 years old by this point, but as a rom hacking tool it's still best-in-class. Most other hacking communities would kill for an editor as good as that.

He's never been the most prolific rom hacker, but his sagely prowess is undeniable.

 

[nosimpleway]

The Crystals, see, they're set up in the beginning as having elements and being the national treasures of entire kingdoms, making you think they're the pillars of the world like they were in FF1 and FF3. The bad guy stealing the crystals might drain them of their power or destroy them, and then the world will die, just like it was going to in those other games!

But no, it turns out, the Crystals are just bits of Lunarian ultratech. In this case they're the batteries for the dimensional elevator at the Tower of Babil, and Golbez needs 'em because Zemus wants the elevator turned on so he can teleport the Giant of Babil down and glass the planet. So the reveal that there are four more underground, and then one more random one on your Lunarian spaceship, and maybe one more at the Tower of Prayer it's not clear whether that's just Mysidia's Crystal of Water again, and one more in Golbez's hand during the fight with Zemus, makes them out to be pretty mundane. They're just not anything as special as they're made out to be in the beginning.

Presumably KluYa brought them with him when he came down to the Blue Planet from the moon, so it's not like they're even all that old.

I mean, even the Giant of Babil isn't all that special. Remakes added the Lost Babil and the Proto-Babil as postgame superbosses, so who knows how many of the bastards there really are. Zemus could have just teleported down another one, except he needs a man in the Tower to do the job and Golbez had his brainwashing spell broken at the end of the first Giant. (Why the supposedly-peaceful Lunarians had at least three and potentially dozens or hundreds of planet-busting superweapons hanging around is not made clear, either.)

 

[FelixSH]

The chap who made the SMW editor Lunar Magic goes by the name FuSoYa. It's over 20 years old by this point, but as a rom hacking tool it's still best-in-class. Most other hacking communities would kill for an editor as good as that.

He's never been the most prolific rom hacker, but his sagely prowess is undeniable.

Oh, didn't know that. I mean, I know the tool, but didn't know the creators name.

The Crystals, see, they're set up in the beginning as having elements and being the national treasures of entire kingdoms, making you think they're the pillars of the world like they were in FF1 and FF3. The bad guy stealing the crystals might drain them of their power or destroy them, and then the world will die, just like it was going to in those other games!

But no, it turns out, the Crystals are just bits of Lunarian ultratech. In this case they're the batteries for the dimensional elevator at the Tower of Babil, and Golbez needs 'em because Zemus wants the elevator turned on so he can teleport the Giant of Babil down and glass the planet. So the reveal that there are four more underground, and then one more random one on your Lunarian spaceship, and maybe one more at the Tower of Prayer it's not clear whether that's just Mysidia's Crystal of Water again, and one more in Golbez's hand during the fight with Zemus, makes them out to be pretty mundane. They're just not anything as special as they're made out to be in the beginning.

Presumably KluYa brought them with him when he came down to the Blue Planet from the moon, so it's not like they're even all that old.

I mean, even the Giant of Babil isn't all that special. Remakes added the Lost Babil and the Proto-Babil as postgame superbosses, so who knows how many of the bastards there really are. Zemus could have just teleported down another one, except he needs a man in the Tower to do the job and Golbez had his brainwashing spell broken at the end of the first Giant. (Why the supposedly-peaceful Lunarians had at least three and potentially dozens or hundreds of planet-busting superweapons hanging around is not made clear, either.)

I hadn't even thought of that, nice. That's actually pretty cool. Shame that I didn't realize that at all.

----------------------------------------------------------

Please imagine a young adventurer, riding on a Chocobo, exploring the green, lush lands.
Imagine a castle, where a king flies into the distance, on the back of a small dragon. His daughter looking after him.
Imagine an old man in a cave, who seems to be aware of some unspecified danger.
Imagine a pirate captain, who realizes that the wind has stopped.
And then, joyful, adventurous music starts to play. There are trumpets involved. It tells you: You are going on an adventure. It will be fun. It will be exciting!​

Final Fantasy V was another game, that I downloaded when I first got internet. Tried it out, maybe made it to the pirate cave, and than stopped. There were other games, that seemed more intriguing. Later on, let's say a year, I was on a random website that talked about old-school JRPGs (yes, SNES games were already old-school in 2002. Feel free to crumple to dust, now). It talked about how FF V was a fun game. I believed it, and started to play. This time for real.

I wasn't in the mood to try anything crazy. With all the fun classes, I stuck with the simple looking ones. I'm sure I had a Knight, a White Mage, a Black Mage and a Monk. I definitely "upgraded" the Knight to Magic Knight, made someone a Summoner and had a Time Mage. I definitely used the basement of that one castle in World 2 as a grinding spot, because everyone should have mastered all the jobs. I definitely saved my MP for bosses, and had four Samurai, who Zeninaged Neo-Exdeath to, uh, death. I never was a mechanics guy. I was here for the story, and I liked it. It was simple, but I still enjoyed it.

I likely played through the game a second time. Again with the classes that looked the most basic. And probably with another Zeninage win against Neo-Exdeath.

Years later, I participated in the Four Job Fiesta, probably around 2015. Sounds somewhat right. I remember having a Bard, and a Dancer. Also a Ninja and a Mystic Knight, if my memory isn't completely faulty. I remember it being fun, and not particularly hard.

But honestly, I don't remember that much about the game. I mean, I remember most of it's story, and I have read through all of Sullas Solo Runs over the last few weeks, because they are fun to read. So I know the bosses way better than I should. But I don't remember much about my feelings while playing, except: This is a nice, fun game.

I will use the old SNES fan translation, because I just like the look of the SNES version of the game more. Granted, I didn't compare them, but reading about the translations the fan translation is supposed to be very good, which I'll just accept.

I wasn't sure how to approach this playthrough. If I just played it, I would likely use the jobs again that I always use. But there are some that I never tried, which are way more interesting, especially considering the point of this project. So I decided to use the following jobs (yes, I posted it already, but now I also want to explain my thoughts):

Bartz: Blue Mage → Dancer

I never played a Blue Mage, because I never wanted to hunt down the spells. Which is a shame, as the Blue Mage looks really interesting. So, that one is my first choice. I already played a Dancer in the Four Job Fiesta, but I like that weird class, and I can use it to attack, when out of MP (or just regaining them, with the right dance). In this one case, I choose specifically Bartz (I might switch to Butz at random), because I love his dancer outfit. It's fabulous.

Lenna: Knight → Summoner → Beastmaster

I don't want two characters to have the same class, and Thief is the only other Job from the first six that I want to actually use, so I made Lenna for the time being into the Knight. As soon as possible, she will become a Summoner (because I love Summoners) and than a Beastmaster. Never tried the latter, and I'm curious about it. Also, it will help me getting Blue Magic.

Galuf/Krile: Monk → Berserker(?) → Geomancer → Bard

Monk is, like Knight, just a placeholder, before I get to the jobs I actually want to use. The same is true for the Berserker. I think the Geomancer and Bard unlock with third or fourth set, but I never tried a Berserker either, so why not use it for some time? Never used a Geomancer, despite always being fascinated by the concept. Bard was another Four Job Fiesta class, but I love it and will definitely use it, because Bards are fun.

Faris: Thief → Chemist

Thief is the other job from the first set that I never tried. Why would I, if they aren't useful for battle? Well, I'm curious if they are actively bad or just mediocre, and I'm interested in finding out if there are at least halfway useful things to steal. Ideally, I will get ingredients for the Chemist, who is the other class that I always found interesting but never wanted to play. Always seemed, like you either had a guide at hand, or it would be useless. Which is funny, because I definitely used a guide, when playing for the first time anyway. I'll find out if he is still useful without a guide. If nothing else, Faris will be my main healer.

Well, that's my setup. I'm looking forward to testing them out.

------------------------------------------

I want to reemphasize that I love the introductory credit sequence, where the letters of Final Fantasy V are used as windows, to watch Bartz ride Boko. It looks beautiful, and the song is great (even if I already forgot how it goes). It really made me think immediately of Super Fun Adventure! With a focus on Fun. It's an immediate, strong mood swing from it's darker prequel (is that even the right word? Doesn't really feel like it, but somehow it does? I'm not sure).

I honestly love that Butz (please understand, that I'm actually just three years old. That dumb name still makes me at least smile) has a Chocobo buddy. And it's probably the most adorable Chocobo to date. It's eyes are gigantic, and it whips its tail from side to side, when Bartz leaves him alone to look at the meteor.

Also, I love how three of the four characters of your party have animal partners. Bartz has the adorable Boko, Lenna has the Sky Drake (is that it's name?) and Faris has the awesome Syldra. It's just a nice detail, I love that our herous are friends with these tame monsters.

By the way, have a look at Boko:

Sorry, the quality isn't great, but I hope you can see how adorable he is. It's a shame, that you only have him with you for such a short time.

The sense of fun is immediately followed up, when the meteor comes crushing down, and we see adorable Surprise-sprites of both Butz and Boko. Let me take this chance to say that I love the spritework in this game. They really got a lot out of the few pixels they had for the cast. The Surprise-sprites are generally super-cute.

Also, everything looks more colorful and cartoonier than in FF IV, and I can't say precisely what it is. I think part of it are the brighter colors and the thicker outlines of sprites in battle. Just one more thing that brings me joy.

I kind of love how cliched the characters in this game are. Bartz is the random adventurer, who protects the weak. Lenna is the kind-hearted princess (in disguise, but the big reveal happens ten minutes into the game, so, that's pretty funny in itself). Galuf has amnesia. Faris is awesome.

This is likely due to this being a fan translation, but we have terms like "Phoenix Down" and "Gil" now, finally. I'm not sure how FF VI handles this, but it's nice to finally get the terms that I'm accustomed to. There is more nice music here too, in that first scene, where you defend Lenna from Goblins. No idea, why I notice it that much, but I really enjoy the music in this game. The pirate cave, too, has a really nice song attached to it. It's not as epic as FF IVs, but it's nice adventure music.

We also, finally, get a visible ATB meter. I'm glad that I can now actually see what is going on. Also, this is the first FF where you can actually change between Wait and Active mode. Or maybe that was cut in the US version of FF IV too, and they just left Wait as the only mode. I did find it surprising, that Wait is the standard, and not Active. I'm in Wait, still, but maybe I'll try some Active out for the first time, ever.

There is another fun scene, directly after Bartz leaves Lenna and Galuf, when Boko stops in full run, Bartz gets thrown against a wall and screams at the Chocobo. It's such a cute game.

The cave is very easy, and ends with another fun scene, where Lenna and Galuf talk about borrowing and stealing the ship. I really enjoy these people interact. I probably won't talk about every scene of this kind, because they are not that insightful, but they are very fun (there are sprites for everyone laughing, it's great) and they inform us a bit about the characters, so please know that I like them a lot.

I do like, that we get the choice between steering the ship ourselves, and letting the pirate drive directly to the Wind Shrine. I chose the latter, because I wasn't sure where the shrine was, and I didn't want to look.

The shrine isn't hard in any way, but it looks really nice, especially with all the green vines. The boss was actually surprisingly tough, compared to the Mist Dragon. I mean, he died before he got to his "Wings Closed" stage, so the actual gimmick of the fight would have been lost on me. But that attack that hits everyone, hits relatively hard.

He also looks great. Here are his two poses:

These wings look amazing, don't they? Love his design. There is also that little version of him on the map, and it, too, looks adorable. Really nice, that it didn't appear out of thin air.

Then, we get to the scene where I thought King Tycoon had died, and we were talking with his ghost. But, apparently, Faris thinks he is still alive, so that's probably true.

Afterwards, I had control of the ship. I do find it fascinating how they make this place seem open, just by making the ocean somewhat big. I remember it feeling open-ended, when I first played it, even if there isn't really anywhere to go, but the closed canal and Tule.

