Final Fantasy VIII
Encyclopedia
is a role-playing video game
released for the PlayStation in 1999 and for Windows
-based personal computer
s in 2000. It was developed and published by Square
(now Square Enix
) as the Final Fantasy
series' eighth title, removing magic point
-based spell-casting and the first title to consistently use realistically proportioned characters.
The game's story focuses on a group of young mercenaries who are drawn into an international conflict, and seek to protect the world from a sorceress manipulating the war for her own purposes. The main protagonist is Squall Leonhart
, a 17-year-old reclusive loner and student at the military academy Balamb Garden, who is training to become a "SeeD", a mercenary paid by the academy.
The development of Final Fantasy VIII began in 1997, during the English localization process of Final Fantasy VII
. The music was scored by Nobuo Uematsu
, series regular, and in a series first, the theme music is a vocal piece, "Eyes on Me", performed by Faye Wong
. The game was positively received by critics and was a commercial success. It was voted the 22nd-best game of all time by readers of the Japanese magazine Famitsu
. Thirteen weeks after its release, Final Fantasy VIII had earned more than US$50 million in sales, making it the fastest-selling Final Fantasy title of all time until Final Fantasy XIII
, a multi-platform release. The game has shipped 8.15 million copies worldwide as of March 31, 2003.
The game became available on PlayStation Network as a PSone Classics title in Japan on September 24, 2009, in the US on December 17, 2009, and in Europe on February 4, 2010.
, the field map, and the battle screen. The world map is a 3D
display in which the player may navigate freely across a small-scale rendering of the game world. Characters travel across the world map in a variety of ways, including by foot, car, Chocobo
, train, and airship. The field map consists of controllable 3D characters overlaid on one or more 2D
pre-rendered
backgrounds, which represent environmental locations such as towns or forests. The battle screen is a 3D model of a location such as a street or room, where turn-based fights between playable characters and CPU
-controlled enemies take place. The interface is menu-driven, as in previous titles, but with the typical weapon and armor systems removed and new features present, such as the Junction system. Also featured is a collectible card-based minigame
called "Triple Triad".
Final Fantasy VIII uses a battle system based on summon-able monsters called "Guardian Forces", abbreviated in-game as "GF." Assigning ("junctioning") a GF onto a character allows the player to use battle commands beyond Attack with the main weapon, such as Magic, GF (to summon the junctioned GF and have it perform an action), and Item. While previous Final Fantasy titles provided each character with a limited pool of magic point
s that were consumed by each spell, in Final Fantasy VIII, spells are acquired ("drawn") either from enemies in battle, Draw Points distributed throughout the game's environments, or by refining items and cards. Spells are then stocked on characters as quantified inventory (up to 100 per spell and limited to 32 distinct spells per character) and are consumed one by one when used. Characters can also junction these spells onto their statistics
—such as Strength, Vitality, and Luck—for various bonuses, provided the character has junctioned a Guardian Force. The junction system's flexibility affords the player a wide range of customization options.
The use of summoned creatures for anything other than a single devastating attack during battle was a significant departure for the Final Fantasy series. The junction system also acts as a substitute for armor and accessories used in previous titles to enhance the characters' statistics. Moreover, where earlier titles required weapons to be equipped and tailored to the character, each major character in Final Fantasy VIII features a unique weapon which can be upgraded, affecting its appearance, power, and Limit Break.
, while various status afflictions can prevent Limit Breaks. They are similar to the Desperation Attacks of Final Fantasy VI
, as they are randomly triggered when a character's health falls below a certain level and his or her Hit Points are in yellow instead of white.
Final Fantasy VIII also introduced interactive elements to complement Limit Break animations. These interactive sequences, which vary between character, weapon, and Limit Break range from randomly selected magic spells to precisely timed button inputs. Successfully completing an interactive sequence increases the resulting attack's potency.
Final Fantasy VIII used an experience point
and level system quite different from previous games in the series. While EXP is awarded after battling and defeating enemies, who are predominantly encountered randomly, and contribute to the continued strengthening and level-gaining of the characters, here the similarity ends. While levels in previous games required ever-increasing amounts of EXP to surmount (e.g., getting to level 2 might require 200 experience points, level 3 might require 400, etc.), characters in Final Fantasy VIII gain a level after accumulating 1000 points. The enemies' levels around the world, furthermore, scales depending on the average level of the active party, as opposed to most RPGs where enemies from previously-visited locations in the game are often weak and easily defeated; however, some enemies do not receive level-scaling, and remain at static levels. Higher-level enemies are capable of inflicting and withstanding significantly more damage, may have additional special attacks, and carry additional magic spells, allowing for Junctioning bonuses which themselves far exceed the bonuses imparted by level-gain.
In addition to gaining levels, Guardian Forces earn Ability Points (AP) after battles, which are automatically allocated to special abilities that Guardian Forces can learn. When a Guardian Force has learned an ability, that ability becomes available for any character who that junctions the GF or the character party, as is the case with field abilities. These abilities allow characters to attack more efficiently, refine magic spells from items, receive stat bonuses upon leveling up, access shops remotely and use additional battle commands.
of broken sections of land that have drifted apart. Islands and marine structures flesh out the rest of the game world, and a handful of off-world locations round out the game's playable areas.
The six main protagonists in Final Fantasy VIII are Squall Leonhart
, a loner who keeps his focus on his duty to avoid vulnerability; Rinoa Heartilly, an outspoken and passionate young woman who follows her heart in all situations; Quistis Trepe, an instructor with a serious, patient attitude; Zell Dincht, a martial artist
with a passion for hot dogs; Selphie Tilmitt, a cheerful girl who loves trains and pilots the airship Ragnarok; and Irvine Kinneas, a marksman
and consummate ladies' man. Temporarily playable characters include Laguna Loire, Kiros Seagill, and Ward Zabac, who appear in "flashback" sequences, and antagonists Seifer Almasy and Edea Kramer.
After the team escapes, Edea launches a missile attack on Trabia Garden. Fearing that Balamb Garden is the next target of Edea's revenge, the team splits into two units. Squall's group returns to Balamb to warn of the attack, but must first stop an internal Garden conflict incited by NORG, SeeD's financier. Selphie's team travels to the Missile Base to stop the launch, but fails. Squall inadvertently turns Balamb Garden into a mobile fortress, allowing the facility to evade the missiles; however, unable to control the Garden, it collides with the docks at Fishermans' Horizon. While local technicians repair the Garden, the Galbadian Army invade in search of a girl named Ellone, who had been staying at Balamb Garden until recently. Ellone eventually escapes to Esthar, the world's technological superpower. During Squall's meeting with Ellone, he learns that she had been "sending" him and his allies into flashbacks set 17 years in the past in a vain effort to alter the present. The scenes center on Laguna and his two friends, Kiros and Ward. During the flashbacks, Laguna changes from a Galbadian soldier to the defender of a country village, and then moves from being the leader of a resistance movement against Sorceress Adel to the President of Esthar.
Meanwhile, Squall confronts his personal anxieties fueled by ongoing developments, such as Headmaster Cid appointing him as SeeD's new leader, and his increasing attraction to Rinoa. While investigating Trabia Garden's wreckage, Squall and his comrades learn that they, along with Seifer and Ellone, were all raised (with the exception of Rinoa) in an orphanage run by Edea; they later developed amnesia due to their use of Guardian Forces. It is also revealed that Cid and Edea had established Garden and SeeD primarily to defeat corrupt sorceresses. After these revelations, the forces of Balamb Garden and the Galbadian Army, led by Squall and Seifer respectively, engage in battle above the orphanage. After Balamb defeats Galbadia, the player learns that Edea is merely an unwilling tool for "Ultimecia", a powerful sorceress from the future who wishes to compress time into a single moment; it is for this reason she has sought Ellone. Edea loses a decisive battle against the SeeD, forcing Ultimecia to transfer her powers to Rinoa; Edea survives, but Rinoa enters a coma. Squall becomes obsessed with waking her and goes to Esthar to find Ellone, as he believes that she can help save Rinoa.
