• Hey Guest. Check out your NeoGAF Wrapped 2025 results here!

The Official Final Fantasy IV DS Thread

Had some client meetings, so got some time in on the train.

Battles - One big question I have, and memory fails me, is in the original version, in active mode, when a character attacks or casts a spell, do your other character's bars continue to increase? In the DS version, when enemies attack/cast spells/etc your bar continues to rise, however, when your character attacks, all bars pause through the whole motion. This in a whole feels a little clunky and defeats the purpose of the ATB it seems. Thusly, battles in the DS version are indeed slower. This is partly due to this ATB bug/oversight, and partly due to the fact that you can tell the processer is definitely chugging, trying to pump out more graphics and spells.

On one hand, it hasn't been extremely annoying, but I think that's because on the other hand it feels as though the encounter rate is lower.

One other thing I noticed, and I don't remember if this is true or not, but when switching weapons in battle you lose your turn, for example, I equipped a rod on Tellah rather then use his staff in battle and had to wait for his gauge to fill again. Was that the same in the original version?

On voices - Actually, outside of the opening, cecil and rosa in his room, cecil and **** leaving, and meeting rydia for the first time, there actually doesn't seem to be as much voiced scenes as I initially imagined. So it doesn't detract from the experience, but at the point it hasn't quite made me go wow as much as just the 3d remake.

On mapingway - Getting 100% on a map does indeed seem to net you goods as I got 5 eye drops from the initial floor of the waterways.

That's it for a while, almost done with work and can put some more time into it tonight!
 
Y2Kev said:
Not if it's like the original. FFIV is one of the easiest main-storyline RPGs I think, meaning the main quest is pretty no-grind and moves VERY fast.
Click to expand...

You really think so? FFIV is probably the last FF where the final boss can actually present a challenge if you play through the game straightforwardly. You definitely don't ever have to grind, but I definitely recall it being more challenging than, say, any FF from the 3d era.

CloudV said:
Well, played a little over lunch.

I received my first decant ability "auto potion" from Rosa in Kaipo. I haven't set it yet, because I'm not sure if you can only use it once or equip again.
Click to expand...

Hmmm, that's interesting. That ability is
not something that existed at all in the original. Can you describe how you got it in more detail? I'm not really clear on what happened there.

Mappingway, formerly known as Namingway, was in Kaipo. Due to the earthquake, he lost his map and he is now out job again. Thusly he is now known as Livingway, and will let you look at the beastiary.
Click to expand...

:lol :lol :lol

Thanks for the impressions, CloudV! Keep 'em up!
 
charlequin said:
You really think so? FFIV is probably the last FF where the final boss can actually present a challenge if you play through the game straightforwardly. You definitely don't ever have to grind, but I definitely recall it being more challenging than, say, any FF from the 3d era.
Click to expand...

Yeah, but it lets your prep all you want (read: Killing ****, Rydia, and Edge) before you actually tussle with him.
 
One other thing I noticed, and I don't remember if this is true or not, but when switching weapons in battle you lose your turn, for example, I equipped a rod on Tellah rather then use his staff in battle and had to wait for his gauge to fill again. Was that the same in the original version?
Click to expand...

Nope, that's new Cloud, remember being in like
The underground and switching between fire and ice swords with Cecil? You wouldn't lose a turn, or switching different claws with Yang?
 
Yeah, I definitely thought it was easy. But the last time I played it was GBA, and the next FF I played was 12...and 12 was definitely much, much harder.

I really loved 4 though because it was so swift.
 
Pureauthor said:
Yeah, but it lets your prep all you want (read: Killing ****, Rydia, and Edge) before you actually tussle with him.
Click to expand...

You've lost me.

Y2Kev said:
Yeah, I definitely thought it was easy. But the last time I played it was GBA, and the next FF I played was 12...and 12 was definitely much, much harder.
Click to expand...

Play IV and VI back-to-back.
 
charlequin said:
You've lost me.
Click to expand...

Before you use the Crystal on Zeromus, he just stands there like some evil cotton ball. (As a side note, the evil cotton ball looks a whole lot cooler than what you actually fight.) Allowing you to prep all you want before the fight.
 
Got this today and Chocobo Wii. Put a little time into this and some comments:

--Opening CG is the worst compressed FMV I've ever seen, even for DS standards. Looks like total shit; good job Square. Hope they put it on a dvd at some point for archival purposes.

