Pages

Saturday, June 1, 2024

Final Fantasy Dimensions

Initially released as an episodic title similar to Final Fantasy IV: The After Years (and sharing many of the same developers), Final Fantasy Dimensions is a 16-bit styled Final Fantasy in just about every respect - familiar monsters, job classes and abilities appear, there are numerous familiar character names and story beats, and the combat system feels remarkably similar to Final Fantasy IV with its five-character teams and active time battles.  The story also plays with an idea only briefly touched upon in Final Fantasy III - there being a parallel team of Warriors of Darkness that serve as a counterbalance to the Warriors of Light, splitting the narrative between two separate parties that eventually coalesce into a larger plot.  There are also (quite frequent) random battles and a lot of dungeons to get through, so while the game does last a good 50 hours, it does get pretty monotonous to play.  The game controls adequately for touch-screen based platforms, although talking to wandering NPCs can be a bit irritating, and if you're on a smaller device it's easy to fat-finger and hit the wrong command at a bad moment.  All in all though, Dimensions is a decent 2D Final Fantasy that obviously draws inspiration and numerous elements from the series' roots, but has enough fresh ideas to become a distinct and memorable title its own right.  If you're one of those fans who has lamented the lack of turn based Final Fantasy games in recent years, Dimensions is one you may want to give a try.


Developer: Matrix Software
Publisher: Square Enix
Released: 2010, 2012
Platforms: i-mode, EZweb, iOS, Android