First, I finally changed everyone into their job, and then watched the pirates scream for beer. I really like these guys, they seem so dangerous at the start, and then you realize that they all have hearts of gold. Well, maybe not, I guess they would still have killed us, but they are nice if you get to know them.

We also can finally play the piano again, like we could in FF III. Still a lot of fun, and I like how it is now tied into a side-quest for playing them all.

In Tule, we also meet Zokk, who knows Lenna and her father. He initially doesn't want to give us the key to the canal. But then, we get a nice scene of Bartz, getting outside in the middle of the night, looking at the stars and remembering his dad, who also talked about the Crystals. It was nice. Showed us a bit of a different side of Bartz.

The canal was easy, including the boss, Karlabos.

Yes, I really like the spritework in this game, especially from the bosses. They all look great and detailed.

The only Blue Magic spell I have found until now (don't tell me where any of the others are, I'll try to find them myself) is Goblin Punch. And for some reason, it hit for 250 damage, or something absurd like that. That made an easy fight even easier. Honestly, I don't have much to talk about, he only attacked, and then died.

I did like the scene afterwards, where Faris' heart breaks, when she sees Syldra being dragged down. It was another nice, effective scene. As was the helpless drifting, because without Syldra, there is no way to actually steer the ship.

The Ship Graveyard is not actually hard, but I guess it's a bit of a wake-up call. It is at least long enough, that you might need some healing. There is a World Map in here, that is missable, I guess? Huh.

As a dungeon, this place looks nice, and it really shows how far we have come in terms of dungeon design. This place makes sense within the world, and in that there are all this broken ship parts, that you have to navigate to get anywhere.

I always made sure to make use separate save file here, because I was afraid of getting stuck (didn't realize, that you can sleep in Faris' ship). It was probably unwaranted, as the dungeon might be a bit long, but it's not that hard.

I did enjoy the scene with Siren, where the game pretty much hammers home that Faris is strongly connected to King Tycoon and, therefore, Lenna. And I did find it really clever, that the reason Sirens magic didn't work on Galuf is, that he has amnesia, and just doesn't recognize Krile. Clever way of using that old trope.

The battle against Siren was somewhat challenging. I mean, I had to use potions a few times, to not die. It isn't a bad concept, to have her switch between two states, but with a Black Mage (or even a White one), this would probably have been very easy. The way it was, I just defended, when she was in her undead state.

Well, that's all for now. Here, have a picture of Siren:

I love that green glove, and her cape thing. Also, that tunderbolt looks really cool. Nice design, I like it a lot, and I appreciate that she has no mouth and creppy eyes (though that is probably more a case of graphical limitations).

 

[Torzelbaum]

It's an immediate, strong mood swing from it's darker prequel (is that even the right word? Doesn't really feel like it, but somehow it does? I'm not sure).

4 and 5 are not related story-wise so I think predecessor might be a better choice.

Lenna has the Sky Drake (is that it's name?)

I think they are also called wind drakes or wyverns but this one has a specific name which I think you learn later in the game.

By the way, have a look at Boko:

Sorry, the quality isn't great, but I hope you can see how adorable he is. It's a shame, that you only have him with you for such a short time.

Chocobos with the same name show up in other FF games but I don't think they are as adorable as the Boko in 5.

And for some reason, it hit for 250 damage, or something absurd like that.

That was probably because of a special property of that spell.

Also, that tunderbolt looks really cool.

If I had ever noticed it before then I had forgotten about it but it sort of looks like she's skipping rope with it.

 

[Beowulf]

FF5 has such a weird place in my head, because I had played 4 and 6 to death by early high school, and my friend Dan got a copy of the Super Famicom cart and an adaptor, so my first experience with FF5 was playing it in Japanese with the entire script translation printed out on the bed next to me. I don't think I even made it to the third world. Then early in college I discovered emulation and fan translation patches, but I think I only played a little of it that way because the officially-translated PS1 version came out that same year. (And boy, that translation was...not great.) I played half of the PS1 version, then returned to the fan translation a year later. I did a LOT of grinding to master job classes, both times. It wasn't until I played the GBA version in 2006 that I really got the knack for focusing on classes I wanted to use and only grinding for skills/stat boosts I genuinely needed.

It's never been my favorite, probably because I imprinted on the games that released in the US before it and it's so different from them in a bunch of ways. (Coming into 5 after playing 1, 4 and 6 but never seeing 3? It's jarring.) But I should probably revisit it.

 

[JBear]

We also can finally play the piano again, like we could in FF III.

I encourage you to keep an eye out for other similarities and callbacks to FFIII, coming so fresh off of it, as there are quite a lot of them. As you might expect, this game is as much a sequel to FFIII as it is FFIV.

 

[Lokii]

I like this game a lot.

In medieval alchemy, quintessence means "a pure essence latent in all things and the substance of which the heavenly bodies are composed," literally "fifth essence." (The other four being, of course, "fire, earth, water, air" hmm.)

I find it potent that in a lot of ways FFV is the quintessential Final Fantasy.

 

[Peklo]

I will join in again, playing the GBA version. Last time I played was the Super Famicom game on a SNES Classic, patched to incorporate the GBA script. It was a great way to experience the game, but now I want to stick to handheld play.

Like previously alluded to, it's really hard for me to pick any meaningful favourites with this series anymore, as I like all of them in some way; a few of them like IV probably trend toward the bottom of that scale for the issues that have been discussed, but in the end it's all relative. Even so, if someone brings up V as a series-best, or pressures me into picking one and only one for the position, it's not really a conclusion I ever have to justify or contest internally that much as that's just how it shakes out if I really start examining the individual aspects of it that I like. The sense of bitterness I have to reconcile with on occasion is that the specific qualities that draw me to V are also ones that aren't really held in great esteem by very many, even those that champion the game as spectacular; sometimes those aspects are even held up as weaknesses that diminish the game. People can and will like the same things for very different reasons, and I have long since accepted that I don't come to V for game mechanics, while at the same time recognize that a lot of its audience finds it compelling first and foremost for that. If I want to emphasize anything when talking about the game now, it's for things like featuring my favourite central cast, my favourite villain, my favourite world, my favourite soundtrack--again, not at the expense of its peers but in a way that values it for these things as much as for any other canonized strength it may possess.

We could just as well start from the start, from the way the game opens with a cinematic that in one fell swoop shines the spotlight on all of the Four Warriors of Light, stressing that this is going to be a game about a unified group dynamic and which cares equally about all of its players and how they relate to each other. It's also a showcase for a tremendous bit of audiovisual choreography where a four-minute-long opening theme goes through the according movements, tonal swings and spiked reactions in sync with the scene playing out. It's stuff like this that puts V easily on at least as accomplished and engaged a level of presentational flair as the games surrounding it, but you have to care about the material to notice.

In a similar fashion, V is a definitive Uematsu soundtrack for me because I don't think he developed a better percussive texture anywhere else, both compositionally and instrumentation-wise, and the general mood of it is also something really unique for him: whereas IV was grand and iconic, and VI goes on to be sentimentally charged throughout, V is gentle, jaunty, and quietly sweet, reflecting its narrative ethos and the dispositions of its characters. They named the credits theme Dear Friends to underline the importance of that running motif, a title which is shared by the game's arrange album released in 1993. They did not go for majestic orchestrations or blazing rock renditions on that album, as are often the default modes for such material--instead, Uematsu and others collaborated with Saami (Finland's indigenous people) musicians during recording sessions in Finland for an end result that is as idiosyncratic as the source material demanded, and something not frequently explored by the genre and medium it occupies. The perception may be that FFV in this bit of additional material can't help but pander to me personally, but it is a powerful thing for media you're already invested in to pay that commitment forward in respecting and integrating something from your own culture, or culture you live in contact with, into what forms its own self.

More things will probably come to mind as I continue on, but in the wake of the Wind Crystal's shattering and the picking up of those pieces, most of what runs through my head is: damn do I love almost everything about this game.

 

[nosimpleway]

The FF5 Advance translation made Bartz out to be so, so dumb. Charmingly dumb, but dumb all the same. Does he come off that way in the SNES fan translation?

Blue Magic is hard to find but it is like all the other magic in that you only need one "copy". If one person picks up a Blue spell, everyone can use it if they equip the !Blue skillset.

The first undocumented trick to Goblin Punch is that it does full physical-hit damage from the back row, which can help keep your guys alive. The second undocumented trick to Goblin Punch, that you noticed, is

Spoiler

that damage is octupled if the user and the target are the same experience level.

There's a third undocumented trick to Goblin Punch that might be useful to know a bit later on. It's a weird spell.

(If you need to grind for jobs right off, there are groups of three Bandersnatch around the Wind Shrine that give 3 AP, and groups of three Nutkins that give 2. You probably don't but the option is there.

Spoiler

Particularly if you want to learn Martial Arts as a Monk, which is stronger than any actual weapons you'll have for a while.

Spoiler: SPOILERS COMBINE

But Goblin Punch and Martial Arts don't stack, so you can't have a Monk with !Blue hit with full power from the back row.

Oh, something that's not intuitive that might be helpful to know. If you get the Equip ____ skill from a job, using that skill means you get the relevant stat from the job that gave it to you. Equip Rod and Equip Staff give you the Magic stat of a Time (?) or White Mage, and Equip Lance gives you the Strength of a Dragoon, and so on.

 

[Peklo]

I'm a little further along now--right past Siren. Some related tidbits:

• I've never formally or otherwise participated in the Four Job Fiesta, because it's simply not the way I usually want to interact with the game, but this time I'm willing to go ahead with that approach as long as it seems tenable and interesting. Just rolling the dice come every Crystal and Job line-up; a character gets that one Job to use as they may from then on, and duplicates from a set are allowed. That's how I landed on Bartz the Knight, Lenna and Galuf the Monks, and Faris the Blue Mage. Simple and powerful, and whenever a game allows me to ignore dedicated healers, I tend to sway that way anyway. It's a real hurdle to reliably pick up Blue Magic like this, though: only one valid target out of four, and the Monks counterattack the enemies you're trying to bait to death all the time, leading to a lot of superfluous learning sessions. At least the EXP, AP and gil roll in!

• the dungeon design is instantly impressive to me, especially in this chronological context we're strolling through the series under. The Mist Cave in IV was a compelling little microcosm of the kind of aesthetic and navigational style that game went on to iterate on for most of its running time, but it was fairly plain outside of the environmental narrative itself: you got the one ominous warning to turn back and then the boss battle setpiece. V's equivalent dungeon tutorial, the Pirate Cave, is equally linear, but instead of one interlocking room it's divided into three screens, each of which contain some little bump in the road to keep things lively: Bartz spotting the healing spring (hello, FFIII); the trio spying on the pirate to figure out the secret door mechanism; them spotting the pirate flagship mysteriously sailing on the world map in a world without wind through an opening in the dungeon wall (leading to a little clearing on the world map; a design tic that was occasionally seen up until this point but not for much longer in the series). There is no boss battle to cap things off, but instead more character interaction and Faris's introduction, which I think highlights where the comparative attentions of these games are: IV used characters as plot tickets to move events forward where they needed to go, whereas V is really invested in their mutual ribbing, asides and internal thoughts even if the assessment of them most often declaims them as too plain or forgettable. Again, I think it's in the contrast between the games's storytelling approaches: IV gives you loud, cartoonish melodrama to latch onto and form impressions of its cast with--V contains just as much lively character but it's often doled out in little interpersonal sketches and character interactions that are more textured than the endless retinues of introductions and catching-ups IV's party dynamics often consisted of. These characters are just more diversely developed over time, which is one of the benefits of a cast that's mostly locked in and not separated for the game's duration.

