Introduction

Final Fantasy II is an odd duck. As the first of what turned out to be many sequels, it's a highly ambitious game with tons of interesting ideas and odd quirks.

And it doesn't really work. I'll admit this upfront: while I am FFII apologist, at the end of the day, it's a game that's fundamentally flawed. The story is a nice attempt for 1988. but it's only a curiosity now. The character leveling is odd and unbalanced. And if you don't understand how some of the mechanics work it's a frustrating system.

That being said, there's a weird narrative that's built up around this game. That it's an impossibly hard, grindy piece of shit. And that's simply not true. It doesn't hold up now, but most games of the time don't. For a game from 1988 it's a surprisingly lenient one. And for all the bullshit it has, the character leveling system can be oddly absorbing. Honestly, I find it a lot more fun to play than either the original Final Fantasy or FFIII.

Two LPs have already demonstrated how, with the proper know how, you can demolish FF2. Gabriel Pope's LP absolutely destroys the game's difficulty with a minimum of effort. Mega 64's a little more restrained, but by the end was mostly breezing through.

So the goal with this LP? Let's make Final Fantasy II hard again. I originally thought a solo run would spice things up nicely, but I found that a solo FF2 run doesn't play that differently than a regular game. Therefore, we're adding a few restrictions to the list.

-No insta-death spells. This means no Death (obviously) no Mini, no Toad (I'm sad too), just anything that kills an enemy instantly. Warp/Exit will still be allowed, but only for its actual intended function.
-No Berserk or Haste.
-No weapons or shields. We're gonna let our fists do the talking.

-Update: As of the 9th update, all armor that increases agility or evasion is verboten.

...this is gonna be fun.

Special Spoiler Warning Notice

I do not care one iota about FF2's plot. I'm only going to mention it out of obligation. If you really wanna experience the story, there's two other LPs of the game you can read. They're good LPs. Therefore don't bother putting anything in spoiler tags. I won't.

The Let's Play Archive

Final Fantasy II

by Camel Pimp

Introduction

Table of Contents