While Rinoa is being treated on Esthar's space station, Ultimecia uses her to free Sorceress Adel from her orbital prison. Ultimecia then orders Seifer to activate the Lunatic Pandora facility, inciting a rain of creatures from the moon that sends Adel's containment device to the planet. Having selected Adel as her next host, Ultimecia abandons Rinoa in outer space. Squall rescues her, and they return to the planet on a derelict starship. Upon their landing, delegates from Esthar isolate Rinoa for fear of her sorceress abilities, forcing Squall to rescue her. President Laguna apologizes for the incident and announces Dr. Odine's plan to let Ultimecia possess Rinoa, have Ellone send Rinoa (and thus Ultimecia as well) to the past and then retrieve only Rinoa back to the present, enabling Ultimecia to achieve Time Compression, as it would allow Squall's group to confront Ultimecia in her time. To do this, Squall's team infiltrates Lunatic Pandora, defeats Seifer and Adel, and has Rinoa inherit Adel's sorceress powers. Time Compression is thus initiated; Squall and his allies travel to Ultimecia's era and defeat her.
With Ultimecia defeated, the universe begins returning to normal; however, Squall is nearly lost in the flow of time as he witnesses the origins of the game's story. When a dying Ultimecia travels back in time to pass her powers to Edea, Squall informs Edea of the concepts of Garden and SeeD that she will create. Afterward, he is able to properly recollect his memories and thus return to the present. The end cinematic depicts the events after Squall's return to the present. Seifer is once again reunited with Raijin and Fujin; Laguna visits Raine's grave (and remembers his proposal to her) along with Ellone, Ward, and Kiros; and a celebration takes place in the Garden, with Squall and Rinoa kissing one another under the moonlight.
translation of Final Fantasy VII. As with much of the production of Final Fantasy VII
, series creator and veteran Hironobu Sakaguchi
served as the executive producer
, working primarily on the development of Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within
and leaving direction of Final Fantasy VIII to Yoshinori Kitase
. Shinji Hashimoto
was assigned to be the producer in Sakaguchi's place, while the battle system was designed by Hiroyuki Ito
.
and art director Yusuke Naora
strove to achieve this impression through the inclusion of realistically proportioned characters—a departure from the super deformed
designs used in the previous title. Additionally, Naora attempted to enhance the realism of the world through predominantly bright lighting effects with shadows distributed as appropriate. Other measures taken included implementing rental cars for travel in-game, and the use of motion capture
technology to give the game's characters lifelike movements in the game's full motion video
sequences.
In an interview with Famitsu
, Naora described that the game was generally designed to be a "bright, fresh Final Fantasy." The designers felt a need to invert the atmosphere of previous games in the series, which had feelings of "light emerging from darkness". This decision was easy for the developers to make, because most of them had worked on Final Fantasy VII and felt that a new direction was acceptable. The world designs were also developed with the knowledge that most of the staff were now used to computer graphics
, which was not the case with Final Fantasy VII. The developers also noted that with Final Fantasy VIII, they attempted to "mix future, real life and fantasy." As part of a theme desired by Kitase to give the game a foreign atmosphere, various designs were given to its locations using the style of internationally familiar places, while also maintaining a fantasy
atmosphere. Inspiration ranged from ancient Egypt
ian and Greek architecture
, to the city of Paris, France, to an idealized futuristic European society. Flags were also given to some factions, their designs based on the group's history and culture. In contrast, in an interview with the Official UK PlayStation Magazine, it was stated that Triple Triad was added to the game because cards were a popular hobby in Japan.
To maintain a foreign atmosphere, the characters of the game were designed to have predominantly European appearances. The first Final Fantasy VIII character created was Squall. Desiring to add a unique angle to Squall's appearance and emphasize his role as the central character, Nomura gave him a scar across his brow and the bridge of his nose. As there was not yet a detailed history conceived for the character, Nomura left the explanation for Squall's scar to scenario writer Kazushige Nojima
. Squall was given a gunblade, a fictional revolver
–sword
hybrid that functions primarily as a sword, with an added damaging vibration feature activated by use of its gun mechanism, similar to a vibroblade. His character design was complemented by a fur lining along the collar of his jacket, incorporated by Nomura as a challenge for the game's full motion video
designers. Additionally, some designs Nomura had previously drawn, but had not yet used in a Final Fantasy game, were incorporated into Final Fantasy VIII. These were the designs of Edea, Fujin and Raijin. The latter two had originally been designed for use in Final Fantasy VII, but with the inclusion of the Turks characters in that game, it was felt that Fujin and Raijin were unnecessary. Nomura had designed Edea before the development of Final Fantasy VII, based on the style of Yoshitaka Amano
. For the Guardian Forces, Nomura felt they should be unique beings, without clothes or other human-like concepts. This was problematic, as he did not want them to "become the actual monsters", so he took great care in their design. Leviathan was the first GF, created as a test and included in a game demo
. After it received a positive reaction from players, Nomura decided to create the remaining sequences in a similar fashion.
and Squall. With Final Fantasy VIII, however, Nojima worked to give players actual insight into what the character was thinking; a direct contrast with his handling of Final Fantasy VII, which encouraged the player to speculate. This approach to Final Fantasy VIII is reflected by the frequent use of dialogue that takes place solely within Squall's mind, allowing the player to read his thoughts and understand what he is thinking or feeling even when he keeps those thoughts to himself.
. An origami
book was released in November 1999. On September 22, 1999, a CD-ROM
titled Final Fantasy VIII Desktop Accessories was released. It contains desktop icons
, computer wallpaper
s, screensaver
s, and an e-mail
application. It additionally features a stand-alone edition of the Triple Triad minigame
, which allowed players to compete against one another via a local area network
.
Also in 1999, the ballroom dance scene of Final Fantasy VIII was featured as a technical demo
for the PlayStation 2
. In 2000, a PC
version was released for Windows
. This port featured smoother graphics, enhanced audio, and the inclusion of Chocobo World, a minigame
starring Boko, a Chocobo featured in one of the side-quests
in Final Fantasy VIII. For most North American and European players, the PC version of the game was the only means of playing Chocobo World, as the game was originally designed to be played via the PocketStation
, a handheld console never released outside Japan. In 2009, Final Fantasy VIII was added to the PlayStation Store
on the PlayStation Network.
wrote the soundtrack for Final Fantasy VIII. He tried to base the songs off of the emotional content of when they would be played, asserting that expressing the emotions he desires is more important than improving skills: "I think it will be a shame if we won't be able to cry as we play our own game". He could not determine a character's emotions solely based on the plot, instead using images of appearance and attire—"It's important to know when their emotions are at their height, but it usually takes until a month before release for them to finish the ending dialog...!" In response to a question by IGN music stating that the music of Final Fantasy VIII was very dark and perhaps influenced by the plot of the game, Uematsu stated "the atmosphere of music varies depending on story line, of course, but it's also my intention to put various types of music into one game". The absence of character themes found in the previous two games was due to Uematsu finding those of Final Fantasy VI
and Final Fantasy VII
ineffective. Uematsu considers it reasonable to have character themes if each character has a "highlight" in the game, but he found Final Fantasy VIII only focused on Squall Leonhart
and Rinoa Heartilly as a couple, resulting in the "Eyes on Me" theme.
The original soundtrack was released on four Compact Disc
s by DigiCube
in Japan on March 10, 1999, and by Square EA in North America as Final Fantasy VIII Music Collection in January 2000. It was republished worldwide by Square Enix on May 10, 2004. An album of orchestra
l arrangement
s of selected tracks from the game was released under the title Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec Final Fantasy VIII on November 19, 1999 by DigiCube
, and subsequently published on July 22, 2004 by Square Enix
. The pieces were arranged and conducted by Shiro Hamaguchi
for a live orchestra. A collection of piano
arrangements performed by Shinko Ogata was released under the title Piano Collections: Final Fantasy VIII by DigiCube
on January 21, 2000 and subsequently re-published by Square Enix
on July 22, 2004.
The score is best known for two songs: "Liberi Fatali", a Latin
choral
piece that is played during the introduction to the game, and "Eyes On Me", a pop song
serving as the game's theme, performed by Chinese
singer Faye Wong
. Near the end of the production of Final Fantasy VII, the developers suggested to use a singer, but abandoned the idea due to a lack of reasoning based on the game's theme and storyline. However, Nobuo Uematsu thought a ballad would closely relate to the theme and characters of Final Fantasy VIII. This resulted in the game's developers sharing "countless" artists, eventually deciding on Wong. Uematsu claims "her voice and mood seem to match my image of the song exactly", and that her ethnicity "fits the international image of Final Fantasy". After negotiations were made, "Eyes on Me" was recorded in Hong Kong with an orchestra
. The song was released as a CD single
in Japan and sold over 400,000 copies, setting the record for highest-selling video game music disc ever released in that country at the time. "Liberi Fatali" was played during the 2004 Summer Olympics
in Athens
during the women's synchronized swimming event.
