Everything old is new again in the Final Fantasy franchise. Dormant entries in the aged series are becoming relevant once again with shiny new releases, whether they're the Final Fantasy Pixel Remaster series bringing new-yet-old sprite work to the classic franchise, or the Final Fantasy 7 Remake series, which is telling the old story of Final Fantasy 7 in a whole new way. Between those and the effort over the past few years to release upgraded versions of Final Fantasy 7, 8, 9, 10, 10-2, and the upgraded version of 12 onto modern consoles, the entirety of Final Fantasy is available to modern players in some kind of enhanced version.
Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin looks to shake up that mold. Taking an approach comparable to Final Fantasy 7 Remake but with its own twist, Stranger of Paradise seeks to adapt the original Final Fantasy as a heavily actionized Soulslike comparable to developer Team Ninja’s Nioh games. This is a significant reimagining of what the source game was, and also a striking use of the first Final Fantasy after Square Enix had spent so long doing little more than take imagery from it. If this endeavor is a success, there’s a chance that fans could be looking at a new template for how Square Enix treats its older titles over the next several years.
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One notable commonality between Final Fantasy Origin and Final Fantasy 7 Remake is that they’ve both taken turn-based games and translated them into action games. FFO in particular is especially action-oriented due to the expertise of Team Ninja, yet it still adapts classic job and magic systems that have been around since the NES games. Set beside Final Fantasy 15 and 16, it seems like action RPGs, sometimes bordering on full action games with leveling and in-depth customization, are where Square Enix wants the series to go.
This shift towards action games isn’t the only evidence that such a direction is being applied to most of the Final Fantasy brands. Square Enix is building up new franchises and development studios to fulfill the demand for new “old school” turn-based RPGs. Tokyo RPG Factory and its small set of games was a somewhat unsuccessful venture, but Dragon Quest, the Bravely Default games, Octopath Traveler, and soon Project Triangle Strategy were all much more successful. Fans would still like to see classics like Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger rendered like Octopath’s “HD sprites over 3D environments,” but that can wait while the action remakes and new turn-based titles take their turns.
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The upcoming games most likely to fit this template are all probably going to be based on much older titles. It’s easy to see a path Square Enix can take where it and its business partners gradually work on remaking the oldest Final Fantasy games. This could be done in chronological order, or it could be done by popularity. Many Final Fantasy 6, 8, and 9 fans have been clamoring to see their games get more love. While FF9 is getting a show soon, 6 and 8 have been left with HD remasters. FF7R takes priority over high-profile projects like that for now, but remakes of those in a similar vein could pop up eventually.
However, more relevant to the immediate future is the classic NES and somewhat less famous SNES titles. If Team Ninja stays on tap as a partner developer for Final Fantasy’s future, more games like Stranger of Paradise could be made out of the older games. With that being said, they wouldn’t necessarily need to come off as edgier alternate tellings like FFO. Chances are, Jack and his obsession with killing Chaos aren’t making it out of his home game. His storyline was based on an old idea Tetsuya Nomura had been workshopping anyways, rather than anything directly from Final Fantasy 1.
That does raise the question of how these old games could be adapted. The first Final Fantasy fits as a straightforward dungeon-crawler, as do all of the games before FF6. However, they also all have more established characters. Despite their weak writing compared to modern games, Final Fantasy 2 and 3 do have set casts, especially if the rewritten DS remake of FF3 is taken into consideration. If more action-RPG remakes are pursued, then even within Stranger of Paradise’s proposed template there would have to be variance based on just how many new plot elements or characters could be permitted, and, without knowing how FFO looks between its dungeons, how much focus the world itself gets as its own sort of character. No one would want to lose all the charm and memorable moments from these old games.
To get an idea of how these sorts of remakes would go, one could simply imagine how Final Fantasy 2 would look reimagined as an action game. The core party is made up of written characters rather than total blank slates like FF1, so they could be kept. The potential for many different playstyles and even something like the job progression system of FFO is still there, as FF2 always allowed players to build in any direction they pleased. One could extend this to FF3 and FF5 as well, which encouraged frequent job switching. Really, Final Fantasy 2 as Final Fantasy Origin with more town areas would work quite well. FF4 and FF6 would just need to take a structural approach closer to the linear, plot-driven FF7 Remake.
Classic Final Fantasy titles have their fans and are an important part of the franchise’s legacy that should be preserved and remembered. With the preservation job already complete, there’s no reason not to set aside the time, talent, and budget to give these games full remakes full of new gameplay and modern visuals. Even those who don’t appreciate the heavily action-oriented direction Square Enix’s biggest franchise is heading in must admit that seeing these Final Fantasy games get love, attention, and a new chance to shine on modern hardware isn’t a bad thing. Hopefully, Square Enix carries on the work it’s doing with Final Fantasy Origin and Final Fantasy 7 Remake into other classic entries.
Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin releases in 2022 for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.