Final Fantasy I and II were both really fun games. I really enjoyed the ability to set up my party however I wanted in FFI, The Warrior, BMage, WMage and Thief combo worked really well. It kinda sucked that 9 times out of 10, FFI would tell you an objective without telling you where to go, but in itself, it was a really fun game. FFII? Eh... Not so much. It was a solid game, but the level up system was TERRIBLE. Grinding in the later levels pretty much involved hitting yourself to get stronger. It was a good game, but for sure, not top 5 material.
FFIII, is what I would call without a doubt, my least favorite in the series. The game involved more grind than any other and just wasn't really that great. The job system was decent, but they should have tweaked it in the remake to make it more like FFV's. I played the remake for the DS, so there was more plot shoehorned in, but it was pretty bad. I didn't know why exactly I was doing some of the thing's the game sent me off to do 90% of the time. If I had to give it a good point though, the main party was done very very nicely. It's still a dick move though when [spoiler] You beat the final Boss just for them to introduce another one last second.
The SNES era FF's were all really solid and well done games in my opinion. FFIV was my favorite as a kid, I played the hell out of it. I still don't see why they never kept the 5 man party, but whatever. FFV was probably where the SNES era lacked a bit. It was a decent game, and the job system was really good, but it just felt like it lacked in the fun that FFIV had. I mean it was okay, but it wasn't great. Also Exdeath is a tree... And a dick... Fucking Tree. FFVI is a LOT better than FFV was, and I don't know about dying a lot, because I only died once or twice, the game was pretty easy. The characters are a lot better than Butz and his trio of oblivious women (Butz was Bartz's name in the Japanese version and Butz sounds a lot funnier) Which is why I'm still angry at SE for NOT PUTTING LOCKE IN DISSIDIA 012, or ANY OTHER FFVI CHARACTER FOR THAT MATTER. Still one thing the game didn't tell me is how to junction Espers. I made it to the final area without discovering this little tidbit, and it would have been a lot easier if I knew I could learn Cure spells rather than drip feeding my party with Hi Potions.
If you've never heard of FFVII before, than I congratulate you for finding out how to live under a rock for the past 14 or so years since the game's release. I always heard about all the hype FFVII got and frankly I didn't get it. It looked like a bunch of spikey haired 20 something year old's and a black guy going to fight some guy with a sword just slightly longer than he is. Presumably they were going to fight him because his sword was 2 or 3 inches longer than the law would allow or something. Then I played the game. Usually this is the point where the posters says "And my life changed forever". I played it at Res's and pretty much ran around slums for 3 hours being bored. It wasn't till I bought it myself and sat down and played it for a decent amount of time before I actually liked it. Getting a gold chocobo was probably one of the best feeling accomplishments than many other games can offer. It's a great game once you get a few hours in, and it's probably one of the top 3 Final Fantasy games. FFVIII was also a great game, in fact, the entire PS1 era was probably the best. FFVIII however, comes with it's own slew of problems. Level scaling... I wanna know who thought of this. It works well for games like Fallout, but not for a JRPG. Plus, the game needs to put more emphasis on telling the player to junction magic. Poor Res is only 20 minutes or so into the game because he didn't bother to junction enough magic to himself. That being said, once you use the Diablos no encounter ability and go draw all the magic you can from the island closest to heaven/hell, you pretty much are an unstoppable force. Plus, the ending scene on Balamb Garden with the video camera is really great. FFVIII is one of the better FF games.
The crown and glory itself, Final Fantasy IX is without a doubt, my favorite Final Fantasy game. It came out of the blue too, I never expected this one to be so damn good. There were only, I'd say, one or two parts that were kinda boring (Namely the card minigame tournament and Fossil Roo). The game had by far the best party members (With the exception of Quina, who is pretty garbage) and supporting characters. The sprites and FMV's were done better than any FF game before it. It beats the hell out of the blocky FFVII sprites and the lanky FFVIII sprites. Kuja was just the right amount of dickhead to make him a great villain and all the throwbacks were pretty well put in. The final boss was another great part, with Sephiroth I just used Knights of the Round and Omnislash and beat him in 3 turns and Ultimecia, I just spammed the Aura spell and limit broke her over and over. FFIX's final boss was a nailbiter through the whole thing, scrambling to revive party members and healing them before he unleashed another powerful spell. I didn't think I was gonna win, but I ended up doing so with only 2 characters left standing. In short, PLAY THIS GAME, it is awesome.
I'm about halfway through X, so I'll likely write about X and X-2 when I finish them, I'll include XIII with XI and XII, possible XIII-2 if it's out by then (Probably won't be)
