Final Fantasy II: Anniversary Edition

Final Fantasy II...this has been remade the same number of times as Final Fantasy I. The game starts out with the epilouge, which explains how the Emperor of Palamecia has sold his doul to evil, giving him the power to start his campaign for world conquest. Four youthes, Firion, Maria, Guy, and Leon, find themselves running from the now taken over town of Fynn, where a rebellion force had been established to stop the Empire.

While running, the four run into a party of Black Knights, and are badly injured. When Firion, the hero, wakes up in the rebellion headquaters in the town of Altair, he rushes out the door to find his friends. Maria and Guy are found waiting for him outside the door, but Leon has disappeared....The three join the rebellion against the Empire to get revenge, and the fight for the world begins...

Review:

This game is different. I will say that before I even begin. It has strayed far from the tradition Final Fantasy. The game has been remade with better music and graphics, along wth the CG cutscenes from the PSX version, the "Soul of Rebirth" quest from the GBA version, and it's own cutscenes and dungeons exclusve to this version.

Over all, the story is pretty good. It's has similiarities to that of Star Wars, in which a rebellion rises to stop an Empire. In this game, many characters (main and minor) die or sacrifice themselves in order to help the rebellion in their fight, which some games lack. The reason why it's good this game has that and it gains more credit for that then games that don't is that this game lets you know and teaches that wars aren't all fun and adventures, it's a battle, and people will die.

The most notable deaths are Minwu the White Mage, Josef the Monk, Scott, the Prince of Kashuan, Ricard the Dragoon, Cid the Engineer, Tobul the Blacksmith, and the King of Fynn. These characters can later be seen in the "Soul of Rebirth" bonus quest, which is unlocked on the title screen after completing the main game.

The leveling up system has been taken out in favor of a more realistic system where you build each stat, magic, weapon (categorized into groups) seperatly. While more realistic, this can be very time comsuming and tedious. The damage ratio is quite strange, as at one point you can be doing up to, say, 100 to an enemy, but do 30 next turn without the enemy changing or using defense spells at all.

Trying to raise stats by staying in a battle and just repeatedly using a magic spell or hitting your party members with a weapon to level it up is a good way to level up faster, but many enemies tend to up run from the fight, and sometimes ends the battle before you want it to. To avoid this, however, you should try to find a spot wth very strong enemies, and hope that they aren't strong enough to obstruct your leveling up.

Anoter notable difference that this game has different from the other Final Fantasies is the word system. In this game, key words will appear in red, and after the person has completeing his or her sentence, you can learn that word and use it in dfferent situations. The Key Items work in the same fashion. After the word or item that the sitaution was involved in is done, it becomes useless, and another word or item replaces it. There is the exception of the Wyvern, which will use Blaze on all enemies when used in battle, the Canoe, and Scott's Ring, which will bring up the world map.

The enemies get harder at a very quick rate, sometimes even mixing in along with weaker enemies, appearing randomly and wiping out your party. This can be very unhelpful considering the fact that most of the time you only have three party members. Enemies often give out useful items, however.

The music is very well done, and lets you know what kind of situation you are in. While the battle music is cool, it doesn't try to be all showy and awesome, it is dramatic and climaxing.


Arcane Labyrinth


The new dungeon for Final Fantasy II. The Arcane Labyrinth is split into three dungeons on the East, West, and South side of Salamand, and centers itself around key words used exclusively for the Arcane Labyrinth along with ones used in the main storyline. When you begin, you are asked to break the seal on a warp using one of your key words. Once you step on the warp, it will bring you to a dungeon that fits where the key word came from (example - when you use the key word "Wild Rose", you are taken to a castle under attack by Imperial forces).

When you reach the dungeon, there are people in need of help (when you are in the Wild Rose's dungeon, you must defeat all the Imperials), however, you have two choices - Help to person or people out, or simply find the next warp and leave. Leaving may be simpilier then helping them, but in order to get Arcane Labyrinth exclusive words to go to pther dungeons, you must help the person or people in need.

Enemies encountered in the dungeon is based on the location the key word you used took you to, which means that you must be careful using dungeon exclusive words. The Arcane Labyrinth is a very useful place to level up and can be entertaining, but be sure to use a few storyline key words before using new ones, so you get an idea of what's going on.

This is a very fun game, and I recommend it even to the people who have the Dawn of Souls or any other version of it.