Final Fantasy IV: The After Years: - From Here the Future Looks Bright to Me
Written: Oct 30 '09
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Chapter Feature is Interesting, Great Battle System, Great Story, Perfect Difficulty
Cons: Questionable Aesthetic Changes, New Characters are Mostly Lame
The Bottom Line: Fans of RPGs From the 16-bit Era Owe it to Themselves to Check This One Out.
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| jeremy1456's Full Review: Final Fantasy IV: The After Years for Wiiware |
It's no secret; Final Fantasy IV (originally released as Final Fantasy II in the US) is my favorite game of all time. It's the one game I've played through in excess of thirty times from start to finish and I still boot it up on an annual basis. The developer, Square-Enix has never been a big fan of making direct sequels to their games (with few exceptions) but after releasing Final Fantasy X-2 I began wondering what a direct sequel to an earlier game would be like. I wished and prayed for a return to the world of Final Fantasy IV most of all, but I never held much hope for such an endeavor. To my bewilderment such a sequel was announced, but disappointingly enough the game was to be only for Japanese cell phones. I had little hope of ever playing it until the game was announced for Nintendo's Wiiware download service. As you might expect, price would not be an issue for me. The game is now upon us, but was the wait worth it? The fanboy in me says 'you better believe it.'
The story of Final Fantasy IV: The After Years picks up nearly two decades after the original game's conclusion. Cecil is now the king of the once evil country of Baron but the world is still recovering from the destruction caused at the hands of the first game's villains. The game begins as Ceodore (the son of Rosa and Cecil) is on a routine mission with Baron's military force, the Red Wings. A mysterious second moon appears in the sky and hordes of monsters led by a mysterious blue haired girl begin their attack on the peaceful blue planet. It's up to Ceodore along with a ragtag group of heroes (including several members of the original cast) to combine their powers and once again save the world.
The After Years' story is catered almost entirely to fans of the original game. Those who never played Final Fantasy IV simply won't appreciate the fan service which this game so heavily relies upon. What's interesting is that the game is divided into different scenarios - all of which (save for the final one) follows specific characters from the original game. It's unfortunate that each character based scenario is considered add-on content which must be purchased at two bucks a pop, but at that price most of them are worth it.
The main story is quite decent and fares well as a follow-up to Final Fantasy IV, but some of the character scenarios are quite boring. The problem here is that too often they repeat scenario from the original story. Edward's is the worst of the bunch - you can predict nearly every twist and turn because most of it happened already... in the original game. If you didn't get such good bonuses from playing through all of them I would recommend skipping half of the chapters. The fact that you have to pay for each of them separately is simply inexcusable. Other scenarios, such as Palom's, Edge's, and the Lunarians are well worth the price though. In the final chapter of the game the scenarios combine with one another and you are given the option of loading data which allows money, items, and character stats to carry over. This is reason enough to play through every scenario - even the bad ones.
Gameplay from the original is mostly the same. The After Years is a turn based RPG with random enemy encounters as you traverse the large world map and trek through various dungeons. The game makes use of the Active Time Battle system in which each character is assigned a bar that gradually fills, at which point they are allowed to perform an assigned command which includes Attack, Magic, Item, and various character specific special skills. The After Years should feel pretty familiar to anyone who has played any of the 16-bit Final Fantasy titles. Despite being based on the classic games the battle system is still as fun as it ever was.
With that said, there have been a few changes here and there. The most obvious inclusion is the 'band' system that allows characters to perform combination attacks with others in the party. These skills are generally quite powerful and add another layer of strategy in planning your party. The interesting thing about band attacks is that the game doesn't automatically tell you which characters can combine to perform them - you have to manually choose two characters in the midst of battle using the band command and hope that they can share an action. Sometimes the story will automatically reveal band attacks, but most of the time you're left to experiment.
Another interesting feature of this game involves the phases of the moon. On the main menu you are given a display that shows which phase the moon is currently in, be it waning, waxing, full or new. These different phases bring about bonuses to your attacks. Depending on what the moon is doing your characters might see an boost in physical attack power, special skills, or white/black magic. The phases will also hurt one of these abilities too (again, each phase has different characteristics) so careful planning is required depending on your battle strategy. What's cool is that the enemies gain and lose the same advantages your party does.
