Final Fantasy Adventure for Game Boy - A Review | hungrygoriya 

This is one I wish I had when I first had my Game Boy. Fortunately I too have picked it up and did a good play through. It was actually kind of neat seeing all the sprites that I only knew from the sequel over on the SNES! Definitely worth a play though if you like the later games. I can’t believe I use to be able to play on that small lightless screen! For anyone who wants to play the series without needing an elaborate set up then all you need is a Switch! It’s called “Collection of Mana” and it has the first three games all in one! There is also the “Secret of Mana Remake” out there, but I prefer the original on Collections. If you want to play more after that then a rerelease of the PS1 title “Legends of Mana” is available, and a great remake of the third game “Trials of Mana” bringing the series into 3D! Guess I’ll quit my plug 😂 as you can see I am a huge Mana fan!

I got this game when I was 9 and remember every thing about it even 300 years later

When the Game Boy first came out and everyone at school was saying "Its such a downgrade from the NES" "There won't be able to do a big game like Zelda" Then this came along and everyone stopped saying that. I loaned this game out to sooooo many of my friends lol. After this came out we all realized that a Zelda game was possible and not long after Link's Awakening came along. This game holds a special place in my heart for giving me hope that the Game Boy could be just as fulfilling as the NES in my hand. And yes...that soundtrack is still burned into my brain more than 30 years down the road.

4:20 You can't shove townspeople out of the way, but you can knock them back by attacking them. If you hit them enough times they will perish, still saying their usual text. They respawn if you go offscreen and come back. Me: *Hits villager 20 times with a sword* Villager: *explodes* "Hello, young man! Welcome to Topple!"

0:09 that domino was wonderful

Your complaint about chatty townspeople perfectly mirrors my own feelings about encountering real life humans.

I remember being stuck at the palm trees 8 clue for days until a friend on the school bus told me the solution, ah those pre-internet days!

I remember getting this game for Easter in 1992 when I was 14 years old. I love this game and its playthrough, it was the closest thing to Zelda I had played that made me feel like it was an expansion of what that could have been. I swear if I go digging through my old artwork from when I was a kid I can find the hand-drawn maps I made of the dungeons including the corners where the maddocks could break through the wall and into another room. Thanks for the awesome video!

I beat this game for the first time last year on the Collection of Mana and I'm already nostalgic for the soundtrack. The biggest mistake I made was naming my Boy "Girl" and my Girl "Boy."

Ah, trapped by a villager in a town. No classic RPG experience is complete without this moment. I remember watching your stream with the palm tree puzzle. Thought we were going to stay there forever. 😅 Personally I like the idea of a poison effect that deals deadly damage. One of my pet peeves in video games in general is negative status effects that can just be ignored. Like when your character is "blind" but still consistently hits the enemy.

I snorted at the angry faced He-Man popping up looking like he was passing an especially difficult stool.

This game was remade twice. First as Sword of Mana on the GBA and then again as a top down 3D game called Adventures Of Mana. Sword Of Mana is like a reimagining of the game while Adventures Of Mana stays much closer to the original. I got softlocked in the last dungeon of the game! I ran out of keys.

I can't express how happy I am to see you review this game. This was one of the first games I ever beat as a child! I still have my original childhood cartridge and I managed to transfer the save to my computer with a dumper. Forever made me a fan of the mana series. The opening theme song has lived rent free in my head for 33 years, I hummed it to my children as a lullaby.

Hi there Goriya! This was my all time favorite Game Boy game growing up. The very end of the game was probably the first time I ever cried at a video game as a kid. Much later as an adult it was incredible to learn it was a Seiken Densetsu game and not really a Final Fantasy game. It also made me so happy later on in the GBA generation when they released the remake, Sword of Mana. I need to play through both of these again. Thanks for the great video as always Goriya.

Man… listening to that music brings back so many memories. Thank you so much for posting this.

My favorite Gameboy game and probably favorite game of the Mana series as well.

Let’s gooooooooooooooo new hungry goriya video!!!!!!!!

I also just played this game recently! Thanks for the timely review!

I've been saving this to watch with coffee on a nice Saturday morning. Great as always, HG!

