Everything Is Final Fantasy

We meet Desch, Doga, Unei, and face off against the almighty Xande. We come across Moogles for the first time and need more than a few airships to get to the end. Inside a bit of a jumbled experience thanks to differing versions, we find a heart-warming tale about the preciousness of mortality and an important balance between light and darkness.

Final Fantasy puts its unique spin on the ancient history of folktales about gods and monsters. Cross-cultural myths and legends inform the role of these deity-like creatures. From nothing more than fancy magic spells to integral characters in sweeping stories, Ifrit and Shiva, Ramuh and Titan, Bahamut and Carbunkle, Odin and Alexander shape the cosmology of Final Fantasy.

We talk about the various job/class systems of Final Fantasy with focus on FFIII, FFV, FF Tactics, FF Tactics Advance, FFXIII, and FFXIV.  

Nobuo Uematsu crafts a few more masterpieces, the art stagnates a bit, and Final Fantasy II introduces an incredibly interesting game play system... that the franchise never touched again.

FFII has some issues in hindsight but was still vitally important to the franchise for introducing staples like Chocobos and Cid and perhaps the most important one of all - the principle that each new game have a new world, story, and cast of characters. 

Drawing from Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Studio Ghibli and a few others, we talk about how the Empire vs. Rebels trope is used in Final Fantasy. The Dark Knight, the Super Weapon, the Turncoat, Industry vs. Nature, Pluralism vs. Individualism and the question of whether or not conquest alone makes an empire nefarious or if true evil lies in something else.

The brothers Creasman explain their preferences in evaluating art, looking at how this podcast will be different from retroactive reviews of video games. Then we apply that rubric to the first Final Fantasy.

We begin our ongoing celebrations of Nobuo Uematsu and Yoshitaka Amano as the art and music of Final Fantasy take us to entirely new worlds and introduce us to classic beloved characters. 

We conclude the OG Final Fantasy and dive into a philosophical debate about time loops and the nature of free will. 

The first Final Fantasy game sets the stage by introducing us to the crystals (orbs) Garland, Matoya, Chaos, and the Warriors of Light. 

Welcome back to Final Fantasy Weekly! Brothers Ira and Drew explain their love for the King of JRPGs and their intentions with this long-running deep dive series.