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The Dark side of Final Fantasy

We expose the seedy underbelly of the popular franchise

Words: Jon Brown, PlayStation World UK

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You thought Final Fantasy was all about cute cat-things named “moogles” and some brooding teens that save the world, right? Oh, you couldn’t be more wrong. Little did you know that the pinnacle RPG franchise will tear your life to shit and make you a depraved maniac. Think we’re bluffing? Go ahead tough guy, read on about the dark side of Final Fantasy.

Addiction

Medical research shows that thousands of gamers worldwide can’t operate without their daily fix of Final Fantasy. What do you mean you don’t believe us? Check out the recent study presented to the Society of Neuroscience in Washington D.C, which claims to have scientific proof that FF addicts bear all the psychological hallmarks of die-hard smackheads. Just what we wanted to hear.

Officially the most addictive, most socially harmful Final Fantasy of them all is Final Fantasy XI, the massively-multiplayer-online effort. Shakerag65, a recovering “addict” we spoke to from Baltimore, confesses to having spent over 6,000 hours in total playing Final Fantasy XI. “I started playing in 2004 after I graduated,” he told us via email. “I couldn’t find a job, so I was playing FFXI more and more. It messed with my whole sleep cycle, to the point where I became almost completely nocturnal. And by the time I did find a job, I’d "achieved" so much in the game I couldn’t bear to walk away, so I just kept playing. It seemed like the logical thing to do. It wasn’t until September 2006 that I stopped playing for good, and by then I’d spent the equivalent of 250 days on something that, in the real world, equates to nothing.”