But don't get me wrong, Squall is not a perfect protagonist at all.

When I was about 9 years old, a group of friends and I made a consequential journey to the local video rental. One of us had discovered something called "RPGs" (not the weapon) and we set out to rent as many as we could. I picked up Illusion of Gaia, while my other friends got Chrono Trigger, and another got Final Fantasy VI. We took turns renting them from the store. After we had each gone through the three, there was one thing we all agreed on: we were hooked.

My journey with RPGs then continued as I pushed my way through as many of them as possible. I picked up games like Heroes of Might and Magic, Breath of Fire, Earthbound, Super Mario RPG, Elder Scrolls, Star Ocean, and Phantasy Star. The obsession has continued steadily into adulthood.

But of them all, Final Fantasy stands out. Not because it's my favorite series necessarily, but because such a large volume of their games happen to be some of my favorite games of all time. Honestly, it's hard for me to feel a lot of attachment to the Final Fantasy series as a whole, and I am pretty critical of it. But, of all the final fantasy games I enjoy, the one I enjoy the most is FFVIII.

FFVIII is probably one of more controversial games of the series. Out of all of the fans of the series, you won't find a game where there is more of a love/hate split than this one. That's because the game also followed probably the most critically acclaimed game of all time, Final Fantasy VII, and so draws a lot of heat for the ways in which it did not live up to its predecessor.

That being said, FFVIII is my favorite Final Fantasy game for a multitude of reasons. It begins by talking about its contenders, IV, VI, VII, IX, and X. The games not mentioned I don't figure into this because the games I listed are the ones during the golden age of the series, and just about anyone who picks a "favorite" of the series picks on of these, and not the others.

I want to also make it clear this is subjective. Also I am not considering graphics at all in my ranking. It's all about the story, the effort, and the story. And if you don't agree, you're free to think poorly of me.


No, you're not dreaming Squall.

IV, although being the first of the series to embark on the kind of emotional and personal journeys that would become a trademark of the series, is very raw in its telling. Characters only get explored in 2 dimensional ways and the plot gets goofy and weird often. I love this game, no doubt, but there is little left to mystery, and the plot is extremely linear.

VI was my first final fantasy. To this day it holds a special place in my heart because of it. The tales woven together in this story are magical and deep. However, nothing is left to mystery. The game ends with almost nothing left to the imagination, despite beginning so strongly in that direction. People who love this game the most are probably right -- I always recommend people to play this one first as it beautifully sums up everything awesome about this series.

VII despite its incredibly well documented plot holes, so powerfully captures the imagination. Its character development is strong and deep. The players felt real and had personalities, desires, and ideas that ran deep. Not to mention, the overarching moral message of the story is perhaps the best. Nevertheless, so many aspects of the game feel lacking, and its obscure story telling is better explained by mistakes in its development cycle due to hasty execution. I can't disagree with people who love this game the most out of the series. I am fine with them thinking I am wrong.

IX is the game that they released because they were afraid of how far VIII took the series away from the original purpose of the series. The fantasy elements here are a love letter to the original fans of the series. However, what I generally don't like about this game is how well the setup is, followed by a poor execution in the second half. The last boss is my biggest pet peeve as it didn't seem to make any sense at all. Don't get me wrong, the soundtrack in this game is amazing and I tend to listen only to this game and FFVIII's soundtracks.

X is... disappointing. As I like to say, X is great until you leave Zanarkand! I find the world disappointing for the most part. Characters are dull. Music is mixed. I realize that just about everything people love about this game I despise, and that's okay by me. I also beat X2 and it only solidified by hatred for the series more. I felt like each game after VI I loved the series more, and X was the beginning of my distrust in SquareEnix.

Now... just to be clear, I love all of these games (except X). I love IV, VI, VII, VIII, and IX basically equally, in fact. For all of their flaws, these games basically are in my top 10 favorite games of all time, and they are all part of the same series of games! It's awesome. I hope to some day shake Hinorobu Sakaguchi's hand and thank him for everything.


Honeybadger has nothing on this guy.

For VIII, let me start with the flaws. VIII has some pretty bad dialogue, a few characters who are pretty one dimensional for the most part, a rushed battle and leveling system, and some pretty funny memes that make fun of the game.


Then again, every single Japanese male is still copying this hairstyle.

But the strengths of this game push it far beyond its flaws. The story itself is the most complete in the series in so many ways in the sense that the world ties itself together so beautifully. So many dialogues and messages in the story hint at some distant detail of the history of the world, its cities, and its characters. If you are careful, almost every non-essential characters has their actions plotted out throughout the game. And there are a number of them. One of my favorite examples is Headmaster Martine from Galbadia. He makes a bet on your team to kill the sorceress and loses. You see him later in the game mourning over his failure. This level of deep character interaction that is non-essential to the story is what makes VIII so great.

That's because the primary plot is focused on a love story. That allowed the producers of the game to paint a very detailed, mysterious, and hidden story behind the focus of the story to embellish and strengthen the narrative. This happens in such a powerful way that when you stumble upon the greater secrets of the game, such as the Centra ruins or the Deep Sea Research center, you are able to attempt to connect the dots about the secrets of the world in order to understand why they are there.


Foreshadowing looms in the distance...

The best example of this actually is in the Centra continent. When you are exploring it you find a massive fissure in the center of the land. In the second disk, you won't understand what this is... but by the end of the third, it all adds up... and the realization of what it means is part of the biggest plot shocker I've ever experienced in a game (Lunatic Pandora).


Pre-rendered backgrounds, animated!

One of the biggest criticisms of the game is that the character drama is not very well fleshed out. I like to disagree, because the characters are played off of each other extremely well. It might just be hard to notice how well they get paired together for events the first time through while you're staring at all of the beautifully pre-rendered backgrounds.


Brings a whole new meaning to "down to earth".

Speaking of pre-rendered backgrounds... this game diverged from FFVII before it by no longer having black, empty spaces in some of their backgrounds. Instead, each background gets to stretch out to the corners of the screen. They also brightened the world, so the game has a wholesome feel rather than dirty and drab like it's predecessor. Don't get me wrong, the darkness of FFVII certainly made it the game it is.


I must have sat at this particular screen in the game for a good 30 minutes just to watch the water flow. Still impressive to me.

Plus, the music is definitely the best of the series. Yea, even Eyes on Me. That goddamned scene in the ship gets me every time. But before you watch it, let me just say that it's only worth the scene if you have played the game up to that point. The lead up is fantastic (yes, the aliens, too).

There are all sorts of little gems in this game that if you pay attention it just might surprise you. Each time I play through it I notice something new that the developers left for me. Occasionally I like going back and watching great videos about the details of the game. Here is a review that I think hits almost everything square on the head.

So, that's basically why it's my favorite game in the FF series. Time to go play it!


I always wonder what a remake of this game would be like.

BONUS: Here is the link to the reddit comment I made that inspired this article