Final Fantasy 8 | SEEDs of Draw

Hi guys and welcome to my place! 😀

Today I bring to you my review of one of the best Playstation games and one of my favourites (although not in top 10) Final Fantasy 8! There will be some point where you will be able to find a list with all my reviews for the Final Fantasy series… Someday, like in the future (and not today :D)

But let’s start shall we? 😛

Story:

How am I going to explain this without any kind of spoilers… It’s difficult! (and there it goes one paragraph that I just deleted lolol) It’s hard to write about this story because it’s so damn good and I want to really transmit that!

Well… Final Fantasy 8 occurs in a world where there are 3 different school which their goal is to create Seeds. Seeds basically are a neutral army which only answers to their own school. They can work for any type of Client being them a nation or just a particular person. Your main character is Squall, rookie Seed that ends up leading a group to save the World (Of course xD)

The story starts with Squall doing the final exam to become a Seed. And what a way to start a story really! Basically the final exam is doing a seed mission, in this case save one nation which is being occupied by the Galbadian army (the bad guys) and I was blown away with what I saw, but I’ll talk about that in the Graphics part xD Basically you go in teams of 3 and Squall ends up with Zell, someone who Squall thinks that is a nuisance and with Seifer, your rival and in this mission, your leader.

Your only mission is to defend a part of the city, however nothing is happening and Seifer proceeds to make the group go a little further and go away from the spot they are supposed to be. They discover that the Galbadia mission is to make the broadcasting antenna start functioning again.

They end up being ordered to pull back and flee from the batlle area. You come back to Balamb garden (the school) and the results are communicated. From all the people who took the exam only Squall, Zell, Sophie (the girl who came tell you that you needed to withdraw) and one random guys pass the exam. Seifer does not pass the exam (even if it was his second try) because he didn’t follow the orders that were given.

After this, Squall, Zell and Sophie, the rookie Seeds embark into a mission where the point of contact is a girl called Rinoa that you know from the intro that she will have an important part in all this and that there will be romance involved with Squall, however at this point she’s just a “Client”. Rinoa is the leader of the group called OWLs (not the blogging thing xD), a rebellious group trying to liberate Timber, their city, from the hands of Galbadia, this way your mission is to help them to capture the Galbadian President. Although they do not have the most epic quarters their idea is in fact fascinating, however it fails because Galbadia was already expecting something of the sort (Of course this is to be done without the school name being involved).

The president is in town to do a broadcast to the world (remember that they were trying to fix the other antenna right? That’s why!) to communicate sorcerer Edea the embassador of Galbadia. Seifer ends up showing up in the middle of the broadcast and takes the president as hostage. The group runs to him to make sure he doesn’t do anything stupid, but it’s Zell that ends up talking about the school name while live. The president ends up escaping and when Seifer is running away Sorceress Edea appears and she’s able to attract him to join her forces as her knight (or something like that).

Now, from here the group (including Rinoa) runs away from Timber and tries to stay low for a while, however not long after they receive another mission to assassinate Sorceress Edea. It does not take any kind of geniouness to understand that the sorceress will be your main antagonist in this game 🙂 I’ll stop from here and only explain you why are you given the order to assassinate sorceress Edea: Sorceress in the Final Fantasy VIII are really rare and are super hyper mega powerful 😛 With such power alligned to a nation that wants to dominate the world… Well… It’s easy to understand why you need to stop her 😀

I just love her character!

However, the story is NOT that straight forward! The plot is really well constructed and there are MANY plot twists that you are not really expecting to happen! 😛 And more than the main plot you have all the romance and other character stories happening in paralel 😛

It’s one of the best stories in the Final Fantasy series without a doubt ^^

Characters:

The characters are really well constructed and every each one of them have strong thraits and are easy to recognize.

The characters are:

• Squall – the lone wolf but a leader non the less
• Rinoa – a kind hearted girl but with the determination of a lion
• Zell – Childish, but extremely loyal
• Sophie – She’s basically the lovely one 😛
• Quistis – A genius, but insecure at the same time
• Irvine – The playboy, but ends up having insecurities non the less

From the left to the right: Zell, Quistis, Squall, Rinoa, Sophie and Irvine

All the characters end up being related to each other, but you will have to play to know why 😉 But I can tell you that is one of those games that I like all characters! Even the bad ones!

Animation:

First of all, it was the first time Square Soft used real proportions while designing the characters (and the only one in the Playstation One) which for me blow my brain off from the beginning 😀

But, more that, the cutscenes are gorgeous for the time it came out… Let’s face it Final Fanatsy 7 didn’t have many cutscenes and the ones that it had showed that 90’s gaming feeling all over the place 😀 Final Fantasy 8 appears with more cutscenes and way more polished! Below you can find the first mission cutscene that made my jaw drop xD

 

 

If that’s not beautiful, I don’t know what is!

Gameplay:

Final Fantasy 8 was also really original in its gameplay.

First, the leveling system is completely different from what you could have seen before! I’ll try to explain you! 😛

Although levels still matter, the main thing that gives strength to your characters are junctioning guardian forces and magic that you draw from enemies… Confused? Well, don’t worry, it’s normal. To tell you the truth the junction idea is complex and for me to explain how it works would take a lot of words 😀 But do not worry, the game explains it how it works in the tutorial xD

The thing I really want to talk is about the draw skill. In Final Fantasy 8 you can draw magic (like blizzard for example) from monsters. When you draw you can do two things: cast it right away, or stock it (until a max of 100). This stocked magic is used to make your characters stronger, so yeah you guessed it! You will have to grind A LOT to get the magics to 100 (and I mean a LOT). For me it’s the only thing that may not appeal to some people and I understand why. Fortunately I like to grind, so there is no worries 😀

Other distinct thing from previous (and future installments) is the Seed Rank. Since you are a Seed, it’s expected for you to receive pay for your work right? Well, you do and depending on your level the money you get is different. The Seed level increments (or decreases) depending the way you battle and what you choose when you have multiple ways to answer a conversation or an event.

You also have a card mini-game in Final Fantasy 8 which is fun to play! It is really easy to learn, but hard to master 😀 (Not like Final Fantasy 9 which until this day I can’t understand how it works besides the basics lolol).

Music:

What is a good story or a good cutscene without excellent music? Well, Final Fantasy VIII, in my opinion, has the better music from all the installments. I mean listen to the music of this intro!!!!!

 

That’s all for today everyone! Sorry, I know that the post went a little longer than normal, but Final Fantasy 8 is THAT good and original, making it hard to explain the game with a few words >.<

I give Final Fantasy VIII 5 Draws out of 5 Seed Ranks

Have you already played Final Fantasy VIII? Did you like it? If not, are you thinking on playing it in the future? Comment down below! 😀

See You Soon!