Final Vision

Final Vision is a platform RPG from the mind of Alspal - think Knytt meets Castlevania. Decked out with charmingly crude pixel art, the game is one giant, sprawling level in which you, the king of said level/kingdom, run around killing things to get stronger and buy more stuff. I don't know about you, but that sounds geekalicious to me.

The game is a veritable homage to Final Fantasy: pixel art from the series composes the save statues that dot the land; items and spells are copied straight from the source; even your choice of classes is a one-time imitation of the FFV job system. You also get an airship early on, though being able to travel in only two directions somewhat limits the sense of flight.

However, the RPG/platforming hybrid isn't perfect; there is some limitation in your actions. For instance you cannot jump, move, and attack simultaneously. The magical classes are somewhat unbalanced, considering your magic points don't regenerate over time, so you must resort to chugging ether potions to operate, and those cost about fourty times more than a rest at the Inn. Primarily, my level grind consisted of getting up on a ledge and spamming the attack button repeatedly on much higher-level enemies - if you recall, this is kind of the opposite problem Symphony of the Night had with its twenty second long boss battles of point-blank button jamming. If for opposite reasons, Final Vision is about as easy as Symphony of the Night, which is to say, increasingly as you figure out the exploits and gain levels.

The game also suffers from some bizarre interface issues. The need to assign every command, whether it be "Attack", a spell or a potion, to either the left Ctrl or Shift button before using it is very clunky; this is highlighted when you die and need to use a Life potion before your five second grace period is up. Topping that off is the lack of any kind of high-level menu interface - re-loading or quitting involves pressing Alt-Tab, then quitting the game using the Window's tab interface, then re-starting. Technically it works, but sheesh.

The game's writing is a very one-dimensional fantasy cliché, which I can dig. Generally I like games with sublimely understated humanity to their fiction, or that are grossly obtuse and almost self-parodying; this is possibly the latter.

I recommend you play as the Dragoon - the reach makes it very easy - but if you want a challenge try the Summoner.