Final Fantasy titles sure like to leak themselves early these days, don't they?  Reckon this thread will get a bit more face-time come next month, but to speak of the Japanese version of Final Fantasy V Advance, well.... what little I've played seems pretty darned fantastic.  The script is irrelevant here, as it appears to have been directly lifted from the original Super Famicom version, so let's instead speak of the technical aspects of the port.

First, the very best news: no lag time or slowdown.  At least, none that I've seen so far; I just came out of the Wind Shrine, with the full four member party, and the first set of job classes.  I test-ran the on-field menus extensively, and engaged in a good number of battles in varying situations with lots of menu sifting, and it all runs as smooth as you remember them from the SFC/SNES version.  Glory be, this time we've got perfect programming.

Actually, I shouldn't say it's completely perfect.  Now mind you, this is coming from an absolute diehard FFV fan, but there are some brief (VERY brief) instances where movement hic-ups ever so slightly when walking or running around  So far, I noticed this in the pirate base and the Town of Tule.  Again, I must emphasize that this is so absolutely slight that it's likely only the most hardcore purists will ever truly notice. 

My other micro nit-pick is when changing job classes.  After you've changed your class, the pauses when it changes to your 'choose your abilities' and 'equip your new class equipment' screens seem about a second or two longer than the original.  Again, something a lot of people won't notice, but as someone who's swapped maybe a million classes in her lifetime with this game, it is there. 

And this one isn't a terribly big issue, but the game did tear something terrible after touching the HP/MP rejuvenation pot at the entrance of the Wind Shrine, and then immediately start moving about during the healing blue light.  A brief but major bit of slowdown there.

Graphically, the overworld and on-field character sprites seem completely unchanged from the original SFC/SNES version.  The choppy scrolling as you're walking on the fields that plagued FF4 Advance isn't evident here, and things look and move very fluidly.  Also, the Mode 7 seems to have been handled competently, with the first meteorite crash looking pound for pound faithful to the original.   Battle character sprites -- heroes and enemies alike -- are largely untouched too, but it's the battle backrounds that got the most notable graphical remake treatment. They've been greatly spruced up to Dawn of Souls caliber, and they look positively GORGEOUS.

Maybe it's the new LCD screen technology of Nintendo's latest portables, but most everything about the game just looks brighter, sharper, and more vibrant.

Battles themselves feel properly balanced too, and basically the way they should be.  Unlike FFIV, your characters won't be attacking two or three times for every enemy's turn.  Enemies dissipate a lot faster after being defeated, which to me is a good thing.  It tends to make the game even more briskly paced than it was, and thankfully, the trademark FF5 quick-text boxes were brought back as well.  And for those wondering, yes, the auto-dash feature was retained, and you don't even need the Thief ability to do it.  Equipping the dash ability with the thief makes you run two times as fast. 

People will have their opinions on the new facial portraits (and Amano detractors will have a field day), but I rather like them.  They are radical at first glance, but they do contribute to adding that touch of personality.  Butz and Lenna look nice, Galuf is kinda old man kooky looking, and Faris.... well, let's just say she came out the worst of the bunch.  Oh, and Boko is totally adorable.  ^_~  I only wish they went that extra mile, and added varying facial expressions to any given situation. 

The sound effects have a new set of their own, where they attempt to replicate the original, but are still noticeably different - some for the better, some for the not so better.   Compromises obviously had to made to the music, but like FFIV, I feel that it's more than serviceable and a stellar feat, given the GBA's sound capabilities.  "Four Valiant Hearts" took a bit of a hit, but the richness of the opening theme "A Premonition" is surprisingly retained, and sounds great.  The softer songs, like "Lenna's Theme" and "Tenderness In The Air" are wonderful, and there's enough power in the instrumentation for the "Battle Theme" and "Pirates Ahoy!" to leave its faithful mark.  Strangely enough, "Sealed Away" got sped up in tempo considerably, and the "Fanfare" sounds like it was completely redone.

So far, this is looking like a great port.  There's just the feeling that SE put in a lot more effort this time around, which should also give people hope for FF6.  I can't wait to pick up the domestic version next month, so I can put some serious play time in.

Good to know it's basically intact...I'll have to hear the music part for myself, but it simply can't be worse than the PS1 port. As long as the battles run smoothly...That and the music were my real nitpicks for FFIV Advance. I'm not going to worry too much about a couple of map or menu hiccups.

