IT WASN'T!!!!!
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It's a Great Big World of Final Fantasy Out There
- Thread starter gogglebob
- Start date
Chapter 21-3: Back to The Grind
Initial Stream: 11/16/20
00:00 – Alright, that's a load of stupid sidequests out of the way. Let's see about doing some PLOT
02:00 – "I don't think ASIMO has religion."
ALSO 02:00 – So I THINK this is the story's BIG reveal, as the anime teens are trying to appear serious and the FF7 OC is expositing all over the place. I'm too busy reporting a bot in Gogglebob's chat to notice.
05:30 – I HOPE YOU DIE.
09:00 – I stand by my theory that Robert Dhal became a Children's Author just to give himself an outlet for his deep-set urge to MURDER CHILDREN.
10:19 – Anime brother just teleported away anime sister because he couldn't help but try the handprint scanner. He then freaks the fuck out because he thought he murdered his sister. His sister, who's totally fine, decides to let him sweat it out for a little bit. Anyway that how the game tells us this dungeon has teleport mechanics.
18:00 – To all aspiring rappers: it's okay to sell out as long as you make it apparent you do not give a shit about the product, and are only doing it for the money.
XX:XX – GOD THIS DUNGEON IS FUCKING BORING.
23:10 – Caliscrub joins us! His mic has NEVER worked upon joining a call EVER!
25:10 – Oh damn they made it to the evil castle.
WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED IN THE PLOT?
Nothing. Literally nothing. The fuck you want from me.
Initial Stream: 11/16/20
00:00 – Alright, that's a load of stupid sidequests out of the way. Let's see about doing some PLOT
02:00 – "I don't think ASIMO has religion."
ALSO 02:00 – So I THINK this is the story's BIG reveal, as the anime teens are trying to appear serious and the FF7 OC is expositing all over the place. I'm too busy reporting a bot in Gogglebob's chat to notice.
05:30 – I HOPE YOU DIE.
09:00 – I stand by my theory that Robert Dhal became a Children's Author just to give himself an outlet for his deep-set urge to MURDER CHILDREN.
10:19 – Anime brother just teleported away anime sister because he couldn't help but try the handprint scanner. He then freaks the fuck out because he thought he murdered his sister. His sister, who's totally fine, decides to let him sweat it out for a little bit. Anyway that how the game tells us this dungeon has teleport mechanics.
18:00 – To all aspiring rappers: it's okay to sell out as long as you make it apparent you do not give a shit about the product, and are only doing it for the money.
XX:XX – GOD THIS DUNGEON IS FUCKING BORING.
23:10 – Caliscrub joins us! His mic has NEVER worked upon joining a call EVER!
25:10 – Oh damn they made it to the evil castle.
WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED IN THE PLOT?
Nothing. Literally nothing. The fuck you want from me.
Chapter 21-4: We're still doing this, huh.
Initial Stream: 11/16/20
00:00 – You know when we got to the EVIL CASTLE at the end of the last video I sort of assumed SOMETHING would happen. I was wrong.
ALSO 00:00 – Caliscrub regails us with tales of the noise complaint he got from his neighbors. Apparently he got very excited about street fighter and his neighbors were like THAT'S NOT ALLOWED. Caliscrub's neighbors suck.
00:57 – Greatest tweet of all time.
10:20 – "Please respect the jargon, Cali. They're called FUCKOS."
14:00 – Don't even talk to us if you don't know about Street Sharks Season 4.
20:00 – For a brief moment, we all break kafabe and admit that we're actually glad we started this hell project because it allows a regular human connection in these trying times. Then we all dive right back into talking shit about eachother and about this game, which is bad.
XX:XX – At some point between the prior timestamp and the next timestamp, we talked about THE WORST WEBCOMIC. I'm not telling you the time, or the webcomic, because I want it to be a surprise.
30:00 – Caliscrub asks if we can tell where we are in the dungeon. We cannot. This game is bad.
40:30 – Oh shit, an actual cutscene! The horrible Mascot character is weak to the aura of the bad guys or something, so it leaves. Thank god.
53:00 – ACTUAL PLOT RELEVANT CUTSCENE TIME! Turns out the dude with the dumb mask and the knight with all the feathers were...
57:30 – ...THE ANIME TEENS PARENTS!!! DUN DUNN DUNNNNNNNN!!!!! Oh also we killed them. and froze our older system or our aunt or whatever the white haired lady's deal is inside a crystal. like a piece of shit wizard.
1:04:00 – FINAL BOSS TIME!
1:07:00 – Final boss did that JRPG bullshit where you totally won but once his HP's at zero he's like HAHA I WAS ONLY PRETENDING TO LOSE YOU CAN NEVER DEFEAT ME LOL. It's a bad video game. This causes Anime boy to crystal the bad guy AND ALSO HIMSELF. Everyone's dead or dead-adjacent except Anime girl... ROLL CREDITS.
WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED IN THE PLOT?
Turns out the Anime Teens caused all the problems. They fixed all the problems, except doing so killed them. Everyone is dead and/or sad. This is the final update, there definitely won't be any more updates after this one because the game is over forever and ever.
Initial Stream: 11/16/20
00:00 – You know when we got to the EVIL CASTLE at the end of the last video I sort of assumed SOMETHING would happen. I was wrong.
ALSO 00:00 – Caliscrub regails us with tales of the noise complaint he got from his neighbors. Apparently he got very excited about street fighter and his neighbors were like THAT'S NOT ALLOWED. Caliscrub's neighbors suck.
00:57 – Greatest tweet of all time.
10:20 – "Please respect the jargon, Cali. They're called FUCKOS."
14:00 – Don't even talk to us if you don't know about Street Sharks Season 4.
20:00 – For a brief moment, we all break kafabe and admit that we're actually glad we started this hell project because it allows a regular human connection in these trying times. Then we all dive right back into talking shit about eachother and about this game, which is bad.
XX:XX – At some point between the prior timestamp and the next timestamp, we talked about THE WORST WEBCOMIC. I'm not telling you the time, or the webcomic, because I want it to be a surprise.
30:00 – Caliscrub asks if we can tell where we are in the dungeon. We cannot. This game is bad.
40:30 – Oh shit, an actual cutscene! The horrible Mascot character is weak to the aura of the bad guys or something, so it leaves. Thank god.
53:00 – ACTUAL PLOT RELEVANT CUTSCENE TIME! Turns out the dude with the dumb mask and the knight with all the feathers were...
57:30 – ...THE ANIME TEENS PARENTS!!! DUN DUNN DUNNNNNNNN!!!!! Oh also we killed them. and froze our older system or our aunt or whatever the white haired lady's deal is inside a crystal. like a piece of shit wizard.
1:04:00 – FINAL BOSS TIME!
1:07:00 – Final boss did that JRPG bullshit where you totally won but once his HP's at zero he's like HAHA I WAS ONLY PRETENDING TO LOSE YOU CAN NEVER DEFEAT ME LOL. It's a bad video game. This causes Anime boy to crystal the bad guy AND ALSO HIMSELF. Everyone's dead or dead-adjacent except Anime girl... ROLL CREDITS.
WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED IN THE PLOT?
Turns out the Anime Teens caused all the problems. They fixed all the problems, except doing so killed them. Everyone is dead and/or sad. This is the final update, there definitely won't be any more updates after this one because the game is over forever and ever.
Turn those Corners Up 1: LOL JK
Initial Stream: 11/16/20
00:00 – IT WAS A CLEVAR DECEPTION!!!!! Did you think the game was over? I sure did!
02:30 – I HOPE YOU WOAH DEJA VU
Okay for real, it's kind of genuinely clever how the BAD END RESET takes the form of Anime Girl basically bargaining with God to get a do-over. Sort of like if the good end of undertale played out in the text instead of just being subtext. 6/10 for being kind of clever almost. Also apparently the COST of getting a do-over was the horrible mascot's life! So 8/10!
08:40 – Hey it's our aunt or our sister or our older friend that we trapped inside a cube or some shit. I guess we're gonna try and be like "Hey... our bad" this time? Whatever. We're talking about The X-Men Movies. Logan is so fucking good, holy shit.
15:00 – I am forcing you to become aware of the greatest new word. BAHAMUDONK. You have been enlightened. You're welcome
17:00 – So it turns out the amazing timeline-saving thing we need to do to PROPERLY PREPARE for the final battle so it doesn't go to hell is... pick all the good end items from a menu. The first one is bad Bahamut or maybe good Bahamut who cares. I'm talking about how the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy fucked up so badly at the finish line it retroactively poisoned the whole thing. Fuck you JJ Abrams.
25:00 – I'm not sure where this Giant Robot came from, and honestly I'm afraid to ask.
35:40 – That boss fight took around 15 minutes and Gogglebob was literally sitting on the fast forward button the whole time. This is a bad video game.
39:00 – I got distracted by real-time models of the solar system, which caused Gogglebob to continue into the next bullshit sidequest, dragging out the length of this video. I'm sorry.
49:00 – Yeah the entire chat is at the "oh god let it end already" point.
AND THEN WE JUST TALKED ABOUT RANDOM SHIT UNTIL IT ENDED.
WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED IN THE PLOT?
Anime Teen girl sacrified the mascot for a reset. Then the teens met up with the... relative(?) they killed(??) earlier, figure out that they have to do a lot of sidequests to get the good ending, and start by fighting visually identical dragons FOR FUCKING EVER.
Initial Stream: 11/16/20
00:00 – IT WAS A CLEVAR DECEPTION!!!!! Did you think the game was over? I sure did!
02:30 – I HOPE YOU WOAH DEJA VU
Okay for real, it's kind of genuinely clever how the BAD END RESET takes the form of Anime Girl basically bargaining with God to get a do-over. Sort of like if the good end of undertale played out in the text instead of just being subtext. 6/10 for being kind of clever almost. Also apparently the COST of getting a do-over was the horrible mascot's life! So 8/10!
08:40 – Hey it's our aunt or our sister or our older friend that we trapped inside a cube or some shit. I guess we're gonna try and be like "Hey... our bad" this time? Whatever. We're talking about The X-Men Movies. Logan is so fucking good, holy shit.
15:00 – I am forcing you to become aware of the greatest new word. BAHAMUDONK. You have been enlightened. You're welcome
17:00 – So it turns out the amazing timeline-saving thing we need to do to PROPERLY PREPARE for the final battle so it doesn't go to hell is... pick all the good end items from a menu. The first one is bad Bahamut or maybe good Bahamut who cares. I'm talking about how the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy fucked up so badly at the finish line it retroactively poisoned the whole thing. Fuck you JJ Abrams.
25:00 – I'm not sure where this Giant Robot came from, and honestly I'm afraid to ask.
35:40 – That boss fight took around 15 minutes and Gogglebob was literally sitting on the fast forward button the whole time. This is a bad video game.
39:00 – I got distracted by real-time models of the solar system, which caused Gogglebob to continue into the next bullshit sidequest, dragging out the length of this video. I'm sorry.
49:00 – Yeah the entire chat is at the "oh god let it end already" point.
AND THEN WE JUST TALKED ABOUT RANDOM SHIT UNTIL IT ENDED.
WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED IN THE PLOT?
Anime Teen girl sacrified the mascot for a reset. Then the teens met up with the... relative(?) they killed(??) earlier, figure out that they have to do a lot of sidequests to get the good ending, and start by fighting visually identical dragons FOR FUCKING EVER.
Turn Those Corners Up: Part 2: We’re Back! A Fox God’s Story
Initial Stream: 11/24/20
00:00 – As my esteemed colleague has noted, we’re working toward the good ending here, which involves collecting all the legendary summon monsters. Last week we scored (good) Bahamut and Diablos, now we’re going for Leviathan. Faris has something to say about that. Given all the “important summons” are Final Fantasy 8 dudes, us dudes go on to talk about Final Fantasy 8.
14:00 – Lightning battles Odin with Ramuh’s granddaughter as we discuss Ready Player 2.
24:31 – Not a mandatory quest, but defeating Odin allows us to see (FF13) Shiva and Snow versus Shivalry, the male cousin of Shiva. Shivalry is more of a sentai archetype than a himbo, unfortunately. However, we do learn that BEAT is a himbo.
34:00 – Yakuza: Like a Dragon is discussed as we fight to reclaim our dead mascot creature. This section of the quest is stupid. Seriously. The whole thing seems to be hung on a character relationship from thirteen chapters ago, and it is not compelling in any conceivable way. It seems to exist as a prelude to what happens during the true ending, but the true ending does it so much more successfully. This “preview” version of the concept with forgettable characters is ineffective, and only serves to make the twins appear even dumber when they’re surprised by the inevitable outcome (coming next part).
