The A-Z Of Final Fantasy: Everything You Need To Know

I - Ifrit

One of the most popular and commonly recurring summons is the fiery beast Ifrit. An elemental summons, Ifrit inflicts fire based damage on your foes in glorious style. Ifrit is always a middle weight summon and usually comes as a part of the narrative. By far the best incarnation of Ifrit is FF10, where you can use him as a playable character and even duel with other summoners. In fairness, the summoning is just all round the best it has ever been in FF10, but Ifrit is no exception.

J - JRPG

This might seem a cheap cop-out for 'J' but lets look at the genre which the FF franchise helped to create. It has long been accepted that Japanese Role Playing Games are unique among other RPGs, even if they are often very similar to one another. In recent years game developers have put a lot of effort into modernising the JRPG and have moved away from what we now call the 'traditional JRPG'. A traditional JRPG will usually feature the following: random battles, turn based combat, level grinding, a party of various fighting classes and a long and usually world changing story. Many of these elements are still present in some form or another in the modern JRPG but many have moved away from tropes such as random battles and straight up turn based combat. While other huge JRPG franchises like Dragon Quest have retained a very traditional gameplay model, the FF franchise has evolved dramatically and while the action is now more kinetic and exciting and the monsters are visible from a distance the experience is still distinctly Japanese.

K - Knights of the Round

For the many, many fans of FF7, Knights of the Round is the ultimate boon. An insane summoning that has 13 knights attack your foe in succession. The real beauty is that each knight's attack has 3 strikes to it that individually takes off a huge amount of life. Very few things get up afterwards!

L - Leveling Up

Whether you love or hate RPGs usually comes down to your stance on leveling up. Some people find it utterly addictive, some people find it utterly boring. I'm one of the former as nothing thrills me more in gaming than making my character marginally stronger than he or she was a minute ago. The FF games have a wide variety of leveling methods. Some of the titles such as FF9 gradually increase your main stats with each level, and use weapons, armour and items to buff your character. Others, like FF10, give you total control over your character, even down to raising their HP or luck. This level of micro-managing is one of the key factors that differentiates JRPGs from Western RPGs. It is also one of the reasons that a series as long running as the FF franchise can still feel fresh and innovative after 25 years!