Cerise Magazine

May 2007 Issue

Features

• From the Editors
• Craft Check: Make Your Own Miniatures

Articles

• 5 Steps to Attract Girl Gamers
  Author: Latoya Peterson

Latoya gives game designers five simple suggestions for tapping into a greater share of the potential female video gamer market.

• Playing With Patriarchy
  Author: Natalie Hill

Is video gaming a "boys' club"? Natalie looks at what casual misogyny can do to girl and women gamers.

• Lagging Behind
  Author: Lindsey Galloway

What games do girls want to play? Lindsey takes a look at the "Girls' Games Movement" and the future of gender in games.

• Girls Don't Play Video Games
  Author: Nick Cummings

Do girls play video games? Nick revisits this myth and talks about why it may be more damaging than it first appears.

Reviews

• Final Fantasy III
  by Ariel Wetzel

 

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Finally, 16 years after the original release: an international and legitimate way to purchase and play Final Fantasy III. The Nintendo DS version is a genuine remake with a 3D overhaul, new characters, and more.

Story

Don’t look for surprises in FFIII’s story; it is as old school as the rest of the game with errands, dungeons, and retrieval of magical artifacts making up most of the player’s tasks. There are a few twists and fun world-building, but I’m disappointed that a game that must have relied so much on text the first time around didn’t use that text more to set the stage.

Characters

There is nothing spectacular about the characters in this game, which is a disappointment. The four playable characters, the Warriors of Light, are unique to the DS version, including their names, personalities, and back-stories. Still, they are solid and aren’t especially stereotypical (if they do fall into archetypes a bit).

In the original version of the game, released on Famicom (the name for NES in Japan) in 1990, the four Warriors of Light were all men. Now, there is only one playable female character: Refia, the (adopted) daughter of a blacksmith. She is both feminine and knowledgeable of her father’s trade. Unfortunately her femininity is exhibited mostly through her distaste for turning into a toad, but she’s motivated by a sense of adventure and destiny rather than tagging along as a man’s love interest or childhood friend.

Gameplay

FFIII utilizes a four-character party and the series’ “job system”: you switch out your characters jobs from a number of options (like warrior, white mage, and monk) and earn more jobs as the story progresses (viking, dark knight, and evoker to name a few). I enjoy the breadth of job options, but not how the game limits access to gear for many jobs at specific points.

I think I missed the airship, so to speak, of FFIII stylus love; a lot of folks have praised the option of touch screen battles, but I’m just not feeling it. Touch screen battles seem too slow, pulling through menus and tapping the monster I want to attack, when I can just smash A to breeze through easier battles.

Battles

Good news: anyone can be your party leader and the job system allows any character to succeed at any job. Refia can lead, and she isn’t pigeonholed into white mage or held back by weak statistics.

The battles are pretty challenging, too. This RPG has left my party dead more than any other game I’ve played in recent years. The monsters in dungeons, especially the bosses, are tough, and I can’t get away with second-rate gear and obsolete spells.

Graphics

I’m no connoisseur of graphics, but I’m digging the up-dated 3D graphics in FFIII well enough. The character style reminds me of a less-cute version of Final Fantasy IX, sans the 2D backgrounds. The 3D world really lacks the beauty of the old hand-painted backdrops of Playstation games. I think FFIII could have been a visually breathtaking game with detailed 2D scenery, especially if it utilized the DS’s double screens more to show it off.

The End

I don’t mindlessly click through the battles in this game. FFIII’s dungeons taught me to be thrifty, and I appreciate that I have to think about my next move especially during a boss fight. I wish I could say the same for the story. I click through the dialogue, breeze between the towns to get the next battle, and hurry to find the next twinkle of treasure or unlock the next set of new jobs. I’m not expecting anything of Golden Saucer caliber, but I wish that there was more to do in this game besides progress the lackluster story.

In the end, I think the biggest appeal for this game is the DS. I hold it in my hands, intimately close, and delight in the occasional use of the double screen. On any other system, I think FFIII would be lost among my pile of other unplayed old school RPGs. But being up close and personal during those tough boss fights, I feel connected with the action, and that keeps me playing.