• god bless Kazuko Shibuya, is all I can say. 1992 was bookended by two major RPG releases from Squaresoft, with Romancing SaGa launching early in the year. That game had eight distinct protagonists and a total playable character count above twenty in all; Shibuya drew those sprites, with their extremely outlandish battle and celebratory poses that FF had not even attempted before. Then, she spent practically the entire rest of the year designing and drawing the monumental task that FFV was shaping up to become: 22 visually distinct Jobs (between individual characters occupying the same Job, also) shared between a playable cast of 5--that's a 110 sprite sets for characters intended to emote and animate in the full range at this point expected of FF in its battle presentation, and which V took to new heights besides. It's a ridiculous workload and accomplishment, setting the bar so high that any analogous Job System works made since are always struggling to keep up let alone match the scale of it. It's one of the first "dress-up games" where the fun of seeing characters in different guise and garb is its own reward, and it's all tied to the excellent mechanical underpinnings that give the concept form and lasting power even outside of the sheer visuality of it.

• there's some stuff here that doesn't read so well. For starters, the game calls specific attention to how the enemies in the Torna Canal--all tentacled cephalopods--only target and attack women, which is a shitty detail to include, and no better when it shows up again and again in the series with increasing prominence, codified by VI's Ultros and all subsequent appearances made by him. There's also all the early scenes with Faris, which are hard to navigate even if and especially if you like the character. There's queer panic, a practical outing scene, sexist asides mainly from Galuf--everything you'd unfortunately expect from a work of this tone, vintage and cultural context. The game's reliance on humour to endear its characters to the player becomes a weakness in these moments when it appears as more wantonly cruel than it ought to be, and it's also possible the rather flippant GBA localization is playing up the ostensibly comical insensitivity of such material. Whatever the case, it's hard going here but it's not as longlasting as it might be elsewhere: when the initial heteronormative shock subsides and Faris's identity is addressed, it ceases to be a factor in the narrative and the characters's interactions with one another; Faris is not constantly needled and shamed for who she is, she does not need to justify herself further at any point after this, and as far as gender identity and presentation go, she has no end-point in sight where she adopts a dress code, demeanor and speech patterns that aren't true to her masculinely-coded lived experience--if anything, later plot points reject that notion and affirm her personal authenticity as she chooses to claim it. There's a lot about Faris that's queer representation born out of genre contrivance and mistreatment, but enough to also see her as a really important point of identification despite the foibles.

• there's a bit after Faris's crew goes home to base-sit and she joins the party on a permanent basis, stopping the regular ale runs while at town, where completely unprompted except for the player's own sense of curiosity and awareness of their exploratory options, one can sail to that earlier pirate cave for a revisist, which has Bartz look for Boko in the place he told him to stay, concluding with a scene where the pirates are treating the bedridden Boko's wounds and seeing to his recuperation as Bartz reconnects with his friend and traveling companion. This is a detour that exists in the game and can be completely missed, and its foremost function, outside of the handful of items also to be uncovered, is sheer character-focused storytelling, addressing a hook that was left dangling earlier. V goes on to have more of these, and they always put the characters as written in the focal role--little footnotes to be added to the book of who they are and what they're about. This is not something that particularly existed in the series conceptually before this point, as every diversion on the adventure was propelled mostly by the promise of treasure, experience points and battles--not character development. Some games in the series's future take these ephemeral asides to extreme heights in both their obscurity and their prevalence--VIII and IX are great for this--but this is where I'd count the ethos as having begun.

 

[FelixSH]

I encourage you to keep an eye out for other similarities and callbacks to FFIII, coming so fresh off of it, as there are quite a lot of them. As you might expect, this game is as much a sequel to FFIII as it is FFIV.

I will...well, I will try. While doing these write-ups, I realize that I tend to overlook interesting stuff. Feel free to point out stuff that I missed.

I like this game a lot.

In medieval alchemy, quintessence means "a pure essence latent in all things and the substance of which the heavenly bodies are composed," literally "fifth essence." (The other four being, of course, "fire, earth, water, air" hmm.)

I find it potent that in a lot of ways FFV is the quintessential Final Fantasy.

I would like to say something clever here, but because it's just me, I'll stick with "Well said".

The FF5 Advance translation made Bartz out to be so, so dumb. Charmingly dumb, but dumb all the same. Does he come off that way in the SNES fan translation?

As far as I know, the SNES version has less flavour, because it was a fan-translation (as good as it was). There seem to be some nuances missing, especially when it comes to the party characters. But Bartz still isn't the brightest candle - there is a scene where he is woken up by his friends, and instead of doing it like a normal person, I jumps out of bed and...gets ready to fight, I think? Then the room brightens up, and it's clear that Bartz was still in half-sleep, and didn't realize that it was only his friends, who tell him that he is a weirdo. That he crashed into a wall at the start, when Boko suddenly stopped, also points to the game saying: Yeah, he is a charmingly dumb guy. With the focus on charmingly, I like Bartz a lot.

Blue Magic is hard to find but it is like all the other magic in that you only need one "copy". If one person picks up a Blue spell, everyone can use it if they equip the !Blue skillset.

I plan to not share jobs, so this will likely have no practical use for me, but it's nice to know. Thanks!

Oh, something that's not intuitive that might be helpful to know. If you get the Equip ____ skill from a job, using that skill means you get the relevant stat from the job that gave it to you. Equip Rod and Equip Staff give you the Magic stat of a Time (?) or White Mage, and Equip Lance gives you the Strength of a Dragoon, and so on.

I didn't know this! So, basically the Monks Brawl ability is sort of an "equip fists", right? That makes these "equip x" skills immediately more interesting.

I will join in again, playing the GBA version. Last time I played was the Super Famicom game on a SNES Classic, patched to incorporate the GBA script. It was a great way to experience the game, but now I want to stick to handheld play.

Nice to have you along for the ride, again. I'm looking forward to read more of your impressions. Especially considering your unique perspective on the game - considering that most people look at the story and characters as second-rate, I'm interested in reading more from you.

• I've never formally or otherwise participated in the Four Job Fiesta, because it's simply not the way I usually want to interact with the game, but this time I'm willing to go ahead with that approach as long as it seems tenable and interesting. Just rolling the dice come every Crystal and Job line-up; a character gets that one Job to use as they may from then on, and duplicates from a set are allowed. That's how I landed on Bartz the Knight, Lenna and Galuf the Monks, and Faris the Blue Mage. Simple and powerful, and whenever a game allows me to ignore dedicated healers, I tend to sway that way anyway. It's a real hurdle to reliably pick up Blue Magic like this, though: only one valid target out of four, and the Monks counterattack the enemies you're trying to bait to death all the time, leading to a lot of superfluous learning sessions. At least the EXP, AP and gil roll in!

Yeah, the way I learned the first two Blue Magic spells was by killing off the three other characters, and waiting for Bartz to get attacked. Doesn't feel very nice of me, but thankfully that wasn't necessary for the other ones I picked up already.

• There is no boss battle to cap things off, but instead more character interaction and Faris's introduction, which I think highlights where the comparative attentions of these games are: IV used characters as plot tickets to move events forward where they needed to go, whereas V is really invested in their mutual ribbing, asides and internal thoughts even if the assessment of them most often declaims them as too plain or forgettable. Again, I think it's in the contrast between the games's storytelling approaches: IV gives you loud, cartoonish melodrama to latch onto and form impressions of its cast with--V contains just as much lively character but it's often doled out in little interpersonal sketches and character interactions that are more textured than the endless retinues of introductions and catching-ups IV's party dynamics often consisted of. These characters are just more diversely developed over time, which is one of the benefits of a cast that's mostly locked in and not separated for the game's duration.

Yeah, that contrast between IV and V is really interesting, and I think I prefer the one V took. These character moments are, for the most part, very charming. In IV, you travel with people who might share part of your goals, but who are not really part of your group in a real sense (Tellah is a prime example, he leaves as soon as we don't serve his purpose anymore). Here, I already feel like this is a group of friends, who not only enjoy the journey (which, too, is very contrary to IV), but also enjoy each others company.

The comparison with IX that you made later on is very fitting too. These scenes, where you see what people outside your party are doing are very charming, and give you a sense of more to the world than just the journey. Both V and IX go deep into the state of their main characters, and look not only at what they suffer from, but also what they enjoy.

• god bless Kazuko Shibuya, is all I can say. 1992 was bookended by two major RPG releases from Squaresoft, with Romancing SaGa launching early in the year. That game had eight distinct protagonists and a total playable character count above twenty in all; Shibuya drew those sprites, with their extremely outlandish battle and celebratory poses that FF had not even attempted before. Then, she spent practically the entire rest of the year designing and drawing the monumental task that FFV was shaping up to become: 22 visually distinct Jobs (between individual characters occupying the same Job, also) shared between a playable cast of 5--that's a 110 sprite sets for characters intended to emote and animate in the full range at this point expected of FF in its battle presentation, and which V took to new heights besides. It's a ridiculous workload and accomplishment, setting the bar so high that any analogous Job System works made since are always struggling to keep up let alone match the scale of it. It's one of the first "dress-up games" where the fun of seeing characters in different guise and garb is its own reward, and it's all tied to the excellent mechanical underpinnings that give the concept form and lasting power even outside of the sheer visuality of it.

Can't agree more, Shibuya did an amazing job. All these costumes are fun to look at, with all their diversity and playfulness. My favourite is probably the Beastmaster - dressing your characters as sheep is just really, really adorable. Seriously, the spritework in this game is great, and absurdly diverse.

---------------------------------------

I also continued with my journey. When I stopped last time, I was just done with the ship graveyard. A lot has happened since then.

The next town is Carven, and it has a great, lively soundtrack to it. I know, we just came from a place were ships "died", together with the crew, but that feels like regular fantasy fair. In general, the world here seems pretty lively, happy and welcoming. Also, I find the artwork in general having made great advances compared to FF IV - everything looks so much more detailed and lively. I love how the architecture in this game looks, houses and castles alike.

I do like, that the Wind Crystals shattering had an immediate effect, by letting the wind die down. It is also part of the story - no ships can sail anymore, and we need another mode of travel. Luckily, Lennas pet dragon (Hiryuu in this version) has been seen landing on the nearby mountain.

Back in 2004(?), whenever it was that I played FF III DS for the first time, I was immediately thinking of this mountain, when we have to climb the mountain with Bahamut on top. It plays out completely differently, but it seems weirdly related, all the same. They even have some Horrible Birds, the same that you fight against at the mountain in FF III. Thankfully, I only encountered one, and he didn't turn me to stone. I appreciate seeing a monster from FF I again, though.

In town, I actually found it pretty funny, how we first have to learn about the ships being useless now. After we learn this, every time someone mentions anything related, Bartz has these thoughts of "When we can't go by sea, than..." and trails off. Until we learn about the Hiryuu. It's a fun...puzzle(?). Dunno, I just like Bartz's reaction.

Near the top of the mountain, we meet a huntress - Magissa, who wants to kill the Hiryuu and sell his horn, or something. She and her husband Forza have interesting designs to them:

Forza looks really weird (is he supposed to be some kind of super-monk? What's up with these purple orbs?), and only vaguely human, but Magisa is clearly just a jerk. Her design, though, is really great. She has great boots, these weird wrapped things around her right arm, a cool whip and also a sword. Nice work. Also, and I don't know if that is a callback to FF III, but Lenna is shot by one of Magisas poisoned arrows, like a NPC in III. Fittingly, she starts the battle poisoned, which isn't a big deal.

The battle was actually quite challenging, mainly because Magisa has this Drain. The main problem was that it did instantly kill one of my guys. I also appreciated the mechanics - at first, you only fight her, but after some time she (a pure mage) sees that it gets dangerous, and calls her physically strong husband, who steps in front of her to defend Magisa. Which is annoying, because now I had to start annew with Forza, before being able to do decent damage to Magisa.

