the journey begins.

saturday, january 4th, 2025.

Oh, video games! I've been playing 'em since I was but a wee tyke— the NES was my first video game console. I think I was maybe 7 or 8 when my parents gifted me one for Christmas. Oh!— how enthralled (and spoiled) I was! I managed to get my mitts on a GameBoy, Sega Genesis, SNES, PlayStation, Nintendo 64, and a Sega DreamCast throughout my childhood. I had plenty of friends that caught the bug, too. Back in the halcyon days of nerds being, well, nerdy. When Dungeons & Dragons was "satanic," computers were thousands of dollars, and dial-up internet was a game-changer.

But, I digress. Today, I'd like to write about the Final Fantasy series. My first experience was renting a copy of Final Fantasy III for the SNES multiple times from a local Blockbuster Video competitor. Final Fantasy III was the first game to really draw me in with a proper narrative— there was simply nothing like it back then. There were twists and turns in the story, there was an opera scene that'd bring a tear to your eye. I can't emphasize just how damn magical this game was— it was certainly enough to cause this young preteen to part with his lawn-mowing allowance to keep renting the game enough to finish it. (Keep in mind, those games were like $70 in '90s dollars!)

I distinctly remember writing an essay in middle school about Final Fantasy XVII. I don't remember the writing prompt, but I do remember extrapolating that Squaresoft would eventually roll the odometer on the series enough to hit that lofty numerical goal. Probably something about "where do you see yourself in twenty years?" or somesuch.

Anyway, my love for the Final Fantasy series has certainly waned through my teens and early adulthood. There was GoldenEye, there was Halo, and there was Rock Band. Final Fantasy lost its lustre after Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy: Tactics for me. Instead, it was split-screen multiplayer with my friends! Frozen pizza, lugging CRT TVs to my friends' dorms, and bleary-eyed 8:00am classes made me altogether forget the series.

Lately, I've been starting and stopping so many games. Many— the roguelikes, especially— are endless. There's no end to them. No central narrative, just play and keep playing. I've probably got thousands of hours in Slay the Spire and probably many more in competitive games such as Counter-Strike and World of Tanks. To the point that I had to quit multiplayer gaming cold turkey because it became something of an addiction.

ah yes, the journey!

Around the holidays, I started the demo for Final Fantasy XVI on a lark. Don't know if you've played it, but this blog post is almost entirely a love letter to my journey-in-progress in that game. You see— it has a very Game of Thrones feel to it, and something about it clicked with me. It's got narrative, and I was thoroughly hooked by the demo. Bought the game on sale pretty quickly while the gettin' was good.

As a JRPG, the game is fairly limited. There's a very limited palette of equipment and magic to choose from. The game, frankly, feels incredibly linear and on-rails. But as an experience, I can't mince words— It is phenomenal and something you've got to see for yourself. Or maybe, it's something I needed to experience. Final Fantasy XVI rekindled my love for gaming in a way I haven't thought possible in the decades since that pimply-faced teen I once was journeyed through Figaro on the tiny 13" Magnavox CRT TV in his bedroom.

Final Fantasy XVI brought the magic back and I'm so glad it did.

I've poked around online at the reviews. It's one of those habits of mine— I often peruse Wikipedia after watching a good movie to see how it was critically received, along with theories about the themes and motifs in the films that I might have missed.

Ah, anyway. This blog post isn't about giving a review of the game. I'm still playing through it. The narrative has grabbed me and taken me on a delightful rollercoaster, despite the reviews that claim how trite and telegraphed the plot is.

This post is a love letter to a series that I had forgotten about, and a return to form. To the magic of gaming, before everything became a min-max climb to the top.

I'm excited to play through Final Fantasy XVI.

And afterwards, I think I might revisit the other games in the series. I don't know if I'll play through all the mainline single-player Final Fantasy games, but I hope I can chase the high (fantasy) that once enamored me in a way that no other game series has, before or since.

Until next time, be well. :)