I’ll be honest with you: I have no idea how to feel about Dissidia Final Fantasy. On the one hand, characters from every Final Fantasy game meeting up in one handheld fighter? That should be great, right? On the other hand, Final Fantasy spin-offs have a tendency to be less than stellar, and the idea of pitting characters from different Final Fantasy titles against each other seems kind of strange. Then again, I once thought Final Fantasy and Disney characters coming together was a weird idea, so maybe I should just never doubt anything Square Enix does. At any rate, I had to see more, so I made my way over to the Square Enix booth on the E3 floor to fight a few rounds.

There were only a few characters available to choose from in the demo, and naturally, I chose Cloud. I was pitted against Tidus from FFX, which was a really strange match-up. As soon as I heard that familiar theme song, I was ready to go. Each fight takes place in a fairly large environment, which Cloud could also interact with in certain ways. For example, at strategically timed moments, Cloud could run up a wall and out of the way of attacks. I’m curious as to whether or not these special moves are tied to specific environments, or if each character comes with a different set of unique movement skills.



In addition to standard attacks, Cloud had some familiar moves up his sleeve: I was able to use two of his limit breaks from FFVII, Braver and Cross Slash. I made short work of Tidus, but found myself being defeated a couple of fights later. Dissidia isn’t just a button-masher; there is strategy involved. Like many great fighting games, it is easy to play, but difficult to master. I still don’t know enough about the story to understand why these characters have been pitted against each other, and the plot will probably be a deciding factor in whether or not I want to continue playing this game.

I had fun playing Dissidia, and it was nice to see some familiar faces again, but I’m still wary about a Final Fantasy fighting game. Will I play it again? Most likely. I just want it to be more than just fan service. We’ll find out when Dissidia Final Fantasy comes out for the PSP later this summer.