Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light is a Final Fantasy spin-off game for the Nintendo DS. It is not, despite the name on the box, developed by Square Enix, but it is published by them. Publishers Matrix Software are known mostly for their work on Alundra, but also for porting a ton of Final Fantasy games to handheld version, so they do have a close working relationship with Square.
4 Heroes (too long to write the whole name every time) tells the story of four young people thrust into a crisis and needing to save the world. If you've heard this story before, get used to it. I can't honestly tell you what their names are, as I named them Cloud, Aeris (she'll never be Aerith to me!), Locke, and Tifa. The gameplay is pretty reminiscent of classic NES/Famicom RPGs, with very basic inputs and no ATB gauge.
The game is definitely intentionally a throwback. The soundtrack has a simple nature to it, although it's definitely not chiptune. The visuals are very basic, and the story is prototypical early Dragon Warrior/Final Fantasy fare.
I frankly hate the graphics. The characters are made in an almost chibi way, with huge heads, expressionless haunting eyes, and freakishly pale skin. Don't believe me?
<End rant>
The environments are nearly as dreadful in terms of their visuals as the characters themselves, but not quite. The colors are all muted and depressing, and they have this disturbing cell shaded nature to them that causes everything to look fuzzy and lack definition. Here's a sample.
I'm definitely biased against the chibi look, but I think these are fair critiques. I will give them a bit of credit visually, in that they animated each and every weapon, armor, and crown to look differently, and these different items are represented on your characters both in battle and outside of it. This is a nice touch of love, although I found most of the weapons to be pretty boring looking. Some of the crowns are almost cute, although the terrifying heads underneath them detract from this quite a bit.
Speaking of crowns, the game relies heavily on these magical hats as a kind of class system. As you advance in the game, you'll unlock more crowns, in a system similar to that of Final Fantasy V, except for unlike Final Fantasy V, it's not nearly as much fun. There are lots of classes, which is nice. But it seems that the Black Mage and White Mage classes you obtain at the very beginning are by far the strongest ones, and you can easily ride these through to the end of the game.
The actual system with the crowns is fairly boring, in that you upgrade the crowns with gems found in battle. Upgrading the crowns will give you access to a new ability to use, and some of these are very nice. You cannot, however, mix and match abilities to build your character, as each ability is limited solely to when you are wearing that crown. You opportunity to experiment and try new things is stunted, especially compared to a brilliant system like in Final Fantasy V or Final Fantasy Tactics, in which you can learn new abilities by using the classes, and then take those skills for use in other classes.
The battle system is intriguing in terms of resource management. You get one point per turn to use, and can always attack for one point, or use basic abilities for one. If you want to use more advanced moves, you have to "boost" and get an extra point, enabling you to use a more powerful attack the next turn. This is a fun system, and enables you to use powerful spells and abilities a lot, as long as you are willing to boost and wait a few turns.
Other parts of the battle system are, however, incredibly frustrating. For some reason, the geniuses at Matrix Software sought to bring RPGs back to a point at which no one wanted them to go, and made it so that you can't select a target with your attack. Rather, your characters simply default to attacking the farthest back enemy when using long range attacks, or the closest enemy when using short ranged ones. This takes away a large amount of the fun strategy involved in playing RPGs, and makes the game more or less about boosting up to get more points, and then burning it all to crush everyone all at once.
The soundtrack has some good moments, but is mostly forgettable.
I detested that the game had the name Final Fantasy, but functionally had 0 tie ins to the main series. Even in the spin-off games, you can still do things like find a chocobo or moogles, meet Odin, Carbuncle, Bahamut, and other typical summons, find weapons with familiar names, and ride in an airship. The game completely neglected this kind of pleasant fanservice, and left me wondering why it had the name at all.
My biggest problem with the game, however, is the level up system. Like in traditional RPGs, you can level up to get stronger, but in this game the enemies level up with you. WHYYYYYYYY! Getting my team super strong to wipe enemies is pretty much my favorite thing about RPGs! I love shepherding my little team from babies, developing their skills, taking them down a path I want them to go, and watching with delight as they smite the enemy. This game completely takes that option away from you, both with the basic crowns system that essentially removes customization from your characters' development, but also with a level up system that is practically useless. I spent hours upon hours grinding to get stronger to beat the bosses, as this is a pretty tough game, until I figured out that it's a complete waste of time! This is my one complaint with games like Skyrim, but at least with Skyrim it was so nonlinear that it made sense, as you couldn't funnel players through a plot tunnel and carefully control the difficulty, and at least they give you other options to strengthen your player and build the character up in the way you want.
I want to try to be fair to this game, but it was garbage. There was very little I enjoyed about it, and would have abandoned it if I wasn't trying to complete every Final Fantasy game, although this game definitely tested the limits of what I'd consider to be a Final Fantasy game. It was definitely the worst Final Fantasy game I've ever played, as at least most are competent. I'll give it a 4.0/10, taking the place of Golden Sun: Dark Dawn as the worst game I've reviewed thus far! Congratulations to Camelot for losing last place, and good riddance to Matrix Software. Perhaps I'll try another of your games at some point, but it may be a while.
Up next on What I'm Playing in the handheld category was a nice quick jaunt down memory lane for me, but we'll see whether or not reality matched up with my nostalgia! Here's a hint...
-TRO
P.s. Definitely don't play Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light, just in case I wasn't clear. No one should enjoy it.
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