--Cutscene direction is really fantastic. Excellent angles, pacing, and use of music. Voice work is solid too. Very pleased with the cutscenes. Graphics look great in them as well.

--Loading is better than FF3 DS. Still a little long, but not annoying like FF3.

--Battles are better/faster than FF3 DS. Still a little slow compared to the 2d version, but bearable and not annoying like FF3. Battle art/animation is better than FF3 DS and not great, but not shitty. Tales of Innocence has faaaaar better graphics/animation/framerate in battle.

--The thought bubbles at the menu are cute and the whole menu design is interesting looking, though a bit more sluggish than the original menus.

--Somewhat disappointed the music is identical. I would have been fine with the same tunes as long as they were remastered a bit to sound better quality. But no, sounds pretty shitty compared to ToI (the SQ not the compositions).


So right now I'm overall pleased with it and it seems better than I expected. I love the cutscene presentation and the battles are decent enough to endure to keep playing and see all the cutscenes :P Much better than FF3 DS, which was just ugly, slow, and had shitty cutscenes so I had no reason to play it.
 
I should have mine tomorrow! So excited, FF4 is love.

And charlequin is definitely right about FF4 vs. FF6.
 
Bebpo said:
--Somewhat disappointed the music is identical. I would have been fine with the same tunes as long as they were remastered a bit to sound better quality. But no, sounds pretty shitty compared to ToI (the SQ not the compositions).
Click to expand...
I asked someone I know if the music was identical and he said in some parts it was, but that the Theme of Love part when Cecil and Rosa have their conversation near the beginning of the game in his room sounds like it was ripped from the Celtic Moon CD.

Seems like the tunes they could grab from Celtic Moon, they used in the game, whereas everything else that isn't on that CD had to be made from scratch.
 
speedpop said:
I asked someone I know if the music was identical and he said in some parts it was, but that the Theme of Love part when Cecil and Rosa have their conversation near the beginning of the game in his room sounds like it was ripped from the Celtic Moon CD.
Click to expand...

Hmm, odd. I do like a lot of the Celtic Moon arrangements, so... it's not like this will bother me! But I'm sad more of the music didn't get touched up -- they really did a fantastic job with FF3's soundtrack.
 
charlequin said:
Hmm, odd. I do like a lot of the Celtic Moon arrangements, so... it's not like this will bother me! But I'm sad more of the music didn't get touched up -- they really did a fantastic job with FF3's soundtrack.
Click to expand...

Yeah, FF3's ost is one of the only things I liked about the DS game, yet ironically it's one of the only things I dislike about FF4.

I hope for FF6 they use new arrangements for everything with at least higher quality samples than the SFC game.
 
I guess they spent more money on voice actors than they did on musical composition :-/
The voice actors/actress are all big names in Japan by the way.
 
Troidal said:
I guess they spent more money on voice actors than they did on musical composition :-/
The voice actors/actress are all big names in Japan by the way.
Click to expand...

Much like when Ryouri no Tetsujin came to America, they should keep Takeshi Kaga's VA intact for FFIV. :)
 
Battles - One big question I have, and memory fails me, is in the original version, in active mode, when a character attacks or casts a spell, do your other character's bars continue to increase? In the DS version, when enemies attack/cast spells/etc your bar continues to rise, however, when your character attacks, all bars pause through the whole motion. This in a whole feels a little clunky and defeats the purpose of the ATB it seems. Thusly, battles in the DS version are indeed slower. This is partly due to this ATB bug/oversight, and partly due to the fact that you can tell the processer is definitely chugging, trying to pump out more graphics and spells.
Click to expand...
wasnt the original like this too? I remember bar pausing in FF8 iirc. maybe my memory is all wrong.

Active/Wait only means that the bar keeps running even while selecting spells from menus. in Wait the bar (and the battle for that matter) 'stops' allowing you to select your stuff with less hurry. in FF9 the ATB bar on Active was always running no matter what.
 
Yeah I dunno, I haven't played FF4 for like 10 years so I have no idea what the original music sounds like and am just going by what someone told me that it was just the SFC music. Most of it sounds fine to me outside the fanfare and first town.

I really like how the backgrounds in battle are 2d with parallax scrolling. Looks really nice. The auto-mapping in dungeons is great. If FF3 DS was re-released with that + voice acting/faster load times I'd probably play it :P I'm really happy with how this game turned out. Having not played the game since the PS1 port first came out, this is nice nostalgia and actually holds up fairly well.

