So i’ve been playing some old RPG’s, the First one was Final Fantasy 6 which i disliked, then i played Star Ocean, which i liked a lot, and now i’ve finished Breath of Fire.

First i must say that this game is old, and it feels old, very old. It feels like a game that is aware of being in a more powerful console than the 8 bits NES, yet it still doesn’t konw what a modern game is.

First problem, there’s no fast walk at all, you only have a slow walking speed. Over time you get used to it, but it’s frustrating noneteless.

The map, the world in general is quite massive in terms of space, with that walking speed it takes time to reach any place, eventually you get a spell that transports you to almost all towns, but that only makes the experience bearable.

Well heres the tip, the map is divided in large yet isolated areas, and each area has at most 5 places to go. Yep, the map is for the most part, quite empty but at first it gives an entirely different impression.

Another problem is NPCs and the events. The NPCs have this problem that, when a plot event is triggered they only say what they have to say once, just once, oh you forgot what it was? get fucked.

My last complaint is the interface, is quite chaotic, i don’t want to dive further into it, let’s just say that most of the options exist, you just need to explore it. The spells UI is the worst part of all, you get many spells but not an option that explains what they do, their names don’t help at all.

Many old games have these types of problems, the difference between them and Breath of Fire is that Breath of Fire is a very ambicious game, you feel the impact of these problems much more than with other games.

So after this session of complainig, the remaining question is, is this game worth at all?

My personal response would be. YES, totally.

First there is a GBA version that fixes the slow walking speed problem, unfortunately the music is worse considering that the GBA has worse hardware in that matter.

So let’s talk about the good points.

The combat system is AMAZING, it’s just entertaining and interesting to play, especially compared to Final Fantasy 6. There is much more strategy than FF6 althought the game is not that complex in terms of gameplay. The game is not easy, it has a moderate difficulty, it never resorts to overgrind in order to present a challenge, it’s a fair game with a fair challenge, and i like it that way.

The music is very good, unfortunately the last tracks are kinda generic, so it kinda falls short at the last quarter of the experience. Regardless of that, most of the overworld themes, the village theme, the shop theme and many others are nice as hell, it immerses you in the environment.

The story is very entertaining and i actually cared. It’s not nearly as good as FFVI but it has its own charm.

Graphically this game is excellent, despite not showing as many large elements as FFVI, many places share a similar structure althought the desing is different. The enemy desings and the characther desings are fantastic.

So to summarize. Graphics: 8.7

Battle System: 9.2

Story: 6.7

Music: 8.1

Gameplay/game design: 5.4

So this game is a solid 7.62, a good game indeed.