Final Fantasy IV

Final Fantasy IV for Super NES, Playstation, Gameboy Advance and Nintendo DS system
A Dark Knight from the kingdom of Baron, on his journey to save the world from the evil Golbez.

In Final Fantasy IV, the player controls a large cast of characters and completes quests to advance the story. Characters move and interact with people and enemies on a field map, which may represent a variety of settings, such as towers, caves, and forests. Travel between areas occurs on a world map. The player can use towns to replenish strength, buy equipment, and discover clues about their next destination. Conversely, the player fights monsters at random intervals on the world map and in dungeons. In battle, the player has the option to fight, use magic or an item, retreat, change character positions, parry, or pause. Certain characters have special options. Player characters and monsters have HP or hit points (represented by a numerically based life bar); attacks reduce hit points until none are left, at which point the character faints or the monster dies. If all characters are defeated, the game must be restored from a saved game file. The player can restore the characters’ hit points by having them sleep in an inn or use items in the party’s inventory, such as a Potion. Equipment (such as swords and armor)bought in towns or found in dungeons can be used to increase damage inflicted on monsters or minimize received damage. The player can choose whether characters appear on the front line of a battle or in reserve. A character’s placement impacts distribution of damage received and inflicted. The game’s story is linear—the player can usually advance the game through only one path, although limited side quests are available

Most of Final Fantasy IV takes place on Earth, also known as the Blue Planet, which consists of an upper world (or Overworld) and an underground world (or Underworld). The Overworld consists of territories populated by different character classes from the series. The Underworld is primarily inhabited by dwarves and is covered in rock and magma. A red, artificial moon orbits the planet, upon which two races, the Lunarians and the Hummingway live. A second, natural moon orbits as well, though it is never visited in the game. Travel among the three realms is accomplished through airships.

Final Fantasy IV : DS is an enhanced remake of the original Final Fantasy IV. It was released for the Nintendo DS as part of the campaign for Final Fantasy series 20th anniversary. The game was developed by Matrix Software, the same team responsible for the Final Fantasy III remake, and was supervised by members of the original development team: Takashi Tokita served as executive producer and director, Tomoya Asano as producer and Hiroyuki Itō as battle designer. Animator Yoshinori Kanada storyboarded the new cut scenes. The developers have since began a weekly blog, chronicling the development of the game.

The game was released in Japan on December 20, 2007. The game was announced for a US release in the May 2008 issue of Nintendo Power. IGN recently reported that the US release is set for July 22nd.

Director: Hironobu Sakaguchi
Scenario Writer: Takashi Tokita
Image Designer: Yoshitaka Amano
Composer: Nobuo Uematsu