48:00 – Do you suppose the most popular search engine in a Final Fantasy universe is Moogle, or did the little fluffballs cash out by inventing Final Fantasy digital commerce?
53:00 – Tama, our foxy (not like that) mascot is revived, reality is restored, and maybe we were talking about Earthbound too much to notice.
What actually happened in the plot:
Faris avenges her distant ancestors, who were killed by Leviathan. Or Leviathan is faking her defeat, as apparently she wasn’t distinctly responsible for the death of Faris’s ancestors, she just happened to be in the area.
Lightning loses a duel to Odin. So she recruits Ramewl, Ramuh’s granddaughter, and then returns to claim victory by battling with a rad lightning sword.
Refia’s uncle is still possessed by a Bahamutian spirit (see Chapter 7), but the “spirit” is still attempting to kill the mythical fox monster that killed Refia’s aunt (before the possession). This apparently proves that there’s some part of the “real” uncle still alive in there. Or whatever. What’s important is that Evil Uncle finally dies after a fox battle, and our heroes claim a “life” from the fox monster. They use this life to revive Tama. With Tama revived, reality resets to a version where Tama was always there… so it’s kind of ambiguous if anything in the last two updates canon “happened”. Huh. Regardless, the party is now back to 100% complete, and, with the support of The Seven Deadly Summons (or whatever), we’re ready to retry on destroying the final general of the Bahamutian Army.
Initial Stream: 11/24/20
00:00 – As my esteemed colleague has noted, we’re working toward the good ending here, which involves collecting all the legendary summon monsters. Last week we scored (good) Bahamut and Diablos, now we’re going for Leviathan. Faris has something to say about that. Given all the “important summons” are Final Fantasy 8 dudes, us dudes go on to talk about Final Fantasy 8.
14:00 – Lightning battles Odin with Ramuh’s granddaughter as we discuss Ready Player 2.
24:31 – Not a mandatory quest, but defeating Odin allows us to see (FF13) Shiva and Snow versus Shivalry, the male cousin of Shiva. Shivalry is more of a sentai archetype than a himbo, unfortunately. However, we do learn that BEAT is a himbo.
34:00 – Yakuza: Like a Dragon is discussed as we fight to reclaim our dead mascot creature. This section of the quest is stupid. Seriously. The whole thing seems to be hung on a character relationship from thirteen chapters ago, and it is not compelling in any conceivable way. It seems to exist as a prelude to what happens during the true ending, but the true ending does it so much more successfully. This “preview” version of the concept with forgettable characters is ineffective, and only serves to make the twins appear even dumber when they’re surprised by the inevitable outcome (coming next part).
48:00 – Do you suppose the most popular search engine in a Final Fantasy universe is Moogle, or did the little fluffballs cash out by inventing Final Fantasy digital commerce?
53:00 – Tama, our foxy (not like that) mascot is revived, reality is restored, and maybe we were talking about Earthbound too much to notice.
What actually happened in the plot:
Faris avenges her distant ancestors, who were killed by Leviathan. Or Leviathan is faking her defeat, as apparently she wasn’t distinctly responsible for the death of Faris’s ancestors, she just happened to be in the area.
Lightning loses a duel to Odin. So she recruits Ramewl, Ramuh’s granddaughter, and then returns to claim victory by battling with a rad lightning sword.
Refia’s uncle is still possessed by a Bahamutian spirit (see Chapter 7), but the “spirit” is still attempting to kill the mythical fox monster that killed Refia’s aunt (before the possession). This apparently proves that there’s some part of the “real” uncle still alive in there. Or whatever. What’s important is that Evil Uncle finally dies after a fox battle, and our heroes claim a “life” from the fox monster. They use this life to revive Tama. With Tama revived, reality resets to a version where Tama was always there… so it’s kind of ambiguous if anything in the last two updates canon “happened”. Huh. Regardless, the party is now back to 100% complete, and, with the support of The Seven Deadly Summons (or whatever), we’re ready to retry on destroying the final general of the Bahamutian Army.
Turn Those Corners Up: Part 3: Everybody Dance Now
Initial Stream: 11/24/20
01:00 – The final battle approacheth. But we’re mostly focusing on Dr. Weird quotes.
7:30 – The first actual Game Over in this Let’s Play! Granted, I’ve been cheating (almost) the whole time, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that I’ve been practically invincible… but still! Incidentally, if you’re wondering about the cause of death, it was a doom “countdown timer” status effect that I was completely unprepared to encounter.
13:30 – Revenge! I have triumphed over my previous failure, and am making progress. So let’s talk about Gungrave and Trigun. Hey, wait a minute! This isn’t a Wild Arms Let’s Play!
19:30 – I am always happy to visit the concept of Freud sucks. Regardless, we have to fight mom twice, so Sigmund would likely have something to say about that.
26:00 – The final boss, Brandelis, appears again. Looks like he has the ancient weapons of Final Fantasy 5 at his disposal, but I just might be thinking that because a bell is involved.
31:00 – Here it is: the absolute final boss! In typical Final Fantasy fashion, it is some hulking monstrosity that can’t even fit on the screen. We take this time to label our respective Bouncer-sonas.
37:00 – We Officially won! The World Ends With You 2 is being released! We also beat the final boss!
42:00 –
It would have been super cool if these moves were at all available during the actual gameplay of World of Final Fantasy. Or at least anywhere other than a fight with a cactus.
46:00 – Time for an ending parade/choreographed dance number. I will claim that the volume on the game on this recording is so low because I was trying to avoid copyright issues with the obviously trademarked to all hell song here in the ending.
57:30 – As a chaser, we tackle the final (vanilla) intervention quest with “other mascot” Serafie learning from Siren how to gigantamax or whatever.
What actually happened in the plot:
The original ending went poorly when the twins tackled Brandelis alone on his own home turf. Reynn has full knowledge of that “bad end”, so the plan this time is to enlist all the champions (aka Final Fantasy characters) in various support roles, and attack the Ultima Gate at the top of the Crystal Tower. (Oddly enough, the summons that we had to fight to see this ending are not involved at all.) The Summoner Sorority is going to seal the Ultima Gate with the assistance of Hauyn (the twins’ adopted sister, BEAT), and the battle-ready champions (Cloud, Lightning, etc) are going to run interference on Brandelis. Quistis and Shelke were supposed to distract The Man in the Golden Mask (secretly Dad) and Plumed Knight (Mom), but those champions fail, and Lann and Reynn are forced to fight their possessed parents again. They succeed in defeating the evil mirages, but learn that Mom and Dad have been dead since their possession started (or thereabouts). Ghost Mom & Dad bid tearful goodbyes as Lann and Reynn move on to battle Brandelis. Brandelis has apparently been able to siphon some of the Mirage Keeper power of the twins and their parents, so he is effectively invincible with the ability to rewrite reality at will. It could be a stalemate, but the Ghost Parents help the twins to fashion an infinity cube as a prison for Brandelis. Right about then, the summoners finish up their job, and all the bad machines across the world are sucked back into the Ultima Gate. This also begins to absorb Brandelis, who once again breaks free from his infinity box. The twins attack Brandelis, and subdue him at the cost of being sucked into the gate, too. Brandelis, Lann, and Reynn are all banished to another dimension, but Hauyn and the champions are free to help rebuild the world. Hauyn is chosen as the new Mirage Keeper for this dimension, and goddess Enna Kross seems so happy with this outcome, she starts a goddamn dance party.
But wait there’s more!
Just because we saved the World of Final Fantasy doesn’t mean it’s all over. Tune in for our next stream tonight for bonus dungeon(s) and content exclusive to the Maxima upgrade of World of Final Fantasy. Please look forward to it!
…And, yes, we will finally get to facing a certain omnigear…
Initial Stream: 11/24/20
01:00 – The final battle approacheth. But we’re mostly focusing on Dr. Weird quotes.
7:30 – The first actual Game Over in this Let’s Play! Granted, I’ve been cheating (almost) the whole time, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that I’ve been practically invincible… but still! Incidentally, if you’re wondering about the cause of death, it was a doom “countdown timer” status effect that I was completely unprepared to encounter.
13:30 – Revenge! I have triumphed over my previous failure, and am making progress. So let’s talk about Gungrave and Trigun. Hey, wait a minute! This isn’t a Wild Arms Let’s Play!
19:30 – I am always happy to visit the concept of Freud sucks. Regardless, we have to fight mom twice, so Sigmund would likely have something to say about that.
26:00 – The final boss, Brandelis, appears again. Looks like he has the ancient weapons of Final Fantasy 5 at his disposal, but I just might be thinking that because a bell is involved.
31:00 – Here it is: the absolute final boss! In typical Final Fantasy fashion, it is some hulking monstrosity that can’t even fit on the screen. We take this time to label our respective Bouncer-sonas.
37:00 – We Officially won! The World Ends With You 2 is being released! We also beat the final boss!
42:00 –
It would have been super cool if these moves were at all available during the actual gameplay of World of Final Fantasy. Or at least anywhere other than a fight with a cactus.
46:00 – Time for an ending parade/choreographed dance number. I will claim that the volume on the game on this recording is so low because I was trying to avoid copyright issues with the obviously trademarked to all hell song here in the ending.
57:30 – As a chaser, we tackle the final (vanilla) intervention quest with “other mascot” Serafie learning from Siren how to gigantamax or whatever.
What actually happened in the plot:
The original ending went poorly when the twins tackled Brandelis alone on his own home turf. Reynn has full knowledge of that “bad end”, so the plan this time is to enlist all the champions (aka Final Fantasy characters) in various support roles, and attack the Ultima Gate at the top of the Crystal Tower. (Oddly enough, the summons that we had to fight to see this ending are not involved at all.) The Summoner Sorority is going to seal the Ultima Gate with the assistance of Hauyn (the twins’ adopted sister, BEAT), and the battle-ready champions (Cloud, Lightning, etc) are going to run interference on Brandelis. Quistis and Shelke were supposed to distract The Man in the Golden Mask (secretly Dad) and Plumed Knight (Mom), but those champions fail, and Lann and Reynn are forced to fight their possessed parents again. They succeed in defeating the evil mirages, but learn that Mom and Dad have been dead since their possession started (or thereabouts). Ghost Mom & Dad bid tearful goodbyes as Lann and Reynn move on to battle Brandelis. Brandelis has apparently been able to siphon some of the Mirage Keeper power of the twins and their parents, so he is effectively invincible with the ability to rewrite reality at will. It could be a stalemate, but the Ghost Parents help the twins to fashion an infinity cube as a prison for Brandelis. Right about then, the summoners finish up their job, and all the bad machines across the world are sucked back into the Ultima Gate. This also begins to absorb Brandelis, who once again breaks free from his infinity box. The twins attack Brandelis, and subdue him at the cost of being sucked into the gate, too. Brandelis, Lann, and Reynn are all banished to another dimension, but Hauyn and the champions are free to help rebuild the world. Hauyn is chosen as the new Mirage Keeper for this dimension, and goddess Enna Kross seems so happy with this outcome, she starts a goddamn dance party.
But wait there’s more!
Just because we saved the World of Final Fantasy doesn’t mean it’s all over. Tune in for our next stream tonight for bonus dungeon(s) and content exclusive to the Maxima upgrade of World of Final Fantasy. Please look forward to it!
…And, yes, we will finally get to facing a certain omnigear…
Maxima Content Part 1: The Final Xover
Initial Stream: 12/1/20
00:00 – We start this video with a short video of its own called “What I did on my Thanksgiving Vacation”. Long story short: you can unlock a bunch of stuff by beating the final boss after completing all intervention questions (and I still had one undone when we did that on the previous stream), and I sorted much of that new content while nobody was looking. There were three whole dungeons featuring reused assets (complete with recolored bosses) that were tackled and defeated between streams. That unlocks a fourth “reused” dungeon, and we pick things up at the culmination of that quest. And our final boss for that area is…
6:00 – Mr. Xenogears, aka XG. A full discussion on the Xeno franchise’s ownership and its plots naturally follows. I consider myself something of an expert on the subject.
Also, since I didn’t actually wind up summoning XG during the stream, here’s the lil’ big guy in action. I have to assume that “Little Walking Head” XG was originally designed to be a more present part of the plot. Either that or someone really wanted to toss a headmaster in here.
22:00 – So XG is the final “secret” boss of the original content for World of Final Fantasy. The Maxima upgrade offers some new content, and that’s going to be the majority of these last four updates. There’s a full explanation of that here (in the video), but, long story short, there was a mobile World of Final Fantasy game, Meli-Melo, and, while it appears to have been a failure (it was discontinued almost exactly a year after launch), my understanding is that a lot of the “new” assets from that game got recycled into the Maxima upgrade. Never waste a pixel, Square-Enix! So we’re going to see the new, Maxima-based intervention quests, starting with Cecil trying to cure a friend of desert fever. It’s not the friend you think!
32:00 – Zack time. I guess he died? If you check his in-game biography, it distinctly notes that he is basically a zombie reanimated by mako in this world. Don’t worry, he’ll get better. This is a happy dimension.
40:00 – See? He’s better now. And Serah, sister of Lightning, fights Shiva while we play with wikis. fanboymaster, I just checked, and apparently your edit will only be preserved on this video.
45:00 – Discussion of the upcoming Saga Frontier remake. TLDL: they better do something about the overt implication that a blood transfusion can give you immortality/gay.
What actually happened in the plot:
At the culmination of the “first” ending (maybe second?) Wynne is appointed the new guardian of the world, while Lann and Reynn are sucked into another dimension. Now, the “extra” ending reveals that Wynne receives two “twin mirages” from Enna Kross (god), which allows her to summon little duplicates of her adopted twin siblings. Thus, all post-game content is apparently Wynne having adventures with Lann/Reynn golems. It’s not weird at all!
• XG (Xenogears) is defeated in a presumably non-canon bonus battle (or maybe it’s in another dimension).
• Cecil secures a restorative flower for a sick Kain by defeating Yojimbo.
• Zack reawakens in Castle Figaro’s basement as a berserker, and, after fighting the heroes, flies off with Bahamut (who was coincidentally trying to take a nap in that same basement).
• Serah fights Shiva-Ixion, her fiancee’s summon-cycle, for the right to decorate her for Snow’s birthday (seriously). Zack is dropped off nearby by Bahamut, who cured Zack of his mako poisoning (possibly accidentally). Wynne followed Bahamut/Zack here, and identifies Serah as having some unknown, but super important destiny. Zack asks out Serah. Zack with a C does not play Serah with an H’s favorite song.
Initial Stream: 12/1/20
00:00 – We start this video with a short video of its own called “What I did on my Thanksgiving Vacation”. Long story short: you can unlock a bunch of stuff by beating the final boss after completing all intervention questions (and I still had one undone when we did that on the previous stream), and I sorted much of that new content while nobody was looking. There were three whole dungeons featuring reused assets (complete with recolored bosses) that were tackled and defeated between streams. That unlocks a fourth “reused” dungeon, and we pick things up at the culmination of that quest. And our final boss for that area is…
6:00 – Mr. Xenogears, aka XG. A full discussion on the Xeno franchise’s ownership and its plots naturally follows. I consider myself something of an expert on the subject.
Also, since I didn’t actually wind up summoning XG during the stream, here’s the lil’ big guy in action. I have to assume that “Little Walking Head” XG was originally designed to be a more present part of the plot. Either that or someone really wanted to toss a headmaster in here.
22:00 – So XG is the final “secret” boss of the original content for World of Final Fantasy. The Maxima upgrade offers some new content, and that’s going to be the majority of these last four updates. There’s a full explanation of that here (in the video), but, long story short, there was a mobile World of Final Fantasy game, Meli-Melo, and, while it appears to have been a failure (it was discontinued almost exactly a year after launch), my understanding is that a lot of the “new” assets from that game got recycled into the Maxima upgrade. Never waste a pixel, Square-Enix! So we’re going to see the new, Maxima-based intervention quests, starting with Cecil trying to cure a friend of desert fever. It’s not the friend you think!
32:00 – Zack time. I guess he died? If you check his in-game biography, it distinctly notes that he is basically a zombie reanimated by mako in this world. Don’t worry, he’ll get better. This is a happy dimension.
40:00 – See? He’s better now. And Serah, sister of Lightning, fights Shiva while we play with wikis. fanboymaster, I just checked, and apparently your edit will only be preserved on this video.
45:00 – Discussion of the upcoming Saga Frontier remake. TLDL: they better do something about the overt implication that a blood transfusion can give you immortality/gay.
What actually happened in the plot:
At the culmination of the “first” ending (maybe second?) Wynne is appointed the new guardian of the world, while Lann and Reynn are sucked into another dimension. Now, the “extra” ending reveals that Wynne receives two “twin mirages” from Enna Kross (god), which allows her to summon little duplicates of her adopted twin siblings. Thus, all post-game content is apparently Wynne having adventures with Lann/Reynn golems. It’s not weird at all!
• XG (Xenogears) is defeated in a presumably non-canon bonus battle (or maybe it’s in another dimension).
• Cecil secures a restorative flower for a sick Kain by defeating Yojimbo.
• Zack reawakens in Castle Figaro’s basement as a berserker, and, after fighting the heroes, flies off with Bahamut (who was coincidentally trying to take a nap in that same basement).
• Serah fights Shiva-Ixion, her fiancee’s summon-cycle, for the right to decorate her for Snow’s birthday (seriously). Zack is dropped off nearby by Bahamut, who cured Zack of his mako poisoning (possibly accidentally). Wynne followed Bahamut/Zack here, and identifies Serah as having some unknown, but super important destiny. Zack asks out Serah. Zack with a C does not play Serah with an H’s favorite song.
Maxima Content Part 2: This is Why I didn’t Stream the Other Dungeons
Initial Stream: 12/1/20
1:00 – The rules of the Ultimate Dungeon suck! Apparently there are distinct warps that occasionally take you back to the start of the place, and random floors may have random rules that severely limit your options. And, of course, this dungeon is going to be nothing but reused assets. Bah! Let’s just discuss a Playstation Superman game and collectors being annoying.
8:30 - I don’t know east from west. I’m going to blame Shantae for this.
14:50 – “Nobody fucks with Dr. Brainshit.”
20:00 – Kary/Marilith is our first boss of the area while we talk about Amalgam comics. I too miss Lobo the Duck.
30:00 - Time to refuel after a discussion of Devil May Cry 3, and then on to part two (of four) of the dungeon.
49:20 – “I envy your optimism”… by the way, this dungeon takes forever. We’re not even a full third of the way done with this nonsense yet.
50:00 – CaliScrub arrives… he missed the best, giant-robot based part.
54:00 – The Kraken Boss fight. We already did this one, as two of the ol’ Final Fantasy 1 fiends already appear as part of the mandatory plot. This Kraken is like forty levels more powerful, though, so at least it isn’t as easy as before. Wee?
56:00 – Minecraft human trafficking is described as we wrap up this section.
What actually happened in the plot:
Nothing. Wynne is venturing through The Ultimate Dungeon toward whatever is down there. We’re about 40% through that.
Initial Stream: 12/1/20
1:00 – The rules of the Ultimate Dungeon suck! Apparently there are distinct warps that occasionally take you back to the start of the place, and random floors may have random rules that severely limit your options. And, of course, this dungeon is going to be nothing but reused assets. Bah! Let’s just discuss a Playstation Superman game and collectors being annoying.
8:30 - I don’t know east from west. I’m going to blame Shantae for this.
14:50 – “Nobody fucks with Dr. Brainshit.”
20:00 – Kary/Marilith is our first boss of the area while we talk about Amalgam comics. I too miss Lobo the Duck.
30:00 - Time to refuel after a discussion of Devil May Cry 3, and then on to part two (of four) of the dungeon.
49:20 – “I envy your optimism”… by the way, this dungeon takes forever. We’re not even a full third of the way done with this nonsense yet.
50:00 – CaliScrub arrives… he missed the best, giant-robot based part.
54:00 – The Kraken Boss fight. We already did this one, as two of the ol’ Final Fantasy 1 fiends already appear as part of the mandatory plot. This Kraken is like forty levels more powerful, though, so at least it isn’t as easy as before. Wee?
56:00 – Minecraft human trafficking is described as we wrap up this section.
What actually happened in the plot:
Nothing. Wynne is venturing through The Ultimate Dungeon toward whatever is down there. We’re about 40% through that.
Maxima Content Part 3: The Ultimate Slog
Initial Stream: 12/1/20
00:00 – I couldn’t remember the details on the stream, but here’s the full rundown on the economy of what was apparently Planet Zoo . I will never look at warthogs the same way again.
7:00 – Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity is discussed, which I believe means we have successfully gone full circle on discussing a separate game during the World of Final Fantasy Stream. Long story short, everyone in Hyrule should already have fish.
Also, this bit occurs during a “no item floor” in the dungeon proper. These dungeon rules are truly random (they’re not tied to particular floors, and may change between dungeon visits), and losing the ability to use potions between battles in a game where you can’t even cast cure outside of a fight is a little… terrible. This means that “no item floors” make a little more of an impact than, say, “extra damage” or literally any other random effect.
15:00 – Lich appears. You can’t use Raise/Phoenix Down on an opponent, but you can use an elixir. Guess how Lich goes down.
25:00 – There is just so much Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity discussion here. We will never stream that game.
31:00 – Tiamat, and we already beat her, too. Kind of a wet fart of a way to finish the first 80% of this dungeon.
37:00 – The ultimate section of the ultimate dungeon begins as fanboymaster explains the name switch between Kary/Marilith.
42:00 – Please enjoy watching me engage in ice Sliding dumbassery for five pointless minutes.
50:00 – Florida leadership is discussed on the way to the ultimate boss of this ultimate area… but we stop just shy of the battle itself. Sorry!
What actually happened in the plot:
Still nothing. We’re about 95% of the way through this dungeon as of this update. Incidentally, it is noted in the in-game encyclopedia that these adventures are technically canon for Wynne… just we’re well past the actual “end” of the game, so it’s pretty safe to claim none of this will ever be referenced by anything.
Initial Stream: 12/1/20
00:00 – I couldn’t remember the details on the stream, but here’s the full rundown on the economy of what was apparently Planet Zoo . I will never look at warthogs the same way again.
7:00 – Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity is discussed, which I believe means we have successfully gone full circle on discussing a separate game during the World of Final Fantasy Stream. Long story short, everyone in Hyrule should already have fish.
Also, this bit occurs during a “no item floor” in the dungeon proper. These dungeon rules are truly random (they’re not tied to particular floors, and may change between dungeon visits), and losing the ability to use potions between battles in a game where you can’t even cast cure outside of a fight is a little… terrible. This means that “no item floors” make a little more of an impact than, say, “extra damage” or literally any other random effect.
15:00 – Lich appears. You can’t use Raise/Phoenix Down on an opponent, but you can use an elixir. Guess how Lich goes down.
25:00 – There is just so much Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity discussion here. We will never stream that game.
31:00 – Tiamat, and we already beat her, too. Kind of a wet fart of a way to finish the first 80% of this dungeon.
37:00 – The ultimate section of the ultimate dungeon begins as fanboymaster explains the name switch between Kary/Marilith.
42:00 – Please enjoy watching me engage in ice Sliding dumbassery for five pointless minutes.
50:00 – Florida leadership is discussed on the way to the ultimate boss of this ultimate area… but we stop just shy of the battle itself. Sorry!
What actually happened in the plot:
Still nothing. We’re about 95% of the way through this dungeon as of this update. Incidentally, it is noted in the in-game encyclopedia that these adventures are technically canon for Wynne… just we’re well past the actual “end” of the game, so it’s pretty safe to claim none of this will ever be referenced by anything.
Maxima Content Part 4: The End
Initial Stream: 12/1/20 (mostly)
00:00 – Starting off by taking the bold stance that Hitler was not right as we finally approach the final boss of this area. The boss fight is partially expected, partially a surprise. It’s a battle against Garland (Chaos or Garland would be anticipated after the four fiends), but also all four of the fiends simultaneously. Given each of those fiends was an individual (and not easy) boss battle on the way here, this could get dicey.
9:00 – Playstation 4/5 Spider-Man says “defund the police”.
13:00 – Game Over! I had a choice between healing one stack or reviving the other, and I chose wrong, as a powerful, party-wide attack was apparently coming. I came surprisingly close to winning this fight… but nope.
15:00 – Rather than bang my head against that wall again, we try the next secret boss battle, a fight with Enna Kross. As I learn here, it sucks because this trio of bosses can revive themselves repeatedly. And ol’ Enna doesn’t really have any combat animations, so this is the most… lazy of the new Maxima content (and I’m saying that after two hours of a recycled dungeon).
29:00 – Game over again! Same exact reason, too! I have learned nothing!
31:00 – Super Boss #3 requires an airship-based scavenger hunt. And it’s clear right off that this “hunt” is going to take forever, so we pretty much sizzle out with our final World of Final Fantasy stream.
35:00 – And now I avenge myself upon my losses. This section of the video is just highlights of me playing by myself, narrated by myself, because I wasn’t going to drag the stream team through another series of fights that could potentially take forever. I’m not that cruel!
