Final Fantasy VI Advance: The World Is Not Enough

Author's Rating:

Pros: great story, great gameplay dynamics

Cons: linear, mission repetition

The Bottom Line: 
A great portable RPG.

Author's Review
Final Fantasy VI was originally released for the Super Nintendo under the name Final Fantasy III. It was later re-released for the Playstation under the two disc Final Fantasy Anthology set. When discussing overlooked Final Fantasy games, this one ranks up there with Final Fantasy IX in terms of great independent iterations of the series. Final Fantasy VI was released here in North America towards the end of the Super Nintendo era. It sold for a lot, and was quickly overshadowed by the 3D polygonal Final Fantasy VII in terms of wide ranging appeal. Final Fantasy VII really breathed new life into the series here while attracting many new gamers to the RPG genre. Lost in the mix was Final Fantasy VI. An outdated game on a dying console. It's a shame because it faced the same fate on the Playstation re-release and now Gameboy Advance. Back in 1999, Final Fantasy Anthology was overshadowed by the release of the Dreamcast. Now on the Gameboy Advance, Final Fantasy VI Advance was overshadowed by Final Fantasy III for the Nintendo DS, and Final Fantasy XII on the Playstation 2. I almost missed that it was being released a few weeks ago as a result. I never finished this game for the Super Nintendo, nor did I ever own Final Fantasy Anthology. So I decided to right the wrongs of my own past and give this game a try.


Story

In the world of Final Fantasy VI, magic is all but extinct. Since the War of the Magii, magical beings known as Espers exiled themselves to another realm to prevent their coexistence with humans. In the present day, Emperor Gestahl is seeking to find Espers who might not be in exile, but rather living in their world. His quest is for the ultimate power, one that ages ago during the first War of the Magii, ravaged the continents and destroyed the world. It's up to a group of heroes whose hatred of the Empire has bonded them together to fight this threat.

The story is one of the strongest elements of Final Fantasy VI Advance. Yes, most of the base elements of the plot are very cliche. It's yet another save the world story involving a band of unlikely heroes, but there are so many surprising twists that it really creates an epic experience. Characters have dynamic personalities, yet they also are easy to identify with and care about over the course of your journey. The villains also ratchet up the villainy quite a bit. Never before have I ever wanted to really whip a villain more than Kefka. Villains like Sephiroth, Bowser, and Gannon might be epic because they are the main enemy of a good game, but Kefka just beats them out pound for pound that you almost need a novel or movie to really hash out this story and to fully comprehend what he does in this game.


Gameplay

Final Fantasy VI Advance is your standard turn based RPG. You explore the overworld trying to advance the plot. Still, there are many wrinkles as well which make it more than just another Final Fantasy IV.

Final Fantasy VI Advance is split up into two parts with regards to the plot. For sake of spoiling the plot of the game, I'll simply refer to them as the first half and the second half. The first half is pretty linear. You are forced to traverse specific areas and up until the end of the first half, you have limited ways of traversing the overworld. In the first half of the game, there aren't many side quests and the game really stresses for you to stay on course rather than wander around and explore.

The second half is where the game really picks up and makes itself useful. You have more freedom to explore the overworld and different dungeons as you see fit. Still, despite this open-endedness, the second half is much more linear than initially advertised. All paths eventually lead to the same conclusion and there's little consequence in the order or completeness in which do you complete quests in the second half. Sure there's plenty of side quests, but it's a far cry from a game like Chrono Trigger.

Most of the quests involve going from point A to point B, fighing some monsters and the occasional boss. However there are some wrinkles built into the game as well. There are many timer missions where you have to complete a task in a certain amount of time. Similarly there are quests that involve no fighting at all instead remembering lines or processes so you don't have to start over. Finally there are the standard fare of making sure a certain party member doesn't die. Overall, most of these gameplay mechanics appear as quests in other games as well, but the timer missions should be noted as it's not a norm in these Final Fantasy games.

