Final Fantasy 3’s remake on the Nintendo DS was marvelous. And really, who had attempted such a thing before? The game was not just a graphical update, but a complete transplant to the third dimension from an NES source that dealt entirely in pixel art and 2D sprites. Though mechanically it had begun to show its age, the new chibi-style reimagining was so charming and the game so substantially improved that gamers were more than happy to revisit Final Fantasy 3’s captivating world in polygonal 3D. Those, perhaps, were simpler times.
In 2014, Bravely Default exists. Handheld consoles sport graphics from the PS2 and even PS3 eras on occasion. And with the advent of Steam sales and an endless stream of indie titles just waiting to be cheaply downloaded, its crucial to stand out beyond mere brand recognition. Unfortunately, porting a Nintendo DS title to PC is not a particularly effective method.
I want to start out by making one thing very clear; Final Fantasy 3 on PC is in no way worse than the Nintendo DS edition, technically speaking. If you’ve found a way to avoid that game until now, and love the series or the original, it’s certainly worth a play. The asking price is not steep, the core gameplay still endures, and you can scratch it off your backlog. Give it a go, because it’s an important game.
For me, though, that’s where most of the fun abruptly halts. Try as I might, I simply couldn’t ignore the issues, bothersome quirks, and disappointingly frequent giveaways to the game’s age that, largely unaltered from the handheld edition, are quite tough to overlook here on PC. Given the ubiquity of Nintendo DS, it helps to have a reason for swapping platforms. With Final Fantasy 3, I’m still looking for one.
Perhaps surprisingly, a former strength of Final Fantasy 3 has now become a generic non-factor — its story. The gist is that four orphaned children (Luneth, Arc, Refia, and Ingus) discover their destiny as bearers of the sacred light crystals, and must embark on a journey to save the world as a result. Each character is appreciably charming (and less annoying than some of Bravely Default’s cast), but aside from their brazen characterizations as courageous, kind, affectionate, and determined respectively, the game refrains from ever digging much deeper. I recognize that the original Final Fantasy 3 was one of the first games to support a plot of this type, but these days it’s tough to imagine something more trite.
Final Fantasy 3 was the first mainline game in the series to feature an in-depth job system, but even with the DS version improvements much of the experience feels overwhelmingly monotonous. This is a game where you will grind, and often. Random battles are just the beginning, too; class-changing on the go was an impressive feature in FF III’s heyday, but there’s nothing fun about the inordinate amount of time required to level each job class to its maximum potential. Unlike Bravely Default (or better yet, Fire Emblem Awakening), where breezing through each class is a joy of experimental customization, here it feels like work far sooner than it should. As a result, I felt unmotivated to assemble a creative or diverse team. They were merely “good enough.”
I realize it may be a bit much to expect another overhaul on the scale of the NES-to-DS reimagining, but one area where Square Enix could have made up for outdated story and general tedium is with improved graphics. And despite the fact that its chibi style is still cute, Final Fantasy 3 on PC looks almost identical to the DS game. You can set a preferred native resolution, of course, but beyond that expected boost, there are few visual enhancements to speak of. Sounds a lot like something an emulator is perfectly capable of.
Furthermore, this is particularly disappointing to fans of the NES game who may not have enjoyed the DS edition’s 3D visuals to begin with. The visual style taken for the portable version, to me, is an effort to alleviate the limitations of N64-esque graphics. Again, Square never explicitly promised a huge overhaul on PC, but new character models (perhaps elongated and slightly less garishly cartoony) could have gone a long way. That, a few lighting enhancements, and the elimination of at least some of the environments’ horrifically blurry textures might have allowed me to swap the drear of grinding in favor of appreciation for eye-catching surroundings. Instead, this is more an upscale than an HD remake, and the added resolution is largely useless without assets to back it up.
As you may have guessed by now, it’s incredibly difficult to recommend Final Fantasy 3 in 2014, but there is one saving grace. The Steam edition, at $15.99, is cheaper than a sealed copy of the DS game. Penny pinchers will take that info and run with it, and it’s certainly not impossible that this edition appear in a Steam sale down the road. That said, grinding is much more manageable on the go, and given that 3DS is backwards compatible, my recommendation remains with the handheld edition if you’re looking to maximize enjoyment rather than find what is technically “definitive.”
I’m glad folks who haven’t played Final Fantasy 3 will get to try it on PC. It’s an important game in RPG history, and one that paved the way for modern classics like Bravely Default and countless others prior. Given the bare-bones nature of this PC port, though, newcomers are likely better off on Nintendo DS, or better yet, with the time-honored NES version.
Griffin Vacheron is a Writer for CraveOnline. You can follow him on Twitter @novacav.
PC copy provided by publisher. Final Fantasy 3‘s 3D remake is available on DS, mobile, and PC.