But still...FF6 is a good bit more advanced than FF5, so I'm still a bit skeptical how they're getting an enhanced version of it onto the GBA.

I was never a fan of FFV, but for some reason, I have moderately high hopes for this one. I'll pick it up when it hits Canada.

Okay, so SE has FFV and FFVI Advance on the way. When are we going to get Chrono Trigger Advanced and Advanced version of Seiken series? *nudges Square-Enix*

Seriously. SNES had a poor RAM cache, which limited the battle/walking animations in Chrono Trigger, which along with poor item management, were my only problems with the game. I'd love to see some Capcom quality animation in an Advanced Chrono Trigger, should they choose to make one.

I'd be stunned if either of those made it to GBA. Aside from FFV and VI, I'd be stunned if anything but licensed cack made it to GBA. I'm genuinely surprised these weren't canned.

You're absolutely right though - Chrono Trigger should have made it to GBA. Super Metroid should have made it to GBA. There are many, many things that should have made it to GBA and didn't. Damn shame. The machine was killed long before its time.

Yeah, the GBA is pretty much done with, which isn't a bad thing in light of all the great DS games coming out.

-Joshua

Heh, the above reminds me of my stance on the GBA a little while ago. I still think it was terribly mismanaged (little meaningful support, too many ports, was dropped too early), but the slant of great ORIGINAL DS games that has come along and the overall DS capabilities have me not missing it all too much. And there's still a handful of titles coming out for it (mostly Atlus' offerings).

Although...It would be great if there were a way to play DS games on the TV. Maybe have the upper screen on the TV and the touch screen still on the DS or a seperate 1-screen controller.

At this point though, I would much rather see FFVI go DS and not see the programmers try to wrestle around the GBA's limitations. It'll take a miracle to get it ported with no problems.

If you're curious to hear how the music sounds, the GSF set's now up -

http://oddigytitanium.com/psf/gsf/gsf.php

:)

Actually, I think this set sounds better than the FF4 set...

GBA is one of the best-selling platforms out there.  While it didn't receive as much all-new content as the original GB, all those retreads sure sold plenty well.  I wouldn't say there was anything "mismanaged" about the GBA.  The DS didn't become meaningful until mid-2005, so there was a good four-year run for the GBA.  In those four years, there were three new Castlevania games, one new Metroid, one new Zelda, countless new Pokemon and Mega Man games, the Boktai series, new SRPGs like FFTA and TO, the birth of Wario Ware, one new Kirby game, three new F-Zero games, the Golden Sun series, one new Mario Kart, three new Fire Emblem games, two new Famicom/Advance Wars games, Mario & Luigi (undefeated best GBA game), Rhythm Heaven, and to top it all off, the first new Mother game in over a decade.  For a system that cost less than $100 when it was first released, that's not bad at all.  I wouldn't want to go back to the days of the original GB where we had the same stagnant handheld for nine years.

Though...Mother 3 and one of the Fire Emblems aren't available in the US. I won't deny it was (and is) a good system for RPG's, nor that it (and all of those high-profile ports) sold well. I would just think that would have been more incentive to support it better and longer (like, um...more than just four years). Seems like whenever they needed a new platformer for the holidays, they just tapped into their past library and voila! Good news to people who missed them the first time, waste for those of us who know them inside and out (and didn't want to bother with the E-Reader for Mario 3) That was always the most glaring issue I had with it...Seems weird DS is getting Peach, New SMB and Yoshi's Island 2 inside of 9 months after waiting through all of those Mario ports.

Still feels like Nintendo gave up on it too early...The jump from the GBA to DS was a little too abrupt (this was before DS had acquired the killer apps it has now) and happened at exactly the same time GC was doing basically nothing (2005 was a nasty year for Nintendo). Four years of support for systems is hopefully not the norm...I'd like to think DS has more than 2 years before it gets the can like the GBA got in 2005. Nintendo's doing a lot right at the moment, but I can't forget 2005 and their premature and outright abandonment of their two main systems that easily...It's something to keep in mind.

I'm not complaining...The DS is (now) obviously the better system and it's (now) a worthy successor, but at no point did the GBA feel like it had the potential DS does now. I just like the fact I'm looking forward to Yoshi's Island 2 and not...Yoshi's Island 1.

Better system? Possibly but the GBA is still the only real 'throw it in your pocket' system. That counts for a hell of a lot in my books. I don't think anyone is trying to discount the excellent titles on DS - many of which couldn't have been achieved on GBA. And yet, many of the earlier sequels I feel jumped system long before they had to leaving the GBA with nothing.