The music of Final Fantasy VIII has appeared in various official Final Fantasy concerts
. These include 2002's 20020220 Music from FINAL FANTASY, in which the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra
played "Liberi Fatali", "Don't Be Afraid", "Love Grows", and "The Man with the Machine Gun", the 2004 Tour de Japon series, which featured "The Oath", the Dear Friends series that began that same year and included "Liberi Fatali" and "Love Grows", and the 2005 More Friends concert, which included "Maybe I'm a Lion". More recent concerts include the Voices – Music from Final Fantasy 2006 concert showcasing "Liberi Fatali", "Fisherman's Horizon", and "Eyes on Me" and the international Distant Worlds concert tour that continues to date, which includes "Liberi Fatali", "Fisherman's Horizon", "Man with the Machine Gun", and "Love Grows". Several of these concerts have produced live albums as well. Music from the game has also been played in non Final Fantasy-specific concerts such as the Play! A Video Game Symphony
world tour from 2006 onwards, for which Nobuo Uematsu composed the opening fanfare that accompanies each performance.
s list of "Top 10 Video Game Openings", and first by IGN
. GameSpy
listed it as the 15th best cinematic moment in video games. IGN additionally named the game's ending the third best of any game for the PlayStation, while UGO.com named it one of the series' best and most memorable moments. Final Fantasy VIII was voted by readers of Japanese magazine Famitsu
as the 22nd best game of all time in 2006, and named one of the 20 essential Japanese role-playing games by Gamasutra
, stating "[t]here's a lot that Final Fantasy VIII does wrong, but there's even more that it does right".
Reviews of the gameplay have been mixed. IGN felt that it was the weakest aspect of the game, citing its Guardian Force attack sequences as "incredibly cinematic" but tedious, sentiments echoed by Electronic Gaming Monthly
. They also regarded the battle system as intensely complicated, yet refreshingly innovative and something that "RPG fanatics love to obsess over". Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine claims that the game's Junction system is a major flaw due to repetitive stocking of spells, while the UK-based video game magazine Edge
commented that the battle system consists of a "bewildering" number of intricate options and techniques that "most gamers will [...] relish". GameSpot
praised the game's battle system, commenting that the "possibilities for customization [with the Junction system] are immense".
In general, Final Fantasy VIII has been compared favorably to its predecessors. Though questioning the game's lack of voice overs for its characters, Game Revolution praised its storyline and ending. For their part, Edge labeled Final Fantasy VIII "a far more accomplished game than FFVII". On the other hand, the magazine also felt that the game's length left its story unable to "offer consistently strong dialogue and sub-plots". Additionally, it found some of the story's plot twists "not... suitably manipulated and prepared", leaving it "hard not to greet such... moments with anything but indifference". Overall, Edge considered Final Fantasy VIII to be "yet another outstanding edition of SquareSoft's far-from-final fantasies", summarizing it as "aesthetically astonishing, rarely less than compelling, and near peerless in scope and execution". Electronic Gaming Monthly offered similar comments, stating that the game's character development "is the best of any RPG's" and that "Final Fantasy VIII is the pinnacle of its genre." UGO.com stated that while no other game in the series had stirred the controversy that Final Fantasy VIII had and that it was flawed, Final Fantasy VIII was a "daring, groundbreaking game [...] decidedly the most original console-style RPG ever created". In 2002, IGN named the game the seventh best title for the PlayStation of all time, placing higher on the list than Final Fantasy VII and described as "[taking] all of its strong points, and [making] them better".
The PC port received mixed reception. Maximum PC
praised the full motion video sequences as "phenomenal", adding that while the gameplay took getting used to, they enjoyed the teamwork emphasized by it, and that the game's visual presentation added to its appeal. GameSpy stated that while the game was not a "huge leap forward" from the previous title, its gameplay and visual appeal worked for its benefit, though that on a computer the pre-rendered backgrounds appeared blurry and the controls at time difficult with a keyboard. GameSpot criticized the game for not taking advantage of the capabilities afforded to computers at the time, describing the PlayStation version as both looking and sounding superior, and recommending that the title was "not worth buying period" for the PC. UGO.com also described the port as inferior to its original counterpart, adding that its presentation was in turn detrimental to the reception the game received as a whole. Computer Gaming World
praised some of the changes made to the game in light of previous titles and the inclusion of the Triple Triad sub-game, though heavily criticized the port as "lazy" and "disappointing", stating that it only served to emphasize the original game's flaws. Despite their complaints however, they named the game the twentieth best game of 2000.
Role-playing video game
Role-playing video games are a video game genre with origins in pen-and-paper role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, using much of the same terminology, settings and game mechanics. The player in RPGs controls one character, or several adventuring party members, fulfilling one or many quests...
released for the PlayStation in 1999 and for Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
-based personal computer
Personal computer
A personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...
s in 2000. It was developed and published by Square
Square Co.
was a Japanese video game company founded in September 1983 by Masafumi Miyamoto. It merged with Enix in 2003 and became part of Square Enix...
(now Square Enix
Square Enix
is a Japanese video game and publishing company best known for its console role-playing game franchises, which include the Final Fantasy series, the Dragon Quest series, and the action-RPG Kingdom Hearts series...
) as the Final Fantasy
Final Fantasy
is a media franchise created by Hironobu Sakaguchi, and is developed and owned by Square Enix . The franchise centers on a series of fantasy and science-fantasy role-playing video games , but includes motion pictures, anime, printed media, and other merchandise...
series' eighth title, removing magic point
Magic point
Magic points are units of magical power that are used in many role-playing, computer role-playing and similar games as an expendable resource that is needed to pay for magic spells and other abilities, such as special attacks...
-based spell-casting and the first title to consistently use realistically proportioned characters.
The game's story focuses on a group of young mercenaries who are drawn into an international conflict, and seek to protect the world from a sorceress manipulating the war for her own purposes. The main protagonist is Squall Leonhart
Squall Leonhart
is the main protagonist of Final Fantasy VIII, a role-playing game by Square . He was designed by Tetsuya Nomura, with heavy influences coming from game director Yoshinori Kitase. Squall has appeared in several other games, such as the Kingdom Hearts series, where he appears under the name ;...
, a 17-year-old reclusive loner and student at the military academy Balamb Garden, who is training to become a "SeeD", a mercenary paid by the academy.
The development of Final Fantasy VIII began in 1997, during the English localization process of Final Fantasy VII
Final Fantasy VII
is a role-playing video game developed by Square and published by Sony Computer Entertainment as the seventh installment in the Final Fantasy series. It was originally released in 1997 for the Sony PlayStation and was re-released in 1998 for Microsoft Windows-based personal computers and in 2009...
. The music was scored by Nobuo Uematsu
Nobuo Uematsu
is a Japanese video game composer, best known for scoring the majority of titles in the Final Fantasy series. He is considered as one of the most famous and respected composers in the video game community...
, series regular, and in a series first, the theme music is a vocal piece, "Eyes on Me", performed by Faye Wong
Faye Wong
Faye Wong is a highly successful and influential Chinese singer-songwriter and actress who is usually referred to as a diva . Early in her career she briefly used the stage name Shirley Wong . Born in Beijing, she moved to Hong Kong in 1987 and rose to stardom in the early 1990s by singing...
. The game was positively received by critics and was a commercial success. It was voted the 22nd-best game of all time by readers of the Japanese magazine Famitsu
Famitsu
is a line of Japanese video game magazines published by Enterbrain, Inc. and Tokuma. Currently, there are five Famitsū magazines: Shūkan Famitsū, Famitsū PS3 + PSP, Famitsū Xbox 360, Famitsū Wii+DS, and Famitsū Wave DVD...
. Thirteen weeks after its release, Final Fantasy VIII had earned more than US$50 million in sales, making it the fastest-selling Final Fantasy title of all time until Final Fantasy XIII
Final Fantasy XIII
is a console role-playing video game developed and published by Square Enix for the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360. Released in 2009 in Japan and 2010 in North America and PAL regions, it is the thirteenth major installment in the Final Fantasy series...
