Final Fantasy IV

This is the single greatest video game of all time.

There are too many reasons to list why this is true.

Final Fantasy IV (ファイナルファンタジーIV) is a console role-playing game developed and published by Square (now Square Enix) in 1991 as a part of the Final Fantasy video game series. The game first appeared on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System as Final Fantasy II, but has been ported by TOSE with minor differences to the Sony PlayStation, the Bandai WonderSwan Color, and the Nintendo Game Boy Advance under its original name. In May 2007, Square-Enix announced that it was developing a remake of the game for the Nintendo DS.

The player takes the role of Cecil, a Dark Knight from the kingdom of Baron, on his journey to save the world from the evil Golbez. Struggling to prevent Golbez from acquiring powerful Crystals, Cecil learns of his heritage and travels through three realms to battle Golbez's minions. His lover, best friend, and other warriors join him for the adventure.

Final Fantasy IV introduced innovations that became staples of the Final Fantasy series and role-playing games in general. Its "Active Time Battle" system was used in six subsequent Final Fantasy games. Its character-driven plot, use of the new technologies (such as Mode 7) and critically acclaimed score by Nobuo Uematsu have prompted critics to consider Final Fantasy IV one of the greatest games of all time.

Gameplay

In Final Fantasy IV, the player controls a large cast of characters and completes quests to advance the story. Characters move and interact with people and enemies on a field map, which may represent a variety of settings, such as towers, caves, and forests. Travel between areas occurs on a world map. The player can use towns to replenish strength, buy equipment, and discover clues about their next destination. Conversely, the player fights monsters at random intervals on the world map and in dungeons. In battle, the player has the option to fight, use magic or an item, retreat, change character positions, parry, or pause. Certain characters have special options. Player characters and monsters have HP or hit points (represented by a numerically based life bar); attacks reduce hit points until none are left, at which point the character faints or the monster dies. If all characters are defeated, the game must be restored from a saved game file. The player can restore the characters' hit points by having them sleep in an inn or use items in the party's inventory, such as a Potion. Equipment (such as swords or armor) bought in towns or found in dungeons can be used to minimize received damage or increase damage inflicted on monsters. The player can choose whether characters appear on the front line of a battle or in reserve. A character's placement impacts distribution of damage received and inflicted. The game's story is linear—the player can usually advance the game through only one path, although limited side quests are available.

Final Fantasy IV introduced Square's Active Time Battle (ATB) system designed by Hiroyuki Ito, who was one of the battle designers with Kazuhiko Aoki and Akihiko Matsui, which differed from the turn-based designs of previous RPGs. The ATB system centers around the player inputting orders for the characters in real time during battles. An important precedent, ATB was used in many subsequent Square games. Each character is balanced through certain strengths and weaknesses; for instance, a strong magic user may have low defense, while a physical fighter may have low agility. Like other Final Fantasy games, characters gain new, more powerful abilities with battle experience. Magic is classified as either "White" for healing and support; "Black" for offense; or "Summon" (or "call") for summoning monsters to attack or carry out specialized applications. A fourth type—"Ninjutsu"—consists of support and offensive magic and is available to only one character. Magic users, who account for eight of twelve playable characters, gain magic spells at preprogrammed experience levels or fixed story events. The developers have balanced point gains, items, and rewards to eliminate long sessions of gaining levels. Due to the Super Nintendo's greater processing power, Final Fantasy IV contains graphics improved over past Final Fantasy titles and concurrent Super Nintendo games. The game employs the Super Nintendo's Mode 7 technology to give enhanced magic spell visuals and to make airship travel more dramatic by scaling and tilting the ground for a bird's eye view.

Plot

Setting

Most of Final Fantasy IV takes place on Earth, also known as the Blue Planet, which consists of an upper world (or Overworld) and an underground world (or Underworld). The Overworld consists of territories populated by different character classes from the series. The Underworld is primarily inhabited by dwarves and is covered in rock and magma. A red, artificial moon orbits the planet, upon which two races, the Lunarians and the Hummingway live. A second, natural moon orbits as well, though it is never visited in the game. Travel among the three realms is accomplished through airships.

Races

Besides the humans and dwarves, there are two other important races in Final Fantasy IV:

The Hummingway are a race from the Moon. Their appearance is characterized by blue and yellow clothing with turbans on their heads, however, some appear in pink and white. Most of them only speak in humming noises. One notable Hummingway is named Namingway, and appears in most towns offering to change the names of the characters who talk to him. In Final Fantasy IX, the player can find the Namingway card in Kuja's castle, or win it from Mario in the card arena. This card allows players to rename their characters.

