How long is it? (FF IV: The After Years)

Does anyone know?

I’m not sure in terms of hours, but: short. I am definitely toward the end of it and I’m not even at four hours in.

There is the Rydia chapter for 300 more points you can play immediately and that I want to try, but…

Hrmmm… that’s 2 bucks an hour. That’s pretty bad for an RPG.

Are there sidequests, are you powering through for the the story, or are you dilly dallying?

I have not found sidequests worth crap but it seems like-- just like an old-school 16-bit RPG-- there are some points where you do a bit of exploring and get yourself into dungeons where things are profoundly overlevel.

I’m mostly just following the main plot which does sort of keep you on rails after a point, since you’re doing puzzle-dungeons like The Devil’s Road. The nostalgia factor is TREMENDOUS for me because I played this game on my SNES back in the day and there are a lot of clever shout-outs to really cool scenes from the original version of FFIV.

That said: the dungeons have thus far left me dissatisfied and the Lunar Cycle and Band systems… I can’t decide if I like them or not. The Band system is a fine idea that seems really under-implemented. The Lunar Cycle can be interesting but I’ve found myself spamming Tents just so I’m not heading into a boss fight or nasty dungeon bit while under the influence of a moon phase that bones my party.

Could you elaborate on those systems?

Bands are essentially team-up moves. If you have two compatible characters and select their compatible commands for both of them and have MP for them to spend on the Band, they’ll execute a team-up move that can be pretty wickedly powerful.

Downside: while there are hundreds of potential combinations for Bands, in the first chapter of After Years there are exactly four that actually work. Trying to activate other Bands just wastes your time. Bleah! This seems like such a waste to me.

The Lunar Cycle system… basically the way different commands work in combat is affected by the phases of the moon. As the moon goes from full to new and back again, each phase will generally double one of the four basic types of damage (Attack, White, Black, or Ninja) and cut another in half. The effects of the phase of the moon appear to apply to enemies and bosses, which means that basically whether or not you win most boss battles depends on what the phase of the moon was like when you tried the fight.

The phase of the moon advances when you use a Tent or stay at an Inn. It also seems to advance on its own during every 30 minutes or so, maybe less, you spend playing the game. Since the phase of the moon is so influential to combat outcomes, to me the system just seems to reward doing weird degenerate things to try and get the moon into a phase you want before you challenge an enemy.

So do you get the whole game for your 20 bucks or whatever? Or is this like the cell phone version where you gotta buy it bit by bit by bit?

You have to buy it bit by bit, just like the cell phone version. For your initial 800 points you get the first chapter and the option to buy the second one.

People on GameFAQs have done the math and buying every single chapter will cost 3700 Wii points.

Hearing that has killed my desire to get it.

Oh well.

I can’t help myself:

First Sailor: Still no sign of land … How long is it?

Second Sailor: That’s a rather personal question, sir.

How many dollars is 3700 wii points?

37, I think.

I’ll wait for the inevitable retail release.

I’ve heard Square has no intention of putting this out in the retail in the US because they think the margins on it would be too small.

I’ve heard it might appear on XBLA or PSN, though. I guess it depends on how much Nintendo gave them for the exclusive.

Update:

I just beat the 800 points main game. It’s shit. The ending is a transparent cliffhanger, not even just the “boom, Jason’s eyes open,” sense, but in the, “Welcome to my lair…” and then it ends, sense.

There’s no chance to use black magic to any degree, there’s no summoning, most of the time you have a shitty white mage, and the lunar cycles don’t really do much.

Spend your money downloading Lady Gaga’s “The Fame,” from iTunes instead.

There’s supposedly a challenge dungeon at the end, I will let you know as soon as the credits are done rolling.

Update to the Update:

I started the savefile made after you complete the game. I walked into the final room and now have to watch the credits again.

Heh, it turns out the 800 point “main game” for FFIV: The After Years is actually just two random chapters of the cell phone release spliced together. It’s chapters 1 and 8, specifically.

Apparently to actually play the game in its intended order you have to stop halfway through and then play the Rydia chapter, which I still haven’t gotten around to doing.

Raspberries.

I am extremely grateful for this thread since it has saved me money. That’s too bad, though, since I really loved Final Fantasy IV.

Grinding exp in the challenge dungeon is ok, just go to the inn at the final town and talk to Namingway.