Some thoughts about videogame series and how I got into some of them, featuring Final Fantasy, Pokemón and Fire Emblem!
Something I didn’t really realize I do a lot, during a chat with Hyde, is that I have played a bunch of videogames that belong to a franchise, without putting a lot of thought into how they fit or if they are the best way to start it or anything.
Playing the games in order, knowing the backstory of the world or some recurring characters. None of that had really mattered much, at least on the titles I’ve played so far.
Nowadays we can pretty much access any videogame from almost any retro console with a simple search query, if we know where to look. So, if you want to start a videogame series from the beginning, it’s not too hard to do so today, but that’s not something we could take for granted in the past, or today in some cases, if you want to stick to officially available games in modern platforms.
I think that, subconsciouly, I put myself in the shoes of a kid getting into a game for the first time. Depending on the franchise, I just imagine I am in the year the game came out, and I have the limitations of the time, no internet, no guides, no social media. If I am playing a game in the middle of a long-running franchise, I still don’t have to care much. After all, if I’m a kid who just got a Game Boy Color with Dragon Warrior III, I can’t really bother my parents to buy the first and second games first right? Just enjoy what you have and don’t worry too much!
Sure, maybe that doesn’t work for you. There are YouTube videos about “How to get into (insert videogame series)”, and they may help out. Some series do follow a bigger plot, so yeah, starting from the beginning is the move in that case. For the most part, I don’t have problems with what to play or when.
I don’t have that much else to say for or against doing what I do, but up next is a list of (almost) every videogame franchise I have played, and how I got into it! Some details have been lost because time is a thing and memory is limited, but well. I remembered some things anyway which I thought would be fun to leave here for posterity.
The first time I played this series, was the GBA’s Final Fantasy I & II Advance, remakes of the first two games in a single cart. I only played it like 30 minutes, emulated on my HTC ChaChaCha. I could not go past anywhere and I didn’t understand a thing. All I knew is that one of my adult friends liked it, so I tried it out and failed successfully.
The second time I gave it a serious try, I went for Final Fantasy VI. I think I probably watched a video about it at some point, but my memory fails me. The game was fantastic! I was a grown up now that understood menus better. I emulated the GBA version of the game on my PSP and played almost to the end. At some point I lost my save while messing with files on my computer, and by the time I realized it was too late (how many times have I mentioned this? it’s just so sad 😭).
Later on I got into Final Fantasy IV, the PSP Complete Collection of the game. I have played it a bunch and I still have my progress saved on my PSP. I still don’t finish it, but I’m close to the ending.
At some point I also tried Final Fantasy VII, which is considered among the best games ever, and I am still playing the same save file. I started it on the PSP, it’s so old it’s the Spanish translation, as I didn’t know English very well at the time, but I’m still at it, from time to time.
I also returned to FFVI, this time I am playing the SNES original with the ROSE romhack, for a better translation and bugfixes. I am really enjoying this playthrough, although a side of me wishes I had gone for the GBA version again, because it would look great on my Anbernic RG35XX SP.
I think the best point of entry today is still FFIV, the PSP version is really good and easy to emulate, but of course the Pixel Remasters exist nowadays.
Physically, I own the Pixel Remasters, The VII & VIII Remastered Twin Pack, and the X/X-2 HD remaster for Switch.
I had known about this franchise because of the anime, as well as the merchandise around it. It’s sucha cultural phenomena that you just know all about it via osmosis. However, I took my time to get into the games.
The first time I played it, I borrowed a Nintendo DS from a friend, I think it was eiter Pokemón Black or Pokemón X, he had an R4 cart, so it could have been any of them. I remember deleting whatever savefile was on it (I feel extremely bad about this but I’m not sure if he actually played them anyway) and starting a game, I did this multiple times during my stay in his house (I don’t think I knew you could save your progress?), but I never really got it, and abandoned the games for years.
