The world has fallen under the dominion of the Shinra Electric Power Company, a sinister corporation that has monopolized the planet’s very life force as Mako energy. In the urban megalopolis of Midgar, an anti-Shinra rebel group calling themselves Avalanche have stepped up their campaign of resistance.

Cloud Strife, a former member of Shinra’s elite SOLDIER unit now turned mercenary, lends his aid to the rebels, unaware that he will be drawn into an epic battle for the fate of the planet, while having to come to terms with his own lost past.

As this is a port with some extra features, I want to dedicate my time writing and your time reading in order to inform you about how it plays now with the extra features on.

For starters, you can speed up the game, which is a perfect feature if you already played the game before much like myself. I was able to speed through the initial parts of the game, without ever feeling like I was doing it “again”. Important to know here, I finished this game twice in the past and started a third time around half a year ago, but I stopped my casual playthrough the second I found out the Switch was getting the Final Fantasy franchise games!

If this is your first time into the game, I can only recommend not using it and fully enjoying the game as it was intended. Same for the next feature I would like to talk about, the option to always perform the best attacks, the limit breaks. I do consider this cheating as you will basically perform overpowered attacks all of the time. While easy when stuck, it does take away from the true achievement of finishing this masterpiece. For my playthrough, I had it activated and with the previous function combined, I saw myself literally rush through battles and the story. It was fun and energetic, but you know me, I thought it was not the most kosher way to play this gem.

Last new feature, the option to have random encounters disabled. This is something I dislike completely, as an avid fan of the genre. I understand some wanting this activated as it allows you to speed through the story and it should cut tens of hours from the total game time, but I dislike it. If the previous function, the limit breaks, is cheating, this one is more than cheating. I love the randomness of having to fight off enemies at all times.

As Final Fantasy is also a few years old, I would like to say it still looks quite fine. It may look outdated for some and the letterboxed dimensions might be a bit annoying for purists. Personally, I grew up with this game and this game and its story does pass the test of time, a great story way back when and still now too.

In conclusion, although the game highly relies on nostalgia for many gamers of my age, it may appeal less because of those graphics to the newer/younger gamers among us. I would like to say one thing, do try it out, I know it is a mid-priced game and with my high praise for a low priced game like Azure Saga recently, this may be a tough one to decide on. I can only say this one last thing, Final Fantasy is a cult classic, a trendsetter and just a damn good game.

My score is purely based upon the story because I think this should also be said.