How to Play the Final Fantasy Games in Order

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For 35 years, the Final Fantasy franchise has captivated fans with its anthology style of storytelling, keeping things fresh with new characters and stories. It even has a tendency to set the time periods somewhere between past and future in each game while keeping them connected with the same plot: a group of young heroes gathering to fight a great evil threatening their world while they exploring their internal struggles and relationships with each other — a universal theme that people can relate to.

If you’re new and want to get into the Final Fantasy series, there are 15 numbered games (with Final Fantasy XVI on the way), a few direct sequels, and a prequel to the first game. It sounds like a lot, but we’re here to help you make the journey into the RPG franchise a little smoother.

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Looking at the Final Fantasy franchise as a whole can be overwhelming as most of them have hundreds of hours of content to play through. If you want to ease yourself into the franchise, we recommend starting with Final Fantasy VII. This game left an indelible mark on the game industry for having the easiest gameplay and combat systems to get a hang of, especially with the Limit Break system, and giving us the most memorable characters, like Cloud, Tifa, Aerith, Barret, and Sephiroth. Its popularity inspired Square to create Kingdom Hearts in collaboration with Disney so that some of its characters could interact with Disney characters.

Final Fantasy VII even came out with a feature-length CGI and Final Fantasy VII Remake, which has prettier graphics but retains the same story with themes of pro-environmentalism, identity, and moving on from loss — elements that previous Final Fantasy stories did not have. Either version of the game is