Any time a console or handheld game receives a port onto the iPhone or iPad, I get a little more excited every day as that means another fantastic game has made the jump to iOS to be enjoyed by a whole new audience. Today is another one of those days as Square-Enix has announced that Final Fantasy III has just been made available for the iPhone.

In Final Fantasy III, you play as Luneth who is embarking on a journey, along with three other like-minded adventurers, to search for powerful crystals in order to help their fight against the darkness that slowly consumes the land. Final Fantasy III was the first Final Fantasy title to issue jobs to its adventurers rather than giving them a specific class and locking that character down to that class. During your adventure, you’ll be able to switch the jobs of your characters depending on the situation. This adds a whole new level of strategy that the previous Final Fantasy I & II didn’t have.

As we assumed in our previous article, Final Fantasy III is a port of the Nintendo DS version of the game that was released in 2006. The iPhone version of Final Fantasy III includes improved 3-D graphics that takes full advantage of all of the extra horsepower under the hood, as well as a smooth, intuitive touch-panel controls which promise to make the game easier to play than ever before.

Square-Enix also revealed that an iPad version of Final Fantasy III is currently being worked on and is planned to be released next month. This will mark the first time a Final Fantasy title has officially been ported for the iPad, as Final Fantasy I & II never received any iPad love. We’re hoping this means Square-Enix continues releasing future Final Fantasy games, and any other old-school RPG remakes, on the iPad.

Final Fantasy III ($15.99) – [iTunes Link]