“Final Fantasy Dimensions” is *Finally* Available on Android!

On August 31, 2012 the iOS version of “Final Fantasy Dimensions” finally saw its global release.  Yet, for some reason, the promised Android version was not released alongside it.  This was odd, given the promises made by Square-Enix, but no official mention was made as to why the other port wasn’t made at the same time. Unofficially, some cited problems with porting the software to a different OS and others mentioned a supposed decline in desire to publish on the Google Play shop.

This latter fact may be somewhat supported by the length of time that it took “Final Fantasy II,” the Chaos Rings games, and other titles to finally get ported.

Regardless, “Final Fantasy Dimensions” finally saw a release on December 21, 2012 (one final game to enjoy before the world ended?) and version 1.0.1 was released on January 11, 2013.  The game has had approximately 50,000 installs in the last 30 days (essentially since launch) and hopefully those numbers are higher when you take into account the global market.  So far, the game seems quite fun, so my hopes are high regarding it.  Perhaps a review shall follow!

Meanwhile, if you have an Android device and enjoy old-school (early-1990s era) RPGs, $19.99 USD seems to be a fairly reasonable price!

[Game Travels] The Music of Treasure Hunter G

Written By: Warren C. Bennett

Welcome back to another edition of Game Travels! After taking a week off for Thanksgiving, we are back and grooving to some excellent tunes.

Since Treasure Hunter G is the last game produced by Square for the Super Famicom, the music is sports that cool 16-bit synthesized sound that always marked a Square release. However, there seems to be no real unifying force behind the music. Unlike many of the SNES era Final Fantasy titles or even Chrono Trigger, there wasn’t just one man who wrote the music found in Treasure Hunter G. The game has a total of six different composers: Hitashi Sakimoto, Mitsuhito Tanaka (aka John Pee), Masaharu Iwata, Toshiaki Sakodo, Yoko Takada, Tomoko Matsui, and Akiko Goto. A Square Music fan might recognize a few of these names from other Square Enix products. Many of them went on to write music for games of their own.

The soundtrack to this game has both ups and downs. There are some great pieces, but there are also some that seem a little inferior to the past Square offerings. This could be from the shoving together of so many styles in to one cartridge, or it could be the fact this was Square’s swan song for Nintendo.

Since the game has hit the internet, the soundtrack is available for almost anyone to enjoy. This is a boon to all JRPG and Music lovers everywhere, since we can get a taste of the compositions without having to import the massive 73 track CD. There are many ways to listen to the soundtrack, but YouTube is probably the easiest. The whole soundtrack is available on the site from various up-loaders. I found my three favorite clips from the soundtrack for your listening pleasure.

One of my favorite cuts from the soundtrack is called “Sad Freedom.” Created by John Pee, this is a melancholy piece that seems to reflect the sadness of fading memories and lost youth. Though the tune can be a tad upbeat in places, it really makes me think of the mistakes I’ve made in my past and of lost friends.

Going the complete opposite direction is “Go! Go! Kids” composed by Hitoshi Sakimoto. This is a rousing tune set to a martial beat. It tasks the listener with getting up, going out, and taking life by the horns. If there is a battle, you must fight! If there is a quest, you must go on an adventure! This piece wants the listener to be an active part of events, not just let life happen.

The third track is called “Just like the Mountain, he will not move.” It is another composition by John Pee and shares a little of the melancholy nature of “Sad Freedom.” Yet, it also has a bit of an upbeat tone. It combines the typical synth style of early Square games with a salsa back beat, creating both a sad and optimistic experience.

To see a list of the entire soundtrack, click here to go to the SNES Music website. Fantasy Anime also has a download for those that can’t get enough of 90’s era Midi music: Use those tracks to create the best Tripod website you can!

Overall, I’d rate this soundtrack as one of my favorites. The music may be a little uneven, but it is a good listen. It takes me back to the days of playing Final Fantasy and Chrono Trigger on the gray and purple box. Although the soundtrack isn’t fully orchestrated, it is superior to many I hear in video games today.

