Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light (Nintendo DS)

Brandt is a fourteen-year-old boy living in the country of Horne. One day, the king summons him, only to send the boy on a perilous quest: Princess Aire has been kidnapped by the evil Witch of the North, and Brandt must rescue her. However, this quest is just a beginning of a long adventure, as Brandt and his new friends soon discover that the entire kingdom is in danger because of a pact that was signed between the king and the witch…

Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light is a spin-off of the Final Fantasy series, and also the first Final Fantasy title exclusively for the Nintendo DS. It plays much like the classic 2D entries in the series, and also features a class system, disguised as the “Crown System”; a character’s class is dependent on what crown he/she wears. The player gains these crowns during the course of the game. The game also features a “day and night” system; as the party traverses the overworld, time flows. This affects the game in that some stores open/closes at certain times. It might also do various other things.

The battle system is somewhat simplistic, but also unique; Action Points, or AP, play a big part in the battles. Each of the player-controlled characters has an AP meter, each topping at 5. A regular attack consumes 1 AP, and magic consumes 2 or more; this also means there are no mana points in the game. The player has the choice of either waiting a turn to gain 1 AP, or use the Boost command to gain 2 in one turn; by using the latter, the character in question cannot attack that round.

As a first in the series, the characters’ appearances change depending on what weapons and armours they have equipped – as opposed to only weapons visibly changing.

The game was developed by the same team responsible for the DS remakes of Final Fantasy III and IV.