, a multi-platform release. The game has shipped 8.15 million copies worldwide as of March 31, 2003.
The game became available on PlayStation Network as a PSone Classics title in Japan on September 24, 2009, in the US on December 17, 2009, and in Europe on February 4, 2010.
Gameplay
Like any Final Fantasy before it, Final Fantasy VIII consists of three main modes of play: the world mapOverworld
An overworld is, in a broad sense, an area within a video game that interconnects all its levels or locations. They are mostly common in role-playing games, though this does not exclude other video game genres....
, the field map, and the battle screen. The world map is a 3D
3D computer graphics
3D computer graphics are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data that is stored in the computer for the purposes of performing calculations and rendering 2D images...
display in which the player may navigate freely across a small-scale rendering of the game world. Characters travel across the world map in a variety of ways, including by foot, car, Chocobo
Chocobo
A is a fictional creature from the Final Fantasy video game series. The creature is a large and normally flightless galliforme/ratite bird capable of being ridden and otherwise used by player characters during gameplay...
, train, and airship. The field map consists of controllable 3D characters overlaid on one or more 2D
2D computer graphics
2D computer graphics is the computer-based generation of digital images—mostly from two-dimensional models and by techniques specific to them...
pre-rendered
Pre-rendered
Pre-rendering is the process in which video footage is not rendered in real-time by the hardware that is outputing or playing back the video. Instead, the video is a recording of a footage that was previously rendered on a different equipment...
backgrounds, which represent environmental locations such as towns or forests. The battle screen is a 3D model of a location such as a street or room, where turn-based fights between playable characters and CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...
-controlled enemies take place. The interface is menu-driven, as in previous titles, but with the typical weapon and armor systems removed and new features present, such as the Junction system. Also featured is a collectible card-based minigame
Minigame
A minigame is a short video game often contained within another video game. A minigame is always smaller or more simplistic than the game in which it is contained. Minigames are sometimes also offered separately for free to promote the main game...
called "Triple Triad".
Junction system
Magic point
Magic points are units of magical power that are used in many role-playing, computer role-playing and similar games as an expendable resource that is needed to pay for magic spells and other abilities, such as special attacks...
s that were consumed by each spell, in Final Fantasy VIII, spells are acquired ("drawn") either from enemies in battle, Draw Points distributed throughout the game's environments, or by refining items and cards. Spells are then stocked on characters as quantified inventory (up to 100 per spell and limited to 32 distinct spells per character) and are consumed one by one when used. Characters can also junction these spells onto their statistics
Attribute (role-playing games)
An attribute is a piece of data that describes to what extent a fictional character in a role-playing game possesses a specific natural, in-born characteristic common to all characters in the game. That piece of data is usually an abstract number or, in some cases, a set of dice...
—such as Strength, Vitality, and Luck—for various bonuses, provided the character has junctioned a Guardian Force. The junction system's flexibility affords the player a wide range of customization options.
The use of summoned creatures for anything other than a single devastating attack during battle was a significant departure for the Final Fantasy series. The junction system also acts as a substitute for armor and accessories used in previous titles to enhance the characters' statistics. Moreover, where earlier titles required weapons to be equipped and tailored to the character, each major character in Final Fantasy VIII features a unique weapon which can be upgraded, affecting its appearance, power, and Limit Break.
Limit Breaks
Characters in Final Fantasy VIII have unique special attacks called "Limit Breaks", as in Final Fantasy VII. While the Limit Breaks in Final Fantasy VII are triggered after sufficient damage has been received, in Final Fantasy VIII, the availability of Limit Breaks depends on a character's current health—a Limit Break is more likely to be available to a character with low health. The magic spell Aura increases the probability of Limit Breaks appearing, regardless of a character's remaining hit pointsHealth (gaming)
Health is a game mechanic used in role-playing, computer and video games to give value to characters, enemies, NPCs, and related objects. This value can either be numerical, semi-numerical as in hit/health points, or arbitrary as in a life bar....
, while various status afflictions can prevent Limit Breaks. They are similar to the Desperation Attacks of Final Fantasy VI
Final Fantasy VI
is a role-playing video game developed and published by Square , released in 1994 for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System as a part of the Final Fantasy series. Set in a fantasy world with a technology level equivalent to that of the Second Industrial Revolution, the game's story focuses on a...
, as they are randomly triggered when a character's health falls below a certain level and his or her Hit Points are in yellow instead of white.
Final Fantasy VIII also introduced interactive elements to complement Limit Break animations. These interactive sequences, which vary between character, weapon, and Limit Break range from randomly selected magic spells to precisely timed button inputs. Successfully completing an interactive sequence increases the resulting attack's potency.
Experience levels
Experience point
An experience point is a unit of measurement used in many role-playing games and role-playing video games to quantify a player character's progression through the game...
and level system quite different from previous games in the series. While EXP is awarded after battling and defeating enemies, who are predominantly encountered randomly, and contribute to the continued strengthening and level-gaining of the characters, here the similarity ends. While levels in previous games required ever-increasing amounts of EXP to surmount (e.g., getting to level 2 might require 200 experience points, level 3 might require 400, etc.), characters in Final Fantasy VIII gain a level after accumulating 1000 points. The enemies' levels around the world, furthermore, scales depending on the average level of the active party, as opposed to most RPGs where enemies from previously-visited locations in the game are often weak and easily defeated; however, some enemies do not receive level-scaling, and remain at static levels. Higher-level enemies are capable of inflicting and withstanding significantly more damage, may have additional special attacks, and carry additional magic spells, allowing for Junctioning bonuses which themselves far exceed the bonuses imparted by level-gain.
In addition to gaining levels, Guardian Forces earn Ability Points (AP) after battles, which are automatically allocated to special abilities that Guardian Forces can learn. When a Guardian Force has learned an ability, that ability becomes available for any character who that junctions the GF or the character party, as is the case with field abilities. These abilities allow characters to attack more efficiently, refine magic spells from items, receive stat bonuses upon leveling up, access shops remotely and use additional battle commands.
Setting and characters
Most of Final Fantasy VIII is set on an unnamed fantasy world with one moon. The planet comprises five major landmasses, with Esthar, the largest, covering most of the eastern portion of the map. Galbadia, the second-largest continent, lies to the west, and contains many of the game's locations. The northernmost landmass is Trabia, an Arctic region. Positioned roughly in the middle of the world map lies Balamb, the smallest continent, the island on which the game begins. The remaining landmass is small and mostly desolate, riddled with rough, rocky terrain caused by the impact of a "Lunar Cry", an event where monsters from the moon fall to the planet. The southernmost landmass includes an archipelagoArchipelago
An archipelago , sometimes called an island group, is a chain or cluster of islands. The word archipelago is derived from the Greek ἄρχι- – arkhi- and πέλαγος – pélagos through the Italian arcipelago...
of broken sections of land that have drifted apart. Islands and marine structures flesh out the rest of the game world, and a handful of off-world locations round out the game's playable areas.
The six main protagonists in Final Fantasy VIII are Squall Leonhart
Squall Leonhart
is the main protagonist of Final Fantasy VIII, a role-playing game by Square . He was designed by Tetsuya Nomura, with heavy influences coming from game director Yoshinori Kitase. Squall has appeared in several other games, such as the Kingdom Hearts series, where he appears under the name ;...
, a loner who keeps his focus on his duty to avoid vulnerability; Rinoa Heartilly, an outspoken and passionate young woman who follows her heart in all situations; Quistis Trepe, an instructor with a serious, patient attitude; Zell Dincht, a martial artist
Martial arts
Martial arts are extensive systems of codified practices and traditions of combat, practiced for a variety of reasons, including self-defense, competition, physical health and fitness, as well as mental and spiritual development....
with a passion for hot dogs; Selphie Tilmitt, a cheerful girl who loves trains and pilots the airship Ragnarok; and Irvine Kinneas, a marksman
Marksman
A marksman is a person who is skilled in precision, or a sharpshooter shooting, using projectile weapons, such as with a rifle but most commonly with a sniper rifle, to shoot at long range targets...
and consummate ladies' man. Temporarily playable characters include Laguna Loire, Kiros Seagill, and Ward Zabac, who appear in "flashback" sequences, and antagonists Seifer Almasy and Edea Kramer.
