10 Facts You Didn't Know About The Final Fantasy Video Game Franchise - Zentara

Few names in the video game industry carry the weight, prestige, and sheer confusing numbering system of Final Fantasy. Since 1987, Square Enix (formerly Square) has been transporting players to worlds filled with chocobos, moogles, and airships. It is the franchise that popularized the Role-Playing Game (RPG) genre in the West, introduced cinematic storytelling to consoles, and taught an entire generation how to read Roman numerals. From the steampunk grit of Final Fantasy VII to the road-trip bromance of Final Fantasy XV, the series constantly reinvents itself, keeping only a few crystals and a guy named Cid as common threads.

But the history of Final Fantasy is as dramatic as its storylines. The franchise was born out of desperation, nearly destroyed by a Hollywood movie, and accidentally created one of the most famous glitches in gaming history. Did you know the famous “victory fanfare” was written in five minutes? Or that one of the most beloved games in the series was secretly developed by a completely different company? Whether you are a Warrior of Light or a SOLDIER 1st Class, these ten facts will cast a “Raise” spell on your knowledge of the ultimate fantasy.

1. The Name “Final Fantasy” Was Not Because the Company Was Going Bankrupt

The most pervasive myth in gaming history is that the game was titled Final Fantasy because it was Square’s “final” attempt at making a game before going bankrupt. The story goes that creator Hironobu Sakaguchi was ready to quit the industry and return to university if the game failed. While it makes for a romantic underdog story, it is only half true.

Sakaguchi was considering quitting, and Square was in financial trouble, but the name was chosen primarily for a simpler reason: they wanted a title that could be abbreviated to “FF” in Japanese (EFU-EFU), because it sounded pleasing to the ear. Sakaguchi originally wanted to call it Fighting Fantasy, but that name was already trademarked by a board game. So, he switched “Fighting” to “Final.” While the “final attempt” narrative was a happy coincidence that the marketing team later embraced, the linguistic aesthetic was the primary driver.

2. The Iconic “Victory Fanfare” Was Composed in Under 5 Minutes

Duh-duh-duh-dunn, duh-duh, dunn-dunn-dunn! You can hear it, can’t you? The Final Fantasy victory fanfare is one of the most recognizable jingles in pop culture. It was composed by Nobuo Uematsu, the legendary musician behind the majority of the series’ soundtracks.

During the development of the first game, Uematsu was churning out music at a rapid pace. When he got to the victory screen music, he didn’t overthink it. He reportedly sat down at his keyboard and improvised the melody in roughly 3 to 5 minutes. He thought nothing of it at the time, assuming it was just a throwaway jingle. That 5-minute improvisation has now been remixed and re-orchestrated in over 15 mainline games and played at symphonic concerts around the world for decades.

3. Final Fantasy VII Was Originally a Detective Story Set in New York

Final Fantasy VII is famous for its cyberpunk city of Midgar and eco-terrorist plot. However, in the very early planning stages (before development shifted to the PlayStation), the game looked radically different. It was envisioned as a detective story set in a real-world version of New York City in the year 1999.

The concept featured a character named “Detective Joe” hunting down the members of a villainous organization who were blowing up parts of the city. While the setting was scrapped for the fantasy world of Gaia, traces of this original idea survived. The city of Midgar retains that gritty, urban, “New York noir” aesthetic, and the eco-terrorist group AVALANCHE blowing up Mako reactors is a direct evolution of the original plot’s bombings.

4. A Bug in the Code Created the “Combo” System in Final Fantasy I

In the original NES version of Final Fantasy, the Monk class was notoriously buggy. One of the strangest behaviors was that if a Monk hit an enemy, sometimes they would hit multiple times in a single turn without explanation. This wasn’t a feature; it was a programming error in how the game calculated hit rates for unarmed characters.

However, players loved it. The feeling of landing multiple hits felt powerful and satisfying. Square noticed this positive reaction and decided to turn the bug into a feature. In subsequent games, they formalized the “multi-hit” or “combo” mechanics, eventually evolving into the Limit Breaks and Blitz moves of later titles. The entire concept of flashy, multi-hit attacks in the franchise owes its existence to bad math in 1987.

