You might initially find the title of this review confusing. That's fitting, because the title of the game itself is confusing. Now, at first, it looks perfectly normal - it's an adventure in the Final Fantasy world, right? It's got a bunch of the Final Fantasy terminology in the game itself, and it's even got a Chocobo in there! Thing is, this game isn't actually a Final Fantasy game at all. This is actually the first game in the Mana series, best remembered for Secret of Mana released just two years afterwards. Understandably, Square were trying to ride on the success of the only thing keeping them afloat with Final Fantasy, and thus renamed some of their offshoot RPGs under the Final Fantasy name in Western countries! Finally, to make this naming conundrum even more confusing, the European release was called "Mystic Quest" - and yet it has no relation with Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest