Final Fantasy Flight, Part 4

I was on a plane next to a crying baby for six hours. It nearly negated the rest of the perks of flying Virgin America.

The journey back to Matoya's Cave was a fairly tedious one thanks to the unrelenting gangs of goblins that keep attacking the party, despite having no chance whatsoever to survive.

Anyway, the witch received her glass eye. As a reward, she gave our heroes her strongest potion: a jolt tonic to wake the Elf Prince. I'm not sure why the herb was changed to a potion. But perhaps it has to do with Nintendo's changing standards for age appropriate content over the years. Up with violence and religious references, down with drugs nad sex. Maybe the localization team didn't want kids to think the old witch was peddling narcotics.

We also have have one of the earliest examples of an RPG padding its length by forcing its heroes to run back and forth on a fetch quest, all the while subjecting them to unchallenging random battles. Case in point, after I received the jolt tonic, I traveled back south to the docks north of Cornelia, boarded the pirate ship, and sailed south to Elfheim. There, the jolt tonic promptly awakened the prince, who said something about waking up from a nightmare and awarded me with the mystic key. Then, I had to travel back to Cornelia Castle to use the key to open the treasury. The next hour was spent backtracking to the Chaos Shrine, Marsh Cave, and Western Keep to load up on loot.

In order to leave the enclosed sea, the heroes needed to blow up the little land bridge south of the Dwarves' mine. The TNT (which is now called Nitro Powder for no real good reason) was found all the way back in Castle Cornelia in the treasury.

With the land bridge destroyed, our heroes sailed west toward the town of Melmond. The GBA version adds an extra dungeon called the Whisperwind Cove right next to the newly created channel. It looks like a whirlpool and leads to one of the Soul of Chaos location.

The Dwarves' Mine has a different name now. It's called Mt. Drurugarsomethingorother. They all have weird Colonial American/Scottish accents. The blacksmith is still there, and he's still demanding adamantium to make the legendary sword, but he's now a blacksmyth. Go fig.

Melmond is surprisingly green from the outside (I believe some of the other versions show more decay on the world map). But inside the town, the dilapidated buildings, torn up grass, destroyed church, and endless graveyards create a mood of desolation and foreboding. Inside the inn, the decorations are bare and you can even see a big spider web in the corner. It's a nice touch.

Even back in the NES version, Melmond was a sad, dreary place. Sure, there wasn't much variation in the palette. But the gravestones and NPC conversations let you know that it was time to crap your pants because a vampire was running around killing the villagers. Plus, there was no "clinic," and therefore no way to revive characters without going back to Cornelia or Elfheim.

The area is a bit easier in the GBA version thanks to the presence of Phoenix Downs. You can buy them from Cornelia and they cost 500 gil each. Also, Melmond sells the Revive spell, which has the same effect.

One of the dwarves in town identified himself as Watts, a nice reference to Seiken Densetsu. Our heroes also ran into the ever-so-smug Dr. Unne, taking a walk in the northeast corner of town. Oh Dr. Unne, how we love you and your rosetta stone translating ways.

But back to the main adventure. I didn't have enough gil to stock up on the new weapons and armor thanks to the ridiculously expensive spells from Elfheim. However, the heroes were pretty well equipped from my mystic key stash raiding earlier. So I loaded up on potions and antidotes from the item store and headed southwest.

Hopefully the vampire is more challenging this time around.

Final Fantasy Flight, Part 3

So I'm in New York this week to visit a client. Of course, this means more time at the airport playing Final Fantasy.

Actually, it was a JetBlue flight, so there was TV on the plane and I didn't play as much as I would have if I flew Southwest.

One thing that hasn't changed about this game is the sudden price increase for learning new magic upon leaving Pravoka. You'd think the citizens would pitch in since, I dunno, I just saved their lives from sadistic pirates. But no. Spells still cost a pretty penny. As a result, you spend a good hour or so sailing aimlessly and grinding.

It gets worse. The spell shops in Elfheim (formerly Elfland) are even more expensive (1000 gil each) and there are two sets of them for each magic school.

Anyway, the first hour or so consisted of me fighting SAHAGs and ODDEYEs (or whatever they're called now). Occasionally, I fought sharks that managed to jump on deck. In the NES version, you could occasionally fight pirate-like enemies called KYZOKU. They were easy to defeat and awarded a lot of loot. However, they kept not showing up.

Elfheim was interesting. Whereas every town looked roughly the same in the original, the palette was changed here to look more woodland-ish. Edrick's tombstone was also changed to Link's, to align it with the Famicom version.

The Elf Prince was asleep, cursed by the Dark Elf. An elf kindly informed me that a witch named Matoya could wake the prince with her herbs. So... the elves can't ask Matoya for the herb themselves?

I traveled to the Western Keep to speak with the king. The place was in ruins. He told me that Astos caused the downfall of his kingdom and that he needed a crown to restore his kingdom.

I guess the Warriors of Light are kind of like Forrest Gump. They're kind and want to help people, but also pretty stupid. Here we have a king sitting in the middle of a ruin. Nobody asks him why he doesn't join the rest of his folk in Elfheim?

Oh well. Marsh Cave it is!

Square-Enix is more consistent these days with monster names. It used to be that a monster would have seven different names. Here, the WIZARDs have been renamed Piscodemons, which is a subset of Mindflayer found in the later games. These are the squid-faced magi who steal your brain if you're not careful. They were much easier than I remember thanks to a lack of spellcasting. But it could have been due to the Phoenix Down (not in the original) conveniently placed in a nearby chest.

I did die once from the Ghasts outside the Marsh Cave. Back in the day, these enemies were called GEISTs. Every successful attack paralyzes one of the characters. So if you don't kill them fast, the entire party becomes paralyzed and it's impossible to win. They just whittle you down 5 HP at a time until it's game over. I guess the Dia spell had its uses after all. Oh well.

Back at the Western Keep, I healed the entire party, saved the game, and gave the king the crown. Of course, he turned out to be Astos in disguise all along. Ho ho! Classic Final Fantasy twist!

Back in the NES version, Astos used a spell called RUB to "erase" an enemy. Nintendo censorship dictated that no references to death could appear in their games. Here, the spell has been renamed Death and features the now-classic animation of the grim reaper slashing the character's soul.

It was the first spell Astos used, and on my fighter too. But it also missed, which is a Final Fantasy form of epic fail. Thus, the rest of the battle consisted of my fighter wailing on him, while buffed with the Temper spell. Astos crumbled away and left behind Matoya's crystal eye.

How did he ever manage to steal the eye? The world will never know. Next stop: Matoya's Cave.