Nostalgia is a powerful thing. Especially video game nostalgia, since you have a memory of actively participating in these epic moments. I’m the one that cleared the ice cave in Final Fantasy. I’m the one that climbed the ShinRa tower in Final Fantasy VII. The Black Mage’s sprite, the battle victory fanfare… these things are part of our collective shared experiences.

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Final Fantasy All the Bravest exploits these feelings of nostalgia in almost the most cynical way possible. Outside of its nostalgia points (which are significant), it has no redeeming qualities. It barely qualifies as a video game. It’s a fireworks display – a lightshow – comprised of Cloud Strife, Kefka, Meteor spells and Cactuars. All designed to extract money with ruthless efficiency.There is no story in All the Bravest – the entire package is a gauntlet of fights against a best-of collection of random Final Fantasy baddies and bosses. Players begin with a normal-sized party but it rapidly grows and grows (and grows) until you’re battling with 32(!!) party members at once. The experience travels roughly through Final Fantasy history, starting in the fields of FF I’s Corneria, culminating in a fight with FF V’s Neo Exdeath.The problem is that the combat system isn’t a system at all. It’s so simple you could fight with your eyes closed. Players simply have to tap or run their finger over a party member, and that party member attacks.

That’s it. Literally.You can’t target specific enemies. You unlock classes at random as you play, but each one just attacks. Including the White Mage. The makeup of your party (chosen at random when you enter battle) just changes the fireworks display a little. You unlock equipment at random too, but it just provides a passive damage boost. The entire game is just running your finger up and down your rows of party members. There is no decision making of any kind - just “fighting” random enemies with a random group of party members over and over.These battles are tuned to show gamers frequent defeat unless they grind heavily at every turn. Even then, boss fights are almost impossible to clear on the first attempt. When your party inevitably wipes you have three options: back out to the map and grind some more, wait for your party to return (one party member regerates every three minutes) or pay real-world money to revive everyone.All the Bravest would be a pointless (albeit harmless) Final Fantasy time-kille, if it didn’t have so many awful monetary hooks built into it. In addition to paying to resurrect your party you can also pay $0.99 to unlock premium characters from Final Fantasy lore. There are 35 of these characters to unlock, and each purchase nets you one at random. So if you’re after someone specific like Cloud or Zidane… good luck. There’s no up-front way to even know who the 35 are. My two purchases gave me Setzer from FF VI and Rydia from FF IV.Players can also pay $3.99 each to unlock sub-adventures set in FF VII’s Midgar and a few other key locations from Final Fantasy lore.This is what makes All the Bravest such a bitter pill to swallow. This is a really cool core idea. More than 30 Final Fantasy character classes duking it out side-by-side, all at once, in fast-paced arcade-style turn-based battles? Awesome! All in FF VII’s dirty, grimy Midgar, rendered in stylized pixel-art? Yes, please! But instead we received a grind-heavy experience with no gameplay and an extremely greedy business model.