FINAL FANTASY III
Super Nintendo


FINAL FANTASY III, though not the most recent Super Nintendo game by Squaresoft, is certainly one of its most memorable.
The words "epic," "stirring," "gorgeous," and "addicting" all describe FINAL FANTASY III. Its involved plot, charismatic characters, and its brilliant music easily outweigh its flaws, raising this RPG to the highly recommended status. In what other fantasy RPG does a character sing in an opera?
Perhaps FINAL FANTASY III's worst feature, aside from the wretched English translation, is its awkward and frequent combat. In any unsafe area, just wandering around will result in countless random encounters. This is great for the terminally bloodthirsty, but is frustrating for the plot-driven player. Worse, the combat screen shows the characters striking empty air, with the damage "magically" appearing on their opponents. The combat music, however, helps tip the scales into the tolerable range.
In fact, the music is part of what makes FINAL FANTASY III work so well. Each character has a theme song, and some of the melodies are hauntingly beautiful. The tragic tales that many of the characters have to tell are also well-crafted and superbly told. Together, the stories and songs make an impressive combination. The two drawbacks of the character histories are that (1) the player loses control of the scenario whenever a character history or crucial scene is narrated, and (2) some insights are not revealed without the right combination of characters at key times and locations. Both of these flaws, however, are strengths in other ways.
The story revolves largely around the young woman Terra. She has the rare inborn ability to use magic, for which the Empire wishes to use her. Her past is a mystery. Her first companion is a young man named Locke, who is the Japanese anime ideal of a handsome young thief ("Treausure hunter!" Locke insists).
Soon the other characters begin to converge: King Edward, who is both an inventor and a would-be Don Juan; Sabin, Edward's twin brother, who willingly lost the throne by a coin toss; Celes, the young woman ex-general for the Empire; Cyan, the warrior who loses his family to the Empire; Shadow, the mercenary whose dreams are nightmares; Gau, the abandoned boy raised by animals, and many others. Almost all of them have their own stories to tell, stories that come out slowly as the adventure continues.
There is also a large, complex plot thickening at the same time. It concerns the Empire, magic, betrayal, and absurd quantities of power. However, it's really the characters that steal the show. As a warning, the plot is a tad slow in coming and for a while the game is horribly linear, but there is such depth and development within the game that one can easily forgive this.

Interface: Good, mostly intuitive (aside from Sabin's special attacks).
Players: Single player, operating up to four characters at once.
Combat: Combat is, unfortunately, artificial and a tad slow.

Play time: One can easily play this game for sixty hours or more if one is looking for all the hidden scenes, such as the one in which Gau realizes who his father is (try to find this one; it's worth seeing Gau in a tailcoat).
Hints: Try to keep everyone alive; there are certain secrets that come to light only with the survival of certain characters. Supposedly there is a secret ending as well. Oh, and have fun playing with the Empire's flush toilets.
Other comments: The detailed plot, characters, and music far outweigh the awkward combat, bad English, and some linear gameplay. FINAL FANTASY III, by the way, was released in Japan as Final Fantasy VI, and its plot has nothing to do with the previous Final Fantasy games.

Rating: 4.5 (out of 5) Highly recommended!

--Eri Izawa