[DS] Final Fantasy IV 3D DS

So the official Japanese development blog outlined several new features for this version of the game (some of this is old, but it hasn't been posted yet):

* Players may now re-form their party with any character as their leader, just like the original. Only now, when a player enters the menu screen, the leader will be shown on the bottom screen with their personal thoughts on what is going on in the story at the time - sometimes with funny anecdotes.

* An in-game jukebox function has been added with all songs from the game, complete with commentary by Edward.

* New combination attacks can be performed between certain party members.

* Story elements that were not able to be inserted in the original version due to space or time restraints have been added. The overall amount of dialogue has greatly increased.

* It seems that unlike the GBA version, characters such as Cid, Palom, Porom, Edward, and Yang *cannot* be recruited late game. The developers thought this "changed the game too much". "The story of FFIV", Square claims, "was always it's most important feature. The last five characters you control in the original version simply worked very well with each other, and we wanted to preserve those feelings." Characters can now "inherit" skills of any character not currently in the party, giving them new abilities. These new abilities can be shuffled and exchanged in several ways.

* Many towns have been completely re-vamped. Damcyan now appears more "Middle-Eastern", while Fabul is more "Chinese". Eblan has also been designed to look more like a "ninja residence".

* While the polygon count of character models has been reduced from Final Fantasy III DS, more characters and enemies will be displayed on the screen at a time. With new character voices and cut-scenes, the game was barely able to fit on the 1Gb DS game card.

The game is also still on for its December 20 release in Japan.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Official box art up.

Originally Posted by BigCN401

1GB?! o.O
Don't they mean 1Gbit aka 128MB?

And yeah, great update.

Yes, you're right, "1Gb", not "GB". That was my bad.

Still, I was very pleased with these updates. I"m looking forward to the game already. I haven't seen anything about a release date outside Japan, but I guess it's still too early. This is a good opportunity to remind everyone that the DS is region-free!

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Borg1982

Where does that "official" box art come from?

The pic was original posted on the True Gaming blog and then uploaded to Wikipedia to replace an earlier version obtained from a separate source. A larger version is also available here. It was scanned and uploaded at TG alongside the Rune Factory 2 box art which, as far as I can tell, is legit as well.

Oh, and here's some news for the new soundtrack!

Originally Posted by Dale North, Destructoid.com

Music4Games has information on the upcoming soundtrack and single releases for the Nintendo DS remake of Final Fantasy IV.

The two-disc set, featuring arrangements of Nobuo Uematsu's amazing original Super Nintendo score by Junya Nakano and Kenichiro Fukui, will go on sale in Japan on January 30th, 2008. This set will also include a promotional DVD.

For now, there's the CD single for the game's love theme, "Tsukino Akari - Final Fantasy IV Theme of Love," performed by Megumi Ida. Like the full album, this single will include a promotional DVD containing two promotional videos (Japan's name for music videos) and the Tokyo Game Show trailer.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Andrew Evenstar

I can't get this to work. Can someone help me.

The link you're looking for is the second one after the group of pictures ("【JPFans.COM】[Pv](2007.12.05)伊田恵美-月の明り-Final Fantasy IV 愛のテーマ-.torrent (17 K)"). The file you get from it has no extension, but it's actually a torrent file. Just open it in any torrent program, or right click and "Open with..." and select your torrent software from the list.

Also, the new Theme of Love *does* have different lyrics than the one featured in Final Fantasy Vocal Collection PRAY (called "Into the Light" on that particular album). The melody is nearly the same, but the new version is mostly a piano piece with violin accompany while the older one had a whole orchestra thing going on. It sounds really good, though!

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Such a cool video! Seems like I get more excited about the game the more I read about it.

Originally Posted by wvlfpvp

Is it just me, or does the Theme of Love playing through that just highlight how damn sad the story is at times?

Y'now, for a "love song", that theme really is kinda melancholy, but it really fits the tone of the game. The schism between Kain and Cecil was always one of my favorite parts of the story, and I hope the new script does a good job with it.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Actually, those 'moogles' might be the Namingways. They could have re-designed them to be more rabbit-like to fit in with the whole Tsuki Usagi story; they do live on the moon after all. I haven't played it yet, but that would make sense.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?