Let’s Play Final Fantasy 4! 
My second series on Let’s Play With Brigands came just a couple few months after the first began. Those were some busy weeks there for a while, playing Minecraft on Mondays, a random game on Wednesdays, and then a Final Fantasy 4 episode on Fridays, it was getting crowded.
But let’s talk about what is one of the better entries in one of my favorite video game series of all time: Final Fantasy 4.
Let’s Play Final Fantasy 4:
I went back a few years ago and played 2 and 3, the Japanese versions, so the literal second and third games in the series chronologically. They were okay, just sort of tweaks on the first Final Fantasy which was amazing on its own, so the follow ups didn’t quite match the original.
Final Fantasy 4 was the first game which really stood out and showed you what not only an RPG could do but a video game itself could do in terms of storytelling. Nintendo obviously realized this because this was the first game since the original which they decided to bring to America, calling it Final Fantasy 2 in the U.S. and confusing everyone in the process.
The game has one of the most badass beginnings to any game I’ve ever played. You play as Cecil, leader of the Empire’s “Red Wings”. No, not their professional hockey team, but essentially the Royal Airforce and main offensive and defensive force under the king. What was meant for defense is suddenly being used to attack rival nations, securing their crystals out of greed.
When an identity crisis plagued Cecil questions the king’s motivations, the king demotes him in a paranoid rage and sends him on a darker mission which sets Cecil straight once and for all.
I’ve said this about other titles on other systems, but this game showed what the SNES could do in terms of scope, music, graphically – really any category that matters. The random encounters grate after awhile, but that’s a fact of any RPG really.
There’s a good reason why so many people label this as being their favorite Final Fantasy or even favorite video game of all time. The characters were developed and felt alive to a degree which you hadn’t felt before in a game, and you played the game with an invested excitement in what would happen next as things just got bleaker and bleaker.
This game is amazing, and it’s a testament to this series as a whole that it’s only my personal third or fourth favorite overall.