Final Fantasy VIII (Review)

22 Jun, 2026

1998 | PlayStation | ★★★☆☆

Final Fantasy VIII is an odd beast. Feeling both underbaked and bloated, it takes big swings of ambition that should be praised for the daring, yet I feel it never quite strikes home.

Nestled between a pair of games I consider masterpieces, I suppose VIII always had big shoes to fill, and its reputation as a black sheep precedes it.¹ It would be unfair to call it bad, far from it, there is some exceptional creativity on display here - it just struggles to realise itself. The dirty dieselpunk of Final Fantasy VII is polished to a neo-futuristic sheen and the step-up in graphical fidelity is impressive, even after nearly thirty years: the FMVs² are gorgeous as are the pre-rendered backgrounds, characters are more proportional and detailed, and the music quality is crisper.³

The leap in technology is undeniable, but can itself run into problems - perhaps the effort poured into that side of the development, particularly the playable FMVs, ultimately took away from the design side of the game. The world feels small, as if there's less to explore than a four-disc game⁴ should justify. We are given a handful of major locations throughout the game and a smattering of small dungeons and side-spots, yet these are done with quickly and the major cities feel underdeveloped, their history and culture not much fleshed out. Esthar is perhaps the most explored, but then we do not reach it until disc 3, and still, there are questions unanswered by game's end.

That said, VIII seems to take this as its mission. There is a lot unsaid in the story, with much to infer and speculate upon, and I can appreciate those aspects - the wisps of surrealism that permeate the Sorceress archetype and her powers, particularly throughout discs 3 and 4, scratch a spot I love to itch. Unfortunately it feels unearned, as the plot drifts and loses direction several times, threads fall away and sometimes all we're left with is summaries of major events that could have been playable. The cast, despite its small size, seems unattended to, with only the central pairing experiencing any real growth as the story goes on, though Zell and Selphie have a few moments to shine. Major characters rarely conclude an arc, if there's one there at all.⁵ Even the villain is not particularly explored, content to function as the enigmatic source of our heroes' ire. I've little to no understanding of her true motivations, unless I turn to fan theories.⁶ It certainly has some upsides, enhancing the Sorceress' otherworldliness and framing the threat as truly alien, but at the cost of a more spiritual or symbolic challenge for the heroes to overcome, no clash of beliefs or morals, reducing the story's emotional weightiness by a lack of internal conflict.⁷ In the end, the underlying narrative hasn't the depth to support the dreaminess VIII seeks.

I wonder, too, whether the Junction System can sustain the combat side of the game. By the end, I felt bored by fights and bosses, slow dragging plods, so much that I turned encounters off by disc 4.⁸ The system centres around Guardian Forces, VIII's name for summons, which learn their own skills and can be swapped between characters, who can utilise the skills their equipped GF has learned. It leaves characters abilities a blank slate, allowing the player to mix and match strengths and skills across the party. Characters do have individual special abilities and growth patterns, leaning them into particular builds, diluting the idea of swapping abilities between party members on a whim, as the game seems eager to do. It tries to mitigate this by allowing you swap a character's build to another wholesale, but this often involves tinkering to stay at your best - every party split-up comes with admin.

The Draw System is where I feel VIII particularly falters. Magic is not learnt nor purchased, instead one must 'draw' it from a dedicated draw point (uncommon, and offer only small amounts) or from monsters (more lucrative, but also more bothersome). As long as a character has a GF equipped, they can also equip magic to a specific stat, such as Health or Speed, for a boost. The stat boost increases by both quality and volume of spell equipped, i.e. 50 Fire spells will boost your stat far less than 99 Firaga spells. This means that the most efficient way to power up your characters is to subdue every new enemy you come across to see if there's any magic you can draw from them. The highest magic per draw I got on the regular was nine, so this can take quite some time to build up to 99, especially if having to regularly cast Sleep or Stop on your target. A system where the most efficient method of growth is grinding your enemies for magic, repeating the same action for turns on end, becomes boring. Levels end up largely meaningless, as enemies scale to the highest level in your party. There's a lot to be said about ways this system can be utilised to break the game open and power your party up pretty swiftly, and even if the game doesn't explain itself too well you can figure it out pretty well after a number of hours. It certainly seems to be the most interesting and inventive mechanic in VIII, but my lack of engagement with the world and the story, and the dull way of gathering magic to grow your character, left me with little want to explore the Draw System's intricacies.

I'm left not quite disappointed, but feeling bittersweet toward Final Fantasy VIII. The impossible task of living up to to its brethren is perhaps not something I should have sought in it, and to its credit the game works to tirelessly differentiate itself and carve a new path with a tone and identity very much its own. Yet, it falters at the core, unable to synergise the energy brimming within, leaving us with a stuttering diamond cut by an eager but unsteady hand. A deeper analysis would be needed to understand what could or should have been, still, VIII represents Square in an era of boldness and brashness, a leader of the charge in video games as cinematic art, and a worthy holder of the title of Final Fantasy.

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