Intro
Here we go! I played a few minutes of this on the playstation not too many years ago, at a guess in 2018. I was aware of the huge levels of hype and praise around the game and how 6 and 7 were frequently lauded as the best in the series.
Main characters/cast
Terra is the main character. No wait it’s Locke. No, Celes is very important. Or is it Edgar and Sabin? The game does a good job of making a good strong cast of characters to play as. And mercifully the game is not too tragic, though it tries to kill off people it shies away from doing anything permanent.
Battle
Nothing too exciting here but it's all solid as ever. I usually had Sabin doing a particular Blitz, Edgar using Auto Crossbow/Chainsaw/Drill, Celes dropping a spell or attacking and Cyan using Bushido.
This is probably the first game to remove itself from rigid jobs completely, or any mixture of them, so each character is different but with the help of the espers they can all learn every magic spell and summon.
I was lucky to be having such a great party. I had few, if any game overs. I found this one a little bit easier to manage and play. I had more game overs grinding dinosaurs for experience points and whatnot in the late game.
Music/Graphics
Some damn solid numbers in here. Nothing that makes it break from the pack but the Magitek Facility is a banger, probably my favourite track from this game. The boss and battle themes were super too, especially Decisive Battle.
The opera was OK!
Graphically, it looks great as ever. I am finally done with all the sprite games but am glad I took a break between 1-2, 3-4 and 5-6. Made me appreciate them all a bit more.
Plot/Villain/Allies/NPCs
Kefka is a great villain. The Emperor Gestahl is also a great villain. I was more pissed off at Gestahl than Kefka honestly while the latter does some heinous shite the Emperor made me believe in something and betrayed me!
The gooey
I scored this slightly less than 5 as there is simply less to sink your teeth into here. The Espers give you small stat boosts every time you level up with one equipped but the removal of bonus dungeons has made any long term planning redundant. I made sure to equip specific espers to certain party members after they mastered each of them but I was casual enough about it.
I will say, without a guide there are so many things you can miss. At least 3 party members, for starters. There are just so many secrets in the game I would not have come across if not for the guide. Using the Cursed Shield in battle 256 times until it became the excellent Paladin Shield? It was actually not so bad. I equipped 2 accessories that prevented the bad effects and just grinded.
Also I struggled to find Deathgaze initially so I just left it for a while and came back and found him in a few minutes my own way.
Conclusion
A rip-roaring conclusion to my Final Fantasy Pixel Remaster adventure. Having never played any of them before except for a few minutes of VI, they were all very good really. It was really interesting as a huge fan of 7,8,9,10 and 12 to see where all the elements came from. You could see them starting to all come together by the time 6 came around and it was like "let's just write a story and have a game with it". This was all fine and dandy until 13 when they wrote a story and were like "must we design a game as well, what a nuisance".
Was it better than 7? No way. Was it better than 1 through 5? Yes. Was it better than 8,9,10? No. Better than 13? Of course it was! Until I play the 'sequels' I will continue to place 13 near the bottom of the pile. 6 was very good and I look forward to playing it again maybe in a few years when I do all the funky-looking 2014 Steam re-releases.
The whole Kefka or Sephiroth thing can be put to bed by me. I was really disappointed that Kefka just sat in his final dungeon while I went around collecting power and my allies. Even in previous editions 1-5 the final bosses found ways to dick you around until you finally decided to go murder them.
The strong cast with multiple stories going on throughout the game with nice resolutions and heartbreaking moments really made this game shine over the previous 5 remasters. There were also tons of secrets and interesting places and things to do that made it special but again this one benefitted from having 5 games before it making mistakes that it could learn from.
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The achievements were grand - I had missed the Blue Flan in the Magitek Facility so I went back after the game was finished and got him with an earlier save file. I didn't mind as I got to hear the awesome facility music again! It was the last thing I did. Took an hour or two to power through the story. Before that, Siegfried was tough but I just made Celes a 16-hitter. Also the 777 death thing took a while but I just sat down one day with Setzer and grinded it. It kept hitting me so I gave up on it and came back later.
The ending was quite cute.
