Looking back at.....Final Fantasy VIII!

Final Fantasy VIII, that was the start of role playing games for me. So it´s probably not a suprise that I see this Final Fantasy as my favourite, as many gamers that played Final Fantasy VII first will probably like that one more. This is a game I didn´t even buy at first, a friend gave it to me because it was such a good game. I don´t take someone elses word for these things, I´ll decide what I like and what I don´t like. I always hate it when people say that you need to see this or have to play that, guess what I don´t have to do anything! Anyway I ended up playing Final Fantasy VIII and it was probably the most fun I´ve had in a game for quite some time. You see I was still new to the Playstation and I´ve only played Nintendo games before that, so playing something completely different was a nice change.


A good start is a good sign? I think a lot of people can agree that the start of the game is amazing, that opening cinematic is just beautiful and probably still one of my favourites up to this day. So in a way you can say that a good start is a good sign, but it´s not a guarantee! As much as I like the main character Squall, my favourite has always been his rival Seifer. Fun fact: Square actually said that they would make a sequel with Seifer in the lead role, but that turned out to be an April fools day joke. Bummer... Anyway the game has an interesting story where you follow a guy called Squall, he´s a student at a type of academy (called Garden and they call the students seeds, yes I know how silly that sounds but guess what it´s Final Fantasy!) where he trains to become a warrior. He´s one of two students that uses a gunblade (an awesome weapon that is the combination of a gun and a blade, duh), so the headmaster wants him to succeed but also the other student that wields a gunblade (Seifer). With Squall you go on missions and even make some type of dream travels back in time, well I can´t tell you too much about that without spoiling the story. But I can tell you that it´s a lot of fun to play the game, you travel a lot and you´ll discover a lot of strange and interesting things.


But I´ve heard some bad things about this game, is that true? Some people don´t like this game because all the main characters are humans, so there isn´t anything special about that. Personally I don´t see the trouble with that, I actually like that and I never considered that as a problem in a game. Yes that means I´m looking at you Dragon Age 2 haters, there is nothing wrong with playing as a human! Others complain that you only have six characters in your part, since you can only have three out at once I don´t see that as a problem really. Besides in some missions you´ll split up and play with both teams, so you still get to play with everyone! Then there are also people that hate the main character Squall, he´s boring and socially awkward. Well that socially awkward part is actually interesting, often you see his thoughts on the screen and it´s funny what he thinks of others. Also it causes friction with other characters, they want to know what he thinks and then he can be quite blunt. I guess you can find thousands of things that might bother you about a game and yet that´s not what you play games is it? You play games for fun, so you don´t look for what bothers you but what interests and amuses you. I´m not going to tell you that you have to play this game, I´d hate myself if I did that, but I can definately recommend it. But don´t take my word for it, check out some videos on youtube and see for yourself!