Pros: Innovative job system; painless grinding; combat often allows for innovation
Cons: Often requires specific tactics that'll require you to reset the game; forgettable story; frequent load times on the PS1 version
Final Fantasy V should have been one of the games that I was looking forward to playing the most. The job system directly inspired Final Fantasy XI, the first MMORPG I ever really got in to, and I loved the job swapping in Dragon Quest IX (which was fairly similar to what was found in Final Fantasy V). However, for some reason, I had a hard time bringing myself to play it, let alone finish it. I think the conversion itself is partly to blame, as I knew that I was in for a game who's pacing was going to be hurt purely by the load times (I learned the first hand after starting Chrono Trigger on PS1 and then playing it through on the much smoother DS version). But I honestly don't know why I was less excited to start it than Final Fantasy II, a game I knew was partly broken because of it's combat. I have to say that after playing through it, I felt somewhat justified in my reluctance, as I found it often more frustrating than even the eldest Final Fantasy games due to its requiring cheap strategies and, frankly, cheapness.
Final Fantasy V returns to the roots of the series in terms of story, as the main quest features four heroes who must defend four crystals and save the world from danger. The only two Final Fantasies to feature more simplistic stories were I and III, and there is especially whiplash since V followed the game that had had the strongest story of the series to date. As the game goes on, things do get a bit more complicated when the existence of a second world exists, but the game never really strives for anything more than mediocrity in terms of story. In the end, you are predictably tasked with saving the world from a great evil, this time in the form of a sorcerer named X-Death (I've been told by a friend that the character was actually named Exodus in the Japanese original, but the phonetic pronunciation of the name somehow lead the American translators hearing it as X-Death).While I find it understandable for certain games to focus on particular elements to the detriment of others, I really don't find it acceptable to go so lightly on the story when it comes to RPGs, seeing as the story often offers the most incentive to continue playing a 15+ hour game. Humor in the game was also lost on me, as Final Fantasy V offered the most forced humor situations I've ever seen in a Final Fantasy. Perhaps the translation was partly to blame for every joke falling flat, but I doubt it (I kind of chuckled at the pun names in Dragon Quest IX, so I'm not completely adverse to bad humor).
The selling point of the game, and where most of the development clearly went, is the job system. You begin the game with an everyman class, but soon gain access to a handful of jobs that range from White Mage to Knight. By the eighth hour, you'll have found just about every job that the game has to offer (22 in all), but unlike Final Fantasy III, you aren't limited just to the abilities of the class you have equipped. As you level up a class, you earn abilities related to that job that get stored in a sort of ability bank unique to each character. Every character, regardless of job, can equip an additional skill from this bank regardless of their current class, which allows you to mix up the classes a bit. For instance, you could level up a white mage and then switch to a knight but equip the "White Magic" skill in the additional slot to custom make a paladin. The combinations can get pretty interesting, but there are some classes that are clearly inferior and that you aren't likely to touch at all. Overall, there are enough worthwhile classes to still make it interesting and you definitely won't end up keeping your characters in one job the entire game.
The jobs level up separately from your character's main level and you'll find yourself grinding in order to get a new skill for a particular job instead of just grinding to level up. In the last dungeon, I probably ended up unnecessarily grinding for the last battle for about a half an hour because I wanted to master as many classes as I could before facing X-Death. There's also a nice little twist on the system that the game doesn't mention explicitly in that two of the classes gain the best attributes of the classes that you have maxed out, which offers a good incentive to keep leveling up multiple classes. The combat itself is straightforward and more or less identical to the other SNES Final Fantasies, complete with the ATB gauge and frantic menu flipping. You'll find the full array of white and black magic here with the addition of a bunch of skills from different jobs that were not seen again until Final Fantasy XI, so the combat offers a nice variety.
Part of this is due to the fact that Final Fantasy V can be punishingly specific in the tactics it requires you to take, forcing you to change your characters classes in order to win certain boss fights. I'm all for a fight being much more difficult based on the personal choices I've made for my party, but the fights should still be doable. It happens all the time in Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, and I loved it. But Final Fantasy V has a couple of fights that will just be impossible without certain classes which both forced me to restart certain sections and look at an online FAQ frequently to try and avoid further frustration. There are also certain optional boss fights that are near impossible, but you'll run in to if you don't see them coming. There are two in the last level that would require an insane amount of leveling to beat, but players will casually encounter them and inevitably die. I encountered one of these on my way to save my game, resulting in an unnecessary replaying of half of the last dungeon.
The game offers a decent array of optional quests at the end of the game that can lead to the last battle being significantly easier, and just about all can be done painlessly. There are a few optional boss fights like the ones previously mentioned that will test your grinding capabilities, but most bosses at the end of the side quests can be beaten without too much additional effort. While some might view it as fault, after some of the cheap boss battles earlier in the game I was fairly relieved. I was originally not going to get Bahamut, the last summon, because I feared that he would be as cheap as some of the other bosses, but I was actually pleasantly surprised.
Final Fantasy V annoyed me because of how much better it could have easily been. I found the job system innovative and it's more or less what drove me to finish the game, despite a completely lackluster story and frustrating boss fights. With a little more work in terms of story and a bit of tweaking on some of the fights, Final Fantasy V could have been up there as one of the top Final Fantasy games, but instead its faults hold it back and make it an above average RPG.
Overall Score: 7.3
Recommended price: $10, but buy the Game Boy Advance Rerelease
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