Story
Final Fantasy VIII begins as Squall duels with Seifer in a training session outside the Balamb Garden military academy. Meanwhile, Galbadia invades the Dollet Dukedom, forcing Dollet to hire assistance from the Balamb Garden branch of "SeeD", Garden's elite mercenary force. SeeD uses the mission as a final examination for its cadets; with the help of his instructor, Quistis, Squall passes the mission's prerequisite and is grouped with Seifer and Zell. Seifer disobeys orders and abandons his team, forcing Selphie to accompany Squall and Zell for the duration of the mission. After the mission, SeeD halts the Galbadian advance; Squall, Zell, and Selphie graduate to SeeD status, while Seifer is disciplined for his disobedience. During the graduation party, Squall meets Rinoa, whose personality is apparently the opposite of his. When assigned with Zell and Selphie to help Rinoa's resistance faction in Galbadian-occupied Timber, Squall learns that a sorceress named Edea is behind Galbadia's recent hostilities. Under orders from Balamb and Galbadia Gardens, Squall and his comrades—now joined by Rinoa, Quistis, and Irvine—attempt to assassinate Edea. However, the sorceress thwarts the attempt, and the party is detained. During the attempt, Squall's party also learns that Seifer has left Garden to become Edea's second-in-command.After the team escapes, Edea launches a missile attack on Trabia Garden. Fearing that Balamb Garden is the next target of Edea's revenge, the team splits into two units. Squall's group returns to Balamb to warn of the attack, but must first stop an internal Garden conflict incited by NORG, SeeD's financier. Selphie's team travels to the Missile Base to stop the launch, but fails. Squall inadvertently turns Balamb Garden into a mobile fortress, allowing the facility to evade the missiles; however, unable to control the Garden, it collides with the docks at Fishermans' Horizon. While local technicians repair the Garden, the Galbadian Army invade in search of a girl named Ellone, who had been staying at Balamb Garden until recently. Ellone eventually escapes to Esthar, the world's technological superpower. During Squall's meeting with Ellone, he learns that she had been "sending" him and his allies into flashbacks set 17 years in the past in a vain effort to alter the present. The scenes center on Laguna and his two friends, Kiros and Ward. During the flashbacks, Laguna changes from a Galbadian soldier to the defender of a country village, and then moves from being the leader of a resistance movement against Sorceress Adel to the President of Esthar.
Meanwhile, Squall confronts his personal anxieties fueled by ongoing developments, such as Headmaster Cid appointing him as SeeD's new leader, and his increasing attraction to Rinoa. While investigating Trabia Garden's wreckage, Squall and his comrades learn that they, along with Seifer and Ellone, were all raised (with the exception of Rinoa) in an orphanage run by Edea; they later developed amnesia due to their use of Guardian Forces. It is also revealed that Cid and Edea had established Garden and SeeD primarily to defeat corrupt sorceresses. After these revelations, the forces of Balamb Garden and the Galbadian Army, led by Squall and Seifer respectively, engage in battle above the orphanage. After Balamb defeats Galbadia, the player learns that Edea is merely an unwilling tool for "Ultimecia", a powerful sorceress from the future who wishes to compress time into a single moment; it is for this reason she has sought Ellone. Edea loses a decisive battle against the SeeD, forcing Ultimecia to transfer her powers to Rinoa; Edea survives, but Rinoa enters a coma. Squall becomes obsessed with waking her and goes to Esthar to find Ellone, as he believes that she can help save Rinoa.
While Rinoa is being treated on Esthar's space station, Ultimecia uses her to free Sorceress Adel from her orbital prison. Ultimecia then orders Seifer to activate the Lunatic Pandora facility, inciting a rain of creatures from the moon that sends Adel's containment device to the planet. Having selected Adel as her next host, Ultimecia abandons Rinoa in outer space. Squall rescues her, and they return to the planet on a derelict starship. Upon their landing, delegates from Esthar isolate Rinoa for fear of her sorceress abilities, forcing Squall to rescue her. President Laguna apologizes for the incident and announces Dr. Odine's plan to let Ultimecia possess Rinoa, have Ellone send Rinoa (and thus Ultimecia as well) to the past and then retrieve only Rinoa back to the present, enabling Ultimecia to achieve Time Compression, as it would allow Squall's group to confront Ultimecia in her time. To do this, Squall's team infiltrates Lunatic Pandora, defeats Seifer and Adel, and has Rinoa inherit Adel's sorceress powers. Time Compression is thus initiated; Squall and his allies travel to Ultimecia's era and defeat her.
With Ultimecia defeated, the universe begins returning to normal; however, Squall is nearly lost in the flow of time as he witnesses the origins of the game's story. When a dying Ultimecia travels back in time to pass her powers to Edea, Squall informs Edea of the concepts of Garden and SeeD that she will create. Afterward, he is able to properly recollect his memories and thus return to the present. The end cinematic depicts the events after Squall's return to the present. Seifer is once again reunited with Raijin and Fujin; Laguna visits Raine's grave (and remembers his proposal to her) along with Ellone, Ward, and Kiros; and a celebration takes place in the Garden, with Squall and Rinoa kissing one another under the moonlight.
Development
Development of Final Fantasy VIII began in 1997, during the English languageEnglish language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
translation of Final Fantasy VII. As with much of the production of Final Fantasy VII
Final Fantasy VII
is a role-playing video game developed by Square and published by Sony Computer Entertainment as the seventh installment in the Final Fantasy series. It was originally released in 1997 for the Sony PlayStation and was re-released in 1998 for Microsoft Windows-based personal computers and in 2009...
, series creator and veteran Hironobu Sakaguchi
Hironobu Sakaguchi
is a Japanese game designer, game director and game producer. He is world famous as the creator of the Final Fantasy series, and has had a long career in gaming with over 100 million units of video games sold worldwide...
served as the executive producer
Executive producer
An executive producer is a producer who is not involved in any technical aspects of the film making or music process, but who is still responsible for the overall production...
, working primarily on the development of Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within
Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within
Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within is a 2001 Japanese-American computer animated science fiction film directed by Hironobu Sakaguchi, creator of the Final Fantasy series of role-playing video games. It was the first photorealistic computer animated feature film and also holds the record for the most...
and leaving direction of Final Fantasy VIII to Yoshinori Kitase
Yoshinori Kitase
is a Japanese game producer and former game director that has been working for Square Enix since April 1, 1990. He is mostly known for his work on the role-playing video game series Final Fantasy and is currently the manager of 1st Production Department....
. Shinji Hashimoto
Shinji Hashimoto
Shinji Hashimoto is a Japanese game producer. He currently works for Square Enix, which he joined in 1995, and has been the producer for several of their titles, including games in the Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts series...
was assigned to be the producer in Sakaguchi's place, while the battle system was designed by Hiroyuki Ito
Hiroyuki Ito
, also credited with the spelling Hiroyuki Itou, is a Japanese game producer, game director and game designer who has been working for Square Enix since 1987. He is famous for being the creator of Active Time Battle and Active Dimension Battle...
.
Visual design
From the beginning, Kitase knew he wanted a thematic combination of fantasy and realism. To this end, he aimed to include a cast of characters who appeared to be ordinary people. Character designer and battle visual director Tetsuya NomuraTetsuya Nomura
is a Japanese video game director and character designer working for Square Enix , best known for his work on both the Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts series.-Time before Square:Nomura was born in Kōchi, Japan...
and art director Yusuke Naora
Yusuke Naora
Yusuke Naora is a Japanese video game art director and character designer working for Square Enix . He served as the art director for several Final Fantasy and Compilation of Final Fantasy VII titles...
strove to achieve this impression through the inclusion of realistically proportioned characters—a departure from the super deformed
Super deformed
Super deformed or SD is a specific style of Japanese caricature where characters are drawn in an exaggerated way, typically small and chubby, with stubby limbs and oversized heads, to make them resemble small children...
designs used in the previous title. Additionally, Naora attempted to enhance the realism of the world through predominantly bright lighting effects with shadows distributed as appropriate. Other measures taken included implementing rental cars for travel in-game, and the use of motion capture
Motion capture
Motion capture, motion tracking, or mocap are terms used to describe the process of recording movement and translating that movement on to a digital model. It is used in military, entertainment, sports, and medical applications, and for validation of computer vision and robotics...
technology to give the game's characters lifelike movements in the game's full motion video
Full motion video
Full motion video based games are video games that rely upon pre-recorded TV-quality movie or animation rather than sprites, vectors, or 3D models to display action in the game. In the early 1990s a diverse set of games utilized this format...
sequences.