Immortal Dark Dragon is first, and he’s from the anime movie that was produced to promote that mobile game. He’s apparently on the same inter-dimensional team as this game’s main antagonist, but is otherwise wholly new to this title. Fighting him necessitates finding switches across the world, then standing up to a dude that patterns his attacks after Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Arcade Game’s Shredder
38:00 – Garland and the gang all over again. The secret to my success this time is to kill Lich, use water to take out Tiamat and Kary/Marilith simultaneously, and then focus on dropping Kraken. Sorry, can’t kill Kary last. Garland has a bunch of elemental weaknesses after all his buddies are down, so, once again, I was really close to winning the last time.
41:00 – Enna Kross is a pain, with nine extra lives, and still those cheap animations. I’m not certain if this fight would be easier if you focus on exclusively killing one opponent nine times, or spread the death around. Regardless, at the very least you can game the “weakness aiming” by unstacking whenever targeted, so there is a bit of a trick to the battle. However, even if you know what to do, this battle takes forever, and took me personally about forty minutes with the internal speed up feature.
43:00 – And defeating all of those super bosses unlocks the right to fight a super hard version of the original final boss of Final Fantasy Maxima. It’s the same fight, just with absurd attack/HP stats. Beat that final-final boss, and you get to see the all new, secret “teaser” ending for World of Final Fantasy/ Presumptive Trailer for World of Final Fantasy 2. Or, considering how much this whole setup/content is biting on Kingdom Hearts, let’s say World of Final Fantasy 2/418 Days: A Missing Piece 1.8.
46:00 – Oh yeah, you can fish with Final Fantasy 15’s Noctis. Thanks for watching!
What actually happened in the plot:
Wynne conquered Garland, an “Anti-Champion” created at the same time as Warrior of Light, deep in the Ultimate Dungeon. She also repelled Immortal Dark Dragon, a threat from another dimension (again, DLC super bosses or not, in-game datalogs confirm these events as canon). After that, a version of Diablos from another dimension attacks her world, but she defeats him with the aid of Tama and Odin. However, more interesting than the fight is that that Diablos seems to be linked to a mysterious figure in a cloak bearing two Mirage-keeper gauntlets and an odd preoccupation with searching for his “sis”. What does it all mean? Guess we’ll find out some day…
What’s next? Tuesday night streams of World of Final Fantasy are concluded. However, this thread will still be active, as I have a few more things to say about this game outside of the context of videos. And maybe there will be another video related to World of Final Fantasy? Probable! So, anyway, more World of Final Fantasy Let’s Play content coming soon (like, generally in the immediate future soon).
In the meanwhile, Tuesday night streams will continue, just devoid of funko fantasies. Watch the twitters for details, but we’re sticking to the 8:30 EST Tuesday plan. Everyone involved has enjoyed this project (if not the featured game), so we’re going to keep that going.
So please look forward to stuff in this thread and elsewhere! Probably soon!
Initial Stream: 12/1/20 (mostly)
00:00 – Starting off by taking the bold stance that Hitler was not right as we finally approach the final boss of this area. The boss fight is partially expected, partially a surprise. It’s a battle against Garland (Chaos or Garland would be anticipated after the four fiends), but also all four of the fiends simultaneously. Given each of those fiends was an individual (and not easy) boss battle on the way here, this could get dicey.
9:00 – Playstation 4/5 Spider-Man says “defund the police”.
13:00 – Game Over! I had a choice between healing one stack or reviving the other, and I chose wrong, as a powerful, party-wide attack was apparently coming. I came surprisingly close to winning this fight… but nope.
15:00 – Rather than bang my head against that wall again, we try the next secret boss battle, a fight with Enna Kross. As I learn here, it sucks because this trio of bosses can revive themselves repeatedly. And ol’ Enna doesn’t really have any combat animations, so this is the most… lazy of the new Maxima content (and I’m saying that after two hours of a recycled dungeon).
29:00 – Game over again! Same exact reason, too! I have learned nothing!
31:00 – Super Boss #3 requires an airship-based scavenger hunt. And it’s clear right off that this “hunt” is going to take forever, so we pretty much sizzle out with our final World of Final Fantasy stream.
35:00 – And now I avenge myself upon my losses. This section of the video is just highlights of me playing by myself, narrated by myself, because I wasn’t going to drag the stream team through another series of fights that could potentially take forever. I’m not that cruel!
Immortal Dark Dragon is first, and he’s from the anime movie that was produced to promote that mobile game. He’s apparently on the same inter-dimensional team as this game’s main antagonist, but is otherwise wholly new to this title. Fighting him necessitates finding switches across the world, then standing up to a dude that patterns his attacks after Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Arcade Game’s Shredder
38:00 – Garland and the gang all over again. The secret to my success this time is to kill Lich, use water to take out Tiamat and Kary/Marilith simultaneously, and then focus on dropping Kraken. Sorry, can’t kill Kary last. Garland has a bunch of elemental weaknesses after all his buddies are down, so, once again, I was really close to winning the last time.
41:00 – Enna Kross is a pain, with nine extra lives, and still those cheap animations. I’m not certain if this fight would be easier if you focus on exclusively killing one opponent nine times, or spread the death around. Regardless, at the very least you can game the “weakness aiming” by unstacking whenever targeted, so there is a bit of a trick to the battle. However, even if you know what to do, this battle takes forever, and took me personally about forty minutes with the internal speed up feature.
43:00 – And defeating all of those super bosses unlocks the right to fight a super hard version of the original final boss of Final Fantasy Maxima. It’s the same fight, just with absurd attack/HP stats. Beat that final-final boss, and you get to see the all new, secret “teaser” ending for World of Final Fantasy/ Presumptive Trailer for World of Final Fantasy 2. Or, considering how much this whole setup/content is biting on Kingdom Hearts, let’s say World of Final Fantasy 2/418 Days: A Missing Piece 1.8.
46:00 – Oh yeah, you can fish with Final Fantasy 15’s Noctis. Thanks for watching!
What actually happened in the plot:
Wynne conquered Garland, an “Anti-Champion” created at the same time as Warrior of Light, deep in the Ultimate Dungeon. She also repelled Immortal Dark Dragon, a threat from another dimension (again, DLC super bosses or not, in-game datalogs confirm these events as canon). After that, a version of Diablos from another dimension attacks her world, but she defeats him with the aid of Tama and Odin. However, more interesting than the fight is that that Diablos seems to be linked to a mysterious figure in a cloak bearing two Mirage-keeper gauntlets and an odd preoccupation with searching for his “sis”. What does it all mean? Guess we’ll find out some day…
What’s next? Tuesday night streams of World of Final Fantasy are concluded. However, this thread will still be active, as I have a few more things to say about this game outside of the context of videos. And maybe there will be another video related to World of Final Fantasy? Probable! So, anyway, more World of Final Fantasy Let’s Play content coming soon (like, generally in the immediate future soon).
In the meanwhile, Tuesday night streams will continue, just devoid of funko fantasies. Watch the twitters for details, but we’re sticking to the 8:30 EST Tuesday plan. Everyone involved has enjoyed this project (if not the featured game), so we’re going to keep that going.
So please look forward to stuff in this thread and elsewhere! Probably soon!
IT IS NOW SOON
Thanks to a witch’s curse, I am obligated to write about any videogame I have played for longer than a half hour, so let us contemplate World of Final Fantasy.
Long story short on the whole game? It was a noble attempt at… something, but it is hard to say it ever succeeded at anything. I’m trying to work out those “goals”, though, but I’m thinking a good start would be…
World of Final Fantasy is World of Final Fantasy, dummy, it’s about the Final Fantasy heroes
There’s one reason that everyone bought this game (well, everyone that actually did buy the game), and it is Final Fantasy with a capital F. Final Fantasy has one of the greatest pedigrees in the history of gaming, and, while Mega Man, Castlevania, or alike has dropped off in recent years/decades, there has never been a year without a Final Fantasy or Final Fantasy-adjacent product since the advent of the Buster Sword (citation needed). Final Fantasy may be right up there with Mario and Madden as one of the most established gaming franchises out there, and, like it or not, we’ve got Final Fantasies filling up shelves all over the place.
And, in a weird way, that might be a problem.
I know a lot of people reading this have been gaming all of their lives, right there from the advent of the Nintendo Entertainment System. And that likely means you’re damn well near forty. And you know what that also means? You’re old! There were an awful lot of people that were born in the intervening four decades! And they might like Final Fantasy, too! Except, you know, their first Final Fantasy game was Final Fantasy 7. Or Final Fantasy 10. Or, wonder of wonders, they may have played their first Final Fantasy game this year, and it’s a MMORPG involving a strangely high number of cat boys. And that’s before we even get into the number of people that got into gaming later in life, or just recently decided it was time to see what this “Final Fantasy” was all about, or just picked up Final Fantasy 6 because it came with the Super Nintendo Mini, or even they’re interested in finding out the deal with these weird dudes from the Kingdom Hearts 3 expansion. Point being is that there are 35 years of Final Fantasy out there, and people could have started with Final Fantasy “one” or fifteen.
And, if you’ve found you enjoyed Final Fantasy, it’s only natural to have a desire to see what else is out there in the franchise. Only issue? That could take you the rest of your life. There is a lot to any given Final Fantasy, and, before you even get into the idea of how even the smallest FF takes like ten hours, nearly every FF also has wildly disparate moving parts. The battle system in Final Fantasy 5 isn’t going to effectively help you learn whatever Lightning is flipping around about in Final Fantasy 13, and everything you ever learned about harvesting Flan Princess in Final Fantasy 4 is not going to be relevant by the time you have to complete all the “hunts” of Final Fantasy 12. Even if you had infinity time for playing as many videogames as you ever wanted (I want to live there), the Final Fantasy franchise is still daunting, as you have to rapidly switch tracks between mastering materia and farming playing cards. And then you never see a reason to have that “skill” ever again in the franchise (or, for that matter, anywhere else in any other game).
I am a master of the gambit system. That didn’t even survive to see Final Fantasy 12-2 (it happened! It was on DS!)
And, to be absolutely clear, it is in Square-Enix’s best interest that you have not only an affection for the whole of the Final Fantasy franchise, but that you also know it inside and out. Easy example? Dissidia Final Fantasy NT is a fighting game (basically) that relies on you having a familiarity with its cast of Final Fantasy luminaries. And when SE decides to release expansion materials like new fighters, management is literally banking on you not only knowing who Zenos yae Galvus is, but also that you like said character enough to shell out five bucks for the experience. Locke Cole isn’t going to put cyberdollars in cyberwallets if everyone that ever cared about the dude stopped playing videogames in 2010. And this is just one game! Mobile experiences like Pokémon Go, Fire Emblem Heroes, and the entire Fate/Stay franchise are all at least partially based on the concept that people will do godammned anything to get a shiny Pikachu wearing a party hat (or, for the equivalent in the Fate franchise, a shiny, sexy Benjamin Franklin wearing a party hat). Square Enix needs every man, woman, and lilkin on Earth to love Cloud Strife, because the quarter 2 profits are already based on the idea that a million people are going to buy Lara Croft’s Tifa crossover outfit.
Oh, and I guess it’s good for gaming discourse if everyone has the same Final Fantasy knowledge, too. But that’s not super relevant to the people that choose which games get greenlit.
This finally brings us to World of Final Fantasy. It is clear what World of Final Fantasy was trying to do: in the same way that Kingdom Hearts condenses entire Disney movies into “worlds” that feature five characters and two dungeons, World of Final Fantasy boils down its Final Fantasy “guest stars” into their component parts with generally distinctive plots and locales. Yuna the responsible summoner is hanging around the Pyrefly Forest where she first boned a ghost, and Rydia the more cheeky summoner has a peppy adventure where she faces her fear of fire. Final Fantasy guest characters show up just long enough to make an impact on the player, but not outshine the “real” heroes of this tale. In short, by the end of World of Final Fantasy, the player should have a general fondness and understanding of characters from a solid fourteen or so Final Fantasy games. And it’s reasonable to say that playing one 40-hour game is a faster path to understanding the Final Fantasy pantheon than playing fifteen games that could potentially suck up the rest of your life.
But there is a bit of an issue with using the “Kingdom Hearts approach”. No one is going to mistake Pinocchio for Aladdin for Jack Skellington. However, when you hit the FF games, well… Squall is a competent SeeD “hero” that has some issues with confidence. Cloud is a competent SOLDIER “hero” that has some issues with confidence. Lightning is a competent… ah, crap, we’ve already hit a wall. A lot of Final Fantasy characters kind of boil down to the same character once you remove them from their more complicated home plots. Squall and Cloud are very different protagonists in their respective adventures, but, in the limited World of Final Fantasy, they’re practically the same as Tidus. In fact, in a weird way, the “knights” of World of Final Fantasy become something approaching a boy band. Tidus is the funny one, Lightning is the serious one, and Squall is the one that is interested in gardening for some reason. They are only graphically distinguishable, and, frankly, the funko-ization of the gang doesn’t help in that department either.