This game had so many great moments. A gladiator turned hero, a brother playing music in memory of someone he lost, a brave automaton sinking into the depths after saving someone important, it really had it all. That is to say nothing at all of the amazing score of an adventure that more people should really have. Secret of Mana came close, but FFA still laps it easily. It did so much so easily. The folks at Square at that time just understood how to make games.

Good god I got Final Fantasy Adventure when I was 7 with a handful of other games that were super discounted at K Mart. It was Mega Man Xtreme, Final Fantasy Adventure, and Dragon Warrior 2 Tara's Adventure. This was such a great review, and damn that music is still timeless.

Oh man, I was so into this game as a kid! Glad you were able to experience it and that you enjoyed it.

This was my favorite long road trip game as a kid. Whenever I had to sit in the back of a car crossing multiple state lines and then spend several nights in a hotel room, Tetris just wouldn't cut it. I actually tried that again when I went on vacation not that long ago because I was feeling nostalgic and I had forgotten both how long this game is and how difficult it is to see the screen in any kind of shifting lighting on the classic Game Boy because it wasn't backlit. Getting home and finishing it on Super Game Boy was much easier on my eyes at my age.

Your review are calming as always. I have yet to play this game, but I do believe I read "always save 4 keys" somewhere when reading about this game. As I was watching your review I immediately remembered that.

I've watched a few of your videos over the years and for some reason always assumed you had 100k+ subscribers. Just noticed the actual number... and subscribed.

This was the first game I played that hit me in the feels and made me realise games could be more than *just* fun. In the UK it's just called 'Mystic Quest' so I had no idea it had anything to do with Final Fantasy until many years after first playing it.

This is one of my favorite GB games growing up. I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Great review! I'm glad you're getting the community support you deserve

I'm late to the show on your channel. Showed up on my feed about a week ago. Love your style and even though we don't see eye to eye on every thing about some games your reviews are well thought out and give me reason to look at my own views of certain games. Am running through your play reviews. Thanks for the informative and entertaining look back at games I played years ago ( decades ).

This was one of the first games RPG style games I fell in love with (Final Fantasy Legend being the first) and was so excited to see you cover this! Happy you enjoyed it so much. It's been 30 years or so since I first finished it and can still remember exactly where I was sitting and how much an impact it made on 10 year old me.

I first played this as the remake "Sword of Mana" and it's an awesome game. It's awesome that you're reviewing it.

I loved this game as a youngling, and really got into the story as young, hopeful adventures tend to be. I love this review from you, as you're always in depth with your own natural charm.❤

So glad you found this one!! Easily one of the strongest titles on the Game Boy. The soundtrack still blows my mind, considering the limitations of the hardware and memory. Growing up with this, the palm trees and 8 had my brother and I stuck for months. It wasn’t until we came across a game magazine in an electronics boutique that explained the message that we finally were able to figure it out. Also, accidentally soft locked on the final boss fight - Ugh! Oh well, playing through again was not a terrible experience at all. Still play through this one every other year or so. This game scratched a lot of the itches for a proper RPG that Legend missed. It’s the one I always end up coming back to.

one of the best game critics on this website easily. You've introduced me to a few gems. All your criticisms sounded totally fair but the review still got me really excited to try this game out!

Wow, I must have played this one DOZENS of times. Well done on going the extra mile to capture gameplay on a vintage device for that authentic 1991 feel.

Great review! I got this back when it was new and it was a godsend because my parents took us on a long vacation where I had to stay in for hours every day with nothing to do but play the Game Boy, and luckily I had Final Fantasy Adventure, which I beat. Great memories, but my judgement may be slightly tainted by nostalgia.

I don't have a Game Boy (and never have). But, I appreciate it's historical importance in the Gaming World. At some point I'll own one and play some of the games on it.

Man I really do miss games with maps and lists of equipment on the back. My siblings would always pour over the map, looking for cool places to explore or set up a pretend house. And we'd always check the equipment and decide what 'our' loadout would be if we lived in that world, mostly going by how cool the weapon and armor pictures were. So even when we weren't playing the game, we were getting entertained by the box includes!

Your taste in gaming is awesome. I played this the month it came out and enjoyed it thoroughly. My biggest gripe was tilting my original GB to the perfect lighting angle to see the screen for 20 hours as the Super GameBoy was not available yet.

Incidentally, nice to see another fan of that one Super Gameboy border with the cabin in the background. I often like to wait until it turns to night and continue playing with it in that state.

