> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://regionfree.net/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Final Fantasy Resonance is endless nostalgia for better and for worse - URL: https://regionfree.net/final-fantasy-resonance-playstation-5-review/ - Published: 2026-11-02T06:19:43.000Z - Updated: 2026-11-02T06:19:43.000Z - Description: Like nostalgic ride through the old neighborhood, Final Fantasy Resonance is a breezy and charming entry to the expansive saga that doesn't quite rank up there with the all-time greats. Still, it's more Final Fantasy, and that's always a good thing. - Author: Joonatan Itkonen - Tags: Gaming, Game Reviews, #gamereview, #score-4 🕹️ ****Platform:** PlayStation 5 Pro ****Version:** Digital retail review code provided by the distributor ****Independence & Ethics** Region Free is entirely reader-supported and maintains full editorial independence. For more on my scoring and standards, see the [****Review Guide**](https://regionfree.net/review-guide/). I *love* Final Fantasy. Love it. I can't be objective about it. Even the instalments I consider a miss (12, 13, the MMO) are games I've spent dozens of hours on. The ones that I love, hundreds. This is the franchise that got me into gaming, helped me learn Japanese, and taught me to love books, science, culture, and people. It means the world to me. So, in theory, I should be the prime candidate for Final Fantasy Resonance, a kind of Marvel Cinematic Universe for the Square Enix series, with fanservice baked into its very DNA. Well, yes and no. Yes, it's a good game, and I enjoy it quite a bit. But no, not because of the fanservice, which I found quite tedious and superfluous. As a massive love letter to the series itself, Resonance is at its best and worst depending on how heavily it leans into the victory lap that is its gameplay loop. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/0c/47/0c4798b4-e19d-4d8f-8475-ae0910a66a04/content/images/2026/10/Final-Fantasy-Resonance---the-plot-is-nonsense.webp) Originating as a mobile game (Brave Exvius), Resonance drops the gacha mechanics for a more familiar progression system, directly from the old-school titles in the series. If you've played a single Final Fantasy game of the past, especially anything from the PlayStation 1 and SNES eras, you'll be right at home. Everyone else can catch up quickly, as simplicity is part of the charm. The narrative takes places on the road, and each major obstacle requires battling enemies both big and small in fantastic locations, as you solve the problems of villages and cities you encounter on a journey to save the planet. Parties are made up of four characters, each with a Vision that stands in for the job system from Final Fantasy V. These Visions are characters from earlier games, some heroes, others villains, who reach out across time and space through the power of the crystals to help our heroes in this reality. It's a very flimsy excuse, but Final Fantasy has seen worse. Working with a single Vision helps you learn from its abilities until your characters are fully in tune with their powers. As with the job system, it'll take a few rounds to figure out the optimal combinations of heroes and Visions, but once you find a favorite, I didn't see any reason to switch out to new ones except to find a specific skill. The old-fashioned mechanics aren't bad by any stretch, but they do show their age, especially the further the story progresses. After a couple of years with the brilliant new combat system seen in Octopath Traveler, I really hoped that Resonance would pick up a lesson or two from there. The rigid four-characters on-screen limit is classic for a reason, and it does work, but while we're updating things. Perhaps it's just sour grapes. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/0c/47/0c4798b4-e19d-4d8f-8475-ae0910a66a04/content/images/2026/10/Final-Fantasy-Resonance---fighting-Gilgamesh.webp) Luckily, the story is delightfully old-school, with all the highs and lows we've come to expect from a classic Final Fantasy adventure. It isn't surprising by any measure, and experienced fans can call out every plot twist hours in advance, but it is well-written and often surprisingly moving. As with other Final Fantasy stories, the main focus here is the journey. Our hero, Rain, and his best friend Lasswell, are thrust into a cataclysmic road trip when Veritas of the Dark destroys the Earth Crystal, which protects the realm. With the rest of the world-protecting crystals at risk, Rain and Lasswell join forces with the mysterious Fina and set off on a long quest to