The battle system is pretty good. It's a turn based system for your party of 1-4 members, which also uses a action status meter to determine when a party member is ready to fight. Enemies have their own action meter as well except it's hidden. This forces you to attack, defend, or use magic quickly in order to maximize your success. You can turn off this meter, but it takes away from the spirit of the game. There are roughly a dozen playable characters in Final Fantasy VI Advance. They each have their own unique abilities and characteristics. Some characters have the ability to use special equipment suited only for them, while others have powerful abilities apart from anything magical. Finally, some characters have the ability to harness magic in a different way whether it's mimicking an enemy's ability, copying it, or simply enhancing their own magical powers. These special abilities are static among the characters and help to define them within the bounds of the game. You can customize them with certain characters whether its obtaining certain equipment or determining which abilities to learn, but in the end there's usually only one best path to maximizing the potential of your party's individual abilities.

Final Fantasy VI Advance centers around the acquisition of espers. Espers are magical beings that are turned into magicite which is then used by your party members. By equipping them to a character, that character can learn spells with enough experience. They also can be used once per battle as a summon. While each character has unique abilities, you can customize them into different roles by equipping different espers. In the end however, there aren't a ton of espers and it's easy for most party members to know the best magical spells.

Characters can advance themselves through many different means. At certain experience level milestones, they advance a level. This gives your character more hit points, magic capacity, and the ability to deal and avoid damage. In addition, by raiding certain dungeons, you can acquire better equipment enough to make your character much more powerful as well. Finally, you can also acquire new espers with more powerful magical spells, or acquire new abilities in certain characters. Overall, most of the advancement will be achieved through leveling up. New equipment does play a significant role as well. Finding the best equipment can be tricky in spots because it requires providing the right answers to questions or finding secret passages while traversing a one-time only available dungeon.

The enemies in Final Fantasy VI Advanced are balanced very well. From the beginning enemies have basic abilities and spells, but later in the game, especially in the second half, you run into some very powerful enemies that can inflict some nasty status effects on you and themselves. The enemies are pretty similar in terms of toughness as you progress throughout the game. The way the game balances this is by adjusting for your equipment and level your party is at when you reach a specific area. In addition, some missions limit you to less than 4 party members as well, which sufficiently adjusts the difficulty level. The bosses on the other hand weren't terribly difficult. As long as you work quick and have your characters set up properly, the battles tend to be rather easy. In fact, the boss battles were rather disappointing for the most part simply because they concluded rather quickly. Only towards the end did the boss battles required a party with the ability to endure a long and tough fight. Besides, boss battles seemed to require a brute force approach in most instances. The idea is to damage a boss as much as possible before he can finish all your party members off. There are some exceptions whereby you can drain off all their magic points instead, but overall you're smashing everyone who gets in your way, including most bosses.

Final Fantasy VI Advance also includes several extras that weren't in any other iteration of Final Fantasy VI. This includes four new espers, three new spells, some powerful equipment, and two new dungeons. The new espers allows you to learn the new spells, and teaching some of the existing spells a little quicker. The new equipment offers a very powerful upgrade for each member of your party. Obtaining these new pieces of equipment and the new espers requires a rather challenging boss fight for weaker parties. In some instances, the new espers aren't worth the effort given the strength of the boss you have to fight, but the challenge of the fight is still worth playing even if it isn't rewarded that well. The new dungeons were a pleasant surprise. The dragon's nest is a challenging dungeon filled with powerful monsters, the new equipment I outlined earlier, and one very powerful boss at the end. The soul shrine is more of an endurance dungeon filled with some powerful and unique monsters, some of which carry some rare and powerful items. Overall the new content adds more depth to the game, but not very much replay value.


