Final Fantasy III (SNES) review "No, Gestahl is not a dog. He's a bearded old man. You're looking at the sprite wrong."

I'm going to start this review by getting its title out of the way. Yes, this version is called Final Fantasy III in the US. In previous editions of this review, I've called it as such because that's how it was released. However, let's get one thing straight here: this is Final Fantasy VI or FFVI, and I shall be addressing it as such.

Yeah, for ages I thought of this game as FFIII, but I had to learn to let that title go. That's fitting, because that's partly what FFVI is about: learning to let things go.

In the '90s, it was hard for an RPG fan in the US like me to transition from FFIV to FFVI. I was excited to play a new entry in the franchise, but part of me expected the same sort of adventure I received from Cecil and his crew. You know, a campaign that stuck me with whatever characters the story called for and expected me to make the best of a potentially rough situation, while also feeding me a plot that felt like a cross between a fantasy novel and a Saturday morning cartoon. That's what I expected from VI, and that's almost what I got.

Almost, but truly, much better...

FFVI right away tells you to let go of the past. Its semi-cinematic beginning sequence, polished production values, and breathtaking score whisk you away to a more somber world than you're used to, one that's war-torn and yet visually stunning. The medieval sensibilities that came with previous installments vanished, replaced instead by a more Victorian or steampunk style, but one that eschews the stereotypes modern folks have come to associate with the latter genre. You don't see a bunch of people wearing unnecessary goggles or top hats or fumbling around with machinery consisting of needless amounts of gears and pipes.

It kicks off with a protagonist who initially doesn't show much of a personality. She's a green-haired girl that some call a witch because of her magical prowess, invading an innocent town along with a couple of cohorts. I would say the intro's a bit disheartening, but a prior game started off with its not-so-heroic lead attacking towns and stealing their crystals, so you know that eventually Terra, as our girl is named, is going to make a face turn.

And that's precisely what happens. Terra was part of an empire bent on taking over the world and harnessing magic as a means of bolstering its military and asserting global dominance, much in the way fascist nations might push for heavy rearmament. However, she lets go of that part of her life after someone frees her from the device controlling her thoughts.

After a handful of segments in the town, you finally leave with a new ally, free to wander the type of vast world map fans associate with the series, complete with a gorgeous overworld theme and all the turn-based fights against static enemy images you could want. The plot focuses mostly on joining a resistance movement to battle the aforementioned evil empire. Before long, you add more faces to your ranks and things begin to feel a bit like FFIV all over again, even going so far as to mix up your party for you at key points.

Slowly, the tale shows you different personalities and archetypes, and includes even varying degrees of character arcs. You have Cyan, a royal retainer who suffered a massive loss when his kingdom was poisoned. There's also Gau, a boy raised in the wilderness who may or may not be related to a kooky old man near the fields he calls home. Fresh moments draw various reactions from these characters, revealing more of the kind of people they are while also underlining one huge thing: they've all got something they refuse to let go. Hell, even the mysterious and seemingly apathetic ninja who joins you (Shadow) eventually shows via optional cutscenes that he's got some skeletons in his closet...

For the first half of this adventure, story arcs build, progress, and close in a natural fashion, giving way to new developments. Amassing members of the resistance leads to Terra making an astonishing discovery about herself, which causes her to leave the group temporarily. Obviously, the next phase of the campaign revolves around scouring the land to find her, as you mosey from homey township to elaborate dungeons, and even to a place called Zozo that technically counts as both a town and a dungeon.

Soon enough, the game pulls back another layer and reveals something critical to your quest: magic. You see, up to this point, you've been mostly relying on your party members' talents. Locke, for instance, can steal items from enemies. Cyan dishes out mean sword techniques based on how long you allow a meter to charge, Gau learns the maneuvers of monsters he's studied in his home, and Sabin suplexes trains utilizes strikes like those seen in versus-style fighting games. Yes, you basically do a hadouken with this guy by pressing the same button combination, then watching him fire a bright blast from his hands. Terra, for a while, supplied most of the magic use.

However, all of that changes when you gain “magicites,” or crystals that contain the essences of magical beings. Equipping these goodies to your contingent not only alters their build slightly and changes their statistical increases per level, but also teaches them spells. Almost every character can learn every spell, the only exception being an optional yeti who doesn't do much more than punch, swing a bone club, and breathe ice. He's honestly kind of useless, but still cool to enlist...

