Ehren plays through every Final Fantasy!

I, Ehren Rivers, have begun a full run of the mainline Final Fantasy series. Although this is several days late, I started with the Final Fantasy 20th Anniversary Edition for the PSP, and intend to play up through IX on the PSP. I began this playthrough as part of research for some upcoming editorials, and as a way to get myself ever-more-stoked for both E3 and the plethora of Square Enix titles smashing onto the stage this year. I debated with myself for several weeks on which versions of the early games to play; I have Origins on the PS3 and Dawn of Souls for the GBA, I have Final Fantasy III and IV on both DS and PSP, and if I asked my roommate very nicely there’s a chance he would let me play the iOS releases of various games.

In the end, I settled on the PSP versions because many of them are the definitive versions of a particular game. I-IV especially, with IV containing the sequel game, ‘The After Years’. With V-IX it just seemed easiest to play them on the same system, and I hear they look quite good on the PSP screen compared to their PS3 download versions. I have not yet decided if Crisis Core will be a part of my runthrough, although I’m open to suggestions.  I am hoping that I will not complete through Final Fantasy IX before the X|X-2HD collection is released, allowing me to continue my run with the newest available versions. In the event I complete IX first though, I’ll just pop out my old PS2 games and borrow whatever I don’t own. If all goes well (and I’m still every bit as good at power leveling), I will complete Final Fantasy XIII-2 just in time for the release of Lightning Returns in the fall.

Progress

  • I completed the main story of Final Fantasy I in approximately 9 hours, on the first day. I upgraded my classes (I chose the basic Warrior/Thief/White Mage/Black Mage) as soon as I had defeated the Lich and gained access to the canoe, and with some short power leveling I was able to blitz through much of the game.
  • Yesterday I began Final Fantasy II, and am currently attempting to climb through Kashuan Keep in search of the Sunfire needed to destroy the Dreadnaught.

If you have any thoughts, suggestions, tips, tricks, or just want to talk about the games feel free to comment below. Let’s try to keep it civil though, all right? We don’t want this to devolve into people screaming over which games they felt were the best and which they hated.


About the Author

Ehren Rivers Writer; Editorials, Final Fantasy News, Commenter. 24 years old and from the West Coast of the US, he is a longtime Final Fantasy fan who has played nearly every game in the series, both main and sideline. Favorite Final mainline Final Fantasies are XII and VIII, favorite side games are Crystal Chronicles and Tactics Advance 2. Avid reader of Nova Crystallis for many years, commenter for several months prior to being taken on.

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