Topic: REVIEWS: Final Fantasy V Advance

[MegaByte]

The definitive version of a definitive game.

During the 16-bit days, Final Fantasy V was considered inaccessible to the average gamer due to its in-depth character customization.  It was once scheduled for release as Final Fantasy Extreme, but that never came to pass.  Though it was fan-translated earlier, Final Fantasy V first saw an official English release as part of the Final Fantasy Anthology on PlayStation, a version plagued by load times and a mediocre translation.  Now in its third release, but in its first appearance on a US Nintendo system, Final Fantasy V Advance is billed as the finest version of the game by Square-Enix.    

Final Fantasy V occupies an interesting position, not so epic as the following games in the series, yet not as simple as its predecessors.  The four familiar elemental crystals which power the world with the elements of wind, water, fire, and earth are in trouble.  The wind crystal has already shattered, and mysterious meteors are falling from the sky.  Starring a wandering traveler and his chocobo, a princess, a pirate, and an old man with amnesia, Final Fantasy V tells the story of four heroes, each from completely different backgrounds, tied together by destiny to save the world.      FFV Advance starts off with a new sprite version of its introduction, which is partly based on the PlayStation FMV, but with text added to give a little story background.  Personally, I miss the simple Super Famicom intro, which had the traveler riding his chocobo with the game’s theme song playing in the background and where none of the story was revealed.  It seemed more epic that way.  On the bright side, that’s basically the only gripe I have with the game.    

FFVA sports an all-new translation.  Not keeping themselves constrained to a literal translation, the translators did an excellent job converting the script into an equivalent English rendition of the game.  Purists might complain, but the underlying tones are kept intact while making it a more enjoyable read for English speakers.  Even more importantly, the oft-chided pirate speak given to Faris in the PlayStation version has been replaced.  Gone are the days of Nintendo censoring, with the party receiving a lap dance in the first inn and a fair amount of gay subtext and sexual innuendo remaining intact.  Final Fantasy V always seemed to take itself less seriously than many other Final Fantasy games, and it has many light and humorous moments.    

The key feature of Final Fantasy V is its complex job system.  Rather than having characters with locked-in roles, players can choose to be a knight, black mage, white mage, or any one of dozens of other jobs.  Four new jobs have been added in Final Fantasy V Advance.  What was groundbreaking in FFV was the ability to switch job classes while keeping the abilities of previous classes.  Unlike standard RPGs where experience levels are increased, FFV also awards ability points, which are applied to the particular job that a character has at the time.  With more experience, characters learn abilities within their job class.  Once learned, one of these abilities may be “equipped" and will appear in the battle menu under the standard “Attack" option.  For example, players can have a monk with the ability to cast magic or summon beasts.  The micromanagement of abilities that was once considered too complicated is now lauded for its depth and diversity.  The system certainly gives the game more personality and requires more thought for successful battle plans.    

Final Fantasy IV Advance was infamous for its battle system glitches and lag.  Thankfully, Tose seems to have nailed the port this time around, as everything about the game is smooth and responsive.  Final Fantasy V uses the classic Active Time Battle system found in most Final Fantasy games.  The requirement of needing a thief ability to run has been removed, making the game progress much more rapidly.  This tweaking is particularly welcome since the focus of Final Fantasy V is primarily on battles.  With much time spent selecting abilities and weapons, it is nice that the rest of the game plays quickly.    

The challenge of the original remains intact as well; many battles will require careful planning and leveling-up, another testament of old school RPGs.  Besides the normal, sparsely distributed save points, a “quicksave" option is available for saving at any time.  However, once the quicksave is loaded, it is erased, so players can’t use it to cheat their way through battle mishaps.    

Compared to the cinematic experiences of today’s Final Fantasy games, the story of Final Fantasy V is relatively simplistic.  However, there is still a good deal of character development and obligatory plot twists.  Similar to the other GBA Final Fantasy games, Final Fantasy V Advance includes a new dungeon designed to give players one further challenge in the game.  As a slightly enhanced port, the choice to include a few new jobs and a new dungeon were good choices in keeping the classic game play and story intact while adding a few bonuses.  The bestiary is sure to please completionists and fans alike, and the sound test is always welcome when it comes to Uematsu soundtracks.    

The GBA is nearly dead in terms of new releases, and Mother 3 notwithstanding, there are few games I’d rather see close the Game Boy chapter than Final Fantasy V and VI.  Simply put, Final Fantasy V Advance is the definitive version of an already great game, and in the shadow of other Final Fantasy releases, should not be missed.

