Further nostalgia
What I did get, though, was the DS remake of Final Fantasy IV, mainly because I’d never actually played the full version (since the US release was notoriously neutered), and I was curious about some of the things that had been cut. It plays pretty well, though a lot of the differences are subtler than one would expect; it isn’t just missing skills and visible secret passages. I got the shit handed to me on my way through the Cave of Mist, for example, by all those dumb imps and sword rats; the main difference is that they’re actually fast enough to get actions before Cecil can single-target DPS them all to death. In addition, a lot of mobs that previously did the thick end of not a damn thing now actually have interesting abilities; magic counters, for example, to make AOEing the hell out of every group a bit less of a good idea. Assuming that this version more correctly reflects the original balance, it’s pretty interesting to spot all the ways the game was nerfed, and it definitely seems to have a bit more life to it this way.
A lot of the stuff that was changed for the new version is welcome, also. Trainable, equippable abilities are nice (Auto-Potion FTW), it’s great to have a map, and the text makes a whole lot more sense, even if Cecil is a bit over-the-top with his morose brooding. The translation was redone completely, except for one line. One important line. One very important line. I’m not completely sold on the new character models; they’re good for the most part, but a few characters look… bizarre.
So I’m enjoying it so far. I’m hoping that the this version will be a bit more even and contain fewer massive difficulty spikes; the SNES release wasn’t completely nerfed, and would occasionally just get really really really hard for a little while and then subside again.