I wish more of these winter JPN releases were crap. I'm finally on winter break and I have no idea what to play between LO,FF4,ToI,Chocobo,NMH >_<
 
I played FFIV like every 2-3 years on every port they've come up with so it's too bad I wouldn't feel nostalgia for shits if I pick up the DS remake.

I haven't even picked up FFIII either so yeah, who knows when I'll be getting this.. ~_~

Actually I'm more interested in The After...but cell phone...goddamit S-E
 
Bebpo said:
--Cutscene direction is really fantastic. Excellent angles, pacing, and use of music. Voice work is solid too. Very pleased with the cutscenes. Graphics look great in them as well.

--Battles are better/faster than FF3 DS. Still a little slow compared to the 2d version, but bearable and not annoying like FF3. Battle art/animation is better than FF3 DS and not great, but not shitty. Tales of Innocence has faaaaar better graphics/animation/framerate in battle.

--The thought bubbles at the menu are cute and the whole menu design is interesting looking, though a bit more sluggish than the original menus.

--Somewhat disappointed the music is identical. I would have been fine with the same tunes as long as they were remastered a bit to sound better quality. But no, sounds pretty shitty compared to ToI (the SQ not the compositions).
Click to expand...


Having gotten a bit further into this, I would like to retract my statement that the VA doesn't add to it, after going through Damcyan and now on Mount Fabul, the cut scene direction is, like Bebpo said, solid and actually adds quite a bit to it, now that there are more coming in.

Regarding battles, I agree that they are better then FF3. I'm at a toss up to say they are faster. In general if it's 3 enemies or less it feels faster, but since this version is putting the full 6 enemies on the screen it can take a bit longer it feels. The menu does get cluttered with the ATB, trying to do active, and make choices while watching the bottom menu gauges, but I haven't had many screw ups yet.

Thought bubbles are definitely good, and give characters more development and feeling. Agree that the menu is sluggish, but not unbearable.

I would agree with the music, while I love it, the sound quality overall is just a let down, very tinny and poor percussion. Being one of my favs, I was hoping for much more on this point.

charlequin said:
Hmmm, that's interesting. That ability is
not something that existed at all in the original. Can you describe how you got it in more detail? I'm not really clear on what happened there.
Click to expand...

Well, when you first go to Kaipo and find Rosa sick in bed, she just gives it to you. Naming/Mapping/Livingway comes along and explains that you can use it to give the ability to someone, and there are more of this hidden around the world. It goes in your valuables list, and I haven't used it, because I only have one. I'll mess around with it and not save during lunch.


Current progress: Due to the fact that I really only play my DS on the train and at lunch, my progress will probably be slower then others.
While everyone probably knows the story, I'm going to start using spoiler tags.

I'm at Mount Fabul, and the scene with yang is pretty cool as he flips around and kicks imp's asses. HOWEVER, the damn mom bomb battle sucks. When the bomb blows up into the 6 little ones... well it's doing almost 1000 damage to most people, so it's party insta-death... Again, love the thought bubbles, and battles have gotten smoother, albiet longer now that I'm having 4 people (rosa, cecil, rydia, girlbert) vs 6 enemies. One thing is I thought flying monsters were weak against bow/arrows, but Rosa's doing crap for damage....
 
CloudV said:
I'm at Mount Fabul, and the scene with yang is pretty cool as he flips around and kicks imp's asses. HOWEVER, the damn mom bomb battle sucks. When the bomb blows up into the 6 little ones... well it's doing almost 1000 damage to most people, so it's party insta-death... Again, love the thought bubbles, and battles have gotten smoother, albiet longer now that I'm having 4 people (rosa, cecil, rydia, girlbert) vs 6 enemies. One thing is I thought flying monsters were weak against bow/arrows, but Rosa's doing crap for damage....
Click to expand...

I read in this version, defend before Mom Bomb blows up.
Remember, they did alter the bosses somewhat so you can't exactly rely on the old strategies from the SNES days.
 
