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The History of Final Fantasy Retrospective Part 11 takes an in-depth look at three Final Fantasy-related spin-off games (like the Final Fantasy Retrospective Part 10, which looked at the Chocobo titles, FF: Mystic Quest, and every other FF-related piece of media).

First up is Final Fantasy Legend I, II and III for the Game Boy. An offshoot series that really has nothing to do with Final Fantasy and were actually the first games in the “Saga” franchise, which finally got it’s original name back in the United States when the 7th installment, for the PS1, was released in the US as “Saga Frontier” (the last game in the series being Unlimited Saga on the PS2, which received mixed reviews).

They then look at Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles, released for the Nintendo GameCube in 2004 (US). Created by Game Developers Studio, a company made specifically to work on the game, it marked Square’s glorious return to Nintendo systems. Square had entirely skipped the Nintendo 64 era for Sony exclusivity when the cartridge-based N64 format became a limitation to game-development. But with the power and disc-based GameCube system, Square could once again unleash their creativity to the joy of Nintendo consumers.

Crystal Chronicles would mark a highly unique and innovative action RPG spin-off that would become it’s own branch of the franchise. There are now two upcoming Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles games in development: Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates (DS) and Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: The Crystal Bearers (Wii). Also a brand-new game, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: The Young King and the Promised Land was just announced as an exclusively-developed WiiWare title, that will be available for download in the future!

The core Final Fantasy games however still remain exclusive to Sony, including the upcoming Final Fantasy XIII and Final Fantasy Versus XIII, with Final Fantasy 11 being the only core FF game to be released on multiple platforms at it’s debut (although some people don’t consider the MMORPG to be a core game in the series). There is a direct-sequel to Final Fantasy XI in development for Xbox 360, PS3 and PC by the way.

Finally, the retrospective takes an in-depth look at the Kingdom Hearts games, including the original, Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories on the Game Boy Advance, Kingdom Hearts II, and the three upcoming Kingdom Hearts games in development.

Overall, once again a great, great retrospective that no fan of the Final Fantasy titles or any of these games should miss! Enjoy.

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Electronic Arts celebrated Command & Conquer’s 12th Anniversary last month by giving away the original Command & Conquer (Gold) as a free download, compatible for Windows XP! The same version included with the collectors pack Command & Conquer: The First Decade. But what if you missed it? No problem, you can always get C&C at Filefront.

Electronic Arts announced The Command & Conquer Saga, a massive compilation of over a dozen Command & Conquer games including the award-winning titles featured in Command & Conquer The First Decade. Available in North America this October for the PC at a price of just $49.99, The Command & Conquer Saga marks the largest PC franchise compilation to date.

The RTS series has so far sold over 25 million copies worldwide. The Command & Conquer Saga contains the following titles:
* Command & Conquer (Aug. 1995)
* Command & Conquer: The Covert Operations (April 1996)
* Command & Conquer: Red Alert (Oct 1996)
* Command & Conquer: Red Alert — Counterstrike (Mar. 1997)
* Command & Conquer: Red Alert — The Aftermath (Sept. 1997)
* Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun (Aug 1999)
* Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun — Firestorm (Feb. 2000)
* Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 (Oct. 2000)
* Command & Conquer: Red Alert — Yuri’s Revenge (Oct. 2001)
* Command & Conquer: Renegade (Feb. 2002)
* Command & Conquer: Generals (Feb. 2003)
* Command & Conquer: Generals — Zero Hour (Sept. 2003)
* Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars (Mar 2007)

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