The Lunarians are a race of human-like wizards. They came from the planet between Mars and Jupiter, which was destroyed and became the asteroid belt. Sometimes, they are identified by a moon-shape crest on their foreheads. They created Earth's second moon, where they sleep until they believe the time is right for Earthlings and Lunarians to co-exist in harmony. The only known full-blood Lunarians are FuSoYa, the guardian of the Lunarians, Zemus, a restless Lunarian who plans on destroying life on Earth so he, alone, can inhabit the planet, and KluYa, who is believed to be the first Lunarian to interact with humans. In fact, KluYa fell in love with an Earthling, and had at least two sons with her: Cecil, the main character of the game, and Golbez, the villain controlled by Zemus.

Characters

Main article: List of Final Fantasy IV characters

Development sketch by Yoshitaka Amano of the character Kain.Final Fantasy IV offers twelve playable characters, each with a unique character class. The hero, Cecil Harvey, is a Dark Knight of Baron who serves the king alongside his childhood friend Kain Highwind. Kain was once asked to become a Dark Knight, but instead followed his father's example and became a Dragoon. Rosa Farrell is the heroine and Cecil's girlfriend; she became a white mage and archer to protect Cecil as her mother protected her father. Cecil is the captain of the "Red Wings", an elite air force unit constructed by his friend, the engineer Cid Pollendina.

During his quest, Cecil is joined by others. Kain joins very quickly, but is separated from Cecil soon afterwards. Rydia, a young Summoner from the village of Mist, joins shortly after Kain leaves. Cecil gains her trust by saving her life. Tellah is a legendary sage of Mysidia; he is very protective of his daughter Anna. Edward Chris von Muir, the prince of Damcyan, pursues her courtship and travels disguised as a bard. Yang Fang Leiden is the well-mannered head of the Monks of Fabul. Palom and Porom are twin wizards from Mysidia who assist Cecil in a difficult trial. Edward "Edge" Geraldine is the rowdy Ninja prince of Eblan who has a crush on Rydia. Lastly, FuSoYa is the guardian of the Lunarians during their long sleep.

Story

Final Fantasy IV begins with the unmatched monarchy of Baron using the Red Wings to attack peaceful nations and find four powerful Crystals that correspond to the classical elements. Cecil questions the king's motives after stealing the Water Crystal from the wizards' town of Mysidia, murdering several in the process. He is stripped of his rank and sent with Kain to deliver a package to the Village of Mist. To reach the mountain valley where the Village is located, the two traverse the Mist Cave and defeat the Mist Dragon that guards it. Upon reaching the village, they discover the package is actually a bomb, which explodes, resulting in the destruction of the town and the death of many of its inhabitants. In the ensuing chaos, Cecil and Kain encounter Rydia, a young female survivor standing over her mother's body. Rydia's mother was spiritually connected to the Mist Dragon; the dragon's death ended her life as well. The infuriated girl summons a monster to attack Cecil and Kain; it causes an earthquake, which cuts off the route back to Baron and knocks the three unconscious. When Cecil awakens, he discovers that Kain has disappeared and the girl is injured. He carries her to an inn at the town of Kaipo.

Soldiers from Baron arrive in the night to abduct the girl on orders from the king of Baron to kill all Summoners, and Cecil defeats them; impressed, Rydia joins him. While in Kaipo, Cecil discovers a bedridden Rosa. While searching for Cecil, she contracted an ailment curable only by the "Sand Ruby" jewel, released when the Antlion beast lays its eggs. Access to the Antlion's lair is controlled by the Kingdom of Damcyan, so Cecil and Rydia travel north to Damcyan through the desert and an underground waterway through the mountains. They meet Tellah, a sage, in the water pass, who is also travelling to Damcyan in search of his daughter Anna. The three arrive just in time to witness the Red Wings attacking the kingdom. In investigating the ruins of the castle, they discover that Anna was killed in the assault; Tellah blames her death on her lover, Prince Edward, the smitten bard. Edward explains that a warrior named Golbez orchestrated the attack to steal Damcyan's Fire Crystal, prompting Tellah to leave the party to seek vengeance on Golbez for her death. Edward joins Cecil and Rydia and helps them retrieve the Sand Ruby.