[Game Travels] A Bit About “Treasure Hunter G”

Written by: Warren C. Bennett

Treasure Hunter G is one of those RPG’s I’ve heard about for years but have never played.  The year was 1996 and the burgeoning internet filled with rumors of a new Square game. Treasure Hunter G became known to me through magazines and early websites, with whispers of the story hastily pasted with low-rez jpgs on cut-into-many-frames websites.  The world didn’t know about Treasure Hunter G, but a few game journalists and JRPG fans on the internet did.  They knew that this treasure would probably never come across the pond, despite the loud outcries of role playing fans.  The 16-bit era was dying and the new systems were on the horizon, dashing any hopes that this game would be officially translated.

Why did many want to play this?

This game represents the end of an Era, the last game from Square on a Nintendo system for before jumping over to Sony’s Playstation.  It is also one of the last games that to use the old Square design philosophy, focusing on game content and story over graphics.  This is before cinematic and cutting edge visuals became the focus with Final Fantasy VII, leading Square to evolve into the company it is today.  Treasure Hunter G speaks of an era long past, one that is only kept alive through independent companies and loyal fans.  This game is a relic of a time when console RPGs were a niche, a well-guarded secret that only loyalists knew about.   Japanese RPGs were much desired by console RPG enthusiasts and this game was on the top of many lists.   Luckily, those that don’t speak or read Japanese can now play Treasure Hunter G, due to the work of many great fan translators.

How does the game play?

This is a fairly typical role-playing game of the late SNES era.  The player controls the brothers Red and Blue as they explore the land, trying their best to fight an inadvertently released baddie.  They meet villagers, grow their party, and fight many battles.   The battles are turn based and on a grid, making it the battles feel more like a tactics game than a traditional Square product.  Each action during a battle requires a certain number of action points. These increase as the game progresses, letting a character use more abilities during combat.

Graphics

The visual style reminds me of Super Mario RPG and other late era SNES/Super Famicom games.   The entire game is from a top down point of view, with the combat only being separated out by a grid.   The characters are brightly colored and look a bit prerendered, though the increased resolution of modern TVs and monitors make them look a bit pixellated and jaggy.  I actually adore the look and wish new games were presented in this late 16-bit era retro style.

Treasure Hunting with Allahweh

Next week the Game Travel portion of this series will start.  Jessica “Allahweh” Brown will begin her journey through this once Japanese only game.  Join her as she shares her experience in stepping out in to the world of treasure hunters for the first time.

“Final Fantasy XIV” P2P Article Live on WhatMMORPG!

Last week I finally had some time to sit down and right my analytic piece on the post-P2P transition of “Final Fantasy XIV” for WhatMMORPG.  It certainly is interesting to talk about a game that has gone from free-to-play to pay-to-play, which is essentially the reverse of what games seem to do these days.

Some of you might know this game quite well (such as Aylis, who is mentioned and quoted in this article), and some of you may have avoided it with a 10-foot pole.  But, regardless, I think this will make for an interesting read nonetheless!

So, if you want to hear more about the game’s transition, head on over to WhatMMORPG to give it a read!

This Week’s “Collector’s Curio” Article is Live on AS!

As some of you know, we’ve recently started doing themed days over at Anjel Syndicate, and Wednesdays have become our day to focus on rare items from the gaming world.

In light of that, today’s article focuses on a unique disc called “Square’s Preview Extra: FFVII & Siggraph ’95 Works” that was given to members of the press in early-1996.  The disc features a very early sample of “Final Fantasy VII” (which includes Aerith in the starting party) and a CGI demo of a planned remake of “Final Fantasy VI.”  It’s quite a unique piece of gaming history.

So, if you want to know more about it, I suggest heading over to Anjel Syndicate and giving it a read!

“Final Fantasy XIV” is STILL Free-to-Play!

It’s been about nine months since the world-wide release of “Final Fantasy XIV,” Square-Enix’s in-spirit sequel to their 2002 MMORPG.  Yet, the initial release of the game was marred with glaring errors, tons of bugs, a nearly-useless user-interface system, and just downright sluggish controls.  In light of that, although the game was meant to be subscription-based, executives at the company changed it to a free-to-play status because they felt the game just wasn’t good enough to charge money for yet.

Now, nine months later, the game is still free-to-play.  Granted, the game has come a long way, seems to run at a much smoother frame-rate than it did around its release, and the play controls seem far less sluggish, and yet, despite all of this, the game just isn’t on par with most of the other MMORPGs currently on the market.  Yes, the game has an innovative leveling system that is based on skills more than it is on just strict leveling, and it has a unique crafting system through which you can gain physical levels, but the game just isn’t all that fun to play.