I love the GBA. I just don't think its potential was fully realised.

Great news all around, I just hope you can turn character portraits off. Amano in my face nonstop is a horrible thing to have to endure.

Like Dawn of Souls and FFIV Advance before it, no, you can't turn the portraits off.  But I dunno; even though FFV's character designs are the furthest from their sprite look, I'm really liking it the most.  Kururu is so terribly cute in this version.  ^_^

So now we have the last component that may well make this THE definitive version of Final Fantasy V; the newly translated English script.  It's excellent. 

Sharply written, with fluid characterization that needn't resort to the idiotic and childish slang from the PSOne Anthologies version.  Praise all that be good, dignity is brought back to FFV.

Just got it me self, glad to finally have a competent version of FFV, plus more sexy stylings from AMANO.  Here's looking forward to FFVI Advance.  Too bad they had to uglify FFIII DS with PS 3D graphics.

Ah, so there's no more "arr-matey" Faris?

I think this is the best version of FFV we've ever had. I think one of the biggest problems I had with the previous releases (fan translation and official) is that they take the plot so seriously... and you really can't because it's more absurd than usual. Thankfully, this translation is tongue-in-cheek and often very funny. I actually look forward to talking to every townsperson again (something I haven't wanted to do since Lunar 2).

It's also the first time that the main characters have some personality. Before, I considered them the weakest FF cast.

I've often wondered why Squenix hasn't ever put Seiken 2 (Secret of Mana in the US) on the GBA since they did port it to the Wonderswan.

The GBA already has one Seiken under it's belt, albeit the weakest of the series: Sword of Mana, the update to the original Seiken, which we knew as Final Fantasy Adventure on the GB.

Didn't they say something about Seiken 3 being ported to the GBA as a part of their "World of Mana" game lineup?  I'd love to play that one in English, on a platform other than my pc, that is.

A little OT, but Square also ported Front Mission to the Wonderswan, then later updated it and released on the PS1.  Didn't they also say that Front Mission would be ported to a handheld, either the GBA or the PSP?  That's another game I've always wanted in English. 

I'm pretty sure that port never actually happened, though it may have been discussed.

The weakest?  Sure, Sword of Mana is a big letdown compared to the original SD1 (FFA), but it's better than both LoM and CoM (the new weakest, if you ask me).

Nope, they never said that.  They did say that a colorized SD1 is coming to mobile phones in Japan (along with another all-new mobile SD game).

Front Mission 1 was recently announced for DS.

Being that Seiken 1 is one of my favorite games of all time, I really want to play the mobile version. It appears to have been upgraded the same way FF1 and 2 were for the GBA. Same game, better graphics and sound (hopefully on the sound front). Sword of Mana, I both enjoyed and hated the game. As a recreation of Seiken 1 it blows terribly. It was fun, but felt nothing like Seiken 1 in any way. What is the deal with Moldovians and all this randomness they've introduced into the Mana series. These new storylines in SoW and CoW are ridiculas. Medusa, for example, was some monster I wanted a tear from to continue the story in Seiken 1. I could care less, in SoW, that she had a relationship with some Glaive guy, that she was some Moldovian (or whatever they're called) or that she was terribly depressed. Just brutal.    /rant.

I'm enjoying FFV-A so far. The translation is awesome. Music is different from the SNES version, but still fantastic. Looking forward to the bonus dungeon...hopefully a little more cleverly designed from the FF1 and FFIV versions.

Yeah, the thing I like about the original Seiken Densetsu/Final Fantasy Adventure is that it doesn't have all the crap that makes me dislike the Mana series.  The GBA version took what was a pretty competent and creative Zelda-type game and Mana-ed it.  Ugh, I couldn't stomach that game to the end and stopped somewhere around halfway.

Sword of Mana was a piece of crap. The wierd thing is that I couldn't figure out what was so boring about it (aside from the unfavorable comparisons to FFA). I stopped halfway through.

I wouldn't call it crap. It was kinda fun to a point, but I had a similar reaction. It didn't feel enough like a remake, I think was part of it. It also felt slow and clunky (just like FFTA). I stopped after a while too (not sure how far in, plus I played both quests concurently).

-Joshua

Whoops, I had forgotten about Children of Mana.  I honestly had banished it from my mind.  I bought it for cheap when PlayAsia put the import on sale, now I wish I could trade it in. 

