Summary
Awesome movies and other nice little things make up for the sluggish port
The Good
Anyone who is familiar with my reviews or has taken a look at my "Have List" must know I am a huge fan of Squaresoft's Final Fantasy series. Naturally, remakes and collector editions connected to this series interest me more than any others. "Final Fantasy Anthology" was the last Final Fantasy release I have purchased, although I've previously completed both
Final Fantasy V and
Final Fantasy VI. I hesitated for a long time: would it be really worth to pay a considerable amount of money for a mere remake of games I've already finished? Especially if this remake - as I have heard - is just a port of the SNES games with only four added movies?
Well, the answer is: it was worth for
me, but perhaps it wouldn't be worth for some other people. You see, I'm a
sucker for pre-rendered videos, especially if they are made by Squaresoft. There are only four of them in this compilation, two per game, but I must say I watched both intros at least ten times before I actually started playing the games. The intros are, quite simply, works of art, and it's only a pity they are so short (especially the one to "Final Fantasy V"). Both games had already excellent in-game intros (which are both included here, of course), but the new ones don't repeat them or interfere with them: they serve to introduce us to the game world and to present the character cast. As always, Squaresoft's artists create an experience known to us from other Final Fantasy games: the setting, the characters, and the main conflict is presented without any words, modestly, briefly, but with such a force that nothing else is required. Just look how wonderfully the intro of "Final Fantasy V" reflects its medieval setting, or how the grim machinery of the intro "Final Fantasy VI" brings us to a totally different world. The intro to "Final Fantasy V" is a masterpiece of concise artwork: in just a few scenes, it manages to tell us about the most important issues of the game: cosmic disaster - castle- Reina - dragon - Galuf - Faris - meteorite - the hero.
Other additions include extras in "Final Fantasy VI": bestiary, art gallery, etc. But the most noticeable addition beside the movies is the translation of "Final Fantasy V". The original game was never released outside of Japan, so non-Japanese players who wanted to have the game in English had to play the unofficially translated SNES ROM. The ROM translation was fairly good, but now when I've seen the new one, I understood the difference. The new translation adds a lot of style to the personalities of the main characters. The speech is much more fluent, there are more natural expressions, that make the game's dialogues more vivid and colorful. I realized once again how important a good translation was for a complete immersion in a game world. For example, Faris now talks like a real pirate, with colloquial British words and grammar, and this little addition changes the whole picture: the gap between her and Reina seems now much larger, their worlds cannot co-exist; the subsequent plot twists connected to them appear much more unexpected than they were in the original version.
The Bad
Sadly, this remake is below the usual Squaresoft quality in some aspects. To a certain extent, the games aren't even re-made: they are being emulated. No changes were made to the graphics (except for the smoother transition to random battles). I would certainly appreciate a graphical update (like in
Final Fantasy Origins), more pre-rendered cut scenes, more extras, perhaps some gameplay enhancements - all the stuff that was so finely made in both
Lunar games. The biggest disappointment is the sound. The capabilities of a much superior Playstation synthesizer aren't used at all. The instrumentation is sometimes weird, some voices are too loud while the others are hard to hear. For example, the in-game intro to "Final Fantasy V", a majestic orchestral piece, lacks the bass line and sounds like a pale imitation in this version. The release also suffers from poor compatibility - I couldn't run the games properly on a Playstation 2.
The Bottom Line
In the end, it comes to the degree of your admiration towards Squaresoft. If you adore their artwork and loved their classic SNES games, this anthology is an absolute must-have. But if you need a real
remake and won't be satisfied with a couple of extras, this release is probably not for you.
For a detailed opinion about both games, see my separate reviews for the SNES versions of
Final Fantasy V and
Final Fantasy VI.
