Final Fantasy Ultimate Box goes from PSOne to PS3

Varik

http://store.jp.square-enix.com/special/ff25th

All yours for €355 or likely far less when/if it end up available here.

It's only the 13 numbered games with a few CE equivalent extras and more for people with more money than sense.

Retr0gamer

I see they included the dreadful PS1 ports of the SNES games.

WeeBit

I think it looks glorious......I'm an easy sell.

chopperbyrne

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I see they included the dreadful PS1 ports of the SNES games.

With the exception of the CD load times which weren't that bad, there wasn't much wrong with those ports.

Retr0gamer

chopperbyrne wrote: »

With the exception of the CD load times which weren't that bad, there wasn't much wrong with those ports.

The music sounded awful as well. The loading times killed the pace of those games for me, they were far less enjoyable because of it. Then there's also the fact that saving one of the characters in FF6 can be a very steep challenge because the load times are counted during the timed challenge.

Alactric

So...PS1 and PS2 disks with new art. No spin-offs. And a PS2 version of an MMO. How did they arrive at $355 and not, say $99?

snausages

Shame about those load times, but listening to this the music differences seem to be pretty insignificant. Unless I compared them side to side I wouldn't have even noticed that the PS1 soundtrack was different.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkkYLKbtnBI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xgOQRo4BgA

Retr0gamer

Well it's a something I really notice, the instruments all sound wrong. Anyway the worst offense is the load times, its really a much worse game because of them.

Xinkai

I'm just glad I got to play these games on a console I actually owned, and was old enough to afford!

With the exception of an extra... 2 or 3 seconds loading screens, the game was pretty much a flawless port, and the Origins, Anthology & VI ports game me a look into what actually gave FF it's legendary status.

People that complain about an extra 2/3 seconds loading times on a disc based, loading required system, pretty much echo what gamers of 2012 are, whenever somebody says "Loading times are bad" all I hear is "Game is too hard" and that, ladies & gentlemen, grinds my gears. Man up and be thankful others got to experience it.

Nice collection also, too expensive, but that disc art is fabulous~

Retr0gamer

I can honestly say that FFIV is a much worse game on PS1 because of those loading times. Also it's not 2-3 seconds, it's 7-8 which is quite a long time when it happens before and after every random battle, changing screens and opening the menu. FF6's battle system was meant to be fast and non intrusive to the pace of the game and the load times destroy that pace, it's much slower paced and dragged out. If you've read making ofs of FFVII the developers talk about how the load times in FFVII would kill the pace of the game so the balanced the battle system around this.

There's really no reason to experience the game that way when there are better ways to play it.

ancapailldorcha

I only noticed a slight difference in the music and the loading times were no problem at all. I'm amazed Square Enix didn't just release them as emulations for the PC and consoles for a much better price.

Alactric

Xinkai wrote: »

People that complain about an extra 2/3 seconds loading times on a disc based, loading required system, pretty much echo what gamers of 2012 are, whenever somebody says "Loading times are bad" all I hear is "Game is too hard" and that, ladies & gentlemen, grinds my gears. Man up and be thankful others got to experience it.

You realise they were sold in Europe in 2003, for full price right? They were a sub optimum version of what were then 10 year old games. Great games ofc. But a game you enjoyed in spite of the porting issues. It has nothing at all to do with "manning up" :rolleyes: There is a history behind those ports. And it mostly deals with Square Enix being flat out cheap.

Given that the whole point of this collection is cherish and remember the franchise and is targeted at people who are clearly willing to spend a lot of money. The idea of throwing in the PS1 disks, stings. That's not the only thing wrong with the collection either. There are games omitted and the price is bonkers.

martineatworld

Alactric wrote: »

You realise they were sold in Europe in 2003, for full price right? They were a sub optimum version of what were then 10 year old games. Great games ofc. But a game you enjoyed in spite of the porting issues. It has nothing at all to do with "manning up" :rolleyes: There is a history behind those ports. And it mostly deals with Square Enix being flat out cheap.

Given that the whole point of this collection is cherish and remember the franchise and is targeted at people who are clearly willing to spend a lot of money. The idea of throwing in the PS1 disks, stings. That's not the only thing wrong with the collection either. There are games omitted and the price is bonkers.

Ok, they weren't perfect ports, yes, but at least they were actually brought to Europe, which was the first chance for a lot of people to play them. Always look on the brightside eh?

Anyway, I like this collection, think it would be a lovely little collectors piece, although fairly redundant, it looks very well.

Alactric

martineatworld wrote: »

Ok, they weren't perfect ports, yes, but at least they were actually brought to Europe, which was the first chance for a lot of people to play them. Always look on the brightside eh?

Anyway, I like this collection, think it would be a lovely little collectors piece, although fairly redundant, it looks very well.

Absolutely.

Vintage FF, is still Vintage FF, bugs withstanding. The real salt in the wounds is that the problems with the PS1 ports could have been very easily avoided. And Square have done nothing in over 10 years to try and rectify the problem.

