So the idea of a Final Fantasy challenge came to me when I was walking through the video-game section of Best-buy one day. I thought, "wow, I used to really love these games when I was a kid. Wouldn't it be cool to go through some of them again now." And there it was, I caught myself thinking of final fantasy II (or 4 in Japan) and the many hours that I spent on it in elementary school. The second impetus for this challenge came from my recent participation in a "real life" RPG called sfzero. They do tasks for points and levels. The players make up the tasks, and the completed tasks get a net sum for completion but additional points from votes of other players. The thing that interested me is their enthusiasm for documentation. Now that everyone can afford a digital camera, visual evidence can easily be done. With the advent of You-tube, one can also post video evidence. And finally, the third thing that spurred my interest in taking the ridiculous (and yes, it is ridiculous) task is a search on Wikipedia for Final Fantasy. The articles on Final Fantasy show that most of the pre-CD games (1 through 6) have been remade for the GameBoy Advance with new dungeons and characters. That really excited me because those were my favorite ones, not the new graphically intense ones (although the first 6 were notable for their graphics in their time too). So now I'm excited and am getting ready for the challenge.
The problem is setting up a guideline for the challenge. First I wanted to do them in order, straight through 1 to 12 and not any of the spin-off titles. As much as I love Final Fantasy Tactics and X-2, I don't think I have time in my life to play those again. Next I want to document the number of game time used in the challenge, putting in a total game-time for the completion. Next I want to limit the number of GAMEOVER's I get. It would be unrealistic to think that I can beat all of them without dying, so I think I want to give myself 12 for the entire game, but additional ones will be counted as penalties. So if I can make it through FF 1 to 4 without dying, I'll have 12 passes for myself in the later ones. It will be like playing the Hard Core mode in Diablo 2 (another game I love). Furthermore, I do want to get the best gear and finish the hardest sidequests of the game. What's the point of playing them without truly appreciating them? I plan on taking out the Weapons in Final Fantasy 7 again, and probably getting the Hero's badge in Final Fantasy 10 again. Let's hope my enthusiasm does not wane by then. Another guideline that I would like to establish is that once the game time hits a certain number of hours, I will move on. I don't want to linger in Final Fantasy 5 for 200 hours (which might happen if you want to master every job-class). I'm guessing 120 or 150 hours. The last guideline is the use of strategy guides and FAQs, and as for that I am going to say I will use those. Nobody knows all the secrets of every FF game and remembers them. It might be one thing to research on that to get Lulu's Onion Knight doll in FF10, but to actually do the task is a totally different thing. My thing is that I will not use game enhancers, but I will read guides and walkthroughs. This is probably going to be like Calvinball, where I'm going to make up the rules along the way, until a "contest" appears.
Another concern that you readers are wondering is what I might do for Final Fantasy 11, it's an online multi player game after all. For that one, I am just going to finish as many quests as I can. But will I use help? yes, I am. I will start from level one, but let's face it, nobody can SOLO through a MMORPG. I'll have to think more for this one, but there are 15 days until September, so something like a solution will show up.
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