There is a very sweet scene, where we see Lenna nearly sacrificing herself for Hiryuu, who then heals her by feeding her that healing plant. It's very affectionate, and I can only repeat that I love how three of the four party members have this deep relationship with an animal companion. Then, we learn that Bartz is scared of heights, and doesn't want to fly. Which makes his friends laugh at him, before Galuf just pushes him onto the dragon.

Look at them, don't they look great, so happy? The Hiryuu sprite is also very well done.

While this isn't a nice thing to do, I feel like the game just wants to make it clear that this is just friendly ribbing. I imagine Lenna trying to calm Bartz down, while the ride along. It should seem mean, when they laugh at him - but it just feels like they already know Bartzs boundaries, and know that getting some fun out of his fear doesn't overstep it. Maybe I'm being too generous here, but I just love when these people can laugh together, and have some fun.

And than, we have our first "airship". Considering that we can't fly over any mountains, this seems like one more throwback to FF III - our world got bigger, but there are still barriers we can't cross.

With the Hiryuu, we can reach Worus, the town of the Water Crystal. All royalty knows Lenna, of course, so it is no problem to get into any castle in this game. I did look around the castle, and found both the cellar with the horrible, superstrong imp guys (I died) and the sealed place with Shiva (I died again, she is super-strong).

I like that the chancellors in this game are all decent people (maybe that will change later? I don't remember it, at least). There are also people in jail cells, and the guard is really rude ("The people in the dungeon are trash.") Chill out, buddy. I didn't free anyone this time. Actually, I don't remember what happens (or if anything happens) if you do. But I like that the game offers you this little choice.

Near the tower are wild Galuras, who actually don't seem to attack you, as people tell you (or it died too fast?). There is also a little one in the town, it's cute! The one at the top is pretty strong, though, and I was happy to have Lenna covered in heavy armor. Everyone else took heavy damage, but she never got anything in the double digits, and started to protect the wounded, so there was no real danger in this battle. But without a knight, I could imagine this fight being pretty brutal, and I remember having a lot of trouble with it. Here is Galura:

Did I menation that I love the spritework for the bosses in this game (aside from the great spritework for the characters, of course). Damn, this game looks so great.

We do find out, that Syldra was still alive! She saves us, but then goes back into the ocean to die. Poor Faris.

Before using the meteor to get to Karnak, I used the Hiryuu to search around a bit. I visited the pirate cave again to find Boko there, as Peklo already mentioned. It's really cute, the adorable bird lies in bed. I mean, it's not cute that he is hurt, but I like how much these pirates care about poor Boko.

There is another place that you can totally miss - Tycoon castle, where Lenna is from. It's actually just behind the first meteor. It's another lovely place, and everyone is really happy to see Lenna again, including the chancellor (who is just a very nice guy). We get a bunch of stuff, and find some hidden places.

The amount of secrets seems to have been reduced, again, but there are more than I remember. I think every town up to now had a few goodies hidden, somewhere. The one in Tycoon castle felt particularly clever:

See that way to the right? I nearly didn't! You only see it, if you go behind the trees as I did here, for no reason but to have a look. How do you get there?

Bartz is looking at the secret walkway to the right. There isn't anything great hidden (just two cabins), but it's a really well hidden place.

These little scenes and places, that do nothing more than give you some nice, little character scenes, are a reason why I love this game. In this case, we see a scene during the night, where Lenna talks to Faris, to find out if they really are sisters. It's a very nice, warm scene, even though Faris isn't ready to talk about it yet. But it's really sweet, how you see signs of affection all the time in this game.

Back on the main track, after travelling via the meteor teleporter, we get outside of the mountains that blocked the Hiryuu in. On the way to Karnak, we meet some weird wolves, who did some attack that did 0 damage. After the battle, I learned that Bartz has learned the spell with my favourite name: ???? It did 0 damage, because that damage is calculated by "Max HP - Current HP". Nice!

There were also some turtles, who have some turtle shells, which will be nice to have for my chemist, later on. I don't know any recipies yet, but I know that turtle shells are very useful. Finally, Faris could steal more interesting stuff than potions. Because I stole more than I ever did in a FF game, and most of the stuff I get is just potions. Oh, well, it's still nice. Another relevant monster was the giant, black birds whose name I forgot. You can steal Elixirs(!) from them.

Oh, right, after Galura, I changed the relevant jobs. Lenna became a summoner (I didn't realize that I could actually buy the first three summons, and wasn't strong enough for Shiva, so Lenna just hit with her Ice Staff, or whatever it's name is. Galuf became a Berserker, for the time being, who also have a pretty great costume.

In another callback to FF III, when we enter the town of Karnak, we get captured by the guards of the castle. Well, only after we try to buy something, and it's not a perverted magical tree this time, but still. Get into new town, get thrown into prison. I like these little callbacks.

We get to know the new Cid, and are soon left out of the cell, because the Crystal still continues putting out power, despite Cids machine being turned off. The steam ship is near explosion, so we try to turn it off. It's a very cool looking dungeon, where you can see to the lower level in the background, when you are in an upper level. Still a really neat thing to see.

Someone in town mentioned that a specific monster would use Flash, when alone, which made it very easy to grab that blue spell. Nice! I actually got in and out two times, the first time because I wanted to save that I got the spell, the second time because I had no eye drops. Didn't need any.

Oh, right (again), I forgot to mention that I bought a Fire Staff, went back to Shiva and broke the thing. This made the fight, of course, trivial, and made Lenna instantly super powerful. It's also the first time, where I know that having a staff of a specific element equipped will increase the power of the corresponding magic. Which means a difference from 500 to 800, when summoning Shiva!

I completely forgot to make pictures of Liquid Flame, which is a shame, because he looks great, like all the other bosses. It also was probably the hardest fight I had since starting this whole project. Fire 2 is an instant kill for whoever is hit, and Flame (from the human form) did a lot of damage too. Having a Berserker made planning somewhat hard, because he just hit whenever, meaning that I would often get hit by two spells, one after the other. I got killed two times, before finally making it through. Needed to use a few of the High Potions and even Pheonix Downs, that I had found and stolen from monsters.

This here seems to be the game, where they really figured out how to use difficulty in these games. Honestly, I think FF I and II have only "fake" difficulty. These games are both really confusing and hard, if you don't know specific things. In FF I, you shouldn't waste spots for bad spells, you have to somehow know that the "Heal" equipment is actually really useful and that Ribbons are super useful, even if they don't show you how they protect you against spell damage. I'm not sure if any of these informations is in the manual, but without it, the game is way harder. I was turned off from FF I for a long time, because there seemed to be so much you had to learn, before you could play the game. Now that I know, it seems pretty easy. You will only die, if you don't know about the Heal equipment (because Potions aren't enough for the final dungeon) or due to cheap instant death or infinite paralyzation.

In FF II, I feel like it is easier not to screw up, but it also seems like if you don't focus your characters, they will become useless. If you do know sort-of how to develop your characters (in general, that you have to specialize) the game is pretty easy, even if you don't really break it.

FF III and IV are pretty easy games, even if III has a difficult start and end. But elsewise, there isn't too much of a challenge, if you fight every battle and look a bit closer at what the game tells you to do.

FF V is the first one to actually challenge me. Forza and Magisa, Galura and the Liquid Flame were all strong, challenging bosses. Even the random encounters aren't too trivial. But than, I'm restricting myself heavily, and my only heavy hitter couldn't be controlled and was pretty slow. Shiva actually did trivialize a lot of the enemies. With two black mages, Liquid Flame wouldn't have been much of a problem, I guess.

Anyway, we learn more about Galuf, sort of (a Werewolf recognized him), but than everything went bad and the Werewolf died. The following sequence is pretty intense, and the time is really well counted. I made it out with all the treasure, with only 30 secons to spare. Right when I started the boss battle, the music went into intensity-mode and got faster, which was scary and exciting. But Shiva made the battle trivial (as she did with the battles inside the castle, I even had to use an Ether, before fighting the boss). Summoners are really fun, guys. Oh, and Bartz picked up the Aero spell, which means he has now a straight-forward attack spell. Nice to see that one coming back from FF III, too.

There were some nice NPC-moments, with the queen in bed of the inn, talking about the encroaching darkness, and Cid being depressed about having created the machine that made the Crystal shatter. Or, at least he thinks so.

I also made the next class changes. The Berserker was fun, but it also was only a placeholder. For now, Galuf would be a Geomancer, and Lenna would take some time off to tame monsters. Which doesn't matter, I just gave her the !Summon skill. Dancer and Chemist still aren't unlocked, so Bartz will stay a Blue Mage and Faris a Thief for some more time.

 

[nosimpleway]

Monk's Brawl/Barefist/Martial Arts is indeed "Equip Fists". And if I'm not mistaken it too gives a Monk's Strength to whoever has it equipped.

Before the fight with Magissa you find King Tycoon's Mithril Helm that Magissa left out as bait. After the fight, check your inventory, you do indeed have a new Mithril Helm.

Very nearly every boss in the game has a gimmick that makes it tons easier or instantly wins the fight. Magissa is vulnerable to Silence and Forza can be Confused, if you have abilities to do those statuses. It helps in a 4JF more than vanilla, I think. Liquid Flame has a phase where it just self-heals, but it doesn't have much in the way of MP and letting it Fira itself for a while will disable its offensive magic in other forms. The boss on your way out of Karnak

Spoiler

can teach a Blue Mage Death Claw, which the next next boss in the library basement is vulnerable to.

Once you have your next transportation option, the sailing ship, you can reach a ton of stuff. One of them is the best grinding spot in the early part of the game,

Spoiler

an island in the big chain in the southwest that's vaguely shaped like a key. You run into groups of five Black Flames there, they're not terribly dangerous, one summon can often wipe them out, and since you're fighting a big group they give good EXP and cash in aggregate.

I'm not saying you need to grind specifically, but if you take some time to raise the cash, buying some Flame Rings/Coral Rings/Angel Rings from whatever store it is that sells them in the earlygame can make some otherwise tricky spots later much easier to handle, particularly for a game where you're self-imposed challenge running by limiting your job options.

Another island nearby has the

Spoiler

Prototype that isn't super great for EXP or money, but it's a sucker for !Control and drops Dark Matter. ...and foreshadowing.

 

[4-So]

My first exposure to FF5 was in the January 1994 issue of Nintendo Power where an 'Only In Japan' piece contained a small section on the game, showed a few screenshots, and in the blurb mentioned that the game would be released in the US as FF3. Of course, that never happened and we got FF6 instead. So, like many others, my real first exposure was via SNES emulator in the late 90s. Unfortunately, I remember very little about it. Likewise for the FF Anthology version on PSX; I may have played a few hours at most but it didn't click and I abandoned it.

About 5 years ago I decided to play the 'SNES FF Trilogy' again but this time the GBA versions. Using a guide from Caves of Narshe, I was able to finally make my way through it. I'll be the first to admit it doesn't come close to being my favorite FF, and I'm not sure I want to experience it again, but I'm glad I got through it at least once. It's a charming game with a killer soundtrack, a game that I appreciate far more from a mechanical view than any kind of narrative view. I also appreciate it as the 'missing link' between FF4 and FF6 re: stylistic/design choices.

Oh, and Gilgamesh is incredible.

 

[gorha]

The job system is what makes FFV an enduring classic. It brings back the breezy party reconfiguration of FFIII, makes it even breezier by removing the job adjustment period, and allows mixing and matching of abilities, making an enormous variety of party setups and strategies possible... and somehow, they even managed to make most of those strategies viable, without making the game too easy. I've tried new things every time I've played it, it's always felt rewarding to do, and I think I could play it many more times before that stopped being true.

For a long time, I bought into the idea of FFV being a game that lived or died by its job system and combat, and that was enough for me on its own. But about three years ago, I played IV and V back to back, and was really struck by how much more I enjoyed the characters and writing of V. I do think it was soon surpassed in those areas by FFVI, as well as VII & VIII, so I get that it has the reputation it does on the English-speaking part of the internet because we only played it after those games. In the context of the series, and indeed of RPGs in general, at the time it was made, though, it wasn't a game that sacrificed story for gameplay, but one that did everything remarkably well.

