Final Fantasy IV: The After Years: Edward's Tale Quicklook

One thing people know about RPG's is that they tend to take a long time to develop. The story extends for a number of hours and usually doesn't really start making a lot of sense until the end. Porom's Tale really began to weave the stories of Final Fantasy IV: The After Years together and Edward's Tale continues that.

Edward's Tale begins with an advisor to Edward talking about the kingdom's financial situation and the fact they cannot keep helping the other kingdoms rebuild. Edward is not concerned as tell him in order for everyone to prosper they must help. Meanwhile a star falls out of the sky, the same as mentioned in Yang's Tale and Edward's secretary, Hayley enters to discuss that matter. Edward agrees to send Hayley to investigate with the help of some guards. While she is away an emissary from Baron arrives asking Damcyan to allow Baron to investigate the matter. Edward decides to discuss that matter with Cecil personally, after he goes to look for Hayley, who has been gone longer than he expected.

The story in Edward's Tale centers around his desire for answers because he feels uneasy about Baron's request. Edward is accompanied through most of the adventure by three unnamed guards and his secretary Hayley. You'll explore the area of the meteor crash, as you did in Yang's Tale as well as the area around Damcyan and Kaipo. There is a lot of combat and you'll want to have the moon phase appropriate to that. There are no magic users in this chapter so healing items and combat are your main priorities. You will also see a small portion of Yang's Tale from Edward's perspective and the interaction between those two great rulers.

There is no real challenges to be had during this chapter of the game. The combat focuses mostly on lower to moderate strength groups of monsters. During one portion later in the game you expect a boss fight and prepare for it, only to have that fight not happen. During that encounter you'll see the possible beginnings of love take root, which is beginning to become a bit of a theme in these later chapters. Edward shows his character as a compassionate ruler. In the beginning of the game he makes it clear that he will help anyone who needs help in continuing to rebuild their kingdom. He risks his life to save a party member even though it could mean his destruction. Towards the end of the game he shows some ingenuity bringing along items to help him confirm some of his suspicions of the activity occurring in Baron. All told he seems to be the character who has grown the most since the original story. He remembers the past, but not at the cost of the future.

Edward's Tale will take between an hour and a half to two hours to complete and I would say that this, along with Porom's Tale have been the two best additional chapters of the game and the two that are needed most to make the story fit together. While there are no real action packed sequences the development of Edward's character and the interweaving of the stories make this a portion that everyone interested in the story should purchase.

Porom's Tale Quick Look

Porom's Tale: The Vanished Lunar Whale is the first of the latest three installments of the Final Fantasy IV sequel. If you're like me you've probably noticed going along that the stories are only loosely based on the title of the chapter. Porom's Tale begins shortly after the events of Final Fantasy IV and progresses in small leaps through time to end up during the events of The After Years. You should know up front that there is much less combat during this episode than any of the previous chapters. This is mainly due to your party comprising mostly of White Mages.

The prologue of the story takes you to the Underground world of the Dwarves where you will learn a lot about Luca. You will finally learn the origin of her new look for The After Years, how she became Cid's apprentice and who she has a crush on. During this point Rydia, Palom and Porom head to the Feymarch to help Palom continue his training to become a Sage. You will also learn a bit about Rydia's background and how she aged so quickly during the events of the first game. After this the second half of the game shifts its focus back to Porom.

The Elder of Mysidia has become concerned about Baron's future and calls on Porom. She is tasked by the Elder of Mysidia to head to Mt. Ordeals to find the dragoon, Kain. He asks an unnamed Black Mage and White Mage to accompany Porom during her quest. The trio head up Mt. Ordeals where Porom is confronted by a member of Cecil's past, and who Porom seems to remember. As previously mentioned there is not a lot of combat that happens during this chapter and most of the fighting will occur after Kain has joined your party.

The events of the second half of the game wrap around the events of Edge's Tale, Palom's Tale and the first chapter of The After Years The back and forth nature of the story can be a bit confusing, especially if you are not buying all the chapters of The After Years. You just have to understand going in that you're going to be in for more story telling that is usual in RPG's and that may turn some people off, but the fact that this chapter, more than any other so far, has tied all the different parts together. The Lunar Whale mentioned in the title, make a brief appearance and does not really play into the story at this point in any way.

Final Fantasy IV: The After Years Review

I have to be perfectly honest and open up front, and like I said in my preview I’ve not played many Final Fantasy games. I started with Final Fantasy VII, but haven’t played anything before that. So this review is coming from someone who hasn’t played the original Final Fantasy IV. I can say that I’ve played many RPGs in the past and this one ranks near the top in terms of games I’ve enjoyed.

Final Fantasy IV: The After Years opens up with the main character, Ceodore, following in his father’s footsteps. He is embarking on his journey to join the Knights of the Red Wings, the elite fighting force of the Kingdom of Baron. His father is King Cecil, a paladin, and his mother is Rosa, a white mage; they are also the heroes of Final Fantasy IV. The game takes place 17 years after the events of the first game. Once his quest to join the knights is completed the second moon which has been gone for the past 17 years suddenly reappears and the kingdom is invaded by hordes of monsters. Ceodore must defend himself and return to his home to aid in its defense. Along the way he is met by a mysterious “hooded man” who offers to join him on his trip. Other adventures that take place during this initial chapter of the game involve Cecil, Rosa and the engineer Cid, as well as the mysterious dragoon Kain who wants to have a meeting with Cecil. All of these different adventures tie together in a web of intrigue to discover why the second moon has returned, who is the mysterious woman behind it and why does Kain need to see Cecil as quickly as possible.

