» Fri May 27, 2011 10:39 am
The first FF I played was, like many others, VII on the PSX. I had never played an RPG of any kind previously, and actually got the game on the assumption that it was a platformer/action game (the screenshots on the back of the box made it look like this). I initially rented it, as I had heard a bit about it (this was around a year after itw was released). In the week that I had it, I spent about five days trying to beat the first boss (Scorpion Guard), and a further two days getting to AeroBuster (who I couldn't beat). I returned it, frustrated and disappointed. A few weeks later, it was my birthday, and for some inexplicable reason I decided I wanted to give FFVII another chance, so I got it. I settled down to play it, with my sister watching. I was 11, she was 8.
Within a few hours, I had gotten to Aerobuster again, and finally I managed to beat him. I spent the next two months (it was the summer, so I was off school) in the same pattern: wake up, wake my sister up, play FFVII with her watching. She was as addicted to watching as I was to playing. I was hooked. Bear in mind, I had never played ANY kind of RPG, or any Eastern game before, so EVERYTHING was new to me. Previously, I had only played alot of racers, shooters, and Tomb Raider. When I finally reached the end, just before fighting Safer Sephiroth, I had to leave the game for an hour or so. When I returned, the credits were rolling. My sister, who had watched me avidly for two months, had beaten the game in my absence!. She actually started a new game herself a few months on (to this day, almost 12 years later, it's the only game she's ever invested any significant amount of time in), and made it to the second disc before getting stuck and giving up.
To this day, FFVII remains one of my all time favourite games. Just so many awesome memories are associated with it. I still on occasion fire up my old save and wander the world, visit Gold Saucer, fight the weapons, or just zoom around in the Highwind. No game gets my sense of nostalgia firing like FFVII.
After VII, came impatience waiting for VIII to be released. I love VIII, it's my second favourite in the series. I plan on going through it again soon. The world is awesome, and triple triad is the greatest minigame ever devised.
I can barely remember anything of IX. I bought it on release date, finished it, even got a gold chocobo and beat Ozma, but for the life of me I couldn't tell you the plot or name one town in it. I don't think I enjoyed it as much as the previous two.
Next was X, which despite taking the series in the direction that would put me off it entirely, I loved. I actually put more hours into this than any previous FF, mainly because of the monster arena and the dark aeons. The only problem was, I got hooked on the monster arena as soon as it became available, and subsequently became ridiculously overpowered compared to the normal story bosses in the game. I defeated every boss in the last 8 or so hours of the story in one hit.
X-2 was awful. It was nice wandering around Spira again, but the mission-y structure and general silliness meant I couldn't even manage to finish it. Also, at this stage, my tastes had changed somewhat.
Around the time I was playing X, I also got hold of the IV, V and VI ports for the PSX. I absolutely loved VI, amazing game. I really liked IV aswell, although I never managed to beat the final boss. I couldn't really get into V however.
I never played XII, and I've no intentions of getting XIII. From what I've seen of it so far, it's everything I don't like about the games, and nothing I like.
