Yeah I meant to add that spell levels being back is great, and having poison healing and cure on the same level is already a nice way to drain that resource a little.
My inclination was to go straight for dual wielding because at least in the way they show the attack/defense, the gain in damage is huge compared to the armor of a shield. I admittedly did get curious and look it up a little and online it seemed like dual wielding is popular for 3 in particular
So happy to start a new FF! I spent a decent amount of time coming up with a naming scheme for my characters that matches their sprite colors. Imagine my surprise when they all lost their colors as soon as they changed jobs. I was imagining thereād be tinted sprites for every job but I guess that was too much to hope for.
Also kinda disappointed that theyāre walking back some of FF2ās storytelling innovations. Every time an unlabeled textbox pops up I imagine my 4 orphans creepily talking in unison. But getting an airship less than an hour into the game? Who cares about a canoe when we already have that?
It feels like the music really took a step up for this one. The PR uses some electric guitar tones that remind me of Uematsuās later work with the Black Mages.
That combat music goes hard, itās my favorite so far. You have The Bass Line of course, and then something a bit more modern and epic than 1 or 2:
That drum line is really funny to me in the original. Uematsu thrashing the Famicom sound chip for the final entry on the console.
The Pixel Remaster didnāt hold back with the electric guitar and the horns:
I think it works well, although it reminds me of the arrangement the PR did for a legendary track in FFV that I donāt like nearly as much, but thatās a story for another day.
The Boss theme sounds like a circus to me but itās catchy too:
(Watch out the first video contains spoilers for upcoming bosses)
Did someone say circus music? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=We87wkYUiqU
God I love Chrono Crossās soundtrack.
I think from what Iāve heard so far FF2 music is still working best for my tastes, but thereās lots of time to see if that changes.
I lovehate this track.
Funny thing is that I first played Chrono Cross with ePSXe on a crappy laptop circa 2008 (it never released in Europe back then) and this track is burned in my memory with the emulation slowdowns. Now when I listen to the proper version it sounds sped up.
Dark timesā¦
This port is a technical mess. Itās easy enough to switch to Japanese using the trick to change language in the steam properties for the game, but thereās no configuration of any note in the game. It uses a launcher, which only lets you change resolution. Fullscreen blocks language tools, so I have to use borderless window, which blows up the entire game so I can only see part of it. I had to use the old āfix issues with window scalingā compatibility adjustment in windows properties to get it to work. Worst of all, the gameās locked to 30 and is blurry as heck to me when anything moves.
Keyboard controls are awful, like someone didnāt actually sit down with a keyboard. Arrow keys, enter, backspace. Itās like someone just thought āI donāt know what a keyboard is, how its laid out or why someone would use it, so Iāll just lay it out by mapping the gameās functions to keys that have a similar name or functionā. I canāt remap them, so I have to switch between gamepad to play the game and keyboard to interact with windows and language tools.
There are barely any mods, and the ones that do exist mess up the japanese version.
At least everythingās sharp, and the presentation is charming, but it sure does look like an upressed PS1 game. They added some QOL stuff to this version a few years back, including making the menus a little less mobile-y. The entire game also pauses when alt-tabbed away.
As for language, thereās a LOT of kana in this. Unlike the English version, which has significantly more complex language than the original, the JP version almost seems like it was intentional rewritten for the younger crowd. Maybe it changes later, but the script isnāt the same as the original versions, and sticks to mostly simple kanji. So far, the script changes revolve around the fact that you start the game with only one character, ć«ć¼ćć¹, so thereās no back and forth dialogue. In fact, some of the text stays the same, while responses were cut out. This gives a bit of a clue as to whoās talking in the original versions, because the dialogue lines right up. For example, Luneth comments on the marvelous color of the spring in both versions. In the PR, other members respond to him, and thatās simply removed.
Other examples of changes I noticed: č½ćØćē©“ is replaced with just ē©“. Healing with the spring is just one line: ļ¼Øļ¼°ćØļ¼ļ¼°ćå復. Most of the narration or system text is removed altogether, includingg the opening narration. The dialogue with the crystal is reworked to be a conversation with Luneth, and mentions that heāll meet allies. Much of the crystalās dialogue is removed entirely. So is all the narration and system messages after that (you just instantly appear on the map), and no class changes!
I like that thereās an actual in-town battle background when you fight on the dangerous path.
The flower picking girl is replaced entirely by a bunch of kids bullying your next party member, a shy, book-ish girl named ć¢ć«ćÆć„. The bullies use ćć¹ćļ¼, which is funny to me. Flower girl appears after the cutscene though.
Most other NPCs in town say the same stuff, though thereās a couple of people added to talk about Luneth and Arc for the sake of the new story bits. Their dialogue is easier to understand than in the original. Several characters use simpler grammar constructs, like the old guy with the sixth sense uses a simple (sentence) + ććØ instead of the slightly more confusing ä½ + sentence + ć®ć. I recall someone saying the 3ds version had more complex language, but Iām not getting that AT ALL.