Excellent and thoughtful video as always! Thank you! Such a classic.

Another great view. You really are one of the best reviewers around...keep it up! I am a little surprised it took you so long to play this game. It's such a classic that I would have been sure you had already played it...one of the best Game Boy games, if not the best

That streaming set up is so cool

Great review! Definitely gonna check it out 🎉

Good review. I especially enjoyed your attention to the musical component and your generosity sharing those game recommendations.Thanks for the video!

I need to finish this one of these years. I played thru about half of it on the Collection of Mana but got lost in one part, put it down, and never went back. Also thank you for the He-Man & Skeletor cameos. GG!

Love your work, thank you as always!

I loved this game as a kid, but I definitely abused the fact that you could save at any time and burned myself by saving right before the final boss dealt a death blow to my character. Never did finish the game. 😂

This was one of my favorite games on the Gameboy when I was young. It was a real treat being able to see someone experience it for the first time and see that they enjoyed it, as well!

I love the video and your take on the game. Your editing is amazing, really awesome job

I played this game back in the day, I love how far the host bends over backwards to find good points. I mean, the line, “The airship flew West,” is provided as a bit of the story SO GOOD, SO UTTERLY PERFECT that was shown on-screen to illustrate the might of that game’s plot. So fantastic that I’m sure a number of new converts just went out to buy a copy so they could see if that lines was equally mind-blowing on original hardware.

Still one of my favorite memories on the GB. Love your channel!

I sold this game years ago because I really didnt enjoy it in the 90s. I watched the video to see what i missed. It still doesn't seem like anything i have the patience for but i appreciate what they were able to do on the Gameboy. I bought mine at launch, still play it...have about 80 games and of course usually play the same favorite 10 or so. Very good video.

OMG what wonderful timing! I am playing through this game via Collection of Mana on Switch, and I was desperately looking for an in-depth review for this game. No matter the shortcomings of the Gameboy's two buttons and the outdated design decisions by the developers, I find the simplicity in its gameplay so refreshing and charming, To me it is a great companion piece to The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, which has an equally strong and elegant marriage of story and gameplay. The only thing I actively hate about this game (besides that horrible dungeon music) is its name, which really hurts its searchability . I often confuse 'Final Fantasy Adventure' with 'Final Fantasy Legend" and even the European title 'Mystic Quest' does not help since there is a 'Final Fantasy Mystic Quest' is on the Super Nintendo. Therefore, I go with the Japanese title 'Seiken Densetsu'. Thank you for the awesome video Ms. Goriya! Love your videos 3000!!

This was a favorite of mine as a kid. So glad to hear you had a great time with it!

King: And we shall name our son "Dark Lord" Queen: isn't that a bit too ominous? King: what do you mean queen Evilicca?, it's a perfectly serviceable name, and he shall carry it with honor, or my name isn't King Malevolent Heroskiller Babyeater the third. Man, wish i played this one, I had the bad luck of playing Final Fantasy Legends for the GB, it's an RPG alright, turn battles, and all that, but your characters during that battles were just the names you gave them and if they die well, you had two options, revive them for a fortune or just make another like them, near the end revival is cheaper due to the amount of money you get, but at the start it was better to just make new characters. also thanks for sharing this video, now i know what game to look for next time i got to the flea market.

editing and production quality looking good😎

It was '98 or '99 when I borrowed this outstanding trilogy from my best friend, and it brought many days of new life into my old Gameboy. I remember playing it after school while waiting for my dad to finish work. I had many game systems, but nothing could match the portability of a Gameboy at that time. This game and the sequels were top tier Gameboy titles that deserve to be remembered.

Wonderful job on your review as always, Hungry!

I have owned this game since 1991 and it's the most cherished memory of the Gameboy from my childhood. It took me more than a year to finish it, and I was stuck for months on the "palm trees and 8" riddle, but it only added to the game's mystery and charm.

Thank you for taking us through your adventure!

Thanks for sharing! Never beat this one but always loved playing it, especially when I found out it was the first game in the Mana series.

I remember this game fondly. ...Including being very paranoid about savegames. Despite being less than ten years old. This game was scary.

