Game Review: Final Fantasy Record Keeper Will Bring Tears Of Joy To All FF Fans

Most times, our taste in video games affects greatly our judgement on them, which is pretty reasonable. However, this wasn't the case with All The Bravest- an objectively bad and disappointing app from Square Enix. In case you haven’t heard of it (good for you) let me tell you this: it was so disappointing that it was laughable after you got over the phase of aggression. The game basically asked for money every single time in order to unlock a random character from the Final Fantasy universe. Needless to say, all users - fans or not- were mad, to say the least.

Now, Square Enix, reflecting on their past mistakes, returns with a game that looks nothing like the previous instalment (yay!) and treats fans with respect and fairness. Final Fantasy Record Keeper is a collaboration between DeNa and Square Enix and is a freemium game app that can be enjoyed with or without In-app purchases, depending on the player's taste. But we’ll come back to that later.

Plot

FF Record Keeper tells the story of the “Hall of Records”, where the most important FF moments are preserved in the form of paintings. When the records within the paintings began to fade away and darkness fell upon the world, destruction begun and it’s now up to us to save the kingdom. To do that the player must enter each painting and re-live all those amazing FF moments with our beloved heroes such as Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy VII. Defeating the enemies inside the paintings, restores them to their previous state and saves them from being lost for ever.

Gameplay

The player controls a novice Record Keeper, who, under the directions of the Head Keeper Dr. Mog, enters each painting and fights against enemies from the games. At first you begin the adventure alone, but after defeating the enemies and bosses (such as Guard Scorpion from Final Fantasy VII) from the first painting, its main characters join your party. This way, step by step, your team grows bigger and bigger. I won’t spoil the characters who are unlocked, but when I reached the painting that unlocked Cloud I fangirled really hard. No point denying it!

As an avid FF fan, I felt the nostalgia hitting me really hard when I realised that each painting had the soundtrack of the game it represented! It was simply amazing and I’m sure that those of you who love FF will get goosebumps when you listen to it.

The enemies are also carefully chosen for every story arc, and each one is unique for every painting. You’ll fight against familiar creatures, plus there are bosses in the final rounds of each painting you enter. While FFRK is a collection of all the FF games and is in a way, a tribute to the franchise, it doesn’t mean that players who are not familiar with some or any FF games for that matter, can’t enjoy it. The game offers a biography for all of the characters, and the plot is explained in detail so that no one will find it hard to follow the pace.

The battles themselves offer no advantages to old fans either. Apart from the nostalgia factor, everything else is up to the player’s skills and intuition. The tutorial explains fairly well the rules and objectives, as well as what it takes to win. It’s important to know that each enemy has different weaknesses, which is the key for the player to plan a successful attack and form the best team of characters. This makes things easier for you because in-battle you’ll have to act fast, since the battle system is not turn-based but semi turn-based instead.

Each of the characters has a variety of attacks, abilities and spells. After a battle you gain XP, which will prove to be very useful for the following battles. If you find things too hard in a battle you can always go back to a previous one and increase your XP by fighting enemies you’ve defeated before.

Let’s take a closer look on how the battles work. Each dungeon consists of 3, 4 or 5 battles, and take place in the world of the FF game you’re in. The enemies and final boss are all from the game you’re trying to reconstruct. Taking advantage of the enemies’ weaknesses and acting with that in mind, rewards you later with XP. So try to be as strategic as possible. The better you do in battles the better are your rewards.

Speaking of rewards, there is a variety of items and abilities to collect and make use of. There are orbs that the player can acquire by defeating enemies and by completing dungeons, which you can use to create abilities. Abilities (e.g. Thunder) cause great damage to enemies especially if the specific element is their weakness. What you need to remember about abilities though, is that you can use them only a limited number of times while inside a painting, but their number goes back to the maximum when you complete your quest. You can, however, increase the number of abilities by using orbs. The strongest attack of a character is the Soul Break that unleashes great power against an enemy. My advice is to keep the Soul Breaks until you reach the final boss and deal with the other enemies with normal attacks and abilities.

Other items include the Mythril (a crystal that restores your stamina and is your currency for buying relics) and Stamina Shards (fragments that replenish your stamina and increase your maximum stamina at the same time). Stamina is important because in order to go to battle you have to spend stamina points, but the good news is that it refills quite fast.

Every day you can participate on a free relic draw, and you’ll recognize them as they all come from the FF games. You also get its description when you win one.

Characters also have equipment which can be changed by you, depending on the needs of the battle, and can be fused with weaker weapons and armor to strengthen them. However, you can’t do any of that while battling so you’ll have to take care of the equipment settings before entering the next painting/dungeon.

For now the game is not yet completed as there are only the Classic Dungeons available, but new dungeons will be added with updates.

In-App Purchases

I want to start the IAP analysis with the unlockable characters. I know most of you are thinking that there are characters who can be unlocked through IAP in addition to the striaghtforward way, or through IAP only. But it’s exactly the opposite, actually! All characters can be unlocked only by playing and clearing dungeons! How cool is that? Every player has equal chances of unlocking a famous character simply by gaining XP and improving the skills to defeat enemies with the less damage possible on your party. So, if you had any doubts about the game’s sincerity, they should be gone by now.

But what can you buy through IAP? Well, in FFRK the IAP is based on gems, which are the currency you use instead of Mythrils. You can buy gem packages, with the cost determined according to the number of gems a package has (they are a bit expensive though).

Graphics & Sounds

FFRK’s graphics are a mix of hand-drawn designs, 3D cinematics and pixelated gameplay. They all work great together and the pixelated visuals are a tribute to the franchise roots, which makes the experience more pleasant. The colors are crystal-clear and vibrant in all occasions, but the only thing that bothered me is that the menu is too loaded with icons and it can get confusing.

The soundtrack is my absolute favorite, as it includes the BG music of each and every FF game that is present on FFRK. It’ definitely on the strongest point of the game, together with the rest factors that create the nostalgic feeling.

Conclusion

Final Fantasy Record Keeper is a game that FF fans will love, and new players will enjoy immensely due to the unique setting it offers. The battles are fun and decent, the rewards (especially the unlockable characters) are great and tempting for all FF fans, and the IAP system fair. Despite some flaws and the annoying stamina refiling that requires waiting some time before it refills, it is worth having installed as it includes the most characteristic FF moments and allows you to relive them in a cuter, pixelated, and simpler manner. Give it a try and you won’t regret it. After all, how often is that we have a FF game in our phones?

Download FFRK FOR iOS here.

Download FFRK for Android here.

Final Fantasy Record Keeper Screenshots