And, while this at least gives a new audience the cliff’s notes on a particular hero or supporting character, it’s disapointing for anyone that is in this to see those beloved Final Fantasy characters again. Tifa is in “Nibelheim flashback” mode, so she’s… what? A martial artist in training/cowgirl? That’s a far cry from the confident “mom of AVALANCHE” that starred in Final Fantasy 7/Remake. King Edgar comes off as little more than an aggravating flirt compared to the original king that was willing to participate in a hentai to rescue his countrymen. Vivi had practically an entire game’s worth of meditation on mortality and the meaning of life in Final Fantasy 9, and here he barely even has a name. It’s cool that the “intervention quests” all seem tailor made to please people that want to see Pirate Princess Faris and Ifrit have a conversation (I have been writing that fanfic since I was thirteen!), but everything here is so shallow as to be nearly insulting. Final Fantasy fans want a phoenix, yet World of Final Fantasy offers chicken feed.
So World of Final Fantasy is shallow as an introduction to Final Fantasy characters, and even shallower for anyone that wants to spend more time with particular protagonists. But maybe we’re barking up the wrong tree! Maybe it was never supposed to be about the “cameo” characters, maybe…
World of Final Fantasy is its own game, dummy, this is about the original characters and plot
First of all, to break kayfabe for a moment: ha ha ha, oh man, that’s a good one.
Second of all, this is a place where World of Final Fantasy knows what to do, but refuses to put in the time on the “homework” to make it actually happen. As previously stated, World of Final Fantasy follows the usual arc of a Kingdom Hearts story: the plot and main characters are introduced, that is then ignored for hours as our heroes have a ball with a pile guest characters/worlds, and then it all comes back to an original “point” in time for the finale when guests met across the adventure may or may not find a way to help in the concluding, ridiculous battle. Unfortunately, what works for Kingdom Hearts absolutely does not work for World of Final Fantasy for one simple reason: you are never given a reason to care about Lann and Reynn.
The twins are, like, your main characters, right? So you probably feel something there. But beyond that? I technically spent entire days’ worth of hours with those two, and I could barely tell you their defining attributes. Yes, they’re both generally well-meaning heroes that will fight against injustice and love their parents… but past that? Lann is the goofy one, Reynn is the responsible/contemplative one, and, aside from a certain woman’s hatred for cactus men, that’s all I got. They are not really characters beyond broad archetypes, and, when bad things happen to them, nobody cares. Oh, they were wholly responsible for a hundred years of hardship? Yeah, alright, I could buy that. As believable as anything else in this world.
And a reminder that this game is from the same people that brought you Kingdom Hearts 2, which somehow made the fans demand an entire Kingdom Hearts “miniseries” game based on some dork from the opening skateboarding tutorial or whatever. KH2’s Roxas is a fully established, sympathetic character inside of like seven seconds. His own featured game made him a tragic hero that could rival the likes of Shakespeare (or at least anything from the Marvel Cinematic Universe). Lann and Reynn never come close to that over the course of an entire game.
And don’t try to claim the other original supporting characters in World of Final Fantasy fare any better, because there aren’t any. Wynne and Enna both alternate between macguffins and lore dumps, and then we have… Tama the fox mascot? Do not waste my the-time.
But maybe it’s about the overarching lore, right? Maybe this is another Final Fantasy 13 situation wherein the cool, established world is hiding in data entries and other “data logs” hidden around the world. Maybe this is the kind of story that isn’t necessarily about the characters, but about the world (of Final Fantasy).
And, sorry to say that I’m continually setting you up for disappointment here, but World of Final Fantasy flubs there, too. This wasn’t explored much on the stream (what kind of maniac would make a “let’s read” let’s play) but there are “datalogs” and glossaries to spare in World of Final Fantasy; and, spoilers, they all add up to a big fat nothing. Yes, there multiple, fascinating stories in World of Final Fantasy’s backstory (and even more in Maxima), but they all combine to form a Voltron of oblivion (and Enna Kros forms the head).
The ultimate punchline to the lore of World of Final Fantasy is that there are some people that merge with powerful summons to ascend to godhood, and, once they’ve established their nigh-omnipotent powers, they can create worlds. So there are worlds of fantasy, there are worlds of sci-fi, and (since some people are jerks) there are worlds of death-spewing dragons. And some worlds are proper Final Fantasy games, some worlds are obviously implied to be the spin-offs, and some worlds are like this one: where there’s a little sprinkling here and there of the familiar, “main” worlds, but they’re still fairly bonkers. And, of course, sometimes the worlds fight. And, end of the day, that’s that. There are infinity worlds with infinity permutations, and World of Final Fantasy 2 could have equal odds of being another adventure in “this” world, or one where you’re piloting a space ship in a shoot ‘em up (Einhänder is unquestionably implied to be another world). And when your final word on lore is that “all worlds happen and could happen and are happening” it kind of makes the whole thing feel… pointless? Like, I saved this world, I saved Wynne, but apparently there a bunch of other worlds? And even other Wynnes? There’s possibly a great moral here about how saving your own world and the people you love really matters in the face of infinite choices, but that lesson is seemingly absent here. This is one World of Final Fantasy, there are a thousand out there, too, and good will always triumph over evil regardless of what anybody does.
By Alexander, it’s Bioshock Infinite all over again. That’s never good!
But it’s possible that this is all purposeless anyway. World of Final Fantasy shouldn’t be judged like a crossover movie or a novel…
World of Final Fantasy is a videogame, dummy, it’s supposed to be fun to play
Look, let’s get one thing out of the way (he said 2,000 words in): this is supposed to be Final Fantasy: Pokémon. Like a lot in WoFF, it only half commits, as the whole “mirage keeper” aspect of this adventure is arguably generally ignored in the plot (being a mirage keeper is super important to the plot, but you could also replace the nuts and bolts [and backstory] of “mirage keeping” with “making coffee”, and very little about the story would change. (Oh, your mom was a high barista of the cappuccino lineage? How interesting.) But it is everything during battles. The meat of World of Final Fantasy’s challenge isn’t so much about fights that are “hard” to actually manage, but more that you have to manage your mirages before every bout, and be sure you’re prepared for whatever is going to happen this time. A new mirage can only be captured by casting fire on it? Great, be certain you have a fire mirage. This boss is weak to ice? Well, you might lose once, but come back with a Shiva in your gang, and you’re set. And the stacking aspect makes this replacement for “equipment” interesting every time: you can’t just don an anti-lightning ring accessory, you have to “stack” an anti-lightning mirage with another mirage that isn’t going to negate your prime immunity. You have the ability to create completely contradictory stacks, and then never get anything done! Or properly manage all your mirages, and blaze through a volcano with all the ice armor of the Light Warriors of lore. It might take some time, but it is empowering to “get it right” with your stack for a particular area.
Of course, if World of Final Fantasy is biting on Pokémon for this gameplay, they missed one key feature in that experience: being able to switch Pokémon on the fly. Like in Pokémon, you have a limited number of mirages that can be on your belt at one time; however, unlike the Gamefreak original, you absolutely cannot switch your mirages in the midst of a battle. Whatever you chose to start this battle with is stuck until you either win, run, or die. And, while it’s not difficult to solve the puzzle of maybe you need an electric team in the robot-based dungeon, many of the later areas are more generic, and require a greater swatch of abilities and resistances. And there is nothing worse than facing down a gigantic behemoth, knowing you have you the proper instrument in your toolbox right over there, but, sorry, you’re stuck in this battle right now, and you’re going to have to whittle down those health points in the most boring, least satisfying way possible. And then you switch in your trump card for the next behemoth battle, only to face a mag roader team that requires a totally different solution. It’s exhausting, and another place where World of Final Fantasy falls just short of being a great game. It’s not terrible! It’s just… close enough to great that you can see exactly what went wrong.
And while the battle system may be satisfying when it comes together, the dungeons need some serious work. Final Fantasy hasn’t ever been a franchise that was particularly known for its dungeons (monster closets? Yes. Dungeon design? No), so we’ve got an uphill battle there to begin with. But here the dungeons are generally extremely generic locations (ice cave, volcano, basement) with marginally interesting gimmicks (ice sliding puzzle, put out fires, turn on machines). There is exactly one dungeon in this entire adventure that I found remotely memorable (underwater temple complete with wall-walking action), but even that wound up overstaying its welcome by about 20%. Past that, the only other dungeon that even came close was the Train Graveyard, but that loses some significant points for being an extremely confusing maze of platforms that easily loop on each other.
And speaking of the Train Graveyard, that was a dungeon that absolutely required bringing particular mirages with particular abilities (in this case, “zap” and “smash”), whereas previous dungeons only relied on the “map screen abilities” as a way of accessing extra treasure. Was there some warning that I absolutely had to bring a smash-based mirage to this dungeon? Not that I saw. So did I waste a solid half hour trying to figure out if I could solve this “puzzle” without needing a specific mirage, like I had in every dungeon prior? Yep! And that doesn’t leave an impression at all.
And if this entire writeup makes World of Final Fantasy sound like a bad game, I apologize, that is not the intention. This has been a list of the significant problems in World of Final Fantasy, but it is also a list of the only significant problems in World of Final Fantasy. I will admit now, before God and audience, that there were moments when I absolutely did not want to stop playing World of Final Fantasy. The whole adventure really clicked around the 30% completion mark, and, from that point on, I was tempted on a weekly basis to play without my streaming company. Hell, I technically did play the game during those times, I just played the less cinematic bits, like fighting through the coliseum or completing mundane fetch quests. This is a fun game! World of Final Fantasy is a fun game! And it does hold up to its pedigree a lot better than many other spin-offs of popular franchises. This ain’t no Wand of Gamelon.
But my theory has always been that if you’re going to do it, you should do it right. That’s why everything I have ever written, including this article, is absolutely prefect. Final Fantasy is a pedigree in the gaming sphere, and this Final Fantasy product falls short of its forbearers. It’s still a fun experience, but it is also flawed in some very obvious ways. Maybe a World of Final Fantasy 2 will correct these problems, or maybe a third World of Final Fantasy released seventeen years later will address the issues. Maybe it will always be a weird, one-off “quirky adventure” in the Final Fantasy pantheon. Whatever the case, the game we have here, even in its expanded state, is still just “good”, and far shy of flawless.
But, hey, it’s still a fun way to spend eleven nights of streaming.
What’s next? Welp, I feel like we’ve covered an awful lot of World of Final Fantasy at this point, but there is still that whole “lore” thing I’ve admitted to ignoring. Maybe we could take a more focused look at that…
Thanks to a witch’s curse, I am obligated to write about any videogame I have played for longer than a half hour, so let us contemplate World of Final Fantasy.
Long story short on the whole game? It was a noble attempt at… something, but it is hard to say it ever succeeded at anything. I’m trying to work out those “goals”, though, but I’m thinking a good start would be…
World of Final Fantasy is World of Final Fantasy, dummy, it’s about the Final Fantasy heroes
There’s one reason that everyone bought this game (well, everyone that actually did buy the game), and it is Final Fantasy with a capital F. Final Fantasy has one of the greatest pedigrees in the history of gaming, and, while Mega Man, Castlevania, or alike has dropped off in recent years/decades, there has never been a year without a Final Fantasy or Final Fantasy-adjacent product since the advent of the Buster Sword (citation needed). Final Fantasy may be right up there with Mario and Madden as one of the most established gaming franchises out there, and, like it or not, we’ve got Final Fantasies filling up shelves all over the place.
And, in a weird way, that might be a problem.
I know a lot of people reading this have been gaming all of their lives, right there from the advent of the Nintendo Entertainment System. And that likely means you’re damn well near forty. And you know what that also means? You’re old! There were an awful lot of people that were born in the intervening four decades! And they might like Final Fantasy, too! Except, you know, their first Final Fantasy game was Final Fantasy 7. Or Final Fantasy 10. Or, wonder of wonders, they may have played their first Final Fantasy game this year, and it’s a MMORPG involving a strangely high number of cat boys. And that’s before we even get into the number of people that got into gaming later in life, or just recently decided it was time to see what this “Final Fantasy” was all about, or just picked up Final Fantasy 6 because it came with the Super Nintendo Mini, or even they’re interested in finding out the deal with these weird dudes from the Kingdom Hearts 3 expansion. Point being is that there are 35 years of Final Fantasy out there, and people could have started with Final Fantasy “one” or fifteen.
