Do I Like RPGs, or Do I Just Want To?
Playing two different games called Final Fantasy III
I think I’ve mentioned before that the videogames I had as a kid were largely simulationist, and for that matter exclusively PC-based. I’m talking the Sim City, Civilization, and Age of Empires franchises in particular, which all do have some kind of story and cast of characters—in places—but that very much is not the focus.
In the last wee while I’ve been doing something to change that. I played Link’s Awakening last year and Link to the Past earlier this year, and followed that up with the first Golden Sun, all of which I enjoyed greatly.1 But there have been plenty of others that I never did finish. The most recent addition to that latter group (for now) is Final Fantasy VI, known of course as III in the SNES version I’ve been playing.
I had actually tried this game a couple of years ago, and made it up to about the Battle of Narshe before losing interest. I started it from the beginning back in about April and had a great time speeding though those first few hours once again. But now that I’ve reached around the half-way point I’ve put it aside again—why?
I’m not entirely sure, but I think that replay of the first section might be a clue to part of it. You see, I’ve been using a walkthrough quite extensively, and while I have no issue with that kind of thing I was having to rely on it to such a degree that it was no-longer fun. Yet when it came to replaying the opening I knew where to go, and suddenly the game was much more fun…until I ran out of familiar territory.
This compounds with another aspect: FFVI has so many characters to keep track of, each with their own mechanic. I managed to get used to Sabin’s “Blitz”, memorising a few of the most useful combos, but Gau’s Rage is impossible to keep track of and by the time we’re Dancing and Sketching and playing the Slots I’m out.
The winter of 2025 is stressing me out—as did the same period last year, but for different reasons.2 Accordingly I’m not in the mood for mastering complex systems or investing time to advance story, and instead I found myself booting up the game, playing a few random encounters with a particular party I enjoyed playing, and then saving and switching it off. Effectively I’ve been grinding for no reason, just to avoid checking the walkthrough for what I’m supposed to do next. Eventually this progressed to the point of crisis: Am I even having fun anymore? Do I actually like this kind of game or do I just want to be the kind of person who plays RPGs?
It’s been a time, is what I’m saying.
Ultimately, I decided on an answer to the first question at least: no I wasn’t, and so I put it down. But what about the second, the title of this post?
I think it would be too harsh to say that I don’t like RPGs (or JRPGs in particular). Certainly, I liked Golden Sun and Pokemon, but recently I’ve definitely been looking for something less complex and more pick-up-and-put-downable. To test this theory I decided to play… Final Fantasy III.
For those not familiar, the metalore with the early Final Fantasy games is that a about half never made it out of Japan in their original run—hence why VI was originally known as III elsewhere. RHDN does have translations of the Famicom version from as early as the late 90s, but the real III was only officially released outside of Japan in 20063 with the remake for the Nintendo DS. Having not played the original it’s this version that I decided to pick up.
Looking up information about games for the DS online is fun because this was prime forum era and you can find any number of threads from people at the time sharing their experiences. People seem to love this game or hate it, with the criticisms including lack of in-dungeon saves4 and a certain amount of grinding being required. But I’m prepared to cope with the former problem and as I’ve already mentioned I grind reflexively.
I’ve been enjoying myself so far. I’m not using a walkthrough at all, everything is fairly intuitive and even if I’m not being perfectly optimal I can still bluff my way through. The characters are vastly less complex, having apparently slightly more personality than in the original but still ultimately being cyphers that the player can pour anything they like into. The job system is perfectly workable (and helps with the former), and I’m not missing the saves—yet, we’ll see how I feel in that final dungeon. Contra the claim in this RPGamer review that the DS version “isn’t a beginner’s game, no matter what the touch controls and chibi artwork may lead one to think”, I’m doing fine.
Will I finish the game though? Who knows. Judging by the save file on the cartridge I bought I wouldn’t be the first, but that’s ok. I’m coming to see completion as not being necessary, but if I manage it here I’m actually tempted to take a look at the original at some point. I just think it’s neat.
Shares feed updates will resume soon, I hope. I’ve barely had time even to read lately alas.
There have also been a number of Pokemon games, which ought to count, but don’t in my mental calculus for whatever reason.↩︎
Really the whole last few months have been a struggle to do anything other than work, which is why I haven’t been writing.↩︎
Or 2007 in this part of the world.↩︎
You can quicksave, at least, meaning that you can turn your console off—but you can’t reload from those after a party wipe as they’re deleted when loaded.↩︎