At Kaipo, the revived Rosa joins the party, which resolves to go to Fabul to protect the Wind Crystal from being stolen by Golbez and the Red Wings. Along the way, while crossing Mt. Hobs they encounter Yang, the head of the Fabul Monks, being ambushed by Golbez's monsters; the party helps him fight them off. Yang requests Cecil's help in defending Fabul after they inform him of Golbez's plot. At Fabul, the Red Wings attack and Cecil's party slowly retreats through the halls of the castle to the room containing the Wind Crystal, where he is confronted by his friend Kain and learns he is affiliated with the Red Wings. Kain challenges and defeats him in a duel. Golbez arrives, kidnaps Rosa, and steals the Wind Crystal. The next morning, Cecil and Yang decide to sneak into Baron to acquire an airship from Cid for a rescue attempt. After considering Baron's weak sea defenses, Yang charters a ship to take Cecil, Edward, Rydia, and himself to Baron. While sailing, they are attacked by the sea monster Leviathan and the party is scattered.

Cecil awakens on a beach near Mysidia, where he is met with contempt by the town's wizards for stealing the Water Crystal earlier. However, the Mysidian elder understands Cecil's plight, and tells him that to defeat Golbez, Cecil must climb Mt. Ordeals, surrender his dark sword and become a Paladin. The elder sends twin wizards Palom and Porom to assist and spy on Cecil. On the mountain, they encounter Tellah, who is searching for the legendary spell Meteor to defeat Golbez. Golbez attempts to stop the party by sending Scarmiglione, the Fiend of Earth, to stop them, but the party defeats the demon, Cecil completes the trials, and becomes a Paladin; in the process, Tellah also learns the secret of Meteor.

Upon returning to Mysidia, the town elder is impressed that Cecil successfully became a Paladin and allows him the use of the "Serpent Path," a teleporter that takes the party to Baron. There, Cecil learns that Cid has been arrested and Yang brainwashed into the service of Baron. After helping Yang recover, Cecil, Yang, and the others infiltrate the castle and discover that the king is actually the Fiend of Water, Cagnazzo. After defeating him, Cid is freed and takes Cecil and his friends to his newest airship. Before dying, Cagnazzo causes the walls of the castle to move with the intent of crushing the party. Palom and Porom petrify themselves to halt the trap.

Cecil on the World Map outside of BaronCecil takes command of the airship and is met at takeoff by the brainwashed Kain, who demands Cecil retrieve the final Crystal in exchange for Rosa's life. Cecil heads for Troia, where the Earth Crystal is enshrined. He learns the Crystal was stolen by the Dark Elf, and his friends and he retrieve it. Kain leads the group to the Tower of Zot, where Rosa is imprisoned. After the party battles to the tower's summit, Golbez takes the Crystal and attempts to flee. Tellah tries to kill Golbez by using Meteor. The spell kills Tellah and weakens Golbez, shattering his control over Kain's mind. Kain helps Cecil rescue Rosa and, after defeating the Fiend of Wind, Barbariccia (SNES version name is Valvalis), the party escapes to Baron.

In Baron, Kain reveals that Golbez must also obtain four subterranean "Dark Crystals" to achieve his goal. Cecil swears to defend the Crystals; Kain gives him a "Magma Rock" he obtained while in the service of Golbez that is instrumental to accessing the Underworld. The party is initially unsure of how to use it, but they eventually discover the town of Agart, whose inhabitants claim descent from the dwarves of the Underworld. Thinking this town may have the secret to accessing the Underworld, Cecil drops the Magma Rock into the town's exceptionally deep well, triggering an earthquake that opens a passage to the Underworld. They fly through the opening, but their airship is soon damaged while caught in the cross-fire of a battle between the Dwarves' tanks and the airships of the Red Wings, forcing it to crash outside the Castle of Dwarves. King Giott of the dwarves accepts Cecil's offer to guard the Crystals. Cid departs to repair and upgrade the airship; soon after he leaves, Cecil, Rosa, Yang, and Kain discover Golbez has infiltrated the dwarves' crystal room and try to stop his theft of their Crystal. During the battle they are joined by Rydia, who was sucked into the Underworld by Leviathan. However, Golbez escapes with the Dwarves' Dark Crystal, and Cecil sets out to the Tower of Babel to retrieve the lost crystals. King Giott offers the services of his tanks to draw the fire of the tower's defenses while the party infiltrates it. While inside, the party confronts Golbez's servant Dr. Lugae, and after defeating him they are informed the crystals have been moved to that portion of the Tower that is above ground; as his last act, Dr. Lugae orders that the Tower's Super Cannon destroy the dwarf tanks. Yang volunteers to stay behind and destroy the Super Cannon while the party escapes, and is presumed dead.