Random fourth wall breaking tutorials are scattered around, baked into the text of existing townsfolk. Itās no circle of old men in bathrobesā¦ One of them taught me this fun word, ē“ ć£ć“ć, meaning ājoblessā in video games. The dancer just dances, she doesnāt even ask if you want to see it.
The elder adds in a bit of your backstory as a random orphan. Cidās dialogue is greatly expanded, as I suspect most story-related NPCs will be. He gives out more tutorial text, too.
Finally, the third character is hanging out in your airship when you enter it, ć¬ćć£ć¢. Apparently, sheās ćć the blacksmithās daughter and she likes playing hookie from her training, so she didnāt get turned into a weird ghost.
Interesting, I really appreciate the detailed writeup. I do wonder if some of the rewriting is related to wanting to keep the text boxes manageable on a handheld screen?
I hadnāt thought of that, but I checked just now and it uses three-line message boxes, and the average length of a line is pretty similar to the PR version. Technically the box fills the width of the screen but I can tell the lines tend to end around the halfway point, probably to match the constraints of the original screen. I think the originalās resolution is around the same as an NES/SNES, just on a smaller screen.
The more updated writing occasionally sounds like modern manga in its style, and it also does the thing where younger or less educated people use less kanji + spaces, and older/smarter folks uses more jukugo and kanji in general. It feels all over the place, but I stand by that what has been rewritten, and what was added new, has so far been easier to understand. Not so many long compound sentences with weird grammar, except when they were already in the original and not replaced.
Cid, by the way, is much lessā¦ dialectical in this version. He has some verbal tics but isnāt damn near unintelligible like in the original script.
Remember the dude at the front of the castle gates? They replaced him with your fourth member, ć¤ć³ć°ćŗ. He literally says the same thing to start with, about the people in the castle being cursed, word for word. Hilarious.
Things big and small:
Iām shocked we still havenāt gotten jobs. Anyway, on to more differences.
The left tower of the castle actually has random encounters in it! Weird. After the undead hanging around there poisoned me, I also found all the items are written in kana. ć©ććć, ćććć, even the ć in phoenix tail. The buff gryphon is still in the box upstairs, but I canāt tell how strong he is because all of my guys got lucky crits and took him out in less than two turns this time.
There a battlement that you can climb up to in the north of the castle, but thereās nothing there at all. You can sleep in the princessās bed, but no one says anything silly, and thereās a regular bed in the main room to sleep in as well.
No dungeon maps! I end up running around more to find everything because I canāt beeline, but the encounter rate is much lower so it isnāt too bad. You canāt see where chests are, nor is there a counter or any indication of which you have, but thereās still a treasure chest achievement in the game.
You canāt talk to your follower directly, you have to press X. The princess refuses to say anything but asking your name, even if you talk to her multiple times. The crazy thing is she randomly appears during battles to blast the enemy party with Aero. WTF, why does she need my help again?
After defeating the Djinn, youāre teleported to the crystal out of nowhere and given the jobs. Itās not very elegant. Weirder, the missing text from earlier is placed here instead, but its shuffled around. It says the same stuff, verbatim, but the individual lines are in a different order! (one line has an extra ć ćć stapled on though). Hereās where you get the fullscreen narration / cutscene and short credits with FF theme.
A freaking moogle pops out here to give you a tutorial. He explains a specific mechanic of the remake, where changing jobs makes you weaker for a while after you make the change. Looks like instead of onion knight, youāre āclasslessā (lacking makeup). They also added a thief class, so it has all the FFI starting classes available.
Finally, the princess opens her heart to Ingus in this one just like she does to your party, but it makes WAY more sense here as she has presumably known him for a long time, as a castle soldier.
Finally got my butt in gear and started this.
Compared to 1 and 2, I was able to just navigate what the game wanted me to do without any of the details from the thread, so itās feeling even more modern and intuitive.
I went with a Sailor Moon theme for my names. Iām also a little sad that we donāt keep the colors in the job uniforms, but ah well.
Someone else mentioned that they were happy to see the magic levels come back and I strongly agree. I also like that you ćć¤ magic instead of.. consuming it I guess.. it also reminded me a bit of materia from ff7 in a way.
I guess at this point I shouldnāt be surprised that airships just kinda show up in the first 3 hours of the game, but before the canoe?!
It also has them in the other versions, but I think the encounter rate is pretty low so youāre reasonably likely to avoid all encounters but the mandatory one.
Even in the other versions, she managed to flee the castle, avoid the curse and almost get all the way to the Djinn on her own. Pretty hardcore.
Yeah thatās the part that confused me when I watched the footage on youtube and I thought the sequence where the princess throws the ring played out differently in the 3D version, but itās just interspersed with more plot instead. I do find it a bit jarring, but I guess the devs made the same call as I did when I decided to end the week here: itās simply a good tutorial pocket before you venture on.