protect the remaining crystals from destruction. Along the way, they meet with both old and new friends, tragic enemies, and lost loves, just as you'd hope from a grand adventure like this. Brave Exvius wasn't particularly well-written, and it didn't need to be. It was a mobile game, after all. So it's a relief to see that Resonance overhauls the narrative just enough to make a difference. Characters have more room to breathe, plot beats aren't as rushed, and even the fan service (oh boy, there's a lot of fan service) sits surprisingly well into the big picture. At first, I felt a little put-off by the crystals reaching out into other game worlds and highlighting fan-favorite moments from other titles, but even that eventually settled in. It's not like Final Fantasy hasn't done the backpatting tour before, and it's not like previous stories haven't had a meta-quality to them. But, arguably, it's never been this overt. Especially as every Vision unlocks with an extended clipshow of highlights from their respective games. Luckily, combat is so much fun that even the most egregious fanservice works out. The Active Time Battle system is more traditional here than in Octopath Traveller, where you could switch up combatants at will, and the team you choose to go into battle with remains the same throughout the entire encounter. Similarly, chosen Visions can't be switched out mid-combat, so there's a slight chance of do-overs with some of the tougher bosses as you figure out the optimal crew. Veterans will find all of this very familiar, but that doesn't mean there isn't a challenge. But once you start to pick up on skills and tricks, Final Fantasy Resconance reveals itself a surprisingly deep and rewarding system that harkens back to old-school Final Fantasy titles. It's a blast to enter a combat arena knowing your entire team is completely impenetrable to the type of magic the enemies are packing, simply because you remembered a combination of spells from a previous game. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/0c/47/0c4798b4-e19d-4d8f-8475-ae0910a66a04/content/images/2026/10/Final-Fantasy-Resonance---combat-with-party.webp) I genuinely liked my time with Final Fantasy Resonance, even if I didn't quite love it. As a whole, it's a charming, relaxed experience that isn't quite up there with the all-time greats, but that doesn't make it any worse of a Final Fantasy experience, either. During my playthrough, I often wondered how much of my hesitation to outright love it stems from my history with the series. If I didn't have decades of expectation and love already in store, would I be as harsh and as forgiving all at once? For a newcomer, Final Fantasy Resonance is like a guided tour to everything that makes Square Enix's magnum opus such a beloved fixture in gaming. It features the epic road trip, star-crossed lovers, tragic friendships, epic clashes between nations, and eventually someone goes to kill a God. It's very, very silly, and often breathtaking. If you get anything out of Resonance, chances are you'll enjoy the rest of the numbered series as well, at least in some capacity. At around 30 to 50 hours in length, depending on the chosen difficulty and how much of a completionist you are, Final Fantasy Resonance ranks among the shortest modern Final Fantasy titles, though it still packs a ton of things to uncover. The overworld, always a strength for this series, is lovely to explore, especially as the game doesn't skimp out on the travel mechanics one bit. I think this might be the fastest a FF-game has ever let players on an airship. Packed with a superlative soundtrack, good writing, and with the gorgeous 2.5HD graphics that I hope Square Enix keeps alive well into the future, and Final Fantasy Resonance is an easy recommendation to especially those who've heard of the legendary series, but haven't played it yet. This way, they can get a glimpse of the multitude of worlds and destinies longtime fans have loved for decades, and find their favorites to pursue beyond Resonance. Back in the late 90s and early 2000s, it was almost a yearly tradition to get a new Final Fantasy game. As technology got better and gamers more demanding, that gap between releases grew exponentially. Today, it's anywhere from 5 and 7 years between mainline titles, and right now we're waiting on the last part of the FF7 Remake trilogy. After that, who knows? If the alternative is to revisit past franchises, even mobile titles, like Brave Exvius in freshly restored formats, I'm all for it. More Final Fantasy is, after all, more Final Fantasy, and that's never a bad thing.