 

[FelixSH]

Monk's Brawl/Barefist/Martial Arts is indeed "Equip Fists". And if I'm not mistaken it too gives a Monk's Strength to whoever has it equipped.

Before the fight with Magissa you find King Tycoon's Mithril Helm that Magissa left out as bait. After the fight, check your inventory, you do indeed have a new Mithril Helm.

Very nearly every boss in the game has a gimmick that makes it tons easier or instantly wins the fight. Magissa is vulnerable to Silence and Forza can be Confused, if you have abilities to do those statuses. It helps in a 4JF more than vanilla, I think. Liquid Flame has a phase where it just self-heals, but it doesn't have much in the way of MP and letting it Fira itself for a while will disable its offensive magic in other forms. The boss on your way out of Karnak

Spoiler

can teach a Blue Mage Death Claw, which the next next boss in the library basement is vulnerable to.

Once you have your next transportation option, the sailing ship, you can reach a ton of stuff. One of them is the best grinding spot in the early part of the game,

Spoiler

an island in the big chain in the southwest that's vaguely shaped like a key. You run into groups of five Black Flames there, they're not terribly dangerous, one summon can often wipe them out, and since you're fighting a big group they give good EXP and cash in aggregate.

I'm not saying you need to grind specifically, but if you take some time to raise the cash, buying some Flame Rings/Coral Rings/Angel Rings from whatever store it is that sells them in the earlygame can make some otherwise tricky spots later much easier to handle, particularly for a game where you're self-imposed challenge running by limiting your job options.

Another island nearby has the

Spoiler

Prototype that isn't super great for EXP or money, but it's a sucker for !Control and drops Dark Matter. ...and foreshadowing.

Yeah, I don't want to grind at all. It worked for the first four games, would be a shame to start now. I will look back into old places, now that I have the Beastmaster, and take a look at what abilities the monsters have. Just for curiousity, I'd like to look for Blue Magic, and it's definitely how I would have done it, had I played this game as a kid. Just !Control every monster, and take a look. Won't be enough for the 50k, but I'm sure I will manage. And if not, I can always grind later on. I do know the great grinding spot in the basement of that castle in World 2, and if necessary, I will just grind up a specific job there. We'll see how it goes, I mainly want to take a look at the jobs that I normally don't use. If they don't work out, I might take another one. But the game seems flexible enough not to have to worry about that too much.

My first exposure to FF5 was in the January 1994 issue of Nintendo Power where an 'Only In Japan' piece contained a small section on the game, showed a few screenshots, and in the blurb mentioned that the game would be released in the US as FF3. Of course, that never happened and we got FF6 instead. So, like many others, my real first exposure was via SNES emulator in the late 90s. Unfortunately, I remember very little about it. Likewise for the FF Anthology version on PSX; I may have played a few hours at most but it didn't click and I abandoned it.

About 5 years ago I decided to play the 'SNES FF Trilogy' again but this time the GBA versions. Using a guide from Caves of Narshe, I was able to finally make my way through it. I'll be the first to admit it doesn't come close to being my favorite FF, and I'm not sure I want to experience it again, but I'm glad I got through it at least once. It's a charming game with a killer soundtrack, a game that I appreciate far more from a mechanical view than any kind of narrative view. I also appreciate it as the 'missing link' between FF4 and FF6 re: stylistic/design choices.

Oh, and Gilgamesh is incredible.

I feel like every FF fan should have played this game at least once, because Lokii is right: This game feels very quintessential FF to me. It is also an important step in the series, but than, that could be probably said about every game in the series.

Gilgamesh is, indeed, incredible.

The job system is what makes FFV an enduring classic. It brings back the breezy party reconfiguration of FFIII, makes it even breezier by removing the job adjustment period, and allows mixing and matching of abilities, making an enormous variety of party setups and strategies possible... and somehow, they even managed to make most of those strategies viable, without making the game too easy. I've tried new things every time I've played it, it's always felt rewarding to do, and I think I could play it many more times before that stopped being true.

I feel like this can't be said enough. It's such an amazing feat, that you can beat the game with each job combination. Or even each job in a solo challenge, without leveling up too much (except for Berserker, I guess). There are a ton of clever things that you can do, even if some of the weaker classes neccessitate some knowledge of the game (like that you should get Angel and Fire rings in the first world). If you are into systems, this game offers such a variety, it's amazing.

For a long time, I bought into the idea of FFV being a game that lived or died by its job system and combat, and that was enough for me on its own. But about three years ago, I played IV and V back to back, and was really struck by how much more I enjoyed the characters and writing of V. I do think it was soon surpassed in those areas by FFVI, as well as VII & VIII, so I get that it has the reputation it does on the English-speaking part of the internet because we only played it after those games. In the context of the series, and indeed of RPGs in general, at the time it was made, though, it wasn't a game that sacrificed story for gameplay, but one that did everything remarkably well.

The story just is less bombastic and epic than in the other FFs, I think. There is way more levity, and the interesting stuff are all these little character moments, of which you can miss some. I find this concept really fascinating - exploring towns and castles does give you additional equipment, but nothing too amazing has shown up yet (except the healing staff, which I can't use, I think). Instead, you get this little, sweet story beats. I love this concept, even if it means that many people probably miss out on some of the stuff.

 

[Peklo]

Yeah, he is a charmingly dumb guy. With the focus on charmingly, I like Bartz a lot.

He comes off as downright exceptional when sandwiched between the awful leading men of IV and VI, that's for sure. Another reason why V is quietly better about some aspects of writing compared to its peers that it's seldom acknowledged for.

Lenna is shot by one of Magisas poisoned arrows

This is an amazing sequence to me, not for its storyline significance (the procurement of King Tycoon's Mythril Helm as an actual piece of equipment is appreciated and subtle interweaving of narrative and mechanics, though, as pointed out above) but for how it exemplifies the game's great understanding of its narrative tools in the form of its visual assets with the character sprites, who for five games have retained their pixel dimensions despite advances in technology, and V does the most with them in terms of choreography, for what would end up being their last hurrah. In just a minute's span or less, we have 1) Lenna being struck with the arrow and falling down 2) the party being prevented from helping her by the mountain landsliding 3) Faris taking measure of the newly-created gap, winding back, and making the jump... and then plummeting down the cliffside, almost making it 4) despite Magissa's gloating, Faris scales a damn mountain through sheer gumption and pirate princess rectitude 5) immediately after making it back topside, she stages an impromptu, perfectly synchronized engineering feat with Bartz, hammering in a couple of posts on either side and fastening a tightrope for the latter and Galuf to cross the gap and finally confront Magissa for the boss battle proper.

All throughout this, the characters are reacting to each individual action, with subtle movements and repositioning or the very clear in message shocked leaps out of their skin. Final Fantasy V isn't a fun narrative just because of the lighthearted content that connects one plot event to the next, but because of how well and actively the storytelling is communicated on all levels of the production, and with the limited tools available. Sprite/polygonal model choreography would remain an enduring strength for the series, but again I think V was a landmark work in the field.

While this isn't a nice thing to do, I feel like the game just wants to make it clear that this is just friendly ribbing. I imagine Lenna trying to calm Bartz down, while the ride along. It should seem mean, when they laugh at him - but it just feels like they already know Bartzs boundaries, and know that getting some fun out of his fear doesn't overstep it. Maybe I'm being too generous here, but I just love when these people can laugh together, and have some fun.

This is a really important aspect of why I love V's cast as much as I do, especially coming off of IV (and honestly, going into VI). The lines drawn in gendered posturing and social roles are deeply and unavoidably carved in in those games whenever a group dynamic arises or as far as personal interactions go--men shutting down or doubting women; calling the shots over them; launching into action through the threat of losing them, or raging in denial and sorrow for having done so. It's really hard to believe sincerely in the "all-for-one" RPG staple moralizing and life lessons these games try to impart when the social dynamics and how people actually behave in them are so fundamentally out of step with that premise.

V is where I actually buy it, because outside of those stumbles early on that I mentioned, the group dynamic that evolves with the main quartet (plus one) is not built on personal strife that sows discord between them as an unified entity; they all take part in jokes at each other and their own expense, and laugh it off afterwards in good spirit. How many RPGs or video games are centrally defined by the shared laughter between their casts, in ways that are endearing instead of cringe-inducing? It's also worthwhile to note that these laugh tracks are ones that are often shared between all four of the party, directed at some other character or absurd situation; it's not a tool to drive in dividing lines between the men ridiculing the women or the other way around, rather it is again an act of solidarity that brings them together, which extends to all the other physical comedy the game engages in where it's gender-agnostic in who can and will appear ridiculous and take those pratfalls for laughs. I think because of how much the game emphasizes these shared reactions and parity in its treatment of the characters, many players come out of it with a read that the cast is flat, samey, and boring, whereas it's one of the crucial components for why I love the general treatment.

This is already a game that plays around with gender roles and presentation from the start: Faris presenting as a man to the characters and player both to start off with (3:1 men-to-women party ratio); then at least nominally claiming womanhood (2:2); and finally Galuf's exit and Krile's introduction (1:3). The game completely flips around its premise, and Faris alone can be read in whatever manner one so chooses in terms of gender identity, as that's all textually present in the character. You could reasonably call V a rare game in the series that is driven by women as much as the men, and in the matter of representation in the party makeup even overthrowing the status quo, but the most compelling and relevant read of it may be that it ascribes to equality in gendered treatment as much as it can.

We do find out, that Syldra was still alive! She saves us, but then goes back into the ocean to die. Poor Faris.

I think Syldra's wail is probably the most affecting and haunting sound effect these games ever managed, at least in the SNES years.

There is another place that you can totally miss - Tycoon castle, where Lenna is from. It's actually just behind the first meteor. It's another lovely place, and everyone is really happy to see Lenna again, including the chancellor (who is just a very nice guy). We get a bunch of stuff, and find some hidden places.

You are pointed to it rather directly by some NPCs a little later that Lenna showing up at Castle Tycoon would be a good idea, but yeah, this was definitely one of the optional segments in my mind when I highlighted them. It's just really solid scripting that you can slot it in at any point in the narrative after Hiryu is available and it fits right in, and it's not like the character development that occurs is irrelevant: Lenna straight up confronts Faris, knowing she's her long-lost sister. This is something really cool because a lot of times people bemoan that they've "figured out" a plot point before the characters have (regardless of if those characters have access to all the information narratively that the omniscient audience does) and are then made to watch whatever piece of media in question dance around the issue for however long, which gets read as poor writing from the impatient audience point of view that's in a hurry to "solve" stories like they're pieces of a puzzle. In here, Lenna shows that she already connected the dots on her own despite missing half the context; her sister's existence and identity is of more pressing concern to her than the player, no matter who they are, and it reflects in her actions and pro-active deduction.

The following sequence is pretty intense, and the time is really well counted. I made it out with all the treasure, with only 30 secons to spare.