Retr0gamer

If you can play the SNES versions on the Wii then why are the terrible PS1 versions the only ones on PSN. It goes more so when you have compaines like Sega with M2 that charge far less for superb emulated ports of their games but even went out of their way to hunt down an unreleased english pcb of one of the games and emulate it. It's just laziness.

chopperbyrne

Retr0gamer wrote: »

If you can play the SNES versions on the Wii then why are the terrible PS1 versions the only ones on PSN. It goes more so when you have compaines like Sega with M2 that charge far less for superb emulated ports of their games but even went out of their way to hunt down an unreleased english pcb of one of the games and emulate it. It's just laziness.

Probably because those versions were released on a Nintendo platform previously.

No way Nintendo are going to allow them release those versions on other systems.

snausages

I don't get why they can't just re-port the games onto PSN and XBLA though. Include the GBA translations and fix the title screens so they say FFIV and FFVI instead of II and III. It's no different to what they did with the PS1 games, except those versions were ****.

Retr0gamer

chopperbyrne wrote: »

Probably because those versions were released on a Nintendo platform previously.

No way Nintendo are going to allow them release those versions on other systems.

Nintendo don't own any publishing rights to the SNES versions of the game. They can't block its release. Also an emulator that allows playing of these roms is not illegal either.

snausages wrote: »

I don't get why they can't just re-port the games onto PSN and XBLA though. Include the GBA translations and fix the title screens so they say FFIV and FFVI instead of II and III. It's no different to what they did with the PS1 games, except those versions were ****.

Sure it's what they did with FF4 complete collection on PSP. Can't see why they can't do it again.

chopperbyrne

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Nintendo don't own any publishing rights to the SNES versions of the game. They can't block its release. Also an emulator that allows playing of these roms is not illegal either.

There's no way you can possibly know that for certain. Bringing emulators into this is pointless as we're talking about actual releases.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Sure it's what they did with FF4 complete collection on PSP. Can't see why they can't do it again.

That was a new port, not a re-release of the GBA port.

Retr0gamer

chopperbyrne wrote: »

There's no way you can possibly know that for certain. Bringing emulators into this is pointless as we're talking about actual releases.

Yes I can since it's a fact. Nintendo have no publishing rights to those Final Fantasy games anywhere in the world. Squaresoft published them and even if they did have publishing rights, which I reiterate they didn't, then I'm pretty sure that that the timeframe on those publishing rights is well out of date. Nintendo have no rights to the code and no publishing rights. If what you say is true then why didn't EA, the original publisher of most of Squares PS1 games in North America not block the PSN releases of these games? Anyway what does that matter considering it was Square that published the games in North America and not Nintendo.

chopperbyrne wrote: »

That was a new port, not a re-release of the GBA port.

I never said it was. It was a remake that used the GBA versions translation is what I said.

Xinkai

Funny you talk about full price, as I remember, I bought my copy of the FF6 port in Smyths on Jervis Street, for 16.49 (Punt) to be exact. I bought Anthology for 19.99 in Abbey Discs in Northside Shopping Center, and Origins for 24.99 from Game on Henry Street. They weren't full price, I'm pretty sure they all cost 45 on the SNES.

Also remember at the time, Squaresoft had an exclusivity agreement with Nintendo and the FF series, which was signed after FF4 (2 in USA). They delayed FF7 to let the contract expire, which let them make ff7 for the PS1. So while I'm not agreeing with anybody, I'm sure the FF6 license would have still been in Nintendo hands, as the game was under contract at the time of creation & release.

Same reason only ff 1,2&3 are on IOS, and why Chrono Trigger had that big legal battle for an iOS release.

Retr0gamer

Xinkai wrote: »

Also remember at the time, Squaresoft had an exclusivity agreement with Nintendo and the FF series, which was signed after FF4 (2 in USA). They delayed FF7 to let the contract expire, which let them make ff7 for the PS1. So while I'm not agreeing with anybody, I'm sure the FF6 license would have still been in Nintendo hands, as the game was under contract at the time of creation & release.

Then why was there no problem releasing them on PS1?

Xinkai wrote: »

why Chrono Trigger had that big legal battle for an iOS release.

There was?

Xinkai

1. Exclusivity Contract had expired, thus making it legal to release. Think COD DLC on Xbox compared to PS3.

2. There was. Nintendo re-bought rights to CT and ported it to DS. Squeenix wanted it as part of the iOS port collection, thus, a legal rights battle ensued, which Squeenix won.

Retr0gamer

Xinkai wrote: »

2. There was. Nintendo re-bought rights to CT and ported it to DS. Squeenix wanted it as part of the iOS port collection, thus, a legal rights battle ensued, which Squeenix won.

Well it's just I can't find or even recall any mention of any legal battle that ensued. Then there's also the fact that Nintendo have no legal publishing rights to Chrono Trigger on the DS or exclusivity deal as far as I'm aware.

Mr. K

Jeepers, why did this topic turn into a conversation about ports?! They should have included the PSP versions of the first two, but who cares? This is a pretty box set, but only crazy collectors are going to actually buy it. The Amano art on the discs is lovely.