Final Fantasy VI is one of the greatest console RPGs of all time. Period. It is also hands-down the greatest of the numbered Final Fantasy games. Period. If you disagree, then you are an idiot. Or possibly an amoeba. Or a toadstool. Oh sure, everybody loves Final Fantasy VII, or Final Fantasy X, or Final Fantasy Bazillion because they look pretty and utilize ridiculously over-the-top summon spells that take longer to finish then a tonsillectomy. But if you really press anyone who isn't a shrieking, fifteen-year-old Final Fantasy fanatic on which Final Fantasy they think is REALLY the best, I bet they'll confidentially admit they prefer VI. VI consistently tops VII on lists of the best video games of all time, and yet VII is the one you always hear morons gushing about. Well it's not right, and I'll not stand for it anymore! The moment I finish this review I'm going to get in my car and begin careening wildly up and down the streets of New England, never allowing my speed to fall below 85mph. While my overarching objective will be to drive as erratically as possible, I will be making a concerted effort to run down the elderly, children, and the morbidly obese. I will continue doing this until the Final Fantasy fan community finally admits that VI is better than VII. I'm not really sure how my actions will directly achieve this result (apart from reducing the number of morbidly obese Final Fantasy fans, who statistically prefer VII), but much like our president, I'm a doer, not a thinker.

The less insane section.

   I understand some of you may be puzzled by the intensity of my statements, especially those of you who have not played Final Fantasy VI. While it will take the vast majority of my willpower not to be violently sickened by your very presence, I will use what little energy I have left to explain just what makes Final Fantasy VI so great and why you should pray every night to whatever heathen gods you worship in thanksgiving for this masterpiece being ported to the Gameboy Advance.

   The world of Final Fantasy VI, like those of many Japanese RPGs, was once torn apart by a war between great sorcerers thousands of years ago. After both sides pounded each other into oblivion (which was released as a wholly separate game for the Xbox 360) the world slowly recovered, and as of the game's opening, technology has reached a sort of early-Industrial-Revolution-era level. And while most people are content to peacefully live out their steam and coal powered lives, a mighty empire in the south has begun to hunger for more (those evil empires always do, don't they?). You see, when the great war ended, magic faded from the world as well. However, a few Rhodes Scholars in the empire have discovered a new way to harvest great amounts of magical energy from creatures called Espers. Espers, long believed to be extinct, had fought in said war, and their remains continued to be imbued with magic. The game begins with the player controlling a small detachment of Imperials who are on a mission to recover one such creature found frozen in a glacier in the snowy mining town of Narshe.

Like a roller coaster ride, only your seat never moves.

On the topic of old gloves and how they fit.

   Speaking of gameplay, at its roots Final Fantasy VI's is fairly similar to that of most other RPGs of the SNES era. Controlling a party of no more than four adventurers, you wander the countryside visiting a mixture of towns and dungeons. In towns you can talk with NPCs for information, buy or sell items, hunt for people's hidden valuables, taunt awkward preteens, or do any other town-type stuff. When outside of towns or exploring dungeons, you'll periodically be attacked by monsters that you can defeat for experience points and money (I only wish every time I needed a couple of bucks IRL I could just go wail on some giant badgers or something). In battle the screen cuts to a side perspective just like all earlier Final Fantasies, and your characters are allowed to execute a move every time the Active-Time Battle gauge beneath them fills. Actions are fairly limited early on, just like when trying to get busy with a new lady friend, and consist mostly of RPG staples like attack, defend, and use item. But as the game progresses you'll be able to use various magic your characters have learned from the Espers they equip during battle. Also, each character has a set of special moves they can utilize depending on what class they are. Unlike Final Fantasy V, all characters are restricted to their own specific class, but swapping specific characters in and out of your party as needed never gets frustrating since each member of the cast is so well crafted.

More friends than I have in real life.

   There are over a dozen playable characters in Final Fantasy VI, and as most RPGs nowadays top off at about six or seven, this is quite a jump. You'd think with that many characters few of them would get much development, especially considering the game's relative brevity. Well, just like with everything else you've ever thought, you are wrong, wrong, wrong! FFVI does a brilliant job of characterizing its dramatis personas, fleshing out their personalities nicely and making for one of the most unforgettable casts in any RPG ever. From the gentleman thief, Locke, to the melancholy knight, Celes, to the cold, silent ninja assassin, Shadow, you'll come to truly care about all of them. Well, maybe not Relm. She's kind of obnoxious.