5. Final Fantasy IV Was Originally “Final Fantasy V” in the US

If you played Final Fantasy on the Super Nintendo in the early 90s, you might remember playing Final Fantasy II and Final Fantasy III. However, in Japan, these were actually Final Fantasy IV and Final Fantasy VI. This numbering disaster happened because Square decided not to release the real II, III, and V in the West, deeming them too difficult or complex for American audiences.

This created a “missing generation” of games. For over a decade, Western fans had no official way to play the NES sequels or the job-system-heavy Final Fantasy V. The numbering wasn’t officially corrected until the release of Final Fantasy VII on PlayStation, which kept the Japanese number “7,” confusing American gamers who wondered what happened to 4, 5, and 6. The “missing” games were eventually released on PlayStation and Game Boy Advance years later, finally fixing the timeline.

6. The “Cid” Tradition Started in Final Fantasy II

Every mainline Final Fantasy game features a character named Cid. He is usually an older, mechanically gifted engineer associated with airships. However, Cid was notably absent from the very first Final Fantasy game (though he was retroactively mentioned in remakes).

The tradition began in Final Fantasy II (1988) with a character named Cid who ferried the player around on his airship. Since then, “Cid” has been a Highwind captain, a school headmaster, a villainous judge, a mechanic in a garage, and even a thunder god. He is the franchise’s constant—a reassuring presence that guarantees that no matter how weird the magic gets, there is always a guy with a wrench and a flying machine nearby.

7. Final Fantasy Spirits Within Bankrupted the Company and Forced a Merger

In 2001, Square released Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, a groundbreaking CGI movie. It was a technological marvel, rendering photorealistic humans that had never been seen before. It was also a box office bomb of catastrophic proportions. The film cost $137 million to make and grossed only $85 million.

The financial loss was so devastating that it nearly killed Square. The company’s value plummeted, and Sakaguchi, the creator of the franchise, eventually stepped down. To survive, Square was forced to merge with its longtime rival, Enix (the makers of Dragon Quest). This merger created the juggernaut “Square Enix” we know today. In a grim irony, the “movie of the future” almost ensured that the game series had no future at all.

8. Final Fantasy XII Is Set in the Same Universe as Final Fantasy Tactics

Most Final Fantasy games take place in their own self-contained universes with no narrative connection to each other. Final Fantasy XII is a rare exception. It is set in the world of Ivalice, the same setting used for the cult classic strategy game Final Fantasy Tactics and Vagrant Story.

This shared universe, known as the “Ivalice Alliance,” was masterminded by director Yasumi Matsuno. If you pay attention to the lore, Final Fantasy XII is actually a prequel to Tactics, set in a “Golden Age” where airships filled the skies and non-human races (like the lizard-like Bangaa and the bunny-eared Viera) were common. By the time Tactics takes place centuries later, civilization has regressed, airship technology is lost, and the non-human races have largely gone extinct or into hiding, adding a layer of tragic history to the world.

9. A Hidden Development Team Made Final Fantasy IX

Final Fantasy IX is often cited as a return to the series’ roots, featuring knights, mages, and crystals after the sci-fi detour of VII and VIII. But while the main Square team was finishing VIII in Japan, IX was being developed largely in secret in Hawaii.

Hironobu Sakaguchi wanted to create a tribute to the old-school games, so he established a studio in Honolulu. The team was a mix of Japanese developers and American staff, working somewhat independently from the corporate pressure in Tokyo. This geographical separation is often credited for the game’s unique, whimsical “fairy tale” tone, which feels distinct from the angsty, teen-drama style of its PlayStation siblings. It was the last game Sakaguchi was heavily involved in before the movie disaster, making it his true swan song.

10. The Summon “Bahamut” Has Appeared More Than Any Human Character

If there is one entity that defines power in Final Fantasy, it is Bahamut, the Dragon King. While iconic characters like Cloud and Terra appear in spin-offs, Bahamut has appeared as a summon, boss, or storyline element in almost every single mainline game (often multiple times per game as Neo Bahamut, Bahamut ZERO, etc.).

His signature attack, “Megaflare,” is a staple of the series’ combat. Interestingly, in the original mythology (Arabic cosmology), Bahamut is actually a giant fish that holds up the earth. Square took the name and attached it to a dragon, forever changing the pop-culture perception of the creature. Whether he is a robot dragon in space or a primal god destroying a cityscape, Bahamut is the true, enduring star of the franchise.