The escape from Karnak Castle highlights one of the odd but definite strengths of the game: these are some really great castles in video games, probably the best in the series, even. There are many of them, and all of them have distinct layouts, themes and secrets. Castle Tycoon has the amazing view from the balcony the opening showcases, and which you can admire yourself on the return trip; Castle Walse features the elaborate aqueducts where Shiva makes her domain, cells, and the deathtrap cellar where Jackanapes roams; meanwhile Karnak Castle is one of the most memorable setpieces of the game where you're first tantalized on your first visit by the littered treasure strewn about and none of which is reachable for the Fire Crystal's out of control flames--this preview goes on to be your partial roadmap to that treasure when you're put into the position of amassing as much of it as you can manage under duress, against the clock to self-detonation of the premises. The game still has more to eke out of the shared tileset of what a castle environment in it is and can be, and despite those limitations always manages to make each of them feel unique and memorable for their own merits.

~~~
​

Job update: I'm a little farther than Felix's last update, and have rolled the dice on two more Job sets, even if the full fivesome from the Fire Crystal comes a little later. So now I have:

Lenna the Monk/Time Mage/Beastmaster
Bartz the Knight/Mystic Knight/Geomancer
Faris the Blue Mage/Summoner/Beastmaster
Galuf the Monk/Time Mage/Ranger

Pretty happy with how it's been going; the Barehanded pick-up from Monk greatly extends the general fire-and-forget usability of the mages in regular encounters, while Mystic Knight also gets a power boost from Knight's Two-handed. Now Beastmasters can Control enemies for those more elusive Blue spells, Summoners are as obscenely powerful as they are in regular play, and Geomancer is something I always want to use just because I love unpredictability and honestly the consequent unreliablity in RPGs, and this early on Gaia and bells are doing just fine in contributing to the damage too.

 

[nosimpleway]

I'd like to look for Blue Magic, and it's definitely how I would have done it, had I played this game as a kid. Just !Control every monster, and take a look. Won't be enough for the 50k, but I'm sure I will manage. And if not, I can always grind later on. I do know the great grinding spot in the basement of that castle in World 2, and if necessary, I will just grind up a specific job there.

If you want the castle basement in your back pocket as a grinding spot, you deffo want to go find some Blue Magic. Those Object d'Art are vulnerable to Level 5 Death. (Level 5 Death is also weak spot for a couple of tricky bosses later on, so...) Just make sure not everyone in your party is the same level when you go looking for that particular spell. I seem to remember I tend to hit the dungeon where enemies cast it for the first time around level 20 15, and have partywiped at least twice to it because I forgot it was going to be a problem.

I like Blue mages a lot in just about any game where they appear, so I'm resisting the urge to go "MAKE SURE YOU GO TO [PLACE] AND GET [SPELL] FROM [MONSTER]"

but instead

Before you go back to the Walse meteorite later on, head back to North Mountain, !Control a Gaelicat, and get it to cast Float on your group. I'm not sure how much I like the idea of one monster having a spell you don't have access to yet trivializing a completely different fight in a completely different place, it's either genius design rewarding trying everything or just a weird happy accident. I'm not sure which.

 

[nosimpleway]

Replayed the first third of the game, first as a party of Blue Mages, then as a party of Monks. Monks have utter crap magic power but that doesn't seem to matter much early on, so !Blue is surprisingly good as a secondary skill. Nothing like trading hits with an enemy until you get to low HP, then using Vampire to deal even more damage than your bare fists did and heal to full at the same time.

The only time I had to change party composition was outside the Ronkan Ruins, where the missile bays hit a couple guys with Confuse to open each fight. If I let the Confused members move, they KO someone. If I try to bonk them out of confusion, they get KOed because I just don't have a "gently tap" option in this party, whoops.

 

[dosboot]

I feel I just have to say I'm loving this thread, even though I've only been reading it so far. A warm thanks to all of you who are posting interesting thoughts in great detail.

 

[Peklo]

I'm in Galuf's world now.

• after following the game's prompts for a good while from the beginning, the introduction of the Fire-Powered Ship as transportation is the first instance of the game notably opening up from the sequence laid ahead of the player and providing meaningful exploratory tangents. IV was exceptional not only for the tradition that it superficially broke (omitting seafaring exploration and vessels entirely) but how the entire game was structured around the seemingly familiar trappings: there was almost nowhere to go besides the next plot event, nothing to see beyond the confines of the primary narrative. It's part of why I find IV's world as a space to explore and inhabit claustrophobic and uninteresting, and why V appears in stark contrast to it as it does have the "unimportant" nooks and corners of the world to chart as it goes along. You could go straight to the Crescent Island, but on the other side of the world the town of Jachol is there, and the surprisingly terrifying Jachol Cave; Istory lies far north and rumour has it a strange old man wanders its bordering forests... Even if you do stick to course, the Black Chocobo allows the discovery of Lix, pocketed in the middle of impassable mountains--a town one never needs to wander into, but which carries with it enormous sentimental import as it's where Bartz's roots lie and where his parents rest together. It's a lovely collection of scenes full of aching nostalgia, just waiting to be discovered at the player's own behest.

• as highly as I think of this game as a narrative experience and how focally women are featured in it in playable terms, that's not really the case elsewhere in the game's storytelling. Bartz's folks are deceased, yes, but it's Dorgann who's the Dawn Warrior with ties to the rest of the game's cast and the history of its world and conflicts--Stella exists in flashback for a hot second with only a streak of green hair to define her for a passing moment, suffering and dying from non-specific spasms in quick order, nothing else to her. Lenna and Faris's mother isn't even named or directly seen, only alluded to also being ill in their childhood with their father scouring the world for medical treatment--King Tycoon is contrastingly a major character and plot point in both sisters' development. Krile's parents are mentioned as having died while helping the Wind Drake population of their world--Galuf as her grandfather is the parental father figure in lieu of their passing. The Dawn Warriors are also all men. It's still a deeply patriarchal game as far as the emphasis of its big picture storytelling, often defaulting to stressing the emotional significance of men and their deeds while women go anonymously to their graves or aren't there at all, and I don't think Final Fantasy V invented or pioneered a single one of these narrative tendencies in its genre or in larger culture, but given the extreme influence of it as a model for Job System games going forward, it should be held responsible for perpetuating them all the same.

• speaking of Krile, she has probably the best character introduction in the series: rides an interdimensional meteor through the sky, explodes through a wall and shocks the spirit of the villain's malice out of King Tycoon with a dash of Thunder.

• on the topic of said villain, it's finally time to talk a little about Exdeath. He is my favourite in the role in the entire series; others might compare but they do not carry the inimitable qualities that elevate the performance here, and it's important to understand Exdeath as performance to begin with; throughout all of his screen time he exudes such joy in the act and art of villainy that it's impossible not to get caught up in his bombastic delights. Golbez is the obvious visual and chronological analogue to him, and the differences couldn't be clearer: Golbez was detached, formal and serious--he almost never laughed. Exdeath, like the heroes, is defined by laughter; he has a signature onomatopoeic touch for it ("mwa-haha") and it is not dignified in the least--make no mistake that with him we are dealing with a despot but one whose capacity for cruelty is matched by his propensity for figurative moustache-twirling scheming and plotting. From the word go he is declaiming demands such as PREPARE THE GIANT MIRROR as if it's just another day at the office, and you'd better believe this is someone who loves and lives for his work. The absurdities never really stop with Exdeath, and it's that mix of semi-comical levity, utter ruthlessness and alien inevitability that allows him to exist as a narrative force you're always wanting to see more of while giving him his due as a serious threat in the context of his world and story. All the humour that orbits around him is not rooted in strict comedic treatment, but rather in the contrast of playing all of it straight, no matter how outlandish the premise, which endows the character with gravitas no matter what he's doing: he takes hold of the story with startling tonal appropriateness, and is not an intruder upon the defining characteristics for the rest of it--instead, he's a testament to its cohesion.

• more of those delectable passing interludes: Castle Tycoon features additional storyline scenes for Lenna and Faris as soon as Hiryu can take you there, but did you know you can keep coming back for more? It's true! After significant events relating to the two, taking the worrywart Chancellor up on his offer to spend the night at the castle leads to conversations and flashbacks about them--the triggers are after Faris admits to their sisterhood, and after King Tycoon's death. They are very sweet shading on the pair's relationship, and yet another mark of how much the game wants to impress upon the player that this stuff exists for a reason--an emphasis which is easier to understand in context of how the preceding games operated and how V is a culmination and symbiosis of those approaches. III's characters existed as blank slates to facilitate their unlimited mechanical malleability, while IV fashioned those class concepts into reflections of individuals and archetypes; V cannot rely on the Jobs as shorthand and support for characterization, but neither does it want to return to the faceless avatars of years past. Thus, we have a defined cast existing independently of their statistical selves, with that inability to rely on mechanics as narrative leading to more in-depth textual treatment of the cast in turn, with more developed interiority and personal histories outside of the mechanical margins to compensate.

~~~
​

Jobs the final:

Lenna the Monk/Time Mage/Beastmaster/Samurai
Bartz the Knight/Mystic Knight/Geomancer/Dragoon
Faris the Blue Mage/Summoner/Beastmaster/Chemist
Galuf the Monk/Time Mage/Ranger/Dancer

Faris ended up with too many useful skillsets on one character, but not much to be done about that. Everyone synergizes reasonably well with themselves and each other.

 

[nosimpleway]

Krile grates on me. She's off-model with the rest of the cast in order to make her more totes adorbs, she can talk to moogles, and drakes, and chocobos, and the spirits of the departed, and her telepathy's so awesome she gets cute lil' headaches from Ghido calling her. She always has an answer at hand for whatever problem comes up.

 

[Peklo]

"Off-model", or consistent with the way the series has portrayed child characters up to this point in its sprite art. I think it's a great surprise that in dazzling the player with these dozens and dozens of sprite sets via the four playable characters through the majority of the game's duration, there's an unexpected fifth who inhabits an unique expression of that presentation at the eleventh hour, in just as much detail and flair.

Talking to animals is cool, and it's something basically the entire rest of the cast does too so I don't see a meaningful distinction. Even in the old old days, Guy spoke beaver and was a better character for it, and the interactions V's heroes have with their animal companions and other critters are consistently among good story beats here.

 

[FelixSH]

I feel I just have to say I'm loving this thread, even though I've only been reading it so far. A warm thanks to all of you who are posting interesting thoughts in great detail.

Thanks! I'm happy you enjoy it.

He comes off as downright exceptional when sandwiched between the awful leading men of IV and VI, that's for sure. Another reason why V is quietly better about some aspects of writing compared to its peers that it's seldom acknowledged for.

Bartz is one of my favourite leads, just because he doesn't take himself too serious, fitting to the game and the world. Except when he does (specifically: the visit to his Hometown).
I already talked about how I don't care much for Cecil, and, even when I played FF VI for the first time with 15 years, I never cared in any way, shape or form for Locke. But I will get to him, when I get to him.

This is an amazing sequence to me, not for its storyline significance (the procurement of King Tycoon's Mythril Helm as an actual piece of equipment is appreciated and subtle interweaving of narrative and mechanics, though, as pointed out above) but for how it exemplifies the game's great understanding of its narrative tools in the form of its visual assets with the character sprites, who for five games have retained their pixel dimensions despite advances in technology, and V does the most with them in terms of choreography, for what would end up being their last hurrah. In just a minute's span or less, we have 1) Lenna being struck with the arrow and falling down 2) the party being prevented from helping her by the mountain landsliding 3) Faris taking measure of the newly-created gap, winding back, and making the jump... and then plummeting down the cliffside, almost making it 4) despite Magissa's gloating, Faris scales a damn mountain through sheer gumption and pirate princess rectitude 5) immediately after making it back topside, she stages an impromptu, perfectly synchronized engineering feat with Bartz, hammering in a couple of posts on either side and fastening a tightrope for the latter and Galuf to cross the gap and finally confront Magissa for the boss battle proper.

It is really a great scene, and watching Faris climb the mountain always makes me happy. It's exciting, and seeing her and Bartz work so well together already that they are able to create a make-do bridge so efficiently is great. And just the way Magissa and Forza are characterized is fun, I like that this game shows us some regular humans who are just jerks.

Magissa also shows how magic is something that everyone in this world can use. That is partly also made clear through the shops, where you can buy magic. But seeing it is different.

I think because of how much the game emphasizes these shared reactions and parity in its treatment of the characters, many players come out of it with a read that the cast is flat, samey, and boring, whereas it's one of the crucial components for why I love the general treatment.