And, if you’ve found you enjoyed Final Fantasy, it’s only natural to have a desire to see what else is out there in the franchise. Only issue? That could take you the rest of your life. There is a lot to any given Final Fantasy, and, before you even get into the idea of how even the smallest FF takes like ten hours, nearly every FF also has wildly disparate moving parts. The battle system in Final Fantasy 5 isn’t going to effectively help you learn whatever Lightning is flipping around about in Final Fantasy 13, and everything you ever learned about harvesting Flan Princess in Final Fantasy 4 is not going to be relevant by the time you have to complete all the “hunts” of Final Fantasy 12. Even if you had infinity time for playing as many videogames as you ever wanted (I want to live there), the Final Fantasy franchise is still daunting, as you have to rapidly switch tracks between mastering materia and farming playing cards. And then you never see a reason to have that “skill” ever again in the franchise (or, for that matter, anywhere else in any other game).
I am a master of the gambit system. That didn’t even survive to see Final Fantasy 12-2 (it happened! It was on DS!)
And, to be absolutely clear, it is in Square-Enix’s best interest that you have not only an affection for the whole of the Final Fantasy franchise, but that you also know it inside and out. Easy example? Dissidia Final Fantasy NT is a fighting game (basically) that relies on you having a familiarity with its cast of Final Fantasy luminaries. And when SE decides to release expansion materials like new fighters, management is literally banking on you not only knowing who Zenos yae Galvus is, but also that you like said character enough to shell out five bucks for the experience. Locke Cole isn’t going to put cyberdollars in cyberwallets if everyone that ever cared about the dude stopped playing videogames in 2010. And this is just one game! Mobile experiences like Pokémon Go, Fire Emblem Heroes, and the entire Fate/Stay franchise are all at least partially based on the concept that people will do godammned anything to get a shiny Pikachu wearing a party hat (or, for the equivalent in the Fate franchise, a shiny, sexy Benjamin Franklin wearing a party hat). Square Enix needs every man, woman, and lilkin on Earth to love Cloud Strife, because the quarter 2 profits are already based on the idea that a million people are going to buy Lara Croft’s Tifa crossover outfit.
Oh, and I guess it’s good for gaming discourse if everyone has the same Final Fantasy knowledge, too. But that’s not super relevant to the people that choose which games get greenlit.
This finally brings us to World of Final Fantasy. It is clear what World of Final Fantasy was trying to do: in the same way that Kingdom Hearts condenses entire Disney movies into “worlds” that feature five characters and two dungeons, World of Final Fantasy boils down its Final Fantasy “guest stars” into their component parts with generally distinctive plots and locales. Yuna the responsible summoner is hanging around the Pyrefly Forest where she first boned a ghost, and Rydia the more cheeky summoner has a peppy adventure where she faces her fear of fire. Final Fantasy guest characters show up just long enough to make an impact on the player, but not outshine the “real” heroes of this tale. In short, by the end of World of Final Fantasy, the player should have a general fondness and understanding of characters from a solid fourteen or so Final Fantasy games. And it’s reasonable to say that playing one 40-hour game is a faster path to understanding the Final Fantasy pantheon than playing fifteen games that could potentially suck up the rest of your life.
But there is a bit of an issue with using the “Kingdom Hearts approach”. No one is going to mistake Pinocchio for Aladdin for Jack Skellington. However, when you hit the FF games, well… Squall is a competent SeeD “hero” that has some issues with confidence. Cloud is a competent SOLDIER “hero” that has some issues with confidence. Lightning is a competent… ah, crap, we’ve already hit a wall. A lot of Final Fantasy characters kind of boil down to the same character once you remove them from their more complicated home plots. Squall and Cloud are very different protagonists in their respective adventures, but, in the limited World of Final Fantasy, they’re practically the same as Tidus. In fact, in a weird way, the “knights” of World of Final Fantasy become something approaching a boy band. Tidus is the funny one, Lightning is the serious one, and Squall is the one that is interested in gardening for some reason. They are only graphically distinguishable, and, frankly, the funko-ization of the gang doesn’t help in that department either.
And, while this at least gives a new audience the cliff’s notes on a particular hero or supporting character, it’s disapointing for anyone that is in this to see those beloved Final Fantasy characters again. Tifa is in “Nibelheim flashback” mode, so she’s… what? A martial artist in training/cowgirl? That’s a far cry from the confident “mom of AVALANCHE” that starred in Final Fantasy 7/Remake. King Edgar comes off as little more than an aggravating flirt compared to the original king that was willing to participate in a hentai to rescue his countrymen. Vivi had practically an entire game’s worth of meditation on mortality and the meaning of life in Final Fantasy 9, and here he barely even has a name. It’s cool that the “intervention quests” all seem tailor made to please people that want to see Pirate Princess Faris and Ifrit have a conversation (I have been writing that fanfic since I was thirteen!), but everything here is so shallow as to be nearly insulting. Final Fantasy fans want a phoenix, yet World of Final Fantasy offers chicken feed.
So World of Final Fantasy is shallow as an introduction to Final Fantasy characters, and even shallower for anyone that wants to spend more time with particular protagonists. But maybe we’re barking up the wrong tree! Maybe it was never supposed to be about the “cameo” characters, maybe…
World of Final Fantasy is its own game, dummy, this is about the original characters and plot
First of all, to break kayfabe for a moment: ha ha ha, oh man, that’s a good one.
Second of all, this is a place where World of Final Fantasy knows what to do, but refuses to put in the time on the “homework” to make it actually happen. As previously stated, World of Final Fantasy follows the usual arc of a Kingdom Hearts story: the plot and main characters are introduced, that is then ignored for hours as our heroes have a ball with a pile guest characters/worlds, and then it all comes back to an original “point” in time for the finale when guests met across the adventure may or may not find a way to help in the concluding, ridiculous battle. Unfortunately, what works for Kingdom Hearts absolutely does not work for World of Final Fantasy for one simple reason: you are never given a reason to care about Lann and Reynn.
The twins are, like, your main characters, right? So you probably feel something there. But beyond that? I technically spent entire days’ worth of hours with those two, and I could barely tell you their defining attributes. Yes, they’re both generally well-meaning heroes that will fight against injustice and love their parents… but past that? Lann is the goofy one, Reynn is the responsible/contemplative one, and, aside from a certain woman’s hatred for cactus men, that’s all I got. They are not really characters beyond broad archetypes, and, when bad things happen to them, nobody cares. Oh, they were wholly responsible for a hundred years of hardship? Yeah, alright, I could buy that. As believable as anything else in this world.
And a reminder that this game is from the same people that brought you Kingdom Hearts 2, which somehow made the fans demand an entire Kingdom Hearts “miniseries” game based on some dork from the opening skateboarding tutorial or whatever. KH2’s Roxas is a fully established, sympathetic character inside of like seven seconds. His own featured game made him a tragic hero that could rival the likes of Shakespeare (or at least anything from the Marvel Cinematic Universe). Lann and Reynn never come close to that over the course of an entire game.
And don’t try to claim the other original supporting characters in World of Final Fantasy fare any better, because there aren’t any. Wynne and Enna both alternate between macguffins and lore dumps, and then we have… Tama the fox mascot? Do not waste my the-time.
But maybe it’s about the overarching lore, right? Maybe this is another Final Fantasy 13 situation wherein the cool, established world is hiding in data entries and other “data logs” hidden around the world. Maybe this is the kind of story that isn’t necessarily about the characters, but about the world (of Final Fantasy).
And, sorry to say that I’m continually setting you up for disappointment here, but World of Final Fantasy flubs there, too. This wasn’t explored much on the stream (what kind of maniac would make a “let’s read” let’s play) but there are “datalogs” and glossaries to spare in World of Final Fantasy; and, spoilers, they all add up to a big fat nothing. Yes, there multiple, fascinating stories in World of Final Fantasy’s backstory (and even more in Maxima), but they all combine to form a Voltron of oblivion (and Enna Kros forms the head).
The ultimate punchline to the lore of World of Final Fantasy is that there are some people that merge with powerful summons to ascend to godhood, and, once they’ve established their nigh-omnipotent powers, they can create worlds. So there are worlds of fantasy, there are worlds of sci-fi, and (since some people are jerks) there are worlds of death-spewing dragons. And some worlds are proper Final Fantasy games, some worlds are obviously implied to be the spin-offs, and some worlds are like this one: where there’s a little sprinkling here and there of the familiar, “main” worlds, but they’re still fairly bonkers. And, of course, sometimes the worlds fight. And, end of the day, that’s that. There are infinity worlds with infinity permutations, and World of Final Fantasy 2 could have equal odds of being another adventure in “this” world, or one where you’re piloting a space ship in a shoot ‘em up (Einhänder is unquestionably implied to be another world). And when your final word on lore is that “all worlds happen and could happen and are happening” it kind of makes the whole thing feel… pointless? Like, I saved this world, I saved Wynne, but apparently there a bunch of other worlds? And even other Wynnes? There’s possibly a great moral here about how saving your own world and the people you love really matters in the face of infinite choices, but that lesson is seemingly absent here. This is one World of Final Fantasy, there are a thousand out there, too, and good will always triumph over evil regardless of what anybody does.
By Alexander, it’s Bioshock Infinite all over again. That’s never good!
But it’s possible that this is all purposeless anyway. World of Final Fantasy shouldn’t be judged like a crossover movie or a novel…
World of Final Fantasy is a videogame, dummy, it’s supposed to be fun to play
Look, let’s get one thing out of the way (he said 2,000 words in): this is supposed to be Final Fantasy: Pokémon. Like a lot in WoFF, it only half commits, as the whole “mirage keeper” aspect of this adventure is arguably generally ignored in the plot (being a mirage keeper is super important to the plot, but you could also replace the nuts and bolts [and backstory] of “mirage keeping” with “making coffee”, and very little about the story would change. (Oh, your mom was a high barista of the cappuccino lineage? How interesting.) But it is everything during battles. The meat of World of Final Fantasy’s challenge isn’t so much about fights that are “hard” to actually manage, but more that you have to manage your mirages before every bout, and be sure you’re prepared for whatever is going to happen this time. A new mirage can only be captured by casting fire on it? Great, be certain you have a fire mirage. This boss is weak to ice? Well, you might lose once, but come back with a Shiva in your gang, and you’re set. And the stacking aspect makes this replacement for “equipment” interesting every time: you can’t just don an anti-lightning ring accessory, you have to “stack” an anti-lightning mirage with another mirage that isn’t going to negate your prime immunity. You have the ability to create completely contradictory stacks, and then never get anything done! Or properly manage all your mirages, and blaze through a volcano with all the ice armor of the Light Warriors of lore. It might take some time, but it is empowering to “get it right” with your stack for a particular area.
Of course, if World of Final Fantasy is biting on Pokémon for this gameplay, they missed one key feature in that experience: being able to switch Pokémon on the fly. Like in Pokémon, you have a limited number of mirages that can be on your belt at one time; however, unlike the Gamefreak original, you absolutely cannot switch your mirages in the midst of a battle. Whatever you chose to start this battle with is stuck until you either win, run, or die. And, while it’s not difficult to solve the puzzle of maybe you need an electric team in the robot-based dungeon, many of the later areas are more generic, and require a greater swatch of abilities and resistances. And there is nothing worse than facing down a gigantic behemoth, knowing you have you the proper instrument in your toolbox right over there, but, sorry, you’re stuck in this battle right now, and you’re going to have to whittle down those health points in the most boring, least satisfying way possible. And then you switch in your trump card for the next behemoth battle, only to face a mag roader team that requires a totally different solution. It’s exhausting, and another place where World of Final Fantasy falls just short of being a great game. It’s not terrible! It’s just… close enough to great that you can see exactly what went wrong.
And while the battle system may be satisfying when it comes together, the dungeons need some serious work. Final Fantasy hasn’t ever been a franchise that was particularly known for its dungeons (monster closets? Yes. Dungeon design? No), so we’ve got an uphill battle there to begin with. But here the dungeons are generally extremely generic locations (ice cave, volcano, basement) with marginally interesting gimmicks (ice sliding puzzle, put out fires, turn on machines). There is exactly one dungeon in this entire adventure that I found remotely memorable (underwater temple complete with wall-walking action), but even that wound up overstaying its welcome by about 20%. Past that, the only other dungeon that even came close was the Train Graveyard, but that loses some significant points for being an extremely confusing maze of platforms that easily loop on each other.