I got the game earlier today, and finished the game I was playing before diving in. My thoughts so far... (I didn't read any of the other posts, so apologies if some of this has already been covered)

- The new menu system is really weird, but it seems pretty efficient. It uses both screens pretty well, but I need more characters and items to really see how good it is.
- There's a bit of loading when going between rooms. It's not a huge deal by any means, but I do wish it were shorter.
- The voiced scenes are pretty neat, and I've noticed one extra scene if you talk to **** after being removed from the throne room. I can't wait to see some more new ones. The voices really added a LOT to the scene with Cecil and Rosa in his room.
- The music seems to be inspired by the Celtic Moon arrangements, especially the Theme of Love and the town music.
- Battles are a tad slow, even on the highest speed... There's a delay between actions that doesn't really make any sense. This is a real negative for me, but I'll get used to it I hope.
- The automap in dungeons is cooler than I thought it would be. The radius around your character for uncovering it is surprisingly large.
- I actually died against the first boss... never came close before. This fight is definitely much harder than before.

I'll go back and try that boss again in a while. :(
 
Aeana said:
- I actually died against the first boss... never came close before. This fight is definitely much harder than before.

I'll go back and try that boss again in a while. :(
Click to expand...

It definitely seemed harder than I remembered. I got blinded by a butterfly and slowed by slimy things in the first dungeon and had no eye potions and my guys got dropped to like 20hp in the red by the time I finished the fight. I thought blind meant you miss like half the time but out of about 8 attacks, only 1 hit. I managed to run back to town and sleep at the inn afterwards as I hadn't bought any potions before starting out.
 
I went back and beat it. It wasn't THAT bad, but it sure does do a lot more damage now.

The scene in Mist village is really cool this time through.
 
Bebpo said:
It definitely seemed harder than I remembered. I got blinded by a butterfly and slowed by slimy things in the first dungeon and had no eye potions and my guys got dropped to like 20hp in the red by the time I finished the fight. I thought blind meant you miss like half the time but out of about 8 attacks, only 1 hit. I managed to run back to town and sleep at the inn afterwards as I hadn't bought any potions before starting out.
Click to expand...

According to 2ch, the difficulty has been increased past that of the original and GBA versions. It's showing too, I have now died 3 times against the mother bomb. I lowered the battle speed even and put it on wait, but the 3rd only Yang survived, with 59 hp, and was promptly killed by the 6 bombs. Kinda frustrating at this point.

As for the music, I haven't listened to Celtic Moon in years, so I can't make any judgments per se, but the SQ kinda kills any good arrangements they might have had.
Still, for saying all of that, I still love the music.
 
thefro said:
There's a translation wiki up and running for this game, like with FF3 DS.

Probably will be more useful as this game hasn't had a release date set in the US yet.

http://ff4.wikidot.com/
Click to expand...
Nice. Gives me a bit more sanity if the game arrives tomorrow - was just going to go through the game relying on my memory from when I finished it a few years ago.
 
Getting my copy tomorrow. will post impressions when I have it. Thanks for your opinions, it's great knowing the difficulty level has increased.
 
Bebpo said:
--Somewhat disappointed the music is identical. I would have been fine with the same tunes as long as they were remastered a bit to sound better quality. But no, sounds pretty shitty compared to ToI (the SQ not the compositions).
Click to expand...

Yeah, that IS disappointing. I wish they would have completely remixed the music, like they did for Final Fantasy III. It sucks that they just reused the original music.
 
B.K. said:
Yeah, that IS disappointing. I wish they would have completely remixed the music, like they did for Final Fantasy III. It sucks that they just reused the original music.
Click to expand...

They definitely did NOT reuse the original music.
 
Aeana said:
They definitely did NOT reuse the original music.
Click to expand...

How much would you say the arrangements differ from the originals? Most of the songs I've heard in videos sound very much alike the original versions....

Pureauthor said:
Nice, difficulty boosts.
Click to expand...

Agreed. FF3 probably spoiled me -- I was looking at FFVI the other day and going "You... can just buy Phoenix Downs? In a store?" :lol
 
charlequin said:
How much would you say the arrangements differ from the originals? Most of the songs I've heard in videos sound very much alike the original versions....



Agreed. FF3 probably spoiled me -- I was looking at FFVI the other day and going "You... can just buy Phoenix Downs? In a store?" :lol
Click to expand...
What, you want new musical arrangements of the songs? Like, salsa versions of the old OST?
 
Aeana said:
They definitely did NOT reuse the original music.
Click to expand...

Is this like DQIVr where the bass is 2db lower and there is a "ping" for 1 ms in the song so it's a different tune and sounds better than the original?