I find this point interesting, because, by now, the cast of V seems more in-depth and layered than the cast of IV ever does. Cecil and his party (because friends just doesn't work there), as well as their interaction, are mainly defined by tragedy, anger and grieve. They are, for good reason, deeply traumatized, but aside from some nice interactions between Rosa and Rydia, the main fives don't really joke with each other. They joke with the secondary cast, who is more lighthearted (the twins are great fun, as is Cid).

Granted, the cast of V is defined through cutscenes that are entirely missable. But seeing Bartz remember how he got scared of heights, or him visiting the grave of his mother, shines a new light on him. He still is the fun, goofy dork, but there is more to him. It just doesn't overwhelm him. The same with Faris, whose flashbacks are kind of heartbraking. It adds so much to see her looking forward to flying the first time on the Hiryuu, and than later seeing her running away from her father (damn, that was a sweet scene), because she is too scared to actually fly with him - only to change her mind, as soon as he is gone. But she is also, still, the adventure-loving pirate captain who will climb a mountain with her bare hands.

And even Lenna isn't just the nice, correctly raised princess with a soft heart for everyone. She also can make a good-natured joke at other people, or laugh at and with them. Plus, she is brighter than many other JRPG characters, being able to figure out that Faris is her sister, pretty soon.

By the way, I hope I'm not sounding like I want to hate on FF IV. I enjoyed the game a lot, and it is just a useful comparison between the two casts. Please tell me, if I'm too mean to it, I don't want to alienate anyone here.

This is something really cool because a lot of times people bemoan that they've "figured out" a plot point before the characters have (regardless of if those characters have access to all the information narratively that the omniscient audience does) and are then made to watch whatever piece of media in question dance around the issue for however long, which gets read as poor writing from the impatient audience point of view that's in a hurry to "solve" stories like they're pieces of a puzzle. In here, Lenna shows that she already connected the dots on her own despite missing half the context; her sister's existence and identity is of more pressing concern to her than the player, no matter who they are, and it reflects in her actions and pro-active deduction.

FF V does play with these tropes a bit. Like the fact that Lenna is a princess - yes, it is a twist, but instead of coming somewhere in the middle with great fanfare, we learn it 15 minutes into the game. Similar with her and Faris being sisters - it is made clear very soon, and the game can than take time to actually explore that a bit. It feels a bit like a deconstruction, but I'm not sure if that is the right word here. It certainly feels, like the game tried something more interesting with these tropes.

If you want the castle basement in your back pocket as a grinding spot, you deffo want to go find some Blue Magic. Those Object d'Art are vulnerable to Level 5 Death. (Level 5 Death is also weak spot for a couple of tricky bosses later on, so...) Just make sure not everyone in your party is the same level when you go looking for that particular spell. I seem to remember I tend to hit the dungeon where enemies cast it for the first time around level 20 15, and have partywiped at least twice to it because I forgot it was going to be a problem.

That was one of the more annoying spells to get, and I remember that I ALWAYS have some characters at level 15 there, which made this one of the rare spots where I had to grind a bit. Without a White Mage, reviving was just too expensive.

But yeah, got the spell. I was planning on using Softs on the Object d'Arts, but if they are vulnerable to Level 5 Death, all the better.

I like Blue mages a lot in just about any game where they appear, so I'm resisting the urge to go "MAKE SURE YOU GO TO [PLACE] AND GET [SPELL] FROM [MONSTER]"

I have a lot of trouble NOT looking up where to get all these spells. I actually did look around a bit, but I don't really want to actually get out of my way to get these spells, just because. I will just carry on, and look what I get. I know most Blue Magic spells anyway, when I see them (at least up to now), so it's not too hard. I already have more the ten, I think.

Before you go back to the Walse meteorite later on, head back to North Mountain, !Control a Gaelicat, and get it to cast Float on your group. I'm not sure how much I like the idea of one monster having a spell you don't have access to yet trivializing a completely different fight in a completely different place, it's either genius design rewarding trying everything or just a weird happy accident. I'm not sure which.

I knew that trick from Sullas Solo challenges, except that I thought it was a blue spell. Well, it wasn't, but still trivialized the fight against Titan. Also, the Gaelicat might be my favourite monster desing. A cat with strapped-on wings, that actually flies. It's a great, dumb design, and fits so well into this world.

• on the topic of said villain, it's finally time to talk a little about Exdeath. He is my favourite in the role in the entire series; others might compare but they do not carry the inimitable qualities that elevate the performance here, and it's important to understand Exdeath as performance to begin with; throughout all of his screen time he exudes such joy in the act and art of villainy that it's impossible not to get caught up in his bombastic delights. Golbez is the obvious visual and chronological analogue to him, and the differences couldn't be clearer: Golbez was detached, formal and serious--he almost never laughed.

I remember Exdeath and Golbez as pretty similar, just because their in-battle sprites seem strongly related - both giant men in heavy, detailed armor, with no face or generally sign of humanity to be seen.

But even when you first meet him, he feels immediately different. He still does feel like Golbez, but like the goofier, funnier take on him, that befits FF Vs world. And even with that short bit, it feels now clearer to me how we got to Kefka. Both share this pure joy in being EVIL, that I enjoy so much in my villains.

Jobs the final:

Lenna the Monk/Time Mage/Beastmaster/Samurai
Bartz the Knight/Mystic Knight/Geomancer/Dragoon
Faris the Blue Mage/Summoner/Beastmaster/Chemist
Galuf the Monk/Time Mage/Ranger/Dancer

Faris ended up with too many useful skillsets on one character, but not much to be done about that. Everyone synergizes reasonably well with themselves and each other.

This looks like a very fun party, and one where everyone can single-handedly destroy the game. Samurai has Zeninage, Knights and Mystic Knights are physical monsters, Blue Magic, Summoning Magic and both Drink and Mix are amazing abilities. Galuf seems to be the weakest, but Time Magic is super great and fun too. That looks like a really fun setup.

------------------------------------------------

To get to my own playthrough, I continued on from the exploded steamship and Karnak Castle.

The next point of interest was the Ancient Library. The monsters here were pretty good for Blue Magic - I got that song that made everyone in the party go Berserk, and Level 5 Death, which I already put to good use - more on that later. I had a lot of trouble actually getting this spell - my Blue Mage was on the right level, but reviving was expensive, and it was hard to make sure that he was revived, and not immediately killed again.

The weird books with monsters in them, together with the fact that this is a facility that probably also researches magic, reminded me of Ankh-Morporks Unseen University, where they have magic books that have to be chained to their book cases. In one of them, we find Ifrit, who I'm still sad about that you need him to progress. I would find it more fun, if you could just skip him, because I like it when you can find stuff by exploring.

Also interesting was, that this dungeon seems designed for the summoner and the Geomancer. The Geomancer always summoned Will-o-Wisps, which seem to be fire-elemental, and therefore highly effective. And the Summoner probably just got Shiva, who is very useful against Ifrit, who in turn is very useful against Byblos. Thanksfully, because near death, Byblos starts going all in and nearly killed me. Unfortunately, the Magic Hammer didn't hit Bartz, my Blue Mage.

There are also two funny scenes in here. The first happens, when Ifrit threatens the jerk-bookcase that doesn't want to let me pass. The second is when we meet Mid, who was not only so absorbed in his work that he didn't realize that there were monsters EVERYWHERE, but also knows a secret spot between the books, that let him get back to the main hall of the library, while everyone thinks he is in danger. Relly goofy, fun stuff.

We see Mid motivate Cid, which in turn sparks some of Galufs memories for Kryle. And soon, we get our first ship.

I used the opportunity for a detour. It's really nice how you can find two completely optional places - Istory can be completely skipped, but is a very fun place. Bartz has to be a jerk to a sheep (he seems to enjoy poking it), so he gets kicked over the fence, where a bard awaits to teach us a song. It reminds me of the town in FF III, where they raise Chocobos and have a ton of Gysahl Greens. We also learn about an old man in the woods. Hmmm...

We go there immediately, of course, and find Ramuh. Hard, but straight-forward battle. But even here, we get some more characterization - he and Ifrit seem to be rivals. And with that, Lennah could summon the three main elements.

There is also Jakohl, which is even more optional than Istory, but has Coral Swords and Mage Mashers. There is also a cave nearby, that is mainly looted, except for a handful of chests that are deeper inside. It has two enemies to offer - the adorable, harmless Nut Eater, who dies if you look at him funny, and the horrifying Skull Eater, who looks the same, except gray, and will probably eat your skull. Thankfully, the thief can always flee, but I still always lost one person. Except if the Skull Eater fled - then he would sometimes even be seen as defeated, and I would get 5 JP. At one point, you can even climb a wall and get out at another place, which is closed in by mountains. I wonder if this was inspiration for the place in FF IX near the start, where you can climb out of a dungeon to an enclosed space, where you can fight dragons that are way too strong for you (except if you know what you are doing).

After these side-quests, we get to Crescent, where we immediately loose our new ship (and get made fun of, by one of the people there). But thankfully, we find a Chocobo forest with a Black Chocobo. In reference to FF II, I think, we play a harder version of catch with it than in III and IV, and than try to fly. Which was a very funny scene - the music starts, slows down together with the Chocobo, and stops - the bird and Bartz fall down, and we find two Crystal shards in it's feathers. It was a really cute scene, Chocobos are great. With him, we can get back to the Ancient Library to get Mid and Cids help. Who tell us, that they found King Tycoon, who is beyond the Desert.

They help us cross it (the Sandworm survived exactly one Aqua Breath, which I got beforehand) and than died to the next attack. Blue Magic is great!

In the ruins to the South, we play Hide'n'Seek with King Tycoon, one of the most memorable scenes to me, for some reason - I always remember it as being in IV, for some reason. We fall into some ruins below ground, and get teleportet to ruins below Crescent, where Mid and Cid are looking around the Chocobo Forest.

There is a fun puzzle in one of the rooms, where we find a button, but instead of pressing it we read a note. This leads us through the room, to a not that says "The monkey always looks", which makes Bartz grumpy.

There is an old airship inside, and Mid and Cid help us make it fly again. We get attacked by Crayclaw, who was actually a bit of a problem, because I forgot to give Lennah !Summon, and had no one else with a decent attack.

With the airship, we can reach Bartz' hometown Lix, another totally optional area that I already talked about. The backflashes there are very nice. I also learned (through Peklo) about the new scene in Tycoon Castle.

When flying over the ruins, a flying fortress rises out of the ground. To get up there (it has the Crystal), we needed a way to make the airship fly higher, which we did with Adamantium. The Adamantium Turtle (cutely translated as AdamanTiMi) was vulnerable to the Blue Magic spell Flash, which made it miss nearly all the time. I later learned that Level 5 Death would have worked too. Blue Magic is really fun!

Sol Cannon wasn't really a challenge, because the Geomancers Gale Cut and the powered-up Ramuh made me win the fight in time. But it was pretty close, without a White Mage, the healing just wasn't sufficient.

The Fortress itself, which were just more ruins, was a very cool-looking dungeon with nice design. I also finally got White Wind, which meant that I had finally a good healing option (right in time when I would get the Chemist, who will be my main healer). The boss whose name I can't spell, was challenging, and without Blue Magic, it would have been a roadblock. With no strong physical attacker and immunity to Gale Cut and Magic in general, I had no idea how to deal with that. Except that I had, thankfully, Level 5 Death. As I said, no idea what I would have done there without that spell, especially considering how hard that thing hit.

We reach the last Crystal, and learn that the King (who was a jerk, just before) is possessed. Lennah and Faris won't allow Bartz and Galuf to attack, while he wants to attack us. Just in that moment, a new meteor comes crashing in, and Kryle attacks with a bolt, making King Tycoon hit the ground and get normal again.

