11 Things We Miss From Final Fantasy

Of all the complaints about modern games, the loudest and most frequent is that they have become increasingly diluted. Piece by piece, genres have been stripped of all the features that once made them so appealing, as the push for Hollywood production values - and the resultant production costs - have put actual content at a premium.

RPGs in particular have suffered, and especially Final Fantasy. One of the most thrilling aspects of any of the early games in the series was stepping out onto the game's map for the first time, presented with a vast world to explore. The sensation was later replicated as different modes of transport became available, from submarines to cars to airships, as gradually more of the uncharted globe opened up.

The map served important narrative purposes also; nothing can match the sensation of liberation than stepping out of Midgar for the first time, or the thrill of breaking free from Figaro to the wider world on the back of a chocobo.

Technical limitations - as well as dubious storyline demands - abolished the map for Final Fantasy X, as the player essentially walked in a straight line from the most southern tip of Spira to the most northern. Imagine walking from Patagonia to Alaska. That was Final Fantasy X. Apparently that's more realistic than having an oversized representative avatar walking around a globe.

An airship was eventually made available, but instead of having the freedom to explore the watery world, players instead could only choose locations from a menu. Thrilling.

Though Final Fantasies XII and XIII both offered big open plains to explore, ironically the games felt smaller due to a lack of world map. The Final Fantasy VII remake also looks set to dispense with this great tradition from the series - presumably because the developers are embarrassed about having a giant Cloud avatar roam the planet, aesthetically incongruous with the rest of their 'stylish' reimagining.