In an interview with Famitsu
Famitsu
is a line of Japanese video game magazines published by Enterbrain, Inc. and Tokuma. Currently, there are five Famitsū magazines: Shūkan Famitsū, Famitsū PS3 + PSP, Famitsū Xbox 360, Famitsū Wii+DS, and Famitsū Wave DVD...
, Naora described that the game was generally designed to be a "bright, fresh Final Fantasy." The designers felt a need to invert the atmosphere of previous games in the series, which had feelings of "light emerging from darkness". This decision was easy for the developers to make, because most of them had worked on Final Fantasy VII and felt that a new direction was acceptable. The world designs were also developed with the knowledge that most of the staff were now used to computer graphics
Computer graphics
Computer graphics are graphics created using computers and, more generally, the representation and manipulation of image data by a computer with help from specialized software and hardware....
, which was not the case with Final Fantasy VII. The developers also noted that with Final Fantasy VIII, they attempted to "mix future, real life and fantasy." As part of a theme desired by Kitase to give the game a foreign atmosphere, various designs were given to its locations using the style of internationally familiar places, while also maintaining a fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
atmosphere. Inspiration ranged from ancient Egypt
Ancient Egyptian architecture
The Nile valley has been the site of one of the most influential civilizations which developed a vast array of diverse structures encompassing ancient Egyptian architecture...
ian and Greek architecture
Architecture of Ancient Greece
The architecture of Ancient Greece is the architecture produced by the Greek-speaking people whose culture flourished on the Greek mainland and Peloponnesus, the Aegean Islands, and in colonies in Asia Minor and Italy for a period from about 900 BC until the 1st century AD, with the earliest...
, to the city of Paris, France, to an idealized futuristic European society. Flags were also given to some factions, their designs based on the group's history and culture. In contrast, in an interview with the Official UK PlayStation Magazine, it was stated that Triple Triad was added to the game because cards were a popular hobby in Japan.
To maintain a foreign atmosphere, the characters of the game were designed to have predominantly European appearances. The first Final Fantasy VIII character created was Squall. Desiring to add a unique angle to Squall's appearance and emphasize his role as the central character, Nomura gave him a scar across his brow and the bridge of his nose. As there was not yet a detailed history conceived for the character, Nomura left the explanation for Squall's scar to scenario writer Kazushige Nojima
Kazushige Nojima
is a Japanese game scenario writer and is the founder of Stellavista Ltd.. He is best known for writing parts of Square Enix's Final Fantasy video game series—namely Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VIII, Final Fantasy X, Final Fantasy X-2—and the Kingdom Hearts series...
. Squall was given a gunblade, a fictional revolver
Revolver
A revolver is a repeating firearm that has a cylinder containing multiple chambers and at least one barrel for firing. The first revolver ever made was built by Elisha Collier in 1818. The percussion cap revolver was invented by Samuel Colt in 1836. This weapon became known as the Colt Paterson...
–sword
Sword
A sword is a bladed weapon used primarily for cutting or thrusting. The precise definition of the term varies with the historical epoch or the geographical region under consideration...
hybrid that functions primarily as a sword, with an added damaging vibration feature activated by use of its gun mechanism, similar to a vibroblade. His character design was complemented by a fur lining along the collar of his jacket, incorporated by Nomura as a challenge for the game's full motion video
Full motion video
Full motion video based games are video games that rely upon pre-recorded TV-quality movie or animation rather than sprites, vectors, or 3D models to display action in the game. In the early 1990s a diverse set of games utilized this format...
designers. Additionally, some designs Nomura had previously drawn, but had not yet used in a Final Fantasy game, were incorporated into Final Fantasy VIII. These were the designs of Edea, Fujin and Raijin. The latter two had originally been designed for use in Final Fantasy VII, but with the inclusion of the Turks characters in that game, it was felt that Fujin and Raijin were unnecessary. Nomura had designed Edea before the development of Final Fantasy VII, based on the style of Yoshitaka Amano
Yoshitaka Amano
is a Japanese artist. He began his career as an animator and has become known for his illustrations for the anime Vampire Hunter D and for his character designs, image illustrations and title logo designs for the Final Fantasy video game series developed by Square Enix . His influences include...
. For the Guardian Forces, Nomura felt they should be unique beings, without clothes or other human-like concepts. This was problematic, as he did not want them to "become the actual monsters", so he took great care in their design. Leviathan was the first GF, created as a test and included in a game demo
Game demo
A game demo is a freely distributed demonstration or preview of an upcoming or recently released video game. Demos are typically released by the game's publisher to help consumers get a feel of the game before deciding whether to buy the full version....
. After it received a positive reaction from players, Nomura decided to create the remaining sequences in a similar fashion.
Story development
The plot of Final Fantasy VIII was conceived by Kitase, with the stories for the characters provided by Nomura and the actual scenario written by Nojima. During the game's pre-production, Nomura suggested the game be given a "school days" feel. Nojima already had a story in mind in which the main characters were the same age; their ideas meshed, taking form as the "Garden" military academies. Nojima planned that the two playable parties featured in the game (Squall's present day group and Laguna's group from the past) would be highly contrasted with one another. This idea was conveyed through the age and experience of Laguna's group, versus the youth and naïveté of Squall's group. Nojima has expressed that the dynamic of players' relationships with the protagonist is important to him. Both Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy VIII feature reserved, quiet protagonists in the form of Cloud StrifeCloud Strife
is a fictional character and the main protagonist in Square's role-playing game Final Fantasy VII and several of its sequels and spin-offs. His original design was created by Final Fantasy VII character designer Tetsuya Nomura...
and Squall. With Final Fantasy VIII, however, Nojima worked to give players actual insight into what the character was thinking; a direct contrast with his handling of Final Fantasy VII, which encouraged the player to speculate. This approach to Final Fantasy VIII is reflected by the frequent use of dialogue that takes place solely within Squall's mind, allowing the player to read his thoughts and understand what he is thinking or feeling even when he keeps those thoughts to himself.
Other media
In March 1999, one month after the game's release, Final Fantasy VIII Ultimania was published, a book that features an in-depth guide to Final Fantasy VIII and interviews with the developersVideo game developer
A video game developer is a software developer that creates video games. A developer may specialize in a certain video game console, such as Nintendo's Wii, Microsoft's Xbox 360, Sony's PlayStation 3, or may develop for a variety of systems, including personal computers.Most developers also...
. An origami
Origami
is the traditional Japanese art of paper folding, which started in the 17th century AD at the latest and was popularized outside Japan in the mid-1900s. It has since then evolved into a modern art form...
book was released in November 1999. On September 22, 1999, a CD-ROM
CD-ROM
A CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....
titled Final Fantasy VIII Desktop Accessories was released. It contains desktop icons
Icon (computing)
A computer icon is a pictogram displayed on a computer screen and used to navigate a computer system or mobile device. The icon itself is a small picture or symbol serving as a quick, intuitive representation of a software tool, function or a data file accessible on the system. It functions as an...
, computer wallpaper
Computer wallpaper
Wallpaper is an image used as a background of a graphical user interface on a computer screen or mobile communications device. On a computer it is usually for the desktop, while for a mobile phone it is usually the background for the 'home' or 'idle' screen...
s, screensaver
Screensaver
A screensaver is a type of computer program initially designed to prevent phosphor burn-in on CRT and plasma computer monitors by blanking the screen or filling it with moving images or patterns when the computer is not in use...
s, and an e-mail
E-mail
Electronic mail, commonly known as email or e-mail, is a method of exchanging digital messages from an author to one or more recipients. Modern email operates across the Internet or other computer networks. Some early email systems required that the author and the recipient both be online at the...
application. It additionally features a stand-alone edition of the Triple Triad minigame
Minigame
A minigame is a short video game often contained within another video game. A minigame is always smaller or more simplistic than the game in which it is contained. Minigames are sometimes also offered separately for free to promote the main game...