With good headphones FFIVr's music sounds noticably lower quality than DQIVr or ToI. So either they intentional made new lq versions of the old songs like the fanfare or they just directly used the SFC or GBA music files for some songs.
 
From the videos I've watched and the sound file that was just posted it's safe to say they didn't simply use the original super famicon chiptunes. Course this is based on maybe 4 or 5 songs from the game for all I know some of them are direct snes midi files running on ds.
 
badcrumble said:
What, you want new musical arrangements of the songs? Like, salsa versions of the old OST?
Click to expand...

I was really happy with the arrangements for the FF3ds OST.

Aeana said:
Well, here's the town theme. It's definitely not the same as the SNES version.
Click to expand...

Sure isn't! (Sounds totally great.)

A little brief youtube investigation suggests to me that some tracks are more changed than others -- the battle theme is significantly punched up, the opening music sounds noticeably better, but the Bomb Ring and Mist Cave music are quite close in arrangement to the SNES versions.

EDIT: It's definitely not "the same" music, just similar arrangements.
 
speedpop said:
It'd be absolutely stupid for them to use the same music.
Click to expand...

They don't, so don't worry. I'd say they went for the Celtic Moon style based on what Aeana has so graciously recorded for us.
 
Y2Kev said:
They don't, so don't worry. I'd say they went for the Celtic Moon style based on what Aeana has so graciously recorded for us.
Click to expand...
Yeah like I said earlier, I trust my friend's judgement when he told me Theme of Love sounded like it was ripped straight from Celtic Moon.

Just saying it'd be stupid for Square Enix to be completely lazy in regards to the music after all the effort they've gone through for this.
 
On the official blog Junya Nakano said they did the rearrangements based on the SNES version and tried to stay a close as possible to it, but the original music could not be and was not used. It's no surprise that Celtic Moon had a strong impression on him though, it was apparent from that track S-E Music released at TGS (which is played during the CG OP).

Also, I'm quite happy to hear they made the game harder! :D
 
Aye. I can agree. Doesn't sound directly like the arranged tracks but it's close enough to warrant inspiration towards Celtic Moon.

Sounds great :D Thanks Aeana.
 
duckroll said:
Nah, I agree. The FFIV plot was pretty much pulp trash. Lots of different mythological elements meshed together with no real polish or development. Lots of random elements just for the heck of it too. The developments were pretty weak and the plot twists and fake sacrifices were laughable.

I'm really hoping they touch up on a lot of the story elements because FFIV had a pretty bad story. FFV's story might be filled with cheesy lame shit too, but at least FFV knows not to take itself seriously.
Click to expand...

I'm so glad I'm not the only one who feels this way. I played the GBA revision a while back, and the story wasn't as good as I remember as a kid. Nostalgia sure isn't what it used to be... I'm afraid of going back to play FFVI (my favorite FF) for that very same reason.

That said, I'm still going to throw down some cash for a copy of this.
 
Heretic Kazuma said:
I'm so glad I'm not the only one who feels this way. I played the GBA revision a while back, and the story wasn't as good as I remember as a kid. Nostalgia sure isn't what it used to be... I'm afraid of going back to play FFVI (my favorite FF) for that very same reason.
Click to expand...

SHUT UP!! YOU KNOW ITS SHAKESPEARE!!

eh.... I haven't played it fully in about a decade :o
 
jj984jj said:
Also, I'm quite happy to hear they made the game harder! :D
Click to expand...

I'll be happy if the difficulty level throughout is just a bit harder so it's challenging but not quite a bit harder where you have to grind each dungeon.

If the conversation about FF4 at SE went like this "You know what the one thing FF4 is missing? -What? -Grinding! -Awesome, let's add it!" I'm going to be angry with SE.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Game Pass adds Disco Elysium: The Final Cut, Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, Final Fantasy IV,
News 
5
189
Darsxx82 replied
Final Fantasy X - 25th Anniversary
2 3 4
155
429
Signalis replied
Diablo: IV | The Lord of Hatred Review Thread
Analysis 
48
540
The_hunter replied
Final Fantasy Tactics - The Ivalice Chronicles | Review Thread
Opinion Review  2 3
133
4K
demigod replied
Happy 27th To Final Fantasy VIII
2 3
111
1K
Rentahamster replied
Top Bottom