But the Crystal still shatters, and the seal breaks. And with that, joyfully evil Exdeath appears, and seems super powerful. Galuf and Kryle follow him to their world. Bartz, Lennah and Faris soon decide to follow him, which means we have to visit the other three meteors for energy mcguffins.

For Titan, I got levitate from the flying cat monsters, as mentioned above. I died one time against the Chimera Brain, because that thing hits HARD. But it is also vulnerable to Missile, which takes 3/4 of HP, I think. And the six bombs got put low on health with one cast of Titan and one Aqua Breath - then I just waited for the four that didn't die to blow themselves up.

That's more or less were I stopped, except for the fact that I finally got my final jobs. Bartz became a Dancer with Blue Magic (he already mastered the Blue Mage) and Faris became a Chemist. I missed five JP for the next job level, which I grinded to learn Mix!. And then, I started some tests.

You know how people think that you need the Internet, to find out how to use Mix! effectively? That's completely untrue. I just spent some time in battle, and tried out all the mixable options, writing down the results in a table. Granted, I used a savestate inside the Mix-Command, but even on original hardware, I would have just spent an hour trying all the mixes out. There is no possibility of wasting stuff, only the ingrediants that will create results are available, everything else is grayed out. I even had one Dragon Fang and one Dark Matter, so the only combinations I don't know is, when I mix two Dragon Fangs or two Dark Matters. And there are a handful of mixes that I don't understand. What is the difference between Resurrection and Reincarnation, for example? What does a Panacea (I guess it heals every possible status ailment?)? Does Split Shell reduce defense? I already learned that Drain Kiss is easily created and completely overpowered.

Also, Dark Potion (Potion + Dark Matter) heals exactly 666 HP, which made me laugh).

So, yeah, the only thing that holds the Chemist back is the need to grind for ressources and the fact that Dragon Fangs and Dark Matters seem to be pretty rare.

Oh, and I saw the scene where Faris is too scared to accompany her father on the Hiryuu, as a child. As I said, very good scene.

Well, that's all for today.

 

[4-So]

By the way, I hope I'm not sounding like I want to hate on FF IV. I enjoyed the game a lot, and it is just a useful comparison between the two casts. Please tell me, if I'm too mean to it, I don't want to alienate anyone here.

I do feel like my favorite Final Fantasy is getting dunked on a little bit but I don't feel alienated or anything. I don't want "I have some problems with your favorite thing" to be misconstrued as always negative. I understand there is a compare and contrast thing happening here between FF4 and FF5 and they are fairly different games in many ways.

Exdeath as a prototype Kefka totally tracks. I lament the loss of the Maniacal Evil Guy in FF. Not that you need that every time but I think it's overdue.

 

[nosimpleway]

"Archaeoaevis". It's a good word to remember if you have a rack with only vowels on it in your next game of Scrabble.

Skull Eaters are weak to anything !Gaia can hit them with where you find them. They can also be !Controlled and commanded to eat their own skull, which is a neat trick. (If you're in the second world this is somewhat moot, you'll see them again later but by then you're leveled so that their massive defense isn't completely impenetrable anymore.) If you can land a hit that does damage but doesn't kill them, they summon five buddies, which is helpful if you really need to move your bowels. The group is worth 10 AP if you win.

Once you're in the third world the cave near Jachol does indeed lead to a pretty good and popular grinding spot. Now that I think about it, weren't the Grand Dragons in FF9 also vulnerable to Level 5 Death? I seem to remember always cruising over to the islands on the west side of the map for a Zombie Whale once I got the Blue Narcisse before doing any Grand Dragon grind.

Dark Matters always (I think) drop from Exdeath Souls, which you can find with no difficulty at all a little later on. They have 20,000 HP and no tricks to exploit except a weakness to Holy damage, so it's not easy to farm them, but you can.

The third world seems kind of dull overall and this thread helped me pinpoint why: there are virtually no more little character vignettes. You get to see Exdeath go "Mwa-ha-ha!" as he sics his monsters on you a couple of times, but apart from Phoenix Tower there aren't any more flashbacks and very little in the way of in-party character interaction once you get the team back together post-Pyramid.

Also the Pyramid is the worst. Just the worst.

When I first played the PSX release I decided that the Deep-Sea Trench was a good grinding spot, since everything there is vulnerable to Requiem and you can blast through encounters without burning MP. Later playthroughs just make me wonder how I was ever that patient since they don't seem to actually be all that good sources of EXP, cash, or AP.

Anyone playing the GBA version, remember that a Quicksave sets the RNG such that upon restarting your second fight will be with the rarest monster available in the area. It's good for finding Movers at the end of the game, and Stingrays as soon as you can handle fighting Stingrays.

 

[Peklo]

By the way, I hope I'm not sounding like I want to hate on FF IV. I enjoyed the game a lot, and it is just a useful comparison between the two casts. Please tell me, if I'm too mean to it, I don't want to alienate anyone here.

If this was an actual problem with anyone I'd be thrown off the forum! I'm sure no one minds; the point and joy of this project is to get multiple perspectives, and maybe some lesser voiced ones on material the userbase of this forum is well familiar with. Criticism is always a part of interacting with media you care about.

It adds so much to see her looking forward to flying the first time on the Hiryuu, and than later seeing her running away from her father (damn, that was a sweet scene)

The other Tycoon siblings reminiscence is a particular favourite, with little Sarisa putting tiny Lenna to bed, babbling excitedly about her oncoming big day and outing with only toddler noises to answer her. Her tutor Jenica wonders where Sarisa's dawdling at, and the answer's as expected as it is heartwarming: she's joined her younger sister in dream land, having pushed their beds together.

But even when you first meet him, he feels immediately different. He still does feel like Golbez, but like the goofier, funnier take on him, that befits FF Vs world. And even with that short bit, it feels now clearer to me how we got to Kefka. Both share this pure joy in being EVIL, that I enjoy so much in my villains.

The evolution and influence between them is one I also recognize, but in contrast to Exdeath, I don't enjoy Kefka at all--he's likely my least favourite villain in the series. But we'll talk about that later, maybe.

~~~
​

Another play update for me, and with the worlds having merged, a lot has happened since last time, but I think I would just like to focus on one thing: Galuf's death.

art by ナンポウ​

Player character deaths aren't anything new to Final Fantasy even just five games in; it's always engaged in the practice for dramatic weight any time the games have featured defined individuals instead of blank slate avatars. II killed so many of its secondary cast that they served as the basis for the later additional scenario where they reconvened in the afterlife, attaining closure for themselves that was denied them previously. IV is infamous for its similar killer instinct, where the heroic self-sacrifices roll in at dizzying frequency that reaches farcical levels at the very least when most of them are waved off and undone. Only one death of a cast member in IV sticks, that being Tellah--and it's not an accidental distinction.

Tellah is most remembered for his contributions to either the game's memetic reputation through memorable localization, or the way his existence as a set of game mechanics crystallizes that keen eye for liminal, holistic detail that IV possesses and bolsters its storytelling with. As a character in the narrative on purely textual terms, he's pathetic and uncomfortable for the violently possessive love that he exhibits toward his daughter, the loss of whom then turns his arc to self-destructive vengeance in return. Tellah is completely consumed by his need to make Anna's death mean something, however warped and egotistical his reasoning, and the inevitability of his obsession is one of the better realized arcs in the game: you know where it's going to end from the start, and Tellah does too--he just doesn't care or value his own life anymore, and there's nothing the player or his allies can do to dissuade him from that twisted resolution. Tellah's death is the first of its kind in Final Fantasy, where a party member willingly invites their own death not for the altruistic common goal, but solely to satisfy their own need for retribution, regardless of the cost. The game, to its credit, does not frame Tellah's actions as just even if they are in a way justified, at least in his own mind; it's for the crossing over of that moral threshold that his death is treated as final, and he only briefly appears at the climax of the game thereafter, no uplifting revival spared for him. The finality of his death symbolically balances the scales that previously tarnished the heroism of the game's cast.

The importance in understanding Tellah's circumstances is made relevant when attempting to parse what happens with Galuf in V, and what is shared between the two characters. They are the same age, and both the oldest party members of their respective games (save the odd moon man). They both face their towering, armour-clad nemeses in dramatic scripted battles, and meet their ends thus. They're both nominally fighting for the sake of their daughters or granddaughters. The inclination might be to discount V on this basis, for so flagrantly repurposing a memorable character setpiece from a game that built its identity around such things. And yet, the tone and context of the scenes and ultimately, the characters involved, could not be more different and complementary through contrast.

Galuf's elemental crystal essence that he embodies is "hope", and that alone sets him far apart from Tellah, whose life from the little we can glean from IV's characterization, seemed sad and embittered, having estranged the family left to him before the player even meets him, and is then consumed by further loss. His entire screen presence, Tellah is walking toward and arguably seeking his own death, finding nothing to live for after Anna's passing; Galuf meanwhile never gives up--not on his friends, not his duty, not his family, not his world. Tellah joins Cecil's retinue because their goals happen to align and he needs the practical assistance; he is never shown bonding with particularly anyone and remains abrasive at all times--he is not planning for the future. Galuf is separated from his traveling companions and comrades by generations, but he levels with them, gets to know them, forms friendships and emotional ties with them, and they become peers. This is what's represented in the text and supported further by how V's cast define themselves mechanically, in that they don't, at all--everyone begins from the same state, and they grow together rather than apart, in all senses of the word.

So with this as the basis for the character, it's not with hatred or revenge in his heart that Galuf is roused to meet Exdeath head-on, despite knowing what will inevitably befall him for the act: it's to save his actively imperiled granddaughter Krile, who in turn had saved him just moments before; he's safeguarding a young life, not clinging to the memory of one and using it as rationalization for his own deeds. Galuf has spent much of his life across the last thirty years fighting against this one unkillable adversary, but he is never shown to be altered fundamentally by that struggle in ways that aren't true to himself; he remains an uplifting goof until the end. The nature of that end, of course, also matters.

When Tellah faced Golbez, we were forced into the role of a completely passive audience: Tellah wrested control of the game from the player in his rage, all of which proved futile in the end. There's nothing you can do but watch the scene play out as it was set to do since long before, and it's an exhalation bordering on relief when it finally concludes the only way it could. With Galuf and Exdeath, the circumstances are reversed: we still inhabit Galuf's actions in the same language we have until now, and it's the grandiose villain who's cornering the diminutive hero with the same calling cards of magical might seen in that prior encounter: the high-end elements, Flare, Holy, even Meteor. Galuf endures them all, rejecting the limitations of game mechanics and interface, still standing at no health left, and instead of serving to showcase the implacability of the major villain, it's Exdeath who recoils in fear and astonishment at the willpower and endurance of his foe, suffering the symbolic defeat in turn. That we remain in control of Galuf through this scene, as scripted as it is, speaks to the aspirational qualities of the act and the need to be present with Galuf in his time of need, whereas it wasn't proper to conflate the player and the character with Tellah's last stand, nor to subject the audience to his downfall at too intimate a distance.

Tellah and Galuf both die in confronting their archenemies in similar framing, but they both serve totally opposing narrative ends arrived at through the same base ingredients, mixed to a very distinct and differing end recipe. When Tellah passes, he's mourned by those present, but it's met with resignation amidst his own last gasps of regret, the conclusion long foregone. Galuf's departure is more wounding because his character believed in a tomorrow and his final actions were to ensure a dawn, and that comes across in the group's desperate, flailing attempts to throw every trick in the Job book at his ailing frame--Curagas, Phoenix Downs, Elixirs, anything at all. It's sad because they lose someone they genuinely cared about, and maybe the player did too, but as a last bittersweet consolation, Galuf is allowed to bequeath his legacy to Krile, and speak to her reassuringly from beyond--immediately signaling that whatever powers there are in V's world think highly of the manner of his demise, granting him favour in return. Personally, I'm inclined to agree with that estimation.