Upon escaping the Tower the party is met by Cid and a repaired airship. They are pursued by the Red Wings and fly back to the upper world to escape them; Cid throws himself overboard and detonates a bomb to re-seal the passage, apparently sacrificing himself. Back on the surface, they find the path to the Tower of Babel's upper half. While following it they encounter Edge, the ninja prince of Eblan, who seeks revenge on Rubicante for the death of his parents; Edge joins the party. Inside the tower, the party defeats Rubicante but falls through a trap door to an Underground portion of the Tower and finds an abandoned Red Wing airship. After returning in it to the Castle of Dwarves and consulting with King Giott, Cecil and the others decide to go to the Underground's Sealed Cave and retrieve the eighth and final crystal before Golbez gets to it. After they succeed in doing so, however, Golbez reassumes control over Kain and forces him to steal the Crystal. Back at the Dwarf castle, Giott tells Cecil of the Lunar Whale, a "ship of light" designed to take travelers to and from the moon. Cid, who was found by the dwarves and nursed by them back to health, fits their airship with a drill and the party drills their way back to the surface. Cecil returns to Mysidia to pray for the Lunar Whale's appearance. It rises from the ocean, and Cecil, Rosa, Rydia, and Edge board it to travel to the moon.

The final Boss:Zeromus, Rydia is going to call BahamutUpon arriving on the moon, the party enters the only visible structure, the Lunar Palace, and there the party meets an elderly man named FuSoYa who explains that Cecil's father is a heroic but deceased Lunarian.[40] FuSoYa also explains that a Lunarian named Zemus plans to destroy life on the Blue Planet to facilitate Lunarian inhabitation. To achieve this, Zemus manipulated Golbez and Kain to obtain the Crystals needed to revive a giant destructive android, the Giant of Babel. Meanwhile on Earth, the forces of the world, including some characters (Yang, Palom, Porom) thought to have died, hopelessly attack the unleashed Giant. FuSoYa, Cecil, Rosa, Rydia, and Edge enter and destroy the Giant. FuSoYa breaks Zemus' control over Golbez and Kain, and Cecil learns that Golbez is his brother. After destroying the Giant, Golbez and FuSoYa head to the core of the moon to defeat Zemus. Cecil's party follows after reuniting with Kain. After battling to the moon's core, the party witnesses Golbez and FuSoYa defeat Zemus but quickly lose to his ultimate form, Zeromus. With the united life force of all beings combined with a special Crystal provided by Golbez, Cecil and his party defeat Zeromus. Following the conflict, Golbez decides to remain dormant along with the other Lunarians, as he would not be welcome on Earth. One year later, the heroes reunite for Cecil and Rosa's wedding and coronation as Baron's king and queen.

Development

After completing Final Fantasy III in 1990, Square planned to develop two Final Fantasy games—one for the Nintendo Famicom and the other for the forthcoming Super Famicom, to be known as Final Fantasy IV and Final Fantasy V respectively. Due to financial and scheduling constraints, Square dropped plans for the Famicom game and continued development of the Super Famicom version, retitled Final Fantasy IV. A mock-up screenshot of the cancelled title was produced for a Japanese magazine, but little other information exists about it.

[edit] Audio

The score of Final Fantasy IV was written by longtime series composer Nobuo Uematsu. Uematsu has noted that the process of composing was excruciating, involving trial and error and requiring the sound staff to spend several nights in sleeping bags at Square Co. headquarters. His notes were humorously signed as being written at 1:30 AM "in the office, naturally." The score was well received; reviewers have praised the quality of the composition despite the limited medium. The track "Theme of Love" has even been taught to Japanese school children as part of the music curriculum. Uematsu continues to perform certain pieces in his Final Fantasy concert series.

