A few counter points:Retrogamer0001 wrote:Here are my final impressions/criticisms of the game after beating it over the summer - keep in mind this in the context that I liked the game. I think Bone and I actually had a similar discussion about this post at the time, and he made a lot of good points in its defense.Finished Final Fantasy 3 a little while ago after about 30 hours of gameplay (the last eight of that was just grinding all my characters up to level +40 and teaching each one magic) and can't help but be a little disappointed. This game gets so much praise and hype that my expectations were probably overblown anyway, but I still expected more out of the game. What didn't I like?
1) Lack of any meaningful storyline. The story starts off strong but rapidly falls apart about halfway through, right about when you enter the World of Ruin. After that, it's just putting your party back together and grinding levels. This wouldn't be so bad if it was only the last hour or two, but it was about fifteen hours of just running around and fighting battles. The end isn't great by any stretch of the imagination either.
2) Frustratingly high enemy encounter rate. This is one of the worst games I've ever played as far as the random battles go. Absolutely horrendous. Constant and irritating, and really dragged down the entire experience for me,
3) Poorly designed map system. I found it incredibly annoying that the map system didn't display the names of towns and important places on the map itself, and had to resort to finding a digital copy on the internet just so I would know what town was where. Seems like a minor complaint, but travelling between towns is really important in this game and it's very frustrating being lost because of a poor design choice.
4) Impossible-to-find secrets and characters. Adding to the paper-thin storyline complaint, it is very difficult to figure out how to track down some of your original party members, new party members, and many of the end-game items. There are very few hints in the game telling where certain characters can be found (Locke and Terra, for example) and none at all about others (GoGo). The only way to find many of the items and Espers is to use a guide, which I feel isn't something that should be required.
That being said, I think the game is pretty decent but definitely not worth a lot of the praise it gets - I finished Chrono Trigger earlier this summer and I think that is a much, much better all-around RPG experience. I think FF3 is an above average game, but only an average RPG, and certainly not the best in the series.
1) Forgive me it's been a decade or longer since I've played the game. But, once the world is destroyed, the focus of the story switches from stopping the evil at hand to reassembling your party (of which, you're unsure if they're alive or not) and catching up with those found. Then once they are reunited the focus switches back to Terra and stopping Kefka. I don't feel that the story halts once the world is destroyed, but instead it switches gears before building back up.
2) I will agree that random encounters in general is a played out feature that I really can't stand much these days. However, like others have mentioned, there are far worse offenders on this point.
3) This is true of a lot of JRPGs from the 90's. I've never had an issue with it. That doesn't mean that it isn't flawed, it's just that it's never created a problem for me.
4)IMO, that was the best part of FFVI. After the world is destroyed you are left alone as Celeste. Not knowing if your team mates are dead or alive and that sense of desertion is what made that second half of the game so powerful. Also giving you no clue as to how to find your missing party members made the reunion with them all the more special. As far as finding Espers, I like that you had to figure out how to find them. Friends and I would always talk about how and where we found the new Espers or characters.
Again, everyone has their differences of opinion and mine are no more valid than yours. I've never played Chrono Trigger, so I can't comment on the comparison of the two. But, to each their own.