It makes sense to have the credits play at this point (similar to the crossing of the bridge in FF1) rather than when you speak with the crystal 5 minutes into the game. I think they should just have avoided the teleport back to the cave that doesnāt really make sense, just have that sequence play after you defeat the Djinn.
I like this princess quite a lot, for what little screentime she gets. A good upgrade from the damsel in distress of FF1, here everybody else is distressed and sheās girlbossing.
I was very surprised when I first took off in the airship 20 minutes into the game. Immediately followed by a resigned āoh, I seeā when I realized that I couldnāt cross mountains.
Final Fantasy III 3D is so back!! Iām really excited to be playing the 3D version again.
Starting out with Luneth all alone. Iāll be keeping the 3D canon names for this play through as well. My first time playing, these enemies in the first cave scared the crap out of me. āWhat do you mean THATāS a carbuncle?!ā
Seriously, terrifying.
I got out of the cave, recruited Arc, and set off to find the airship. But wait, whatās this cave behind the blacksmiths house? Maybe Iāll check it out
and weāre dead.
I got to the airship and recruited Refia. We walked to the castle and were allowed to go in. Hey, I wonder whatās in this side tower over here? Iāll just go check it ou
and weāre dead.
Okay Iāll stop messing around. I got my last member, Ingus, and Iāll head straight for our main objective: defeating the Djinn. With four party members we should be fi
This version doesnāt have auto save by the way.
I swear Iāve played this game before lmao.
After some TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS (of which I remembered this game does not let you just smash your head into the wall), I walked up the two towers and was finally able to not die and get some levels on everyone. Now we can finally focus on our objective.
We found the princess! She seriously did get pretty far by herself, Iām impressed. When you have followers in this version, they get little cut scenes that give some extra dialogue. With this tip, defeating Djinn will be a breeze.
They also follow you on the map!
Djinn defeated, my characters dramatically disappear before the princessā eyes and are whisked away to the crystal. Yaay we finally get the jobs! (Moogle!) Having played this version before, I know what jobs I like and what path Iād like the characters to go in. In my last play through, I built Luneth as the shield guy, Refia as the main damage dealer, Arc as the healer, and Ignus as the main sorcerer. This time Iām switching it up a bit.
Iāll be keeping Luneth as the shield guy because I canāt bare to change him lol. This time, Arc is going to be the main damage dealer, Refia will be the main sorcerer, and Ignus gets to be the healer. Refia is soooooooooo cute as a monk, but I want to spice it up. I feel like this is a really important decision in this game because you will see this zoom in of your characters after. every. battle. I might as well like what they look like!
Thatās the end of this week. Time to play next weekās content since Iām behind lol.
Love your write up! 
Cracked me up that your party wiped (at least) three times already xD might have happened to me too to be honest
Yeah that first dungeon is no joke, pretty hard by FF standards. I think the Swamp Cave of FF1 was worse though, if only because the layout was harder to navigate.
Iāve played the 3D version before on the original DS. I remember its release being hyped up because at that time, it was the only mainline FF title that hadnāt received an official English localization. I have it on iOS as well but I donāt remember if I finished a second playthrough of not. This game is the one Iām most curious about revisiting since I have zero experience with the Famicom version and itās the one thatās most drastically changed.
I will be disappointed by not having the full models for all the different jobs though. That was always an element I really liked. Even if I had no intention of using a job, I had to try them all out just to see what it looked like. This was basically me after every crystal:
Definitely different than the 3D version, but Iām enjoying it so far. The very casual dialogue in the starting town tripped me up a little bit but I acclimated pretty quickly. Made Luneth a monk, Ark a black mage, Refia a red mage and Ignus a warrior. As much as I appreciate the things FFII was doing, Iām kind of glad to be back to a more straightforward progression system.
Decided to poke my head into the Mythril Cave and Ark and Refia were promptly killed. After a couple trips back and forth to the healing spring back home, I made it to the end of the cave and saw what looked like a switch that did nothing. It wasnāt a total waste though since I was level 6 by the time I reached Sasoon. That made the rest of the weekās content pretty easy. I grabbed the Wightslayer in the tower and set off to find Sara.
Despite her being in the party for such a short time, the ability to talk to her did a lot for her characterization in my opinion, especially compared to the large swaths of silence in FFII where some characters didnāt even feel the need to comment on major story developments. I also appreciated the boys calling her a pain in the ass. The character writing in particular already seems to be an improvement over II. I was a little disappointed she didnāt help in battle like she does in the 3D version but it wasnāt too big a deal. Luneth died before I could get a heal off but other than that, the Djinn battle wasnāt too bad.
My goal is to hopefully finish this game by the end of August. Not sure if Iāll catch up to the main group before you guys finish IV but Iām aiming to catch up during V at the latest.