, which allowed players to compete against one another via a local area network
Local area network
A local area network is a computer network that interconnects computers in a limited area such as a home, school, computer laboratory, or office building...
.
Also in 1999, the ballroom dance scene of Final Fantasy VIII was featured as a technical demo
Technology demo
A tech demo is a prototype, rough example or an otherwise incomplete version of a product, put together with the primary purpose of showcasing the idea, performance, method or the features of the product...
for the PlayStation 2
PlayStation 2
The PlayStation 2 is a sixth-generation video game console manufactured by Sony as part of the PlayStation series. Its development was announced in March 1999 and it was first released on March 4, 2000, in Japan...
. In 2000, a PC
Personal computer
A personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...
version was released for Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
. This port featured smoother graphics, enhanced audio, and the inclusion of Chocobo World, a minigame
Minigame
A minigame is a short video game often contained within another video game. A minigame is always smaller or more simplistic than the game in which it is contained. Minigames are sometimes also offered separately for free to promote the main game...
starring Boko, a Chocobo featured in one of the side-quests
Quest (gaming)
A quest in role-playing video games — including massively multiplayer online role-playing games and their predecessors, MUDs — is a task that a player-controlled character or group of characters may complete in order to gain a reward...
in Final Fantasy VIII. For most North American and European players, the PC version of the game was the only means of playing Chocobo World, as the game was originally designed to be played via the PocketStation
PocketStation
The is a peripheral by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation home video game console. Categorized by Sony as a miniature personal digital assistant, the device features a monochrome liquid crystal display , infrared communication capability, a real-time clock, built-in flash memory, and...
, a handheld console never released outside Japan. In 2009, Final Fantasy VIII was added to the PlayStation Store
PlayStation Store
The PlayStation Store is an online virtual market available to users of Sony's PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable game consoles via the PlayStation Network. The Store offers a range of downloadable content both for purchase and available free of charge. Available content includes full games,...
on the PlayStation Network.
Music
Regular series composer Nobuo UematsuNobuo Uematsu
is a Japanese video game composer, best known for scoring the majority of titles in the Final Fantasy series. He is considered as one of the most famous and respected composers in the video game community...
wrote the soundtrack for Final Fantasy VIII. He tried to base the songs off of the emotional content of when they would be played, asserting that expressing the emotions he desires is more important than improving skills: "I think it will be a shame if we won't be able to cry as we play our own game". He could not determine a character's emotions solely based on the plot, instead using images of appearance and attire—"It's important to know when their emotions are at their height, but it usually takes until a month before release for them to finish the ending dialog...!" In response to a question by IGN music stating that the music of Final Fantasy VIII was very dark and perhaps influenced by the plot of the game, Uematsu stated "the atmosphere of music varies depending on story line, of course, but it's also my intention to put various types of music into one game". The absence of character themes found in the previous two games was due to Uematsu finding those of Final Fantasy VI
Final Fantasy VI
is a role-playing video game developed and published by Square , released in 1994 for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System as a part of the Final Fantasy series. Set in a fantasy world with a technology level equivalent to that of the Second Industrial Revolution, the game's story focuses on a...
and Final Fantasy VII
Final Fantasy VII
is a role-playing video game developed by Square and published by Sony Computer Entertainment as the seventh installment in the Final Fantasy series. It was originally released in 1997 for the Sony PlayStation and was re-released in 1998 for Microsoft Windows-based personal computers and in 2009...
ineffective. Uematsu considers it reasonable to have character themes if each character has a "highlight" in the game, but he found Final Fantasy VIII only focused on Squall Leonhart
Squall Leonhart
is the main protagonist of Final Fantasy VIII, a role-playing game by Square . He was designed by Tetsuya Nomura, with heavy influences coming from game director Yoshinori Kitase. Squall has appeared in several other games, such as the Kingdom Hearts series, where he appears under the name ;...
and Rinoa Heartilly as a couple, resulting in the "Eyes on Me" theme.
The original soundtrack was released on four Compact Disc
Compact Disc
The Compact Disc is an optical disc used to store digital data. It was originally developed to store and playback sound recordings exclusively, but later expanded to encompass data storage , write-once audio and data storage , rewritable media , Video Compact Discs , Super Video Compact Discs ,...
s by DigiCube
DigiCube
DigiCube Co., Ltd. was a Japanese company established as a subsidiary of software developer Square on February 6, 1996 and headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. The primary purpose of DigiCube was to market and distribute Square products, most notably video games and related merchandise, including toys,...
in Japan on March 10, 1999, and by Square EA in North America as Final Fantasy VIII Music Collection in January 2000. It was republished worldwide by Square Enix on May 10, 2004. An album of orchestra
Orchestra
An orchestra is a sizable instrumental ensemble that contains sections of string, brass, woodwind, and percussion instruments. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ορχήστρα, the name for the area in front of an ancient Greek stage reserved for the Greek chorus...
l arrangement
Arrangement
The American Federation of Musicians defines arranging as "the art of preparing and adapting an already written composition for presentation in other than its original form. An arrangement may include reharmonization, paraphrasing, and/or development of a composition, so that it fully represents...
s of selected tracks from the game was released under the title Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec Final Fantasy VIII on November 19, 1999 by DigiCube
DigiCube
DigiCube Co., Ltd. was a Japanese company established as a subsidiary of software developer Square on February 6, 1996 and headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. The primary purpose of DigiCube was to market and distribute Square products, most notably video games and related merchandise, including toys,...
, and subsequently published on July 22, 2004 by Square Enix
Square Enix
is a Japanese video game and publishing company best known for its console role-playing game franchises, which include the Final Fantasy series, the Dragon Quest series, and the action-RPG Kingdom Hearts series...
. The pieces were arranged and conducted by Shiro Hamaguchi
Shiro Hamaguchi
is a Japanese anime composer, arranger and orchestrator. He is best known for composing music to the anime franchises One Piece and Oh My Goddess! and arranging/orchestrating music in the Final Fantasy series...
for a live orchestra. A collection of piano
Piano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
arrangements performed by Shinko Ogata was released under the title Piano Collections: Final Fantasy VIII by DigiCube
DigiCube
DigiCube Co., Ltd. was a Japanese company established as a subsidiary of software developer Square on February 6, 1996 and headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. The primary purpose of DigiCube was to market and distribute Square products, most notably video games and related merchandise, including toys,...
on January 21, 2000 and subsequently re-published by Square Enix
Square Enix
is a Japanese video game and publishing company best known for its console role-playing game franchises, which include the Final Fantasy series, the Dragon Quest series, and the action-RPG Kingdom Hearts series...
on July 22, 2004.
The score is best known for two songs: "Liberi Fatali", a Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
choral
Choir
A choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...
piece that is played during the introduction to the game, and "Eyes On Me", a pop song
Popular music
Popular music belongs to any of a number of musical genres "having wide appeal" and is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. It stands in contrast to both art music and traditional music, which are typically disseminated academically or orally to smaller, local...
serving as the game's theme, performed by Chinese
Chinese people
The term Chinese people may refer to any of the following:*People with Han Chinese ethnicity ....
singer Faye Wong
Faye Wong
Faye Wong is a highly successful and influential Chinese singer-songwriter and actress who is usually referred to as a diva . Early in her career she briefly used the stage name Shirley Wong . Born in Beijing, she moved to Hong Kong in 1987 and rose to stardom in the early 1990s by singing...
. Near the end of the production of Final Fantasy VII, the developers suggested to use a singer, but abandoned the idea due to a lack of reasoning based on the game's theme and storyline. However, Nobuo Uematsu thought a ballad would closely relate to the theme and characters of Final Fantasy VIII. This resulted in the game's developers sharing "countless" artists, eventually deciding on Wong. Uematsu claims "her voice and mood seem to match my image of the song exactly", and that her ethnicity "fits the international image of Final Fantasy". After negotiations were made, "Eyes on Me" was recorded in Hong Kong with an orchestra
Orchestra
An orchestra is a sizable instrumental ensemble that contains sections of string, brass, woodwind, and percussion instruments. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ορχήστρα, the name for the area in front of an ancient Greek stage reserved for the Greek chorus...