With each new scene, wondrous monsters emerge from the bushes and shadows. The game can get goofy with creatures like vicious rodents, but also horrifying with mutated quadrupeds, carnivorous plants, and demonic beasts that roam the plains. However, its doesn't present a massive, jaw-jacking challenge factor. If you fight consistently, you'll remain powered up enough to take on anything. Honestly, being able to permanently give any spell to any character renders a lot of the bestiary toothless in the early outs. Sure, things get hairier in the latter half, but not to the point that a well-place fire or ice spell can't lead to victory...

Boss encounters highlight each plot beat, as they should by pitting you against monstrous creations and critters with more hit points and super powers than your average goblin or wolf. When these fights begin, one of two excellent themes kicks in, accentuating the feel of desperate struggles and hardships. Each boss is tough enough to present a challenge, but weak enough to not overwhelm. Also, it's a testament to how great the game is when you discover there's an exploit that allows you to automatically kill most of the boss lineup with two spells, but you abstain from doing so because it's more thrilling to actually engage them. Best of all, each encounter caps off with a satisfying death animation where a loud SNAP! sounds, just before the villain slowly dissolves off the screen.

The game twists until it feels like it's building to a big showdown on a chunk of land floating in the sky. That's where you meet the primary antagonist for a duel that almost any RPG would've used as their conclusion. FFVI asks you to let go of that notion because it's got other plans. The storyline turns itself on its head, with the world changing for the worse. The meeting doesn't play out in your favor, or even in the villain's favor for that matter. And the next thing you know, your party is scattered and you're cold and alone in a forbidding wasteland that used to be your world...

I read somewhere (AV Club, if I remember correctly) that, whether intentional or not, FFVI can be seen as an allegory for mental illness and/or loss, and learning to cope. Sometimes, you cross a devastating point in life that's irrevocable, that just tears your world to shreds and leaves you in a dim, dismal mess where you don't think you'll see the light again. You feel, in that moment, that you have failed and can never turn back the loss. In some ways, that's true. Things that happened can't “unhappen,” but FFVI once again tells us we need to let go, and shows us both the negative and positive ways we can do so.

It shows us an adventurer who sought to revive his comatose love, made so by his own indiscretion. He thus sought to bring her back, scouring the land for a treasure that might do the deed, not realizing that he was spending his valuable, limited time on the planet trying to undo something that can't be undone. He soon learns his love was never going to fully recover, and while the pain of realizing seems too hard to handle, finally being liberated of that sense of duty gives him his life back. Mainly, though, it frees him up so he can be loved by someone else...

We see brothers who dealt with their parents' deaths in a way that drove a rift between them, only for them to bury the hatchet and finally realize they have each other regardless how gloomy the world and their lives have become. Or an old man recognizing he has more important things going for him than past regrets. Or an airship pilot who remembers that though life is fleeting, love is everlasting.

You venture into the destroyed world, seeking out your friends and fighting off the darker inhabitants and the depressive vibe that come with the second half of the campaign. One by one, you find your allies and amass other secrets that not only make you more powerful, but also close the story arcs for each character. Truly, the end of the world didn't kill you, and now it's making you stronger.

This is where the game shines the most, hiding all manner of secrets in a tremendous world where you fly your airship from port to port, cave to cave looking for your missing crew and making discoveries. Linearity goes out the window, leaving you to explore and make discoveries of your own—or to hit up online guides and wikis. You locate new magicites, learn awesome spells, and battle some of the meanest super-bosses, including numerous dragons, an grotesque horror in the skies, a monstrous magician atop a magical tower, and a demon born from a living painting.

When things finally wind down, though, you don't want them to. You want more adventures with this group, knowing full well you'll never get them. Even if Square Enix coughs up a Final Fantasy VI-2, you just know it'll be as awful as The After Years, especially with the way the campaign wraps up.

In my teenage years, this was the most significant post-game blues I ever faced. Chrono Trigger may be my all-time favorite game, but it curbed its own ending sadness by providing a “New Game +” feature. FFVI doesn't have that. It concludes in a way that says, “This is final, and any attempt to squeeze more conflict out of it will only come across as forced and unnatural.” You want there to be more content, but you don't want it so badly that you would like to see its own finality tarnished in the way Cecil's was.

So that's when you do what the game taught you: let go. You can play it again, but doing so will never be the same as going through it the first time. So all you can do is forever cherish what FFVI had to offer in being one of the finest entries—if not the finest entry—in a long-lasting JRPG franchise; one that balances its melodrama, rule systems, and combat in a way that produces an evergreen, unforgettable experience. Even if you learn to let go of that first playthrough, you never forget it...

Community review by JoeTheDestroyer (December 17, 2023) Rumor has it that Joe is not actually a man, but a machine that likes video games, horror movies, and long walks on the beach. His/Its first contribution to HonestGamers was a review of Breath of Fire III.