Will Square-Enix be able to salvage the game and have it be able to compete with “RIFT,” “Star Wars: The Old Republic,” “Guild Wars 2,” or any of the other upcoming titles?  Only time will tell, but so far progress seems a bit slow.

STORY ALSO AT: Anjel Syndicate.

“Final Fantasy XIV” Downtime…

In the wake of the massive earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan recently, Square-Enix has opted to take down the servers for “Final Fantasy XIV” as an act of good-faith to the people of Japan in the effort to conserve power as much as possible.

This, of course, makes total sense, and those who complain about the downtime are really just self-centered and heartless.

So far, the game has been offline for about a week, and Square-Enix plans to reevaluate the situation on March 22, updating everyone on what they decide to do.

My guess?  I think the game will be down for at least another one to three weeks, perhaps even longer.

One of my friends has even suggested that Square-Enix extend this downtime a bit in order to optimize some things with the game itself.  This seems like a fair enough idea to me.  Perhaps they should keep the game down until the early summer months, fix everything they need to, and have a “grand reopening” of sorts.

Will they do so?  Only time will tell.

Oh, and if you want to donate some money to the relief effort, you can simply text 90999 to “REDCROSS” to give $10 USD to the cause.

“Final Fantasy XIV” Finally Installed!

So, after all those issues I mentioned before, I finally got the game working!

Still, it was a rough journey.  First, we had the issue with the copy we got from Amazon including a European Registration Code.  I’m still not sure how that happened, but I guess I’ll chalk it up to a flub on the part of Square-Enix.

Yesterday, though, we bought a new copy of the game from Best Buy with the intent of returning the other.  Yet, when I installed the game from the new disc, it kept returning a “cyclical redundancy error” and failing to set up the game.

The solution?

I reinstalled it using the disc that came with the European code and we are shipping the box with that code back to Amazon, but with the disc that came with the Best Buy copy.  I doubt they’ll notice as they look the same.

*sighs* Hopefully, though, it will be worth it.  Only time will tell.

“Final Fantasy XIV” Registration Woes…

So, today I finally had some time that I could invest into installing my new copy of “Final Fantasy XIV” onto my computer.  However, things didn’t go too smoothly.

First, you cannot fix anything related to your account name or anything of the sort after registration, so in order to set it up with an account name I wanted, I had to delete the first account I made.  That SHOULD have worked, but it didn’t.  Instead, even though the other account was gone, it must still have been in the database, so I could not register with it again.  Instead, I was forced to register as “Allahweh1453,” which is okay, as 1453 is a number I like to use when I need to.

So, finally, that was settled.

Yet, the real issue came when it was time to link my copy of FFXIV to my Square-Enix account.  Somehow, despite purchasing the game in the United States, the registration code provided with the game (brand-new, mind you) was for the European region of the game.  The game will not allow you to register an EU code while in the US, so I cannot play the game.

My only course is to return the game for another copy or simply get our money back.

Hopefully, this won’t be a problem that is repeated, and I can simply get a working copy with the proper region…

“Final Fantasy XIV” Still Free-to-Play…

By now, I would not be surprised if a fair number of you have heard about the rather disastrous launch of “Final Fantasy XIV” for the PC back in September 2010.

Well, if you haven’t, then let’s just say it was REALLY BAD.  So far, the game has been universally panned, with scores ranging from around 40% on the low-end to a D+ on the high-end.

Of course, Square-Enix promises to make things right in the coming months and with future updates.  In fact, they’ve gone as far as to postpone indefinitely the release of the PlayStation 3 port of the game that was originally scheduled for a release in March 2011.

So, what does this mean for us?  Well, if you do want to play the game, you can do so free-of-charge (well, after you buy a copy of the game, of course!).  Square-Enix has foregone the $12.99 a month subscription fee for the time-being in an effort to not completely lose the current people that are enjoying the game.

So, if, like me, you are a die-hard fan of the series and MMORPGs, this isn’t a bad chance to get onboard with the game and give it a  shot.  I myself just recently acquired a copy thanks to my wife, so I’ll be playing it in the near future and doing a review on it in times to come.