A Welcome Back and Commercials!

Hey everyone! I, the Onion Knight, your Final Fantasy Grove writer, hath returned from thou's ever-so long writing hiatus. I sure hope everyone enjoyed their holidays, because I sure did! I even got some interesting Final Fantasy stuff that I'll have to blog about another day. Since I haven't posted in quite some time, I've decided to blog on commercials advertising Final Fantasy. We'll explore and analyze commercials from the early 80's (mostly Japanese ads) right up to the present. Of course, it won't be only Japanese commercials, but other regions such as North American and European, (if I can find them). All of the commercials will be embedded from YouTube and I will be posting a commercial every day until I've run out of any left to find.

 Today, I'm posting one of my favorite Final Fantasy commercials; a short but great ad. The commercial advertises Final Fantasy I & II, which was a 'compilation' cartridge released on the Famicom during it's later years of retail. The newer version of the Famicom, (also known as the version with the 'dog-bone' controllers), is also advertised at the end of the commercial. With each commercial I analyze, I'll ask one pertinent question: how well does the advertisement represent the product?

Note: the characters are from FFI while the chocobo is from FFII.

 Well, let's look at the visual representation first. Does it look like Final Fantasy? Heck yes. The artistic style, such as the clouds, mountains, and the actors' costumes, all look like some work of Yoshitaka Amano. The airship seen here, (which is a staple in the Final Fantasy games, I should add), seems to be deriven from the artwork seen in the guide released by Nintendo Power for the original Final Fantasy, although that artwork most likely originated from the development team at Square HQ in Japan. Judging from the look of the commercial, it would seem that it's mostly advertising Final Fantasy, not II. The characters seen here do not have similar appearances to characters in FFII, who were Firion, Maria, Guy, and Leon. Although, this is fair since Final Fantasy was probably more popular than the second installment and thus it would be wiser to fully advertise that game. I really like the look of this commercial; it 'oozes' Final Fantasy and seeing the characters riding on an airship into such an inspiring setting spurs me to play Final Fantasy again.

The AV Famicom, aka dog-bone.

 Just as important with anything Final Fantasy related is the subject of music. What are the sounds like in the commercial?  Are they relatable to Final Fantasy? They sure are! There are two peices that play in the commercial: the first one is an arranged version of the prelude, and then halfway through the commercial, the main theme kicks in. The prelude fits the mood and setting of the commercial perfectly, and personally I wish it lasted a little longer. The main theme comes in somewhat abruptly, although it would only be inexcusable to not put in the main theme in there somewhere. Overall, the music of choice is very good. And did you notice that the airship makes 'wooshing' sounds? Nice touch!

Like I said, this one stands as one of my favorite commercials and I JUST CAN'T FREAKIN' WAIT TO PLAY FINAL FANTASY! But I will pose one last question to you folks: who's flying the airship?

Happy New Years!