Final Fantasy Quest #1 - FF8 (Patreon)

Today I turn 40, so my "Final Fantasy Quest to Feel Young Again and Refuse to Let Midlife Crisis Get the Best of Me" (Working Title) officially kicks off. And naturally, we have to start with the very first Final Fantasy and the absolute first RPG I ever played in my life: Final Fantasy VIII.

It was the end of summer break back in 2001. When school started back up, my best friend told me he’d spent the whole break completely obsessed with this amazing game called Final Fantasy VIII, about a school of elite warriors who use summons to fight monsters, evil empires, etc. Since I was 13, anything involving teenage warriors fighting evil, all wrapped up in a futuristic, anime-esque vibe, immediately caught my attention. That weekend, at the local arcade/game shop, my friend showed me the game, and just hearing the "Liberi Fatali" opening was enough to get me instantly hooked. Squall’s cold, aloof attitude was exactly what a 13-year-old thought was the definition of cool back then, and getting the chance to namig him with my own name blew my mind. Naturally, I named him "JJ", and I named Rinoa "Adriana" after my classmate and crush at the time (though, to be honest, I liked Selphie way more, but since she wasn't the main love interest, oh well).

Back in 2001, I didn’t speak any English yet, so it was a massive stroke of luck that the game was translated into Spanish. Given how complex FF8’s gameplay actually is, if it had been in English, I probably would have dropped it before I even finished naming my character. The Junction System was complicated, sure, but I mastered it surprisingly fast and, before I knew it, I had figured out how to break the game by maxing out my stats (though it barely mattered, to be honest, because my friend and I mostly just spammed GF summons because they looked so epic, only using the actual characters for boss fights).

Since I didn’t own a console back then, every Saturday I’d go to play at the arcades, making an hour or two of actual story progress... and wasting another two hours playing Triple Triad. It wasn’t until 2003, when I finally got my own PS1, that I managed to beat the game and officially declare myself an unconditional fan of RPGs and the Final Fantasy series—with FFVIII being literally the only RPG and only FF I had ever played up to that point ^^;

Anyway, I graduated high school that same year (2003) and my parents gave me a two-year gap before starting university. So, feeling like the ultimate #1 fan of Final Fantasy and RPGs, I replayed FFVIII a couple more times. But I was starting to burn out on it, and I finally realized that if I wanted to keep calling myself a fan of the franchise, I was going to have to dive into the other games.

Coming soon: Final Fantasy IV.