. The song was released as a CD single
CD single
A CD single is a music single in the form of a standard size Compact Disc, not to be confused with the 3-inch CD single, which uses a smaller form factor. The format was introduced in the mid-1980s, but did not gain its place in the market until the early 1990s...
in Japan and sold over 400,000 copies, setting the record for highest-selling video game music disc ever released in that country at the time. "Liberi Fatali" was played during the 2004 Summer Olympics
2004 Summer Olympics
The 2004 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad, was a premier international multi-sport event held in Athens, Greece from August 13 to August 29, 2004 with the motto Welcome Home. 10,625 athletes competed, some 600 more than expected, accompanied by 5,501 team...
in Athens
Athens
Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...
during the women's synchronized swimming event.
The music of Final Fantasy VIII has appeared in various official Final Fantasy concerts
Final Fantasy concerts
Final Fantasy is a media franchise created by Hironobu Sakaguchi and owned by Square Enix that includes video games, motion pictures, and other merchandise. The series began in 1987 as an eponymous console role-playing game developed by Square, spawning a video game series that became the central...
. These include 2002's 20020220 Music from FINAL FANTASY, in which the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra
Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra
The claims to be the oldest classical orchestra in Japan, having been founded in Nagoya in 1911. It moved to Tokyo in 1938 and has some 166 members as of 2005....
played "Liberi Fatali", "Don't Be Afraid", "Love Grows", and "The Man with the Machine Gun", the 2004 Tour de Japon series, which featured "The Oath", the Dear Friends series that began that same year and included "Liberi Fatali" and "Love Grows", and the 2005 More Friends concert, which included "Maybe I'm a Lion". More recent concerts include the Voices – Music from Final Fantasy 2006 concert showcasing "Liberi Fatali", "Fisherman's Horizon", and "Eyes on Me" and the international Distant Worlds concert tour that continues to date, which includes "Liberi Fatali", "Fisherman's Horizon", "Man with the Machine Gun", and "Love Grows". Several of these concerts have produced live albums as well. Music from the game has also been played in non Final Fantasy-specific concerts such as the Play! A Video Game Symphony
Play! A Video Game Symphony
PLAY! A Video Game Symphony is a concert series that features music from video games performed by a live orchestra. The concerts from 2006 to 2010 were conducted by Arnie Roth...
world tour from 2006 onwards, for which Nobuo Uematsu composed the opening fanfare that accompanies each performance.
Reception
Final Fantasy VIII received positive reviews from critics and was commercially successful. Within two days of its North American release on September 9, 1999, Final Fantasy VIII became the top-selling video game in the United States, a position it held for more than three weeks. It grossed a total of more than $50 million in the 13 weeks to follow, making it the fastest-selling Final Fantasy title. In Japan, it sold roughly 2.5 million units within the first four days of release. More than 6 million units were sold in total by the end of 1999. As of March 31, 2003, the game had shipped 8.15 million copies worldwide: 3.7 million in Japan and 4.45 million abroad. The opening cut scene in Final Fantasy VIII was ranked second on Game InformerGame Informer
Game Informer is an American-based monthly magazine featuring articles, news, strategy, and reviews of popular video games and associated consoles. It was formed in August 1991, when FuncoLand started publishing a six-page magazine, free in all its retail locations...
s list of "Top 10 Video Game Openings", and first by IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
. GameSpy
GameSpy
GameSpy Industries, Inc., known simply as GameSpy, is a division of IGN Entertainment, which operates a network of game websites and provides online video game-related services and software. GameSpy dates back to the 1996 release of an internet Quake server search program named QSpy. The current...
listed it as the 15th best cinematic moment in video games. IGN additionally named the game's ending the third best of any game for the PlayStation, while UGO.com named it one of the series' best and most memorable moments. Final Fantasy VIII was voted by readers of Japanese magazine Famitsu
Famitsu
is a line of Japanese video game magazines published by Enterbrain, Inc. and Tokuma. Currently, there are five Famitsū magazines: Shūkan Famitsū, Famitsū PS3 + PSP, Famitsū Xbox 360, Famitsū Wii+DS, and Famitsū Wave DVD...
as the 22nd best game of all time in 2006, and named one of the 20 essential Japanese role-playing games by Gamasutra
Gamasutra
Gamasutra is a website founded in 1997 for video game developers. It is owned and operated by UBM TechWeb , a division of United Business Media, and acts as the online sister publication to the print magazine Game Developer...
, stating "[t]here's a lot that Final Fantasy VIII does wrong, but there's even more that it does right".
Reviews of the gameplay have been mixed. IGN felt that it was the weakest aspect of the game, citing its Guardian Force attack sequences as "incredibly cinematic" but tedious, sentiments echoed by Electronic Gaming Monthly
Electronic Gaming Monthly
Electronic Gaming Monthly is a bimonthly American video game magazine. It has been published by EGM Media, LLC. since relaunching in April of 2010. Its previous run, which ended in January 2009, was published by Ziff Davis...
. They also regarded the battle system as intensely complicated, yet refreshingly innovative and something that "RPG fanatics love to obsess over". Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine claims that the game's Junction system is a major flaw due to repetitive stocking of spells, while the UK-based video game magazine Edge
Edge (magazine)
Edge is a multi-format computer and video game magazine published by Future Publishing in the United Kingdom. It is known for its industry contacts, editorial stance, distinctive anonymous third-person writing style, yearly awards and longevity....
commented that the battle system consists of a "bewildering" number of intricate options and techniques that "most gamers will [...] relish". GameSpot
GameSpot
GameSpot is a video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information. The site was launched in May 1, 1996 by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. It was purchased by ZDNet, a brand which was later purchased by CNET Networks. CBS Interactive, which...
praised the game's battle system, commenting that the "possibilities for customization [with the Junction system] are immense".
In general, Final Fantasy VIII has been compared favorably to its predecessors. Though questioning the game's lack of voice overs for its characters, Game Revolution praised its storyline and ending. For their part, Edge labeled Final Fantasy VIII "a far more accomplished game than FFVII". On the other hand, the magazine also felt that the game's length left its story unable to "offer consistently strong dialogue and sub-plots". Additionally, it found some of the story's plot twists "not... suitably manipulated and prepared", leaving it "hard not to greet such... moments with anything but indifference". Overall, Edge considered Final Fantasy VIII to be "yet another outstanding edition of SquareSoft's far-from-final fantasies", summarizing it as "aesthetically astonishing, rarely less than compelling, and near peerless in scope and execution". Electronic Gaming Monthly offered similar comments, stating that the game's character development "is the best of any RPG's" and that "Final Fantasy VIII is the pinnacle of its genre." UGO.com stated that while no other game in the series had stirred the controversy that Final Fantasy VIII had and that it was flawed, Final Fantasy VIII was a "daring, groundbreaking game [...] decidedly the most original console-style RPG ever created". In 2002, IGN named the game the seventh best title for the PlayStation of all time, placing higher on the list than Final Fantasy VII and described as "[taking] all of its strong points, and [making] them better".
The PC port received mixed reception. Maximum PC
Maximum PC
Maximum PC, formerly known as boot, is an American magazine and web site published by Future US. It focuses on cutting-edge PC hardware, with an emphasis on product reviews, step-by-step tutorials, and in-depth technical briefs...
praised the full motion video sequences as "phenomenal", adding that while the gameplay took getting used to, they enjoyed the teamwork emphasized by it, and that the game's visual presentation added to its appeal. GameSpy stated that while the game was not a "huge leap forward" from the previous title, its gameplay and visual appeal worked for its benefit, though that on a computer the pre-rendered backgrounds appeared blurry and the controls at time difficult with a keyboard. GameSpot criticized the game for not taking advantage of the capabilities afforded to computers at the time, describing the PlayStation version as both looking and sounding superior, and recommending that the title was "not worth buying period" for the PC. UGO.com also described the port as inferior to its original counterpart, adding that its presentation was in turn detrimental to the reception the game received as a whole. Computer Gaming World
Computer Gaming World
Computer Gaming World was a computer game magazine founded in 1981 by Russell Sipe as a bimonthly publication. Early issues were typically 40-50 pages in length, written in a newsletter style, including submissions by game designers such as Joel Billings , Dan Bunten , and Chris Crawford...
praised some of the changes made to the game in light of previous titles and the inclusion of the Triple Triad sub-game, though heavily criticized the port as "lazy" and "disappointing", stating that it only served to emphasize the original game's flaws. Despite their complaints however, they named the game the twentieth best game of 2000.