A So-So But Not A Soulful Remake (Final Fantasy I & II: Dawn of Souls (GBA))

Member Name: scream4bruce

Product:	Final Fantasy I & II: Dawn of Souls (GBA)
Date:	22/02/09 (34 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Decent visuals, a decent package

Disadvantages: Poor sound effects, reduced challenge

Final Fantasy: Dawn of Souls (DOS), a collection of remakes of the first two games in the Final Fantasy series, is said to be pretty similar to Final Fantasy Origins for the PlayStation; so there have been changes to make these old skool RPGs appeal to a broader audience. On that note I felt they done more with the story as sometimes the direction was not clear.

Whereas Origin offered an "easy" mode along with "normal" for Final Fantasy I, there's no such choice in Dawn of Souls, and it's not difficult to believe that DOS FFI is equivalent to "easy", what with such quick levelling up (without setting aside time to battle, my characters were around level 70 for the final fight). Unlike FFI, FFII does not have an experience point levelling up system, instead, character statistics increase or decrease depending on how they fare in battle - in DOS FFII these stats can only improve, which was muchly welcomed. What also made these games not so hard as their originals is being able to save anywhere outside of battle, and there are three files in case of not escaping a dungeon. It makes you see how daunting these games must have been! However, in DOS FFII, there is now only one Blood Sword, and not two as in the original - not that I needed them to complete the game!

There's an option for fast walk, and with this turned on, such a need for speed might have players wishing the random rate encounter were relaxed. As for battle, whilst it has become a standard that, when a character is removed, any moves targetted towards them are automatically switched to another of their party, such modernisation for DOS I'm not that fond of (even if, in old, characters attack thin air), as it can mean many a battle where the player can simply hold down the A button to have their characters attack while the system takes care of the rest.

It took me around forty hours to finish both games. Of the extras, they're not bad, there's a neat music player, though the sounds effects in the game are not great. FFI and FFII are not the strongest entries of the series. As such, despite being a decent package, it would be difficult to recommend DOS to the modern RPG fan when there are many interesting alternatives on the GBA. As for those who loved the originals, the reduced level of difficulty would be a turn off.

Summary: Final Fantasy: Dawn of Souls for GBA