Breath of Fire IV Reviews

I was lucky enough to find this game back when it was still new and hot. Back then I was keen on classics JRPG's and the cover art alone told me this was something really special.

To keep this short, Breath of Fire IV is more or less a very typical late 90's JRPG with leveling up system, random fights and such, if you happen to know games like Lunar then you pretty much have the same good stuff here.

What really got me and still do are the design choices which couldn't be any more interesting and creative. Instead of taking the easy anime and fairy tale route all the others were doing, these guys were inspired by Chinese and Shinto mythologies and the presentation is truly memorable and unique, there's nothing quite like it even in our time.

I especially love the hardest motherf'king boss of the game that is Won-Qu, a shishi and guardian spirit of the god emperor. That beast always handed me my arse, but the character itself is so damn cool.

The ending is the reason why this isn't one of my favourites, though, I just hate it. There's two different endings, both of which are more or less the apocalypse of this fancy and unique fairy tale world. I just hate it so much, why not just let it be as it is and leave the rest to the player's imagination. Not only that, but if you happen to choose the good ending, it just stops all of a sudden out of the blue. Everything leading up to that point is so epic and fun it ruined the latter part of the game for me.