I played this in the Switch collection several years ago, but gave up on it after I managed to go to a place too early and couldn't figure out how to get back "on the path" (As an aside, I appreciate Collection of Mana giving you a palette beyond black & white for FFA, but wish it gave you more color options than "Default SGB")

Love it when you release an episode, but love it so much more when, like this, its a game I used to have. I had never played a FF before, and got this on the strength of the name alone. I had no idea it wasn't legit until many many years later. I have some fond memories playing it, but never got very far.

What a special surprise to see a Hungry Goriya video 😁I clicked immediately!!!

Great stuff as always! 🎉

I could not click this video quick enough seeing the topic. Love the game and love your reviews!

I actually only bought a copy of this game relatively later in life, like my mid 20's if I remember right, and I'm impressed how fun it really is, even with no nostalgia involved. A lot of old Gameboy games I own are.... just not great honestly, but when a GB game was good, it was REALLY good.

Oh yay, I love this game. I played it as part of the Collection of Mana for Switch. It is a really impressively big game for being an early Game Boy release. And it's still really fun to play now ! The music is really great too. Also props on the GBC setup.

Had this as a kid and absolutely loved it. Fortunately I never soft locked my game but I do remember getting stuck for a bit due to vague instructions. Also, I had no clue that you could ask the tag along character and that action would be performed. Looking at your footage, I have forgotten a lot about this game and may replay it this weekend.

This is such a well made video with heart

That music really brings back some memories! I'm getting old.

That damn Oasis riddle... I wandered around the desert aimlessly to find the answer. Took me so long that I had grinded up to level 65ish when I noticed that you very briefly stop on your track when you are are on the right spot doing what you have to do. I was so overleveled that I simply breezed through the rest of the game... except against that Lich fellow, who kept 2 hitting me.

What a nice coincidence, I just finished the Japanese version of this game on original cart. I can speak to the translation of the palm tree puzzle - in Japanese, the villager says "yashinoki, hachi no ji." It's a nice little sing-song phrase and it also has one additional drop of meaning - translated, it would come out to "Palm trees, shape of 8." BUT: because the game doesn't use kanji, and the word "ji" can mean lots of things, a non-native speaker like me still got stuck on this puzzle for a while. A friend of mine who knew the solution had to tell me I was onto something with translating "ji" as "shape," and once I had that idea in my head, I solved the puzzle pretty quickly. I also did not have much issue understanding Dr. Bowow / Bomboyaji's directions to the anemone beach, so I'm guessing there was a translation issue there as well. Loved this game, and I agree with your review points.

What a lovely video. Thank you!

My cousin give me this game in a car for a road trip, and I thought it was Zelda'y. Suprisingly, I really loved the Mana series games that would follow up after this. This was an awesome experience. STILL haven't beaten it, to this day!

GREAT video, and I absolutely love this game! This felt like SquareSoft's response to the Zelda craze. What a heckuva response! I grew up as a young kid playing this with my older brother, though oddly enough we didn't like Secret of Mana when we rented it the one time as kids. Compared to the great-feeling controls and combat, SoM felt very slippery and inprecise.

I remember borrowing this from my friend in highschool about 25 years ago. The annoyances mentioned in the video were all true but they didn't stop the game from being awesome and the story was great for a GB game. That figure 8 puzzle was the only pain but the rest of the game was brilliant.

Beat this one 30 years ago. A good game, will have another play through one day. Also, the manual and poster really added to the overall gameplay.

The first mana game

4:12 ah so that's where Skyward Sword got the idea. Wow the song at the end was like, the slowed-down emotional version of Bloody Tears XD

One of my favorite (and most replayed) childhood games! Fun fact: The game's designers *did* account for most soft-locking scenarios by strategically placing skeletons (always drops 🔑 Key), and bouncing blobs (always drops ⛏️ Mattock). I've replayed the game countless times and never personally experienced a soft-lock, but that could also be my memory providing an unfair advantage 😅

It's cool to see the GB Mana game continued the tradition of great Square soundtracks!

Great review. Loved the subtle ffxvi dig haha.

I found the palm trees puzzle when I was 13 and felt like a genius. To me it's a great puzzle, but I guess every mind works differently.

This was a great GB game. I got it late into the GB life span, I think after GB Color was a thing. This game was super big and quickly became one of my favorite games on the hand held. I really like how, near the end, I realized the whole world was connected and it was one continues map!