Three albums of music from Final Fantasy IV have been released in Japan. The first album, Final Fantasy IV: Original Sound Version, was released on June 14, 1991 and contains 44 tracks from the game. The second album was Final Fantasy IV: Celtic Moon, released on October 24, 1991, contains a selection of tracks from the game, arranged and performed by Celtic musician Máire Breatnach. Lastly, Final Fantasy IV Piano Collections, an arrangement of tracks for solo piano performed by Toshiyuki Mori, was released on April 21, 1992 and began the Piano Collections trend for each successive Final Fantasy game. Several tracks have appeared on Final Fantasy compilation albums produced by Square, including The Black Mages and Final Fantasy: Pray. Independent but officially licensed releases of Final Fantasy IV music have been composed by such groups as Project Majestic Mix, which focuses on arranging video game music. Selections also appear on Japanese remix albums, called dojin music, and on English remixing websites.

Reception

In Japan, nearly 1.5 million copies of Final Fantasy IV were shipped to retailers. As of 2006, nearly 3 million copies of the game (including original and PlayStation re-releases) have been sold around the world.

Major reviewers have called Final Fantasy IV one of the greatest video games of all time, noting that it popularized many common console role-playing game features. Reviewers have praised the game for its graphics, gameplay and score. Reviewers have noted that Final Fantasy IV was one of the first role-playing games to feature a complex, involving plot. Nintendo Power proclaimed it set a "new standard of excellence" for role-playing games, It would later place ninth and twenty-eighth in the "100 Greatest Nintendo Games" lists of issues 100 and 200, respectively. In addition, the magazine GamePro rated it a perfect 5 out of 5 score in its March 1992 issue. IGN currently ranks it as twenty-sixth on its list of greatest games of all time; it is the highest rated Final Fantasy title on the list. Famitsu released a reader poll in 2006 ranking it as the sixth best game ever made. The game's original release was heavily criticized for the poor quality of its English language translation. Final Fantasy IV's Game Boy Advance remake was met with praise from reviewers, although a few noted the game's graphics do not hold up well to current games, especially when compared to Final Fantasy VI. Reviewers noted that some fans may still nitpick certain errors in the new translation.

Versions and rereleases

Final Fantasy IV has been ported to several platforms. Each version is nearly unchanged save for minor differences. To date, an easy version of Final Fantasy IV has been released for the Super Famicom, and the game has been ported to Sony PlayStation in 1997, the WonderSwan Color (in 2002), and the Game Boy Advance (in 2005).

Final Fantasy II (North America)

Because the previous two installments of the Final Fantasy series had not been localized and released in North America at the time, Final Fantasy IV was distributed as Final Fantasy II to maintain naming continuity. Later remakes of the game have been released in North America under the original title. While the game retains the storyline, graphics, and sound of the original, developers have significantly reduced the difficulty for beginning gamers. Certain items are less expensive or rare, and several battle commands have been removed—including Tellah's Recall (allowing him to use a random magic spell), Edward's Medicine (which used Potions from the player's inventory to heal the entire party), and Cecil's DarkWave (an attack which targeted all enemies but sacrificed a portion of his health). Several enemies and bosses have been reduced in strength and assigned special weaknesses. Entrances to secret passages on field maps are outlined in blue, whereas they are invisible in the original Japanese version. The translation has been changed in accordance with Nintendo of America's censorship policies (at the time before the formation of the ESRB and its rating system), and certain errors have been introduced during Internationalization and localization.

Certain character descriptions and elements of backstory have been cut due to space limitations. For instance, Kain's background and relationship with his father and the motivations for Zemus's plans to colonize Earth are not in the game. The logo for the U.S. version features the same font and sword-letter-T emblem used in the Game Boy Final Fantasy Legend series rather than an image of Kain, which was used for the Final Fantasy IV title logo (and was used for its later releases as well). Other changes include the removal of overt Judeo-Christian religious references and certain potentially objectionable graphics. The magic spell Holy has been renamed White. All references to prayer are eliminated; the Tower of Prayers in Mysidia is renamed the Tower of Wishes, though the White Mage in the tower still calls it "Tower of Prayers" and Rosa's Pray command is absent. Direct references to death are omitted, although several characters clearly die over the course of the game. Anything considered too risqué has been censored, such as bikinis on town dancers (replaced by leotards). The Programmers' Room special feature (in which the player can find a Porno Magazine) has been removed.

In addition to the content edits, one major gameplay function was altered: The multiplayer option, which operated similarly to the same option in Final Fantasy VI, was completely removed, as was the ability to edit controller settings.