Many elements of the original release were to become staples of the role playing genre, and they return in this game with some new updates. The Active Time Battle System is the one you will encounter most often. Each character has a bar that fills up and once full they may perform an action. That can be to attack, cast magic, use items, or “band” together with another character. You can customize this a bit to your liking. You have to ability to have the game wait until you’ve decided a characters action or continue to run in real time. There is also the option of speeding up or slowing down the speed that these bars move so you have more time to choose what each character does. The banding attacks are powerful combo attacks between 2 or more characters that can be used to deal massive damage to a single enemy or even groups of enemies. They are extremely powerful, but require a small amount of MP, or magic points, to activate. A few of these banding attacks will be given to you throughout the story, but you can also try different combinations of characters to discover other ones on your own. One element of the game that will become increasingly frustrating is the random encounters. These encounters happen very frequently and can interrupt the Gameplay somewhat. In order to survive for extended periods of time you need to make strategic use of all the special attacks you have available to you, and learn each monsters weakness in order exploit them to help speed combat along.

Another new element to the game is the moon phase system. This will cause different aspects of each character to become stronger or weaker based on the phase of the moon you are in. This will change at various intervals, but can be changed at will by pitching a tent at specific locations throughout the world. For instance, during a waxing or waning moon attack power is increased while during a full moon magic abilities are increased. Learning this and how it affects your character will be very beneficial in boss fights. There is also the ability for up to three friends to join in the action and take control of characters during battles. This is an interesting addition, but unless you and all your friends can keep up with the frantic pace of battles it may cause fights outside the in game battles as well.

One aspect of the game that is wonderful, and expected in Square Enix games, is the visuals. The After Years uses the same art style as the original SNES release. The environments are gorgeous; character sprites are vibrant and very animated. Spell effects sparkle and shine; there are a wide variety of these as well. The only downside to the visuals is that environments are reused throughout the game. If you’ve been in one cave, you’ve been in every cave in the game. The layouts may be different, but the look and feel is always the same. This is a small gripe and does not affect the overall feel of the game. Square Enix also knows how to compose music. The upbeat battle theme is a nice contrast to many of the slower, more moody melodies you’ll encounter.

Final Fantasy IV: The After Yearsis broken up into a number of chapters. The first chapter is available for 800 points. Overall, the story is broken up into nine separate stories. The first and the last, which will be available in September, are the only required elements if you want to get the full experience of the main story. Also available now is the first of seven Character Stories, Rydia’s Tale. These will be available in the first weeks of July and August in groups of three. Each Character Story will cost 300 Nintendo Points, but are optional side stories that detail the events that happen to many of the characters you will encounter through the game. They are not necessary to the understanding of the main story. The main story will run you between four and five hours, each of the side stories should take around two hours to complete. All together if you purchase all the available content it will run 3700 Nintendo Points.

For fans of Final Fantasy IV this is a welcome continuation of many peoples favorite game in the series. If you’re new to the series it may feel awkward trying to get into the story. It’s probably helpful to know the history of these characters, but not necessary to follow the story. It’s well worth the price for a quality title in a storied franchise. The only real problem with this release is that once you’ve really gotten into the story and are starting to wonder exactly where things are going the credits roll and you have to wait a bit to find out the rest of the tale. The episodic nature of the game means you’re going to get the experience that you want to have, and it’s an experience that many people would and should enjoy.

Final Score: 4/5

I'm tired of defending Wii

That may sound like something strange coming from someone who loves Nintendo as much as I do, but it's true. Everywhere you turn "hardcore" gamers are bashing Nintendo for abandoning them. For almost three years now I've spent a lot of it trying to sell Wii to those people who want bigger explosions, more realistic graphics and more blood in the Wii games.

Well, I'm not going to do it anymore. I play games to have fun. I enjoy games like the Munchables and My Sims because they're fun. I enjoy games like the Conduit and Call of Duty because they're fun. I don't play games because they look like what I see out of my window. I don't care what the graphics of a game look like. I don't care how much blood a game has in it. I generally avoid those types of games anyway, because that seems to be all there is to them.

I sit down for an hour in front of my TV with a controller in my hand because I want to have fun. I don't want to spend an hour trying to convince a 13 year old boy that the Wii is a fun system. They want cursing, realism, blood and guns in their games and if it doesn't have those the game sucks in their opinion. They're entitled to it, but I think they're wrong.

They won't play a game like The Munchables because it looks like a game for kids. They don't remember the days when we played games like Pac-Man or Galaga because they were fun to play. I don't know when gaming turned from that the the gore fest shooters that people think games have to be in order to be fun.

I just know that I'm tired of listening to it. I'm not going to defend it anymore because it's a losing battle. I'm going to continue to buy the games that I like because I think they deserve support. My gaming shelf is full of games that many would say are stupid. I own My Sims, The Munchables, Paper Mario. I also own games like Call of Duty and The Conduit. They're all fun and arguing with people about that isn't so I'm not going to do it anymore.