The first PlayStation I ever owned was a PSOne--that is to say, the small, miniaturized version of the console released well after the initial launch of the platform. As a result, there was already a pretty significant catalog of games to try by that time. In those early days, it served as essentially a Final Fantasy machine. I played Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VIII, and Final Fantasy IX simultaneously, because at that point I hadn’t yet become compulsive about playing through games from start to finish. The game that really got its hooks in me and on which I spent countless hours, however, was Final Fantasy Tactics, a game that I consider, to this day, to be among my favorite games of all time.
Although I acknowledge now that Final Fantasy Tactics certainly wasn’t the first game of its type and in fact owed a considerable amount of its DNA to its predecessor, Tactics Ogre, the game was like nothing else I had played at the time. It had deep customization and systems paired with an excellent story. The strategy of the combat and the investment I had in the progression of my characters was fiendishly addictive and led to numerous playthroughs in which I created new challenges for myself. A frequent rule of mine was to avoid using the infamous Cidolfas Orlandeau, otherwise known as Thunder God Cid, whose extreme power level essentially breaks the game.
But when it comes down to it, Final Fantasy Tactics was a game that could be broken in any number of ways, and that’s a part of what I liked about it. There were so many things built into the game on which one could experiment and feel clever for having exploited. These exploits and workarounds became well-enough known in the community that a series of challenges were created to make the game more difficult to complete. A common challenge was the Straight Character Class run in which all party members were required to use the same playable job and no abilities from other job classes could be used. In many cases, this wasn’t challenging at all, depending on the power of the class in question. A run with only bards, on the other hand, was quite challenging.
Another common challenge was the Solo Ramza Run, which is pretty self-explanatory. Even these runs could be fairly easily conquered with a little strategy--which led to yet another challenge, which required not only completing the game as a solo character, but in a single class, as well. These were quite a bit more difficult, but all doable, even within strict level ranges. All of these challenges might seem dumbfounding to a casual observer because even without restrictions, the game is difficult on the first run through. I have many memories of Golgorand Execution Site (Golgollada Gallows in more recent translations) and the infamous Wiegraf battle that ended numerous early playthroughs.
The level of investment and engagement in Final Fantasy Tactics was tremendous. In the years that followed, fans eagerly awaited a follow-up that would honor this game’s legacy. Subsequent games in the series were met with a luekwarm reception, at least for the game’s most hardcore fans. I actually really enjoyed Final Fantasy Tactics Advance and its DS sequel, A2: Grimoire of the Rift, but their cutesier style and nerfed difficulty certainly made them feel like games of a different style entirely. Year after year, fans predicted (or perhaps engaged in wishful thinking) that a true successor to Final Fantasy Tactics would arrive. So far, this hasn’t happened, but that hasn’t stopped independent studios from making games that aspire to the heights FFT reached.
It’s almost become a running joke at this point, of course, to imply that your game is inspired by Final Fantasy Tactics. The infamous failed Kickstarter Unsung Story did this. Children of Zodiarcs did this and was arguably misleading in doing so, even if the game itself was quite good. And of course, Fell Seal: Arbiter’s Mark did this. In its case, the comparison is very apt.
Fell Seal is a turn-based tactical RPG in which you assume control of Kyrie, a member of a group called the Arbiters, who enforce the law and mete out justice to those that would disrupt it. Inevitably, as so often happens in video games, she must embark on a pilgrimage to obtain a power for which she is destined. She is accompanied along the way by a motley assortment of allies, including the rookie knight Anadine, the trickster Reiner, and even a shapeshifting monster by the name of Bzaro. The interactions of these characters is reasonably charming and inoffensive, but the characterization isn't something that ever stood out for me.
Like Final Fantasy Tactics, many of these story characters come with a unique class of their own, whether that be protagonist Kyrie’s Marked class with its dark magic or Yates’ Anatomist, with its focus on healing allies and summoning the undead. The abilities of these classes, after acquired, can be mixed and matched. It is possible to have two sets of primary commands, two passive abilities both from the primary class and two of any available that you’ve previously learned. Finally, you may equip an ability that activates only reactively. As a result, there is a high level of customization available for just about any character in the game.