Another awesome review for an awesome game. Cheers!

Wow. You finally got to my favorite nostalgic game. Thank you so much.

This game was the first game I shed tears at the ending. The recent Japanese ad says it all... Check it out if you haven't! My palm tree story: When you walk around the palm trees, there is a slight hitch the same way a trigger panel works. That's the only way I knew that I was in the right spot.

Oh dear, the Palm Tree 8 puzzle... The only time I ever called the Nintendo Power hotline (and they knew *immediately* what I was talking about :D). FWIW, in the German translation (The game is called "Mystic Quest" in Europe since we didn't get Final Fantasy until FF7) it's actually a lot better, but still to complex for my child brain, it says "Follow the 8 at the Palm trees". But yeah, this is one of the best Game Boy games, and I even enjoyed the modern remake on the PS Vita (Adventures of Mana) though of course when that one came out, it was criticized for being such a simple game. I still have Sword of Mana on my To-Do list, which apparently isn't a straight remake but more like a re-imagination of the original with some of the Secret of Mana ideas in it.

One of my favorite games of all time, so much nostalgia. I spent months wondering around jad looking for the figure 8 thing, before internet could help out lmao. There was one time i forgot the game cart in my jeans and it went through the wash! X.x i was so devastated until it dried out and i found out it still ran perfect 👌 man so many memories

It was a fun stream. I remember biting my tongue, so to speak, during the palm tree / 8 puzzle. No idea why I remember these kinda things over 30 years after first playing the game, but that part did stick with me.

This was the second game I ever beat as a kid. I don't play it often but I probably would list it as my favorite game.

Nice review and again it bring back some memories :)! I never had a Game Boy, but the kid of a friend of my dad did and they lent me their Game Boy for some time and this game was included. I remember it being awesome, a bit like Zelda 1, but somewhat more streamlined (sidenote: I guess that Neutopia should have better tried to copy this game). I never got too far if I recall correctly, maybe I got a few weapos, but the cartridge had a save by the final boss, so that's something. Secret of Mana was/is one of my favorites games and it was great to know that FF Adventure was the first one in the line (no disappointment at all with the lack of FF pedigree). Fast forward to the future, just a few years ago I played the remake in an iPad and it was surprinsingly close to the original, I even got stuck without keys in one of the final dungeons xD. I don't remember if it had the palms riddle though.

This was really interesting. Only had 2 gameboy games as a kid so it's cool to see stuff about hidden gems I probably would have obsessed with. The "Palm Trees + 8" would have upset me before the internet though...

an all-time fave! loved this game as a youth. can't wait to watch the review!

Seeing Cosmo Tank at the beginning was exciting! It has such an interesting world to explore; the exact sort of thing I feel the original Game Boy does best. I like this one quite a bit, and though the inventory thing is a pain, it's pretty helpful at the end of the game, if you're trying to get the best equipment. Enemies generally have two items that can show up in the chests they drop (Secret of Mana also does this), but since your items and equipment are in different menus, just fill up your items and keep checking the chest; the virtual die roll to determine which item you get happens every time you touch the chest, so having full items will let you keep trying until the armor/helmet/shield drops instead. That aside, I loved the strange world this game has; when you first get the chocobo and run around in the ocean, seeing all kinds of crazy islands with floating rocks and stuff, especially in monochrome, it made the world seem so deep and mysterious. I'd also like to recommend the GBA... resomething; everyone's got strong opinions of the definitions of remake, reboot, reimagining, rewhatever, and nobody agrees on what those definitions are, so I'll just leave it blank. Anyway, Sword of Mana for the GBA follows the same story beats, but is overall a fairly different experience. Instead of different weapons, you get the different weapon types (including a few new ones), and you can reforge them with different materials you can find, so they're all viable at any point of the game. Magic is created by choosing the elemental, and the actual spell is determined by which weapon you have equipped. The visuals are bright and colorful, and most importantly, it has Li'l Cactus!

This might be weird to say but your voice is really soothing

"The same thing happened to me." I saved in a spot, deep in a dungeon, and ran out of mattocks. :( That's why I'm hoping the GBA remake, Sword of Mana, comes out for Steam someday. Don't forget, RedAux has a big Mana trilogy piano book! I can't wait for those piano streams to come back!