Final Fantasy (episode)

Final Fantasy is the third episode of Did You Know Gaming? and the first episode covering the Final Fantasy series.

Transcript
Did you know that during the development of Final Fantasy VII, series creator Hironobu Sakaguchi's mother tragically died? At the time, Sakaguchi wanted to tell a story showing that just because someone has passed on, it doesn't mean that they are gone. He also wanted to display a realistic death, rather than a Hollywood-style sacrificial end. Sakaguchi's desires developed into the life stream and Aeris's iconic death. The characters continuing with their lives and their efforts to save the world are a reflection of his own feelings coping with his loss and trying to move on.

Here's one piece of trivia that's often suggested: Final Fantasy gets its name from the fact that the series creator Hironobu Sakaguchi wanted the game's title to reflect his feelings at the time of its development. It was his last chance to make a successful game. He was ready to quit the game industry and go back to university where he would have to repeat a year of study and be surrounded by strangers. To him, it really was a final situation, and so the name "Final Fantasy" was born.

The NES version of Final Fantasy had a reference to another major RPG, Dragon Quest, or Dragon Warrior as it was known in North America. In the English version of the game, in the city of Elfheim, one headstone reads "Here lies Erdrick." Erdrick was reference often in the orginal Dragon Quest, and is the hero of Dragon Quest III. The reference was originally to Link from The Legend of Zelda. It was changed back to Link in later editions, including Final Fantasy Origins, the Game Boy Advance version, and Final Fantasy 20th Anniversary Edition for PSP and iOS devices.

Final Fantasy VI has three unused enemies hidden in the game's code. CzarDragon, Colossus, and an alternate form to Umaro. The alternate Umaro and Colossus use the same graphics and palettes as other enemies in the game. The Colossus is fairly simple and has a full attack script. Also, the alternate Umaro is weaker than the original, but its CzarDragon that's interesting. It has no script so when the battle is executed all it does is attack repeatedly, which is odd because there's a line of battle dialogue for the enemy as if it were meant to be fought. The dialogue reads "Mwa, ha ha... Humans and their desires! I'm free at last! I bring you destruction... I bring you terror... I am Czar... Prepare yourselves!" Taking into account the dialogue and its incredible likeness to Shinryu from Final Fantasy V, it seems that CzarDragon was intended to be an optional endgame boss. CzarDragon actually made it into the Game Boy Advance port of the game. It was called by its original Japanese name, Kaiser Dragon. It had a unique sprite similar to the Super Nintendo design, a full battle script, and was the boss of the new bonus dungeon, making the previous endgame boss idea seem more or less accurate.

In Final Fantasy VI, there are multiple cases of art assets being censored in the North American release. Here you can see the Japanese Esper Siren sprite showed her naked from the waist down, but was covered up for American games. The Esper Starlet was also somewhat censored, having a large distinct cleavage in the Japanese version but not in the North American version. Censorship also hit the North American enemy sprites. The Alluring Rider went from wearing a thong to wearing a unitard, the Madame's puff of smoke was removed, and more of the Goddess was covered up. One last change that seems entirely pointless was changing the signs from reading "Pub" to "Cafe." And these changes were also kept in place for the Game Boy Advance port of the game.

That's all for today, but we'll be back with more Did You Know Gaming? soon, so make sure you subscribe, like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and check out more gaming trivia at DidYouKnowGaming.com. And hey, we've also opened up an online store with Did You Know Gaming? themed shirts! If you're a fan of Pokémon or The Legend of Zelda, check out the videos in the annotations onscreen. And also, it wouldn't hurt to subscribe yourself to JonTron.

Games covered

 * Final Fantasy (NES)
 * Final Fantasy VI (SNES)
 * Final Fantasy VII (PS)