And speaking of the Train Graveyard, that was a dungeon that absolutely required bringing particular mirages with particular abilities (in this case, “zap” and “smash”), whereas previous dungeons only relied on the “map screen abilities” as a way of accessing extra treasure. Was there some warning that I absolutely had to bring a smash-based mirage to this dungeon? Not that I saw. So did I waste a solid half hour trying to figure out if I could solve this “puzzle” without needing a specific mirage, like I had in every dungeon prior? Yep! And that doesn’t leave an impression at all.
And if this entire writeup makes World of Final Fantasy sound like a bad game, I apologize, that is not the intention. This has been a list of the significant problems in World of Final Fantasy, but it is also a list of the only significant problems in World of Final Fantasy. I will admit now, before God and audience, that there were moments when I absolutely did not want to stop playing World of Final Fantasy. The whole adventure really clicked around the 30% completion mark, and, from that point on, I was tempted on a weekly basis to play without my streaming company. Hell, I technically did play the game during those times, I just played the less cinematic bits, like fighting through the coliseum or completing mundane fetch quests. This is a fun game! World of Final Fantasy is a fun game! And it does hold up to its pedigree a lot better than many other spin-offs of popular franchises. This ain’t no Wand of Gamelon.
But my theory has always been that if you’re going to do it, you should do it right. That’s why everything I have ever written, including this article, is absolutely prefect. Final Fantasy is a pedigree in the gaming sphere, and this Final Fantasy product falls short of its forbearers. It’s still a fun experience, but it is also flawed in some very obvious ways. Maybe a World of Final Fantasy 2 will correct these problems, or maybe a third World of Final Fantasy released seventeen years later will address the issues. Maybe it will always be a weird, one-off “quirky adventure” in the Final Fantasy pantheon. Whatever the case, the game we have here, even in its expanded state, is still just “good”, and far shy of flawless.
But, hey, it’s still a fun way to spend eleven nights of streaming.
What’s next? Welp, I feel like we’ve covered an awful lot of World of Final Fantasy at this point, but there is still that whole “lore” thing I’ve admitted to ignoring. Maybe we could take a more focused look at that…
Don't think I agree with the points of criticism very much. Everything the game does as a crossover and an original story is framed through its sincere aims to present itself as a comedy, and it's actually consistently funny, thanks to a combination of well-executed physical comedy in the animation, excellent casting and performances (Serafie is a highlight) and a relentlessly and affably wry localization voice. That's what endears the player to the protagonists and other original creations; the details largely don't matter, only the emotional content and delivery does. Distilled (diluted if you're cynical) caricatures standing in for the pre-existing characters is totally desirable and acceptable for a lighthearted all-stars treatment like this that is sharing the limelight between dozens of characters at once, and they do enough in that space to make the cameos matter for the game's context. All World of Final Fantasy really had to do was be justifiably cute, and that it does its routine with such aplomb casts it as an overachiever in its day, which I think is a recurring pattern with a lot of Final Fantasy crossover projects that celebrate and engage in dialogue with the series's history.
I really have to disagree with this one. The game TRIED to be funny on many occasions, but the jokes never land quite right, and the choice of character models being those dead-eyed funko pop abominations prevent the kind of expressiveness required for any sort of character-based comedy.
The game is bad.
*shrug* I never really expected the participants of this LP to actually like the covered material, so I assumed it would just be used as a source of riffing and the impressions to fall along those lines. I just want to offer a counterpoint as someone who really enjoyed what the game did and was.
There are 100% funny moments in this game, and a lot of lesser jokes that, like, could conceivably funny. There are also some amazing mirage entries that are hilarious (and have been noted in the stream and even these "liner notes"), and a few that are... well, that one where they keep trying to make "Lich" rhyme with a naughty word. And the twins really are the classical "straight man and goofy man" partnership.
THAT SAID if you're trying to make something a comedy, maybe don't hang it all on a story where you're required to kill your parents. Twice. If World of Final Fantasy is a comedy, it falls under the same issues that are outlined above: it can't fully commit, and the parts where it veers into drama stand out a lot more than Lann playing football in the background of an info dump. It can be a funny game! The characters can be enjoyable! But if you're going for funny, go for actually funny, and don't hang it all on a story that drowns in its own world that is literally based on a genocide that was instigated by the "wacky" heroes.
I take the opposite position as BEAT on the funkos (or something like that): it feels like, maybe, the fact that Cloud is a wee puppet man is supposed to automatically add levity to any situation. Mini Cloud and Lil' Tifa are facing Ultima Weapon, and Nibelheim is in danger, but, ha ha, they're action figures, who cares? It's silly! But nothing else about the narrative seems to indicate the Lilkin Heroes are anything but serious about their world, and, yes, you're supposed to take Cloud fighting an impossible monster as seriously as in Final Fantasy 7 Remake. So, yeah, Lann might make a crack about something being ridiculous in the midst of that, but you're still in a situation as "serious" as real Final Fantasy, and, give or take a cactuar on your head, you're in a battle that is exactly as serious as your average Final Fantasy.
So, yeah, I totally believe this game was intended to be comedic. And there are funny bits! I acknowledge World of Final Fantasy sincerely tries. But, end of the day? I played Final Fantasy 7 Remake this year, and there were more genuinely funny bits in that adventure than this one. And, in some cases, it came from the exact same characters! It can be done! Just WoFF doesn't seem to know what it wants enough to stick to it.
... And, to be clear (because on rereading this whole post, it sounds like I'm specifically trying to refute you), Peklo, I do appreciate that you have a thoughtful, measured enjoyment of this game, and a desire to share that.
THAT SAID if you're trying to make something a comedy, maybe don't hang it all on a story where you're required to kill your parents. Twice. If World of Final Fantasy is a comedy, it falls under the same issues that are outlined above: it can't fully commit, and the parts where it veers into drama stand out a lot more than Lann playing football in the background of an info dump. It can be a funny game! The characters can be enjoyable! But if you're going for funny, go for actually funny, and don't hang it all on a story that drowns in its own world that is literally based on a genocide that was instigated by the "wacky" heroes.
I take the opposite position as BEAT on the funkos (or something like that): it feels like, maybe, the fact that Cloud is a wee puppet man is supposed to automatically add levity to any situation. Mini Cloud and Lil' Tifa are facing Ultima Weapon, and Nibelheim is in danger, but, ha ha, they're action figures, who cares? It's silly! But nothing else about the narrative seems to indicate the Lilkin Heroes are anything but serious about their world, and, yes, you're supposed to take Cloud fighting an impossible monster as seriously as in Final Fantasy 7 Remake. So, yeah, Lann might make a crack about something being ridiculous in the midst of that, but you're still in a situation as "serious" as real Final Fantasy, and, give or take a cactuar on your head, you're in a battle that is exactly as serious as your average Final Fantasy.
So, yeah, I totally believe this game was intended to be comedic. And there are funny bits! I acknowledge World of Final Fantasy sincerely tries. But, end of the day? I played Final Fantasy 7 Remake this year, and there were more genuinely funny bits in that adventure than this one. And, in some cases, it came from the exact same characters! It can be done! Just WoFF doesn't seem to know what it wants enough to stick to it.
... And, to be clear (because on rereading this whole post, it sounds like I'm specifically trying to refute you), Peklo, I do appreciate that you have a thoughtful, measured enjoyment of this game, and a desire to share that.
Oh, I keep forgetting to officially wrap this up. Let's do that!
World of Final Fantasy: What the Heck Happened
A long time ago in a dimension far, far away, there was a woman named Roksanne. Roksanne had a cute little pet fox buddy, and, apparently, put on a red light for a living castle. Noted summon Alexander merged with Roksanne, and she became Enna Kros.
("Bow before me and bring some snacks, mortals")
Shortly thereafter, Enna Kros discovered The Girl Who Forgot Her Name, and, rather than be a good friend and give her a goddamn name, she decided to exploit the amnesiac’s powers to create whole worlds.
(You could name all sorts of people in the old Final Fantasy games)
Thus, any dimension created by Enna Kross aka Alexander became known as an A-World.
So, while Enna Kros is the god of World of Final Fantasy, there are worlds that are not created by Enna Kros out there. Cogna gotta come from somewhere, and you do not want to hear about what happens in YT-Worlds.
(Typical YT World nonsense)
Thus, Enna Kros created the “Champion System” whereby when one of her worlds is threatened, “Champions” will manifest in the population, and these champions will copy the traits and personalities of heroes from other worlds.
(A dashing champion)
So there’s your excuse for why Cloud, Squall, and that cat lady from the spin-off franchise are all running around, and they’re kinda like their original versions, but, ya know, different enough to be interesting. Or not interesting. Whatever works, we’ve gotta let the “real” heroes shine somehow.
Speaking of heroes, one A-World is Grymoire.
(A Final Fantasy Legend begins)
At the start of this tale, Grymoire is a world that is populated by Jiants, who are “normal” humans (by our reckoning), and Lilikins, little funko looking dudes that were originally a race of summoned helpers. Think that weird dude with the nose from Fairy Tale.
(Lilkin left, Jiant right)
Anyway, the Lilikins formed their own little generally feudal society, and the Jiants mostly hung out in the Nonary Region, working at the Business Factory or whatever it is adults do.
(Nonary Town in good times)
Two Jiants were Lusse and Rorrik.
(Mom and Dad, before)
Lusse was a summoner queen, and Rorrik worked at the box factory making magical boxes. They boned, and birthed the twins, Lann and Reynn.
(The heroes!)
Like their parents, Reynn was an excellent monster keeper, and Lann was good at thinking inside the box. But there was an issue! Reynn and Lann thought their mother was too overworked, so they set out to ease her burden.
Spoilers: this gets her killed. Never try, children!
Nonetheless, there are creatures known as mirages in Grymoire, and Mirage Keepers have the ability to capture and use these mirages like Pokémon.
(Mirages are significantly more physical in this world)
Lann and Reynn jumped to the conclusion that if they caught enough Pikachus, their mother would have an easier time. Maybe tonberries are supposed to be little butlers? Whatever. Lann and Reynn caught as many mirages as possible, and eventually accumulated the most powerful mirages on the planet.
(Three out of seven)
Ifrit, Shiva, Ramuh, Leviathan, Odin, Bahamut and Diablos for some reason were all at the command of the twins. Actually, strike that, we don’t have details on exactly what happened, but, a hundred years later, the whole gang is feared as the legendary Demon Dyad, so it’s assumed Lann and Reynn messed that one up but good.
So, plan B, Lann and Reynn learned from their adopted sister, Hauyn, that there was an Ultima Gate, and they could use it to summon a god.
(Having an adopted sister is a Win)
Figuring they had done so well with controlling gods in the past, they opened the Ultima Gate.
(It's more of a Ultima Hole)
Hauyn objected, but Lann sealed her in a box, because boxes solve problems. And, naturally, when the Ultima Gate was opened, it didn’t bring forth a benevolent god, but Brandelis, an evil version of Bahamut that had already destroyed a few worlds here and there.
(Off-Brand Bahamut)
Brandelis immediately captured the parents of Lann and Reynn, and saw them possessed by a pair of forgettable Final Fantasy 6 Espers.
(Mom and Dad, after)
Then ol’ Branny apparently started siphoning power from Winn and the rest of the family, and set about killing every other Jiant he could find.
(Nonary Town, after the twins had a bright idea)
Somewhere in there, the bad guys started stealing the mirages that Lann and Reynn had accumulated, and there was much concern over actual demons gaining control of the “Demon Dyad”, so the twins managed to eek out one tiny victory. They used four magical keys to seal Brandelis with the Ultima Gate, and trapped four members of the Demon Dyad to sleep with those four keys across the world.
(Always a good sign when they glow on their own)
Only the twins could unlock this sealing, and they certainly wouldn’t ever do that. You know, unless they got amnesia or something.
…. Oh godammit.
So, their mostly dead parents dropped the kids off in Nine Wood Hills, a pocket dimension that was like their home universe, except there aren’t any other people, and the twins were damned to be baristas working a really slow shift for 100 years. As a result of this reality switch, Lann and Reynn were forced to forget their lives before the coffee shop, which sounds rough, but is standard procedure in the Starbucks employee manual.
(A nice cup of amnesia)
In the meanwhile, while Brandelis was sealed, his toadies continued to more subtly wreak havoc over Grymoire, primarily by starting an evil empire and an equally evil religion.
(They're big fans)
The whole point of that nonsense was apparently twofold: steal men’s souls and make them their slaves, and also set up this whole ridiculous prophecy that would goad the twins into unlocking the gates if they ever return with a very specific kind of amnesia that lets them continue to be valiant protagonists, but with no recall that they set up the keys themselves. Of course, oddly enough, this exact thing happens.
So this brings us to where the game actually starts! Wee!