It is definitely a game that more closely adheres to the Final Fantasy Tactics formula than other strategy RPGs I’ve played. Most of them incorporate a lot of the strategy elements but shy away from the customization and character-building. Games like Etrian Odyssey or even Bravely Default satisfy my party-building desires but don’t have the crunchy grid-based gameplay that I’m looking for. This is the only title I’ve played in awhile that achieves that same lovely combination.
On top of that, the art style definitely works for me. The backgrounds are very colorful, the sprites are detailed and nice to look at, and the character artwork is, in general, very well done, even if the detail in the portraits clashes with the more simplistic in-battle graphics. The animations, however, are unexciting and frequently wooden in a way that many games developed in Unity seem to fall prey to. Although the graphics of Final Fantasy Tactics are certainly dated by today’s standards, there is a fluidity in the animations in that game that I”ve always found satisfying, and that’s just not something Fell Seal pulls off.
What’s most important in any strategy RPG, though, are the mechanics. In this way, Fell Seal mostly delivers. The gameplay loop of progressing through a series of classes and unlocking more and more powerful classes continues to be satisfying throughout the entire game, especially as you unlock special classes that can only be assigned via the usage of hidden items. This particular touch reminded me more of Tactics Ogre than anything else, especially when you consider the inclusion of classes like Vampire or Werewolf, classes that also existed in some form in those games and again required special steps to unlock.
Although the on-the-sleeve influence of Final Fantasy Tactics is lovely, I did find myself wishing that the game would take more steps to differentiate itself from that title. Sure, it has classes that have no real analog in that game, but when you consider the classes that are included, it’s almost like developer “6 eyes studios” was going down a checklist to make sure they’d included their homage to each individual class. Squire becomes Mercenary, Knight becomes Knight again, Black Mage becomes Wizard, White Mage becomes Mender. There was room for more differentiation and creativity than what was displayed. Even the most interesting of classes didn’t strike me as incredibly engaging, partially because most of their effects just don’t lead to compelling builds.
Another issue I had was that some classes had repeat abilities, especially when you consider story classes and special unlockables. Some classes simply serve as an amalgam of abilities that other classes have, with maybe only one or two new ones. In a game with this many classes, it makes sense that there would be some repeats, but when you look back at Final Fantasy Tactics, where each class has something like 20 abilities, it’s easy to feel like each new class you unlock isn’t that exciting. It’s great when you end up unlocking splashy abilities like Double Cast II or Blood Magic, but the journey to get there is long, and you’ll find yourself moving from unexciting class to unexciting class on your way. Fell Seal mitigates this somewhat by offering you a stat bonus for mastering a class--a task that’s much easier to do than in FFT, since you’ll only generally have to learn about 10 abilities.
I also found that many encounters were tedious, not just because of the general pace of the game (which I turned up significantly in the settings), but because enemies rely heavily on status effects. I was so frequently silenced and put to sleep that it felt like I never got to have any agency in combat. Compounding this issue is that enemies are frequently in classes that have naturally high speed, which means you never get the chance to take preventative actions. What use is a spell like Barrier in preventing status effects if you’re not fast enough to cast it before being attacked?
Because my weaker characters were so frequently killed before they could do anything, I found myself relying on protagonist Kyrie to clean everyone else up, which resulted in a huge level imbalance. Because of the way the game scales enemy levels, this puts everyone else in your party even further behind, since the enemies increase in power based on the average level of your strongest characters. The stronger Kyrie got, the stronger my enemies did. Even worse is the fact that when weaker allies get killed in combat, they end up with injuries that discourage them from participating in your next battle due to stat penalties.
Fell Seal does have some great ideas, but most of them are cobbled together from other titles. It's not difficult to go down a checklist and identify where each individual mechanic came from. It's a game that owes a great debt to Final Fantasy Tactics, of course, but there's a little Tactics Ogre here, a little Final Fantasy Tactics Advance here, and a little XCOM there. It doesn't have much of an identity of its own at the end of the day, and because it doesn't apply these ideas with as much polish as many of its influences, the game suffers for it. Like Children of Zodiarcs before it, Fell Seal is damaged by inviting a comparison to an incredible game. I enjoyed my time with Fell Seal despite its frustrations, but I can't see myself ever replaying it.
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