A Review on Final Fantasy 5

If I were to pick my favorite game out of the Final Fantasy series thus far, it would have to be Final Fantasy 5. Final Fantasy 5 is a vastly underrated game, and it isn't really the game's fault. The reason why people overlook the game is because it was released between Final Fantasy 4 and Final Fantasy 6, and those two games are considered to be two of the best games in the whole series. However, the reason why Final Fantasy 5 really sticks out to me was because of the comical tone throughout the entire story, the amazing class based system, and finally the memorable characters.

When I was younger I used to watch a lot of Let's Plays on YouTube, because I liked watching people play games that I knew I wasn't going to be able to beat. The first game that I ever watched and fell in love with was HCBailly's Final Fantasy 5 Let's Play. After watching the first few episodes, I instantly got hooked to the story of the game, and I watched the whole Let's Play start to finish. After the LP was finished, I really wanted to play the game, but I wasn't able to actually play it until recently. To this day I have to credit my love for Final Fantasy to that LP.

Final Fantasy 5 is a whole different kind of beast from the rest of the Final Fantasy series. Unlike its predecessors, Final Fantasy 5 wasn't very serious at all. Before this game was created, most games in the series had a very serious plot with very little humor spread throughout the course of the adventure; Final Fantasy 5's plot would end being the antithesis to rest of the games in the series. 

The story of Final Fantasy 5 is very simple: there is an evil guy who is sealed up by the crystals, the crystals start shattering, our heroes go on a journey to stop the crystals from shattering. Looking at the story without my rose-tinted glasses on I can agree with those who say that the story is very cliche. Even though the story of the game is very cliche by today's standards, for someone who hadn't seen an RPG game, I thought that it was amazing. Even though the story was very cliche, the reason why it was one of my favorite in the series was simply because the game was extremely comical. Even in the more serious portions of the game, the characters start cracking jokes and doing silly things. I really liked all of the silliness in the game but I also think that it ended up harming the story of the game simply because I was also expecting something funny, so when Galuf, one of the main characters of the game, dies saving the team from main villain Exdeath (Yes I know, very creative name) it ended up being really hard for me to take it seriously. The game had a really cliche story, but I think that the humor used throughout the story really helped get through the dry parts of the story, but it also harmed the seriousness of the game. I can't forget mentioning how the story is so ridiculous that it was also hard to be taken seriously. For instance, the logical solution to crossing a desert that is infamous for its quicksand would be to fly over it, right? But no, instead the characters decide to kill a gigantic worm beast and use its carcass as a bridge. I personally find this resourceful, but in hindsight, it is pretty ridiculous. 

Another reason why I loved this game was because of the new and improved class system implemented in this game. In Final Fantasy 4, the characters classes were already predetermined which made each character unique, and helped set unique identities for each character while keeping the game relatively simple for the player. This game decided to stray away from that, and go with the Job Class system which was found in the original games. This was quite possibly my favorite part of the game because the Job Class system allowed for me to customize my characters in any way possible, and also adapt to certain situations by changing my class. Some people will argue that the Job Class system takes away the unique aspect of the characters, and that it makes the story of the game rather bland; I found myself getting more attached to the characters due to the job class system, because I ended to spend more time with the characters creating some form of attachment to the story. For me, this was the portion that really carried the game for me, because I always found it so cool that you could change classes, and leveling up each class would give you the ability of that class permanently. It really made you want to try out every class, and play the game more so that you could get that awesome ability from each of the classes, which in turn would cause the player to want to play more (pretty good marketing strategy).

At the end of the day one can argue that Final Fantasy 5, albeit a fun game, is out-shined by its predecessor Final Fantasy 4, and its Successor Final Fantasy 6. I can respect that opinion, but for me, Final Fantasy 5 was more than just "another Final Fantasy game" because it introduced me into the JRPG genre that I have fallen in love with now. I think that Final Fantasy 5 is a really fun game, and some people will disagree with what I have said about the game, but in the end those are only opinions. So, before you make a decision on Final Fantasy 5, at least try to give it a little bit of thought, because you might be thoroughly surprised like I was.

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