The Uncommon Geek

One Uncommon Geek’s celebration of the two games which introduced him to the RPG genre, both of which remain close to his gaming heart to this day.

In my review of Skyrim, I alluded to the fact that I used to play JRPGs almost exclusively, above any other variant. The first RPG that I ever played was Final Fantasy VII for the Sony PlayStation. I had seen other RPGs played before by my friends, games like Earthbound, Shining Force, and Dragon Quest, but never really understood them, and thus had no active interest in trying them. It wasn’t until the release of Final Fantasy VII, that the hype and the general vibe given off from what I could see of that game, interested me enough to try out the demo. I was visiting family in Tennessee at the time, and one of my cousins had a demo disc from a gaming magazine, with the Final Fantasy VII demo on it. Even though all of the dialogue was in Japanese, I was enthralled enough with the gameplay, graphics, music, and atmosphere of the game to be interested in buying it.

I wasn’t even a teenager yet, and barely had any money to speak of. I resorted to trading in my Sega Nomad system for Final Fantasy VII, at Electronics Boutique (before they were purchased by the Galactic Empire, aka Gamestop). While I regret getting rid of that awesome handheld, and should have sacrificed something else instead, I have no regrets about getting my hands on that copy of FFVII. My life was absorbed by this game. Outside of schoolwork and skateboarding, my life was absorbed by it. My cousin across the street was obsessed with it. My best friend at the time was obsessed with it. It became a touchstone of my young teenage life.

These were the days when the Internet was still in its infancy. Dial-up was still the standard, and while there were already some basic FAQ and strategy pages being published on primitive message boards and barebones HTML sites, there was little to go on for online aid in playing a video game. I didn’t have the strategy guide either, so the secrets of FFVII were up to me and my friends to discover all on our own. We traded notes, strategies, secrets, and would bring our memory cards over to show off what new builds we had discovered. Aside from some snippets in gaming magazines, we were left to figure out how to get the secret materia, how to breed rare chocobos, and how to find and defeat the hidden Weapon monsters all on our own. It was an exhilarating experience.

Above and beyond the fun of exploration and discovery, what enthralled me most about FFVII was the story, the characters, and the writing. While there were a few hiccups here and there with the Japanese to English translation, the story in FFVII was still moving and mesmerizing to me. This was a story of redemption, tragedy, loss, betrayal, love, finding friendship in the most unlikely places, high adventure, humor… everything I could have asked for in a story. I fell in love with these characters and this story. I lost track of how many times I have finished FFVII… it is at least 20-30 times, and every time I played I discovered something new, or uncovered some nuance of gameplay that I hadn’t experienced.

Then we come to the year 1999. September 9, 1999, to be exact. Final Fantasy VIII is released in the United States, much to my fevered anticipation. My thirteenth birthday was coming up shortly thereafter, and I pretty much knew that I was going to get this game. I didn’t even care if I received any other gift. My mother, bless her heart, was talked into buying the strategy guide with it, by a game store clerk trying to get an add-on. I initially scoffed at that. “Pah! I don’t need a guide,” I thought. I ended up eating those thoughts later, because there was so very much content to be had in this newest release, and especially with the new mini-game, Triple Triad, having the guide was a godsend.

I cannot properly do justice to how highly I regard Final Fantasy VIII. Though I have remarked in other reviews that I have found my “new favorite game,” or something to that effect, FFVIII has never truly been displaced from its throne atop my list. The story, the characters, and their struggles were something that resonated in the core of my being, and the protagonist, a troubled, angst-ridden introvert, reminded me so much of myself, that I swore I had been spied on by Squaresoft’s writing team.

I was stolen away by this tale. I have never identified more strongly with any group of characters, in any game before or since. Final Fantasy VIII successfully captured my ideal combination of drama, action, humor, romance, and adventure. Would that any of us in the “real world” could share such a tale. On top of that, FFVIII pushed the PSX hardware further than I thought possible, with staggeringly beautiful graphics, top notch sound, incredible summons and Limit Breaks, and a soundtrack which redefined epic.

The prime of the Japanese RPG has long since come and gone, and the Final Fantasy series itself has taken so many bizarre twists and turns over the years, that its latest incarnations are hardly recognizable to me. Lost Odyssey was the last such JRPG that I feel truly captured the spirit of the previous generations, but by and large the Western RPG has eclipsed its Eastern counterparts. I see it as symptom of advancing technology. While games like Mass Effect, Borderlands, The Elder Scrolls, and Fable have been using newer technology to enhance gameplay, storytelling, and pushing the boundaries of what even defines an RPG, I feel that most contemporary JRPGs have been treading water, repeating the same tired and taxing mechanics, with newer, flashier coats of paint.

But classics never die, and the best ones only get better with time. So today, on 7/8, I proclaim a personal holiday, where I will be taking a trip down memory lane by re-immersing myself into the worlds of Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy VIII. Games like Kingdom Hearts and Dissidia may have made him look like a weakling, but in my mind Squall Leonhart is still a badass. I am still waiting for my own Rinoa to come along in my life. And like their tale, one day, I too will have a story to tell that is worthy of being remembered.

FIN