Pros:
       

The job system

 

Very good translation

 

Everything from the original in polished form

       Cons:
       

Somewhat dated feeling despite enhancements

 

Not as story-driven as other Final Fantasy games

               Graphics:  8.0
       The graphics in FFV Advance have been upgraded nearly to the quality standard of Final Fantasy VI.  Character sprites and the overworld have barely been touched, while backgrounds during battle have new art.  The characteristic battle transition has been updated as well.  Like in FFIV Advance, Amano-derived character avatars have been added to dialog boxes, and the boxes themselves sport crisp text sized for the GBA screen.

               Sound:  9.0
       Final Fantasy V had an excellent soundtrack composed by the legendary Nobuo Uematsu.  While instruments have been resampled for the GBA, the actual quality of the samples and composition has not been improved over the Super Famicom version (unlike Final Fantasy III on DS).  The result is that there are many beautiful tunes held back by 16-year old sound synth.

               Control:  8.0
       Control is generally the same as the original version, and works like any standard turn-based RPG.  Thankfully, as in Final Fantasy IV Advance, the game now allows players to run by default.

                      Gameplay:  9.0
       Final Fantasy V is classic J-RPG at its finest.  While a complex job system is the defining aspect of the title, the game doesn’t slouch when it comes to battling, traveling, or story.  The game is as fun to play now as it was fourteen years ago.

 

       Lastability:  7.0
       Final Fantasy V has a little more replayability over many of the other games in the series due to its job class system.  With so many different ways of customizing the characters, each play-through yields a different experience.  However, while classic, the story does not change, making the game more apt to an occasional replay.

 

       Final:  8.5
       There is no question that Final Fantasy V Advance is the best version of the classic RPG.  Final Fantasy games have generally been strong in their genre and FFV is no exception.  While Final Fantasy III might steal the spotlight with its remade graphics and sound, Final Fantasy V remains a solid title, sporting superior gameplay, story, and a diversity found in few games even today.      

[vudu]

Damn you Aaron!  Now I think I'm going to have to break down and buy this.

I have some questions regarding the job system.

How many abilities does each class have (on average)?

I've read that the game doesn't punish you for experimenting and switching jobs (unlike FFIII supposedly does).  However, if you switch too frequently aren't you going to wind up with a character who knows a whole bunch of weak spells from a large variety of classes but not many of the stronger spells?  It seems like you could wind up screwing yourself over pretty bad if that's the case.

Is there a limit to the number of abilities you can learn?  For an extreme example, is it possible (even if it's not easy) to have every character learn every ability from every job?

Does the game let you know what abilities each job can learn and how many ability points it takes to earn those abilities?  Or do you have to resort to looking at a FAQ if you want to avoid a crap-shoot.  For example, I'm not big on power-leveling, so I'd like to know how far I have to go as a Monk to get so-and-so ability so I can decide if it's worth it or if I should just work on beefing up my Knight's abilities.

How do the ability points work?  Do you earn a certain number per battle/enemy?  Do you earn more ability points later in the game (like you normally earn more experience points) or is it relatively constant throughout?  Do the number of points you earn for fighting weak enemies decrease as you progress in the game or is there just a wider range between the first few abilities you learn for a particular job and the last few?  Basically, I want to know if I avoided a certain job on a certain character until the end of the game would it be really easy to get the first few abilities for that class or would I have to put just as much effort into earning them?

Finally--and this one is not related to the job system--are there any Princess Flans in this game?  If I ever see one of those again I might kill someone.  Stupid Pink Tail.

[MegaByte]

> How many abilities does each class have (on average)?

Between 1 and 7, average 4.

>I've read that the game doesn't punish you for experimenting and switching jobs (unlike FFIII supposedly does).  However, if you switch too frequently aren't you going to wind up with a character who knows a whole bunch of weak spells from a large variety of classes but not many of the stronger spells?  It seems like you could wind up screwing yourself over pretty bad if that's the case.

Yep.

> Is there a limit to the number of abilities you can learn?  For an extreme example, is it possible (even if it's not easy) to have every character learn every ability from every job?

No limit, but not all abilities can be active simultaneously.

> Does the game let you know what abilities each job can learn and how many ability points it takes to earn those abilities?  Or do you have to resort to looking at a FAQ if you want to avoid a crap-shoot.  For example, I'm not big on power-leveling, so I'd like to know how far I have to go as a Monk to get so-and-so ability so I can decide if it's worth it or if I should just work on beefing up my Knight's abilities.

Not really, you know what you'll get with the next level, but anything after that will require a FAQ.

