Now that Final Fantasy 2 was finally brought here to the States with the release of Origins, it's a lot more available to the mainstream. *duh* Some of the big trends of the whole series began here, for instance, Cid's first appearance was that of FF2's arrogant airship owner. FF2 also marked the introduction of... the CHOCOBO! There's only 1 forest in which you can acquire one, located just south of Kashuon Castle. And typical of early game Yellow Chocobos, it runs away when you get off of it. Other forms of travel include the Airship, of course, a Pirate Ship, an Ice Sled and Canoe. A big discrepancy off a standard early RPG is the "experience" system.. in that there IS NONE. No experience points anyways.. It goes sort of by the phrase.. "Whatever doesn't kill you only makes you stronger." When come out of a fight with a lot less life than you go into it, good chance you'll gain a few max HP, as well as vitality. Same for MP Usage and strength, and all areas of statistics.. *Which makes it tough to build MP a lot of the time*

Two quick tips for building up.. #1: Hit your own characters to low points when there's just one damaged enemy left, then kill the enemy... You'll almost always gain HP up. It's kinda cheap, but do this for a little while and you'll soon outclass the enemies you fight. Trick #2.. And this takes some balls.. When you first get to Kashuon, hop a Chocobo and ride south, then east til you find Mysidia.. The enemies there are pretty tough.. As in.. kill them, and use an inn, cuz you'll be nearly wiped.. However, you get loads of gold... and Mysidia sells strong weapons and armor.. If you survive the first dozen battles you'll get strong quick.. and be well equipped... The reason it takes a lot of balls.. You're now far from any "easy" area.. and you'll have to build up for a while if you want to be able to make it back to the area the storyline is in, and all the battles can get a little boring after the first hour.. lol.. Still, it's a decent successor to the original, and rounds out a solid compilation for Final Fantasy Origins. =)

Kashuon Castle
Overworld:Enhanced

For the FF2j Rom, click here

The ROM is still in Japanese, however, for the translator patch, click here

And if it doesn't work.. well, you can always get Origins now, to try it out!


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