Legend of Mana I actually kinda liked.  No, it was nowhere near being a true Mana game, but I liked the visual style, and the OST is one of my favorites.

Unfortunately, I checked Square Enix's Mana page, and it seems we are in for another Mana spinoff rather than a port of say, Seiken 2 or 3, instead we are getting Heroes of Mana, which they are teasing by saying its gameplay is Strategy RPG?  Yeah, strategy RPG plus question mark.  The gameplay video makes it look almost like a handheld FF Crystal Chronicles, but at this point who knows.

To add insult to injury, I watched the video for Seiken 4 for the PS2, and it looks like it plays like a cross between Zelda and Kingdom Hearts.  It has KH's combo heavy combat and swarming enemies, and then it shows the perspective switching to first person to use a bow.  Since I couldn't reconfigure the controls for Musashi 2 to adapt to my handicap, I don't have a real positive feeling about this one.  Just another reason to scratch it off my list.

SE, why have you forsaken the good Seiken titles?!

But, I've derailed this topic enough, so I'm shutting up.

So...  FFV came out this week, anyone played it yet?  I'm interested in knowing if they brushed up the translation, or if it's just a copy 'n paste from the PS1.

I know the topic derailed there for just a bit, but really now.....

---

Seriously.  The first three were so damn good, but then eveything went to hell.  SD used to be my favorites series.  After Legend of Mana came out, Metroid became my favorite seires.  Then Prime 2 came out and Zelda became my favorite series.

Ack!  I'm so sorry Angela!  I was just trying to steer the topic back.

I feel like such a jackass now... 

But, I picked up my copy last night, and forsook sleep to play it and...

Your review is dead on, the translation is so much better now, it feels like I'm playing a whole new game.  It used to tick me off when playing the PS1 version and see Lenna's name as "Rena", I can only assume that Kururu/Kululu's name has been restored as well, rather than the awful "Krille" that was used in the PS1 game.  Though I'm still skeptical that the proper Romanization of "Batsu" is Bartz.

As for the Amano portraits, I'm kinda on the fence.  I adore Amano's artwork (I'm so pissed he was at Metrocon just a few weeks ago, and I missed it!  Tampa is only a few hours drive from here!  ) but I don't care for some of the character portraits.

Galuf looks great, Lenna has grown on me, but yeah, Faris did come out the worst of the group, though Bartz kinda creeps me out a bit too.  I was kinda expecting the portraits to look more like the the ones in FFIV Adv, but those were Amano-ified takes on the original portraits, whereas FFV never had any before, so I guess they had no alternative but to use the original concept art.

I'm really glad that the emulation has improved, hopefully this means that FFVI (when is it slated to be out?) will be faithful to the original too, I found the PS1 version absolutely unplayable.

Bad memories of the slowdown when Edgar used his crossbow still plague me.  I also wonder if they might retouch aspects of FFVI's translation too, like changing the names back from Sabin->Mash, Terra->Tina, Cyan->Cayenne, etc.

You could always change the names of playable characters in FFVI, I doubt they'd take it away now.

That's technically true, but to do so you needed the rename card which didn't show up until late in the game, if I remember correctly.

What I was wondering was, if Square Enix would put the correct names back in place from the get go.

Japan gets FF6 GBA in December.  No U.S. date yet.  Concerning the names, I prefer the Woolsley (sp?) names to the original Japanese ones, so I kinda hope they keep those.

Well, you're half right. When you first meet a new character, there's a little screen that describes the character, and then you have an opportunity to name them. Once you name them, you can't re-name them unless you get a Rename Card.

I wouldn't count on them restoring the Japanese names, though. But at least you can.

Yes, they should definitely put in the 'real' names.  "Cefca" is sure to instill fear and rage into the hearts of many.

I think 99.8% of the North American audience buying FFVI GBA would go "wtf" when they see "Mash" instead of "Sabin". Stick with the North American names please. Terra > Tina, Sabin > Mash, Kefka > Cefca. List goes on.

Agreed...Besides, how is the "Ke" katakana brought over as "Ce" anyway? I see it romanized on the FFVI OST as such, but any special reason why? Other than to be annoying...First thing I'd think is that it was a translation goof if I saw it as Cefka.

Even on FFVI Grand Finale it's listed as "Kefka".  I don't see how anything but that could be considered the proper translation.