> How do the ability points work?  Do you earn a certain number per battle/enemy?  Do you earn more ability points later in the game (like you normally earn more experience points) or is it relatively constant throughout?  Do the number of points you earn for fighting weak enemies decrease as you progress in the game or is there just a wider range between the first few abilities you learn for a particular job and the last few?  Basically, I want to know if I avoided a certain job on a certain character until the end of the game would it be really easy to get the first few abilities for that class or would I have to put just as much effort into earning them?

It's basically per battle, with more coming from bigger battles.  Ability points are on a much smaller scale than experience points; they do increase later in the game, but not by a whole lot.  There are increasingly wider ranges of points needed for higher level jobs.

> Finally--and this one is not related to the job system--are there any Princess Flans in this game?  If I ever see one of those again I might kill someone.  Stupid Pink Tail.

Heh, no.  

[KDR_11k]

On the job system, the jobless (and supposedly Mimic, never got that) "job" gets stat boosts from mastered jobs (all abilities learned) and has two ability slots (Mimic has 3 I think). It's really not that difficult to handle, the classes are pretty intuitive and the skills gained from jobs are usually in direct relation to the purpose of the job (e.g. Summoner gets summon abilities, Black Mage gets black magic abilities, Monk gets brawling abilities, ...). I'd say a fair number of the skills earned from jobbing up is just making the job-specific abilities available to the character for all jobs. Magic is bought and I think any mage can use the spells belonging to his profession independent of the job level so you can switch quickly without much penalty and won't miss anything but a few support abilities. Of course mastering jobs means your character gets more powerful and you can combine abilities from different classes (e.g. a master Black Mage can use those spells no matter which job he currently has, provided he doesn't want to use the skill slot for something else ).

If you want advice from me, don't buy those early summons (Chocobo Kick and such), the Summoner's final ability (Summon, 250 AP just for that) will cast a summon at random for free and not having the weak summons means it's more likely to pick an expensive summon instead. Granted, that ability is hard to get without grinding especially since you can Call much earlier and might want to switch your Summoner to another job with Call as a secondary ability. In any case I'd advise against skipping medium level summons (if that's even possible), while that's a benefit in late game they're big lifesavers in the mid game but those weak summons aren't very useful for long.

Even without grinding you'll master a few jobs over the course of the game. Switching jobs also means switching equipment so using a few jobs more than the rest pays.

[vudu]

Quote
No limit, but not all abilities can be active simultaneously.

How's that work out?  How many abilities can be active at once?  It is that a certain number of abilities can only be active at the same time or is it that certain abilities are incompatible with certain jobs (like white mage abilities with the black mage job)?

Quote
If you want advice from me, don't buy those early summons (Chocobo Kick and such), the Summoner's final ability (Summon, 250 AP just for that) will cast a summon at random for free and not having the weak summons means it's more likely to pick an expensive summon instead.

Does this mean you get to pick when and which abilities you earn (like spending money in a store) or do you automatically get whatever the next ability is for the job you currently have selected whenever you have enough ability points?

[MegaByte]

>> No limit, but not all abilities can be active simultaneously.
>How's that work out?  How many abilities can be active at once?  It is that a certain number of abilities can only be active at the same time or is it that certain abilities are incompatible with certain jobs (like white mage abilities with the black mage job)?

Except in the case of Mime, you have all of your currently assigned job abilities and can choose one other ability from all learned abilities.  Once you've mastered a particular job class, all those abilities become available even without an assigned job (Freelancer).  There are two basic types of abilities, ones that give an extra battle menu item (like magic) and ones that boost stats or enable you to do things like equip certain weapons or find secret passages.  There are no incompatible abilities, though some abilities would be counterproductive to actually equip together.

>>If you want advice from me, don't buy those early summons (Chocobo Kick and such), the Summoner's final ability (Summon, 250 AP just for that) will cast a summon at random for free and not having the weak summons means it's more likely to pick an expensive summon instead.
>Does this mean you get to pick when and which abilities you earn (like spending money in a store) or do you automatically get whatever the next ability is for the job you currently have selected whenever you have enough ability points?

ABP are automatically applied to whichever job you have assigned when you get them.

[KDR_11k]

Does this mean you get to pick when and which abilities you earn (like spending money in a store) or do you automatically get whatever the next ability is for the job you currently have selected whenever you have enough ability points?

Spells aren't skills (and summons are just fancyful spells), they are bought in stores or earned as rewards for quests. Skills are things like "cast black magic" which opens the menu with the magic you can cast and that ability is available in different levels that allow more and more of the menu to be accessed (a black mage will always have it at maximum level, the ability only comes into play when you use another job).

Abilities are always learned in sequence, you get APs applied to your current job and they always go towards the next ability. You can see how many APs it takes to get the next ability and what ability that is (IIRC).