Later on, the same adult friend who got me into Final Fantasy also showed me Pokemón, he was playing one of the monochrome ones for the DMG Game Boy, although I admit I didn’t care much about it.
Later, I downloaded Pokemón Fire Red on my phone (emulation once again!), and played a bunch of it. I remember making quite a bit of progress, but I eventually got lost on what to do, and at some point I abandoned the game. Eventually I moved to Pokemón Emerald, played a bunch of it, got lost, and abandoned the game, again.
My latest attempt was Pokemón Unbound, a massive romhack for Fire Red that with a whole different plotline and pretty much everything you could want in a Pokemón game, however, I got kind of overwhelmed by it after only 10 hours or so, I felt like I couldn’t play the game well, so I decided to leave my playthrough for later.
Right now, my plan is to try another romhack, Emerald Legacy to go back to the one I liked the most, this time with all the quality of life features I might need! Crystal Legacy and Yellow Legacy also exist in case you prefer the earlier generation titles.
I also have Pokemón Legends Arceus waiting for me on my Nintendo Switch, a complete departure from the rest of the franchise, one of these days…
I first heard about this game from a friend in middle school. I actually mentioned to him that I was playing Final Fantasy I. I was a bit of a snob about it, even though I barely made any progress. When he mentioned Fire Emblem I was like “yeah but Final Fantasy came first and it’s more famous”. I still prefer FF, but I really should not have dismissed FE back then.
The first real try I gave to the game was on my PSP, more than a decade after I didn’t even bother to give it a chance. I went for Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade, which is just called Fire Emblem in America, as it was the first game that made it out of Japan. I am still playing it, and I’ve had a great time with it. The strategy is quite simple, but still has tons of depth and ways to develop the characters. The story also gets really good over time, I am honestly quite surprised by it, although I don’t think it has reached the heights of Final Fantasy.
Back when I completed Metroid Samus Returns, the friend who lent me his 3DS to play it also let me borrow Fire Emblem Awakening. I played it like 6 hours and had a blast, but I had a lot of other things going on, and ended up abandoning it later, I really wish I could return to it someday.
I also own a copy of Fire Emblem Three Houses for the Nintendo Switch, and I want to play it at some point.
Honestly, I still have much to explore on this franchise! It has a lot of story and lore, some characters show up in multiple games at different points of their life, some characters are descendants from previous games too, it’s kind of neat. I believe Blazing Blade or Three Houses are pretty good ways to get into it.
This is the franchise that inspired this blog post! I have been playing Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow on and off during the year, and I’ve had a blast with it. It’s kind of weird because my total playtime isn’t even 5 hours yet, but I guess that’s what happens when you abuse save states like me.
It’s hard to believe that I never really tried this franchise in my childhood years, as I’ve known of it for ages, and I’ve played Metroid, the game it shares a whole genre name with, for more than a decade.
Anyway, I think each game in this franchise is barely connected to each other, like Final Fantasy, so you can pretty much start with any of them. Of course, some are better than others. The basic story is that Dracula returned, and you have to stop him, everytime.
Personally, I’ve only significantly played Aria of Sorrow. I’ve played Super Castlevania IV, for like 20 minutes too. Other than that, I’m blind.
Still, those two and Symphony of The Night are considered the best entry points of the series, Aria and Symphony are what eventually set the foundations alongside Metroid, to the Metroidvania genre that inspired titles like Hollow Knight and Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown.
Super Castlevania IV on the other hand, is the epitome of the classic, more linear gameplay style that was present during the NES era of the series.
I actually own the Advance Collection and the Dominus Collection physical editions for Nintendo Switch, even if I’ve only truly played one game. I just like the personality of the games I guess, I look forward to playing the others someday.
The draft for this post originally contained like, 12 different series, however, I decided to split this up into multiple parts, so I can dedicate more time to each series and make everything a bit easier to parse. I’ll be updating this article with links to the next blog post about this topic. Although you will be able to start with either one anyway!
This is day 73 of #100DaysToOffload
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