The After Years is quite a bit more difficult than the original game. I for one like a challenge when it comes to role playing games so this was most welcome, but the last scenario's huge final dungeon can certainly be a bit daunting. The enemies are more difficult, save points are more sporadic, and money is harder to accumulate. This makes for a fairly hardcore RPG which newer gamers might find to be a little more difficult than a lot of modern genre staples. I personally think The After Years strikes an excellent balance in difficulty.
One problem I do have with this game is that the enemy encounter rate is quite high even for a classic RPG. There are times when a battle will break out a mere three steps after fighting the last one and this can wear on you a bit. While this is really only noticeable inside dungeons it makes the game downright cumbersome at times.
Another of the game's issues is it's character variety. Most of the new cast members are based entirely too much on existing ones. Yang's daughter Ursula uses all the weapons and has all of the same skills as her father with her new Chakra command being the only thing separating them from being nearly identical. Luca (who was actually in the first game as an NPC) is almost a carbon copy of Cid, except that unlike him she can use axe weapons.
The other new characters (save for Ceodore) are equally as uninspired. On top of that, The After Years holds no punches on tossing throwaway characters your way. It's basically insert 'generic mage' here, and 'generic soldier' there. How hard would it have been to give these characters names and draw them differently? I understand that they're only going to be in my party temporarily, but that doesn't mean I don't want them to take part in the storyline!
Near the end of the game you're given total control over which characters to put into your party. This includes anyone from the main cast which is actually quite a large selection. Despite the fact that several of the new characters are uninspired and near carbon copies of others there is decent variety here. The ability to select your party members is a very nice touch that wasn't even in the original.
Final Fantasy fans will be delighted to see several references to other classic games in the series. At the end of the game you will run into several bosses from the original Final Fantasy all the way up to Final Fantasy VI. These include everything from the elemental fiends of the original game in the series to the flamboyant octopus Ultros from part six. It's perfectly in line with the vast amount of fan service offered by this title, and even though some of these references feel a bit out of place it's all in great fun - some of the enemy designs were ripped straight out of the Super Nintendo games.
The After Years fails somewhat when it comes to presentation. Yes, this game is meant to emulate the 16-bit look of Final Fantasy IV, but it doesn't do a very good job. The graphics have been mostly redone both in and out of battle. Outside of combat the character sprites are too big for my liking and come off as a bit, for lack of better word; goofy. Furthermore, screen scrolling is not as smooth as it should be. Battle scenes fare a bit better with nice enemy graphics and spell effects. Still, something about the new character designs really bothers me in some cases. Overall I think they should have just ripped the graphics straight out of the original game.
The soundtrack is comprised almost completely of slightly reworked music from the original Final Fantasy IV. This too is not a bad thing as it's one of my favorite soundtracks of all time, but the reworked music just doesn't sound as good as the original melodies. The high point of the soundtrack is in the new music made for it. The mysterious girl's theme is amazing, as is the final dungeon's music. There are only a handful of new songs but they're all great. The soundtrack is good, but this is another case where they should have ripped it straight from the original game.
Controls present no major issues - the ATB system makes battles a little more frantic than in your standard RPG but most everything is intuitive. Thankfully the game features a welcome run feature that allows you to move significantly faster when wandering around towns and dungeons. The only thing I've had any kind of issue with is in using band attacks during battles - this is the only unintuitive part of the game which makes it feel like a slapped on feature. Despite this you should have no major problems jumping right in.
Overall Recommendation
Nostalgia aside, Final Fantasy IV: The After Years is a very solid classic style RPG. While the character scenarios are mostly weak the main story is surprisingly solid. The After Years captures most of what makes RPGs from the 16-bit era so darn charming, and even if you've never played a Final Fantasy game a simple retro inclination toward the genre is all you need in order to have fun with this one. This one is definitely recommended, especially for those who love the original as I do. Just bear in mind that the entire game (including all scenarios) will run you almost $40.
Recommended:
Yes
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jeremy1456
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Catching Up On Retro Game Reviews In the Near Future.
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