Of all the Final Fantasies I've played, VI is my personal favorite. I only ever actually finished IV and VI, though, I just played some VII and IX, lots of X and XII, and some XIII.
Chrono Trigger is one of my top five games ever, I love everything about that game.
I really like Deus Ex: Human Revolution. I enjoyed Mankind Divided, to some degree, but that game just isn't as compelling as its predecessor for a number of different reasons.
One of these days I'm going to get around to playing Final Fantasy Tactics. I think.
Obviously the Squaresoft days in the 90s were full of gems, Chrono Trigger is a top 10 all time game for me.
But, if we're just talking about the modern Square Enix days, including their western publishing arm, while they've definitely put out games I've liked, I wouldn't consider them a top tier publisher for me.
The Nier games are probably the first that comes to mind as being great. I liked Tomb Raider 2013 and Rise of the Tomb Raider. I liked this year's Guardians of the Galaxy game quite a lot. Life is Strange is great (going to play the new one soon). That's probably it as far as Square Enix games that's I've really enjoyed from the last few generations.
I'll say it once I'll say it again... if you're a fan of creature collecting games and are somewhat disappointed with the Pokemon series lately: World of Final Fantasy shouldn't be ignored. It has everything from polished graphics, voice acted dialog, refreshing ideas for creature combat, to a phenomenal soundtrack and a girth of content. When I first saw the trailer I scoffed, but playing it changed my mind quickly. I'll be honest I've been playing creature collecting games since Pokemon first released on the original Gameboy and World of Final Fantasy is still my favorite in the genre.
The FFXIV team is killing it, Endwalker is my game of the last several years. It's left me pretty excited for XVI too since a lot of that team is working on that game and I have a lot of confidence in those folks so long as they're allowed to just do their thing. Which seems likely given XIVs runaway success of late.
Mario RPG, The Bouncer and the Nier games. Given the types of games i like Square kinda sits on the outside of my vision, but i am interested in Strangers of Paradise, because it looks reaaaaaal dumb.
Sleeping Dogs is a Square game people forget about and always a good mainstay. Great combat, great story, it's a fun game to replay still in 2021. Also secret best car physics in an open world?
I'm playing through the Nier games for the first time, just about finished with Replicant so I can echo that series as well! Great gameplay and the music is incredible, I'm psyched to start up Automata once I round out Replicant's last couple endings.
Not to mention that FF7: Remake is masterpiece - having never played a final fantasy prior to that - I was pretty blown away by what that game was. Knowing what little I do know about FF7 original and how it branches out after the Midgar story (where the remake concludes), the next few Remake installments are going to be really interesting (when they come out 5 years from now)
@cikame: I didn’t realize that Mario RPG was a square Enix joint. I’m not a believer in companies as far as the magic sauce. It’s the people. I have to do my research.
@banefirelord: was gonna mention Just Cause 2 as well. Every JC game since has kind of "jumped the shark." But 2 is so dang good.
I am also an Outriders apologist. If you subscribe to the Matthew Rorie outlook in games and just want to shoot shit, Outriders scratches that itch pretty well. The adjustable difficulty is nice too.
As a whole though, I think it's weird to give publishing studios that much credit for games. It happens alot with Devolver and Annapurna though, so I'm not surprised to see it happen to AAA Studios too. I guess the difference being Square often owns the studios of the games it releases.
The series that literally got them started, the Final Fantasy series. Personally for me, FFIV will always hold a special place in my heart. It was the first game that made me a fan of the series and JRPGs in general. It was called FFII when I played on the SNES, as it was the second game in the series released in America at the time. I played the original game, but didn't like it. The story, the music, and even the gameplay once the character became more powerful were great. And I'll always remember the characters: Cecil, Rosa, Rydia, Kain, Edge, to name some. All the other FFs after IV are great was well for different reasons. I like some games better than others, but I don't outright hate any of them.
Liked me some Final Fantasy 6. Final Fantasy 12; also very good. Every 6 or so numbered entries they make a really good one of those, so I'm pretty hyped for FF 18 whenever that will come out.
@rejizzle: I hear FF18 will come with a fully real-time version of blitzball AND Triple Triad. Shiva, Ramuh & Ifrit will be there too. And you get to travel by chocobo.
@fugitivej: Thanks for spotting this. Wondecrew's posts are all ver batim copies of prior posts in a given thread. Flag it for moderation, account will probably be removed.
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