Ranking The Final Fantasy Games: #12-10
The very first title in the series, Final Fantasy was truly a last-ditch effort by creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. It reflected his last attempt to create a meaningful game as his own “final” fantasy, as if it weren’t a success he vowed to return to university instead of developing games. Luckily, Square produced enough titles to permit a large amount of sold Final Fantasy cartridges, allowing Sakaguchi to continue his dream.
The game features six classes; half magic focused and half weapon combat focused. Released in 1987 for the NES, it helped to set up the turn-based combat with menu selection that would hold true for most of its sequels. Overworlds, dungeons, towns, airships; it all started here. It was enough to bring Final Fantasy into the RPG realm, but that’s about where the magic ends. The gameplay, music and pacing doesn’t hold up to today’s standards. That’s not to say it was a bad game, but more speaks to the strength of the series overall.