FFIV/Interlude/The After Years Discussion Thread

[Unit-01]

So just finished beating FFIV and I didn't see a thread where I could talk about it without it being off-topic so I made this one.

So FFIV the DS Remake on Steam, for the most part I enjoyed it. Played it for about 32 hours in total, says 50 on steam, but that isn't right, then on my save it says the actual time. The story was pretty good even if I spoiled myself on accident while looking up a quick way to level earlier in the game(something I'd advise against). The ending was a bit cliche with the whole "Friendship power" = praying, but hey it's in a lot of the Final Fantasy(s) so I can give it a pass.

World was pretty interesting and the way characters left and entered your party wasn't really felt... unless you forgot to put a useless augment on them to get a better one later *Cough* Porom *Cough*, but augments in general were a cool idea. They let you get character abilities and put it on ideally one of the 5 final characters that you get for the end game. Also they determined your stat gains past 71 for some odd reason.

Overall I enjoyed the game and i see that After Years has done a few things differently compared to the original(and I mean DS remakes with both).

Now the one thing I don't understand is the rare drops in this game. The tails and Rydia's optional summons.... like what is with the .4% or .8%(treasure hunter augment) drop rate. This game isn't an MMO and there was no reason for those tails to be that rare. Also it has to been RNG based because I killed well over 200 enemies for the black tail and didn't receive it. Thank god there where sirens in the game, but I went through quite a bit of gil and time for that once enemy in particular.

I still have a hard NG+ to play-though, but I'm gonna hold off on that and play The After Years now.

 

[Kermitu Kleric Katie]

Would you believe that those drops are actually rarer in the non-3D versions? It's only by .01%, but still. Not to mention the lack of augments in those versions means no treasure hunter to double the drop rate.

 

[Unit-01]

You make me want to smash my head against concrete.

:FFFUUU:

 

[Kermitu Kleric Katie]

On the bright side, getting those rare drops isn't as big of a deal as in the non-3D versions, especially since there's no new game+ to carry them over into. But I get what you mean. I hate rare drops as well.

Btw, I recommend you check out the PSP version as well. While I prefer the 3D versions of FFIV, I feel like the PSP and 3D versions are sufficiently different enough experiences for both to be worth checking out. I wouldn't bother with other versions of FFIV though, as they're essentially the PSP version with less content.

Btw, I adore FFIV and it's one of my favorite FFs. I'm playing the PSP version right now.

 

[Unit-01]

Thankfully I still have my PSP, with the only game I've played on it being Crisis Core.

I could see about doing that for sure, but that would likely be later down the line since I just got done playing IV.
Could actually buy the complete collection... but I'll wait for now.

 

[robotwarui]

Would you believe that those drops are actually rarer in the non-3D versions? It's only by .01%, but still. Not to mention the lack of augments in those versions means no treasure hunter to double the drop rate.

there is no perfection profile to be had in the PSP version.
1 rare drop per game is rare.
I set aside the PSP for hours on auto battle for Edge to steal Minerva Bustier with no luck.

And the rare summons...

I do remember forever ago on the SNES my Cecil got the Bomb Summon drop in that opening first battle on the Enterprise... and I tried to replicate it in other replays and reset and... guess those were rare in the original SNES version too.

 

[Flintlock]

Remember to check out the Lifestream Podcast's Final Fantasy IV retrospective episode. The first half is available here, and the second will be out shortly, I expect. It's a long show; we really went into detail about all aspects of the game.