   And it's not just the number of characters that sets FFVI apart from other RPGs. Another way it diverges even from its Final Fantasy brethren is that it has no central hero. That's right, no particular character can truly lay claim to the top billing. You start out playing as the magic-using young woman, Terra, but soon your party is split up and you must switch between three different groups as you attempt to reunite. And even when the gang does get back together, the game consistently has you switching the characters in your party.

   Just like always switching jobs and abilities in an effort to create the perfect team made Final Fantasy V such a hoot, trying to assemble the most balanced party from the large pool of characters in Final Fantasy VI adds an equal measure of anal-retentive glee. Several of the game's later dungeons will also require that you attack them with two or three parties simultaneously, similarly to the Fork Tower in Final Fantasy V, so being able to assemble more than one party whose members complement each other well is a substantive part of the game. You can't just pick four dudes to muscle your way through the game with, leaving the other ten or so to waste away like spurned lovers in Greek tragedies. Much like in hippie communes, you've got to spread the love around...yuck.

Time to get superficial!

   Well, compared to most modern consoles RPGs whose graphics have reached a state of clarity sharper than what the human eye is capable of perceiving, Final Fantasy VI Advance might not look like much, but against its handheld peers it holds up amazingly well, particularly when you consider that it's nearly thirteen years old. Back in the days of the SNES, Final Fantasy VI (III at the time) was arguably the best looking game on the system, and now it's definitely one of the better looking ones on the Gameboy Advance. And, yes, it is better looking than your girlfriend. Trust me, we've all seen her. Tell that woman to shave her armpits, for Chrissakes.

   While the character sprites aren't particularly large, they do sport an impressive level of detail and each one looks distinct and appropriate for the character being represented. The environments your characters travel through are absolutely gorgeous, from the quiet, creepy Phantom Forest, to the sprawling, grimy imperial capitol, Vector. Each has a great feel and mood, just like a good prostitute, and through excellent use of 16-bit detail, really establishes a sense of place. The enemies you'll face in battle, though static, are all depicted in the fanciful, occasionally borderline abstract style of classic Final Fantasy art guy Yoshitaka Amano, and are lusciously colored and shaded. All the battle effects animate smoothly, and though some of the larger spells lack the awe inspiring grandeur of those in later Final Fantasies, their simplicity is in a way more satisfying and helps keep the battles moving at a steady pace. I don't know about you, but for me it does tend to bog things down a little bit when every time you cast a spell you have to watch an unskippable animation of a sky god materializing out of clouds and stars and the entire path of reentry of the small planet he hurls down on your foes.

   In terms of sound, every sword slash and exploding fireball sounds appropriate, although being a die-hard FFVI fan, I did notice that the sound emulation wasn't completely spot on. This was a little bit of a letdown, especially since the music in the game was some of composer Nobuo Uematsu's best. Having by this point in the series gained a real understanding of what the SNES sound hardware was capable of, Nobuo truly pushed it to its limits with his soundtrack for FFVI, and regretfully the Gameboy Advance just isn't up to the task. What a wussy. Don't get me wrong, the music still sounds good, and if you've never played another version of FFVI, you'll probably have no issue with it, but I definitely noticed several of the songs, most noticeably the battle music, lacked the depth and breadth of those found in the SNES original. It made me so angry I punched a squirrel... which then kicked my ass. I'm so weak.

What else ya got for me?

   So, what does the "Advance" in Final Fantasy VI Advance stand for? Not much, apparently. Having seen all the cool extra stuff added to the other Final Fantasy GBA ports, I was so excited to see what they'd add to my personal favorite that I soiled someone else's pants. Truly it was a sight to behold. But as it turns out, I need not have bothered performing such a dramatic feat of enthusiasm. First off, there's a slightly more accurate translation, but frankly the old one was pretty solid to begin with. Next are four new Espers (which basically equals a handful of new spells, none of which are particularly useful with the possible exception of Brave) and the corresponding boss fights to acquire them. And finally there's the now standard super hard, super complicated dungeon available after finishing the game (or actually finishing one of the last couple of bosses this time). Of all the Final Fantasy GBA ports, this one has the weakest additional content. Not only that, but it also has a bit of slowdown which becomes most noticeable during battles. All that considered, this port definitely can't be viewed as the definitive version of the game.

   But it's still Final Fantasy VI, a diamond among rock candy. And it's portable, so you can use it to be antisocial in new and exotic settings. Even with its rather weak bonuses, its watered down music, and its bit of slowdown, this is one of the best RPGs you can cram into your Gameboy Advance, and considering the excellent RPG library that the system already has, that's saying a lot. About 2,500 words to be precise. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to start my car. VROOOOOOOOOM!!!

       ... Mike Zeller