Controls

The controls are pretty basic and thus are pretty solid. The dpad moves your character on the world map, and the cursor in menus. Final Fantasy VI Advance uses the A button to accept B button to cancel convention that most other games use and it works well. In addition, the A button also searches for hidden items and opens chests. The shoulder buttons are primarily used for running. The controls are pretty straightforward except for Sabin's blitz command. Sabin's blitz uses a button combination that implements the dpad, the shoulder and face buttons. The combination doesn't have to be inputted in a certain period of time other than if you wait enemies still attack you. It's a short combination involving as little as 3 button presses to 10 for the more complicated moves. They are easy to learn and diagonals on the dpad can be substituted with one of the 4 directionals. Responsiveness could be a little better, but as long as you're careful and don't rush too much, you'll be fine.


Graphics

The graphics are sprite based and are typical of the 16-bit generation. Despite the old school look, Final Fantasy VI Advance does a lot with the limited technology. Certain parts of the game use layering to simulate 3D perspective. For instance in the airship, you can climb or dive in the air, while the ground will react to this movement appropriately. In addition, the sprites have quite a bit of detail to them as well. Enemies in battle have static poses. Some of them like the Ultima Weapon and other bosses look very detailed and fearsome, others like Ultros seem to lack a lot of detail. Characters sprites outside of battle are small and have limited animations, but make the most of them. There are various expressions each character expresses throughout the course of the game. Besides, there's only so much the Gameboy Advance can do with it's hardware, it's good to know that Final Fantasy VI Advance does a good job to push those limits as it had the SNES.


Sound

The sound is pretty good despite heavy recycling. The music has a wonderful composition of detail while adding to the various settings. The further you progress in the game, the more detailed and elaborate the music becomes. Still, and while it's likely more of a shortcoming of the hardware than the lack of imagination from the composer, the music repeats itself so often during certain points that some musical themes begin to wear on you. Most of the musical themes are original, but some themes are variations on older Final Fantasy themes though.

The sound effects are pretty good too, but suffer from the same sorts of problems as the music. That is many of the sound effects are detailed and add the appropriate amount of ambiance to the various settings in the game. Still, many of the sound effects were recycled from previous Final Fantasy games. It's not a cardinal sin with a game like this because even though it's recycled, the sound effects still fit in well with the game's environment.


Replay

There isn't much replay value in Final Fantasy VI Advance. Yes there's many ways to do things in the second half of the game, but it takes a while to start over just to get there and do things differently. Secondly, as many side quests and alternate paths to take, they all end up right back at Kefka in the end. That and the order of completing certain tasks matters little in the second half and doing everything in a single order is enough for most RPG gamers. It's very possible to miss a lot out of powerful equipment, relics, or espers based on one time only decisions. Playing through a second time allows you to pick up those items. The problem with this is that accomplishing this requires a strategy guide or walkthrough in order to see the consequences of your actions. If that's the case, then why not use a strategy guide the first time through to get all the pieces of the story, items, and other powers?

Another incentive to play through the game a second time is to use different combinations of characters for your party for certain situations. Half the time you can choose parts or all of your party to accompany you on a mission. Certain members can bring a set of dynamics worth exploring. Still, while there are several combinations, there isn't much incentive to play through the game more than a second time unless you really enjoy playing this game. That being said, the gameplay is strong enough to entice fans of this genre to play through it another time as if it was a good book. For others, once you play through the game once you should put Final Fantasy VI Advance on Ebay.

Final Fantasy VI Advance is a very good game. The story is epic, the gameplay offers some fantastic RPG elements, offers a good challenge and provides a great experience. I can even see some even placing this game alongside Final Fantasy IV as one of the best RPGs of this type. If you are a fan of a good story, you should not avoid this game. For fans of western-style RPGs, or people who require state of the art graphics should probably pass. It takes an active imagination to envision these characters, and have an appreciation of the acting of 16-bit sprites in order to really get fully invested into the story. Without that imagination, you're left thinking that Square should have ported the game to a more modern platform. Overall, Final Fantasy VI Advance gets a good score from me. RPG fans who liked Golden Sun and still have their Gameboy Advance lying around should definitely pick this game up.