(Okay, let's begin)
After 100 years a slave to coffee, Lann and Reynn are “reawakened” by Enna Kross, who grants them some starter mirages, and sends them off to the “real” world of Grymoire. They are told their memories will return if they capture their old mirages. The duo instantly forgets this order, and winds up focusing on the evil empire’s Bahamutian Army and a prophecy floating around regarding magical keys. So they fell for the bad guy’s plan, like, ten seconds in. Good job, idiots. Thus, the sealed summons escape their confines, and, after getting all those keys, the twins ascend to their ruined former home, and inadvertently free Brandelis. They also free the boxed Wynn, but, bad news, Brandelis had another evil scheme brewing, and that was capturing all the summoners in the world to use the twins’ powers to use the Ultima Gate again, and this time drag the Cogna, evil robots lead by Xenogears, into the world.
(At least one Cogna hails from Final Fantasy 6)
The machines invade, the world is in mortal peril, and it’s all thanks to our “heroes”. Twice!
So, eventually, the twins beat back the robot invasion, and fight their way to a final confrontation with Brandelis. Unfortunately, it goes even more poorly than usual for these losers, as Wynn and their possessed parents all die during the final battle.
They find no way to ultimately defeat Brandelis, as he’s sucked up so much funko energy, he’s become invincible. This leads to Lann permanently sealing Brandelis in a box at the cost of his own, unboxed life. Reynn is beside herself with grief at this outcome, and effectively pleads with god (or her proxy) to get a do-over. She gets her wish, but at the cost of the life of her mascot creature who wasn’t even relevant enough to mention until now. How the player interprets this “sacrifice” may be determined by how much one enjoys the ticks of the verbal.
Regardless, the bad end never happened, Wynn and the (possessed) parents are alive again, but Brandelis still needs sorting. Reynn hatches the clever plan to literally listen to god and finally get around to reclaiming her old mirages.
(Bringing back the big boy)
The twins gather up the Demon Dyad again, borrow a 1-UP mushroom to revive their Naruto, and then decide to tackle Brandelis with the help of the rest of the champions of the world.
(Believe it!)
This leads to a good ending where Wynn survives, the parents die because they were always dead (though, in this case, they’re friendly ghosts), and Brandelis winds up sealed in the rare double box (with some clipping).
(Always remember: proper box maintenance is key)
But things never go well for these idiots, and Brandelis breaks free as the robots are being sucked back into the gate to the Xenoblade universe. The twins halt Brandy’s advance with karate, but Lann, Reynn and Brandelis alike are sucked into the gate.
(Box it!)
In the end, the World of Final Fantasy, Grymoire, is left with a host of Final Fantasy champions, some vaguely tamed demonic mirages, and exactly one jiant, Wynn, that is probably going to have a hard time finding any matches on Tinder.
And what happened to our heroes? Who the hell knows. Their mobile game didn’t do great, so I’m not holding my breath.
That's all, folks! Thanks for reading/watching!
World of Final Fantasy: What the Heck Happened
A long time ago in a dimension far, far away, there was a woman named Roksanne. Roksanne had a cute little pet fox buddy, and, apparently, put on a red light for a living castle. Noted summon Alexander merged with Roksanne, and she became Enna Kros.
("Bow before me and bring some snacks, mortals")
Shortly thereafter, Enna Kros discovered The Girl Who Forgot Her Name, and, rather than be a good friend and give her a goddamn name, she decided to exploit the amnesiac’s powers to create whole worlds.
(You could name all sorts of people in the old Final Fantasy games)
Thus, any dimension created by Enna Kross aka Alexander became known as an A-World.
So, while Enna Kros is the god of World of Final Fantasy, there are worlds that are not created by Enna Kros out there. Cogna gotta come from somewhere, and you do not want to hear about what happens in YT-Worlds.
(Typical YT World nonsense)
Thus, Enna Kros created the “Champion System” whereby when one of her worlds is threatened, “Champions” will manifest in the population, and these champions will copy the traits and personalities of heroes from other worlds.
(A dashing champion)
So there’s your excuse for why Cloud, Squall, and that cat lady from the spin-off franchise are all running around, and they’re kinda like their original versions, but, ya know, different enough to be interesting. Or not interesting. Whatever works, we’ve gotta let the “real” heroes shine somehow.
Speaking of heroes, one A-World is Grymoire.
(A Final Fantasy Legend begins)
At the start of this tale, Grymoire is a world that is populated by Jiants, who are “normal” humans (by our reckoning), and Lilikins, little funko looking dudes that were originally a race of summoned helpers. Think that weird dude with the nose from Fairy Tale.
(Lilkin left, Jiant right)
Anyway, the Lilikins formed their own little generally feudal society, and the Jiants mostly hung out in the Nonary Region, working at the Business Factory or whatever it is adults do.
(Nonary Town in good times)
Two Jiants were Lusse and Rorrik.
(Mom and Dad, before)
Lusse was a summoner queen, and Rorrik worked at the box factory making magical boxes. They boned, and birthed the twins, Lann and Reynn.
(The heroes!)
Like their parents, Reynn was an excellent monster keeper, and Lann was good at thinking inside the box. But there was an issue! Reynn and Lann thought their mother was too overworked, so they set out to ease her burden.
Spoilers: this gets her killed. Never try, children!
Nonetheless, there are creatures known as mirages in Grymoire, and Mirage Keepers have the ability to capture and use these mirages like Pokémon.
(Mirages are significantly more physical in this world)
Lann and Reynn jumped to the conclusion that if they caught enough Pikachus, their mother would have an easier time. Maybe tonberries are supposed to be little butlers? Whatever. Lann and Reynn caught as many mirages as possible, and eventually accumulated the most powerful mirages on the planet.
(Three out of seven)
Ifrit, Shiva, Ramuh, Leviathan, Odin, Bahamut and Diablos for some reason were all at the command of the twins. Actually, strike that, we don’t have details on exactly what happened, but, a hundred years later, the whole gang is feared as the legendary Demon Dyad, so it’s assumed Lann and Reynn messed that one up but good.
So, plan B, Lann and Reynn learned from their adopted sister, Hauyn, that there was an Ultima Gate, and they could use it to summon a god.
(Having an adopted sister is a Win)
Figuring they had done so well with controlling gods in the past, they opened the Ultima Gate.
(It's more of a Ultima Hole)
Hauyn objected, but Lann sealed her in a box, because boxes solve problems. And, naturally, when the Ultima Gate was opened, it didn’t bring forth a benevolent god, but Brandelis, an evil version of Bahamut that had already destroyed a few worlds here and there.
(Off-Brand Bahamut)
Brandelis immediately captured the parents of Lann and Reynn, and saw them possessed by a pair of forgettable Final Fantasy 6 Espers.
(Mom and Dad, after)
Then ol’ Branny apparently started siphoning power from Winn and the rest of the family, and set about killing every other Jiant he could find.
(Nonary Town, after the twins had a bright idea)
Somewhere in there, the bad guys started stealing the mirages that Lann and Reynn had accumulated, and there was much concern over actual demons gaining control of the “Demon Dyad”, so the twins managed to eek out one tiny victory. They used four magical keys to seal Brandelis with the Ultima Gate, and trapped four members of the Demon Dyad to sleep with those four keys across the world.
(Always a good sign when they glow on their own)
Only the twins could unlock this sealing, and they certainly wouldn’t ever do that. You know, unless they got amnesia or something.
…. Oh godammit.
So, their mostly dead parents dropped the kids off in Nine Wood Hills, a pocket dimension that was like their home universe, except there aren’t any other people, and the twins were damned to be baristas working a really slow shift for 100 years. As a result of this reality switch, Lann and Reynn were forced to forget their lives before the coffee shop, which sounds rough, but is standard procedure in the Starbucks employee manual.
(A nice cup of amnesia)
In the meanwhile, while Brandelis was sealed, his toadies continued to more subtly wreak havoc over Grymoire, primarily by starting an evil empire and an equally evil religion.
(They're big fans)
The whole point of that nonsense was apparently twofold: steal men’s souls and make them their slaves, and also set up this whole ridiculous prophecy that would goad the twins into unlocking the gates if they ever return with a very specific kind of amnesia that lets them continue to be valiant protagonists, but with no recall that they set up the keys themselves. Of course, oddly enough, this exact thing happens.
So this brings us to where the game actually starts! Wee!
(Okay, let's begin)
After 100 years a slave to coffee, Lann and Reynn are “reawakened” by Enna Kross, who grants them some starter mirages, and sends them off to the “real” world of Grymoire. They are told their memories will return if they capture their old mirages. The duo instantly forgets this order, and winds up focusing on the evil empire’s Bahamutian Army and a prophecy floating around regarding magical keys. So they fell for the bad guy’s plan, like, ten seconds in. Good job, idiots. Thus, the sealed summons escape their confines, and, after getting all those keys, the twins ascend to their ruined former home, and inadvertently free Brandelis. They also free the boxed Wynn, but, bad news, Brandelis had another evil scheme brewing, and that was capturing all the summoners in the world to use the twins’ powers to use the Ultima Gate again, and this time drag the Cogna, evil robots lead by Xenogears, into the world.
(At least one Cogna hails from Final Fantasy 6)
The machines invade, the world is in mortal peril, and it’s all thanks to our “heroes”. Twice!
So, eventually, the twins beat back the robot invasion, and fight their way to a final confrontation with Brandelis. Unfortunately, it goes even more poorly than usual for these losers, as Wynn and their possessed parents all die during the final battle.
They find no way to ultimately defeat Brandelis, as he’s sucked up so much funko energy, he’s become invincible. This leads to Lann permanently sealing Brandelis in a box at the cost of his own, unboxed life. Reynn is beside herself with grief at this outcome, and effectively pleads with god (or her proxy) to get a do-over. She gets her wish, but at the cost of the life of her mascot creature who wasn’t even relevant enough to mention until now. How the player interprets this “sacrifice” may be determined by how much one enjoys the ticks of the verbal.
Regardless, the bad end never happened, Wynn and the (possessed) parents are alive again, but Brandelis still needs sorting. Reynn hatches the clever plan to literally listen to god and finally get around to reclaiming her old mirages.
(Bringing back the big boy)
The twins gather up the Demon Dyad again, borrow a 1-UP mushroom to revive their Naruto, and then decide to tackle Brandelis with the help of the rest of the champions of the world.
(Believe it!)
This leads to a good ending where Wynn survives, the parents die because they were always dead (though, in this case, they’re friendly ghosts), and Brandelis winds up sealed in the rare double box (with some clipping).
(Always remember: proper box maintenance is key)
But things never go well for these idiots, and Brandelis breaks free as the robots are being sucked back into the gate to the Xenoblade universe. The twins halt Brandy’s advance with karate, but Lann, Reynn and Brandelis alike are sucked into the gate.
(Box it!)
In the end, the World of Final Fantasy, Grymoire, is left with a host of Final Fantasy champions, some vaguely tamed demonic mirages, and exactly one jiant, Wynn, that is probably going to have a hard time finding any matches on Tinder.
And what happened to our heroes? Who the hell knows. Their mobile game didn’t do great, so I’m not holding my breath.
That's all, folks! Thanks for reading/watching!
Speaking of heroes, one A-World is Grymoire.
(A Final Fantasy Legend begins)
A-World looking a lot like the Kingdom of Zeal there.
(Lilkin left, Jiant right)
Lilkin left, Tamaranian Princess wannabe middle, Jiant right?
Two Jiants were Lusse and Rorrik.
(Mom and Dad, before)
I will NEVER get over how different the anime looks from both of the two in-game character model styles.
(Having an adopted sister is a Win)
I particularly like how she tries to do a traditional hair flip but it just stays in place regardless.
Brandelis
(Off-Brand Bahamut)
I see what you did there.
Brandelis immediately captured the parents of Lann and Reynn, and saw them possessed by a pair of forgettable Final Fantasy 6 Espers.
(Mom and Dad, after)
Zona Seeker I'll give you (I'm its only fan!) but Tritoch got the whole of FF6 started, man! He... she... them? is important!
Now, if they had used Quetzalli...
Let me guess, they're gonna get Serge'd by a monster man who's really their father into opening the all-important sealed gate only they have access to.
(They're big fans)
Can Lilkin be big fans of anything?
Knowing the backstory, that sounds like a rather egregious plan by the creator of the world on all accounts.
You'd think either WarMech or some form of Omega would have taken the job, but now this just Raises Further Questions about Xenogears and Weltall and Deus and especially the Wave Existence but really what the hell are you doing Fei.
When you think about it, aren't all mint-in-box Funkos just little Brandelises itching to consume all reality?
And you thought it was the other Squex franchises which were heavy with religious overtones.
Wait, really? I honestly did miss that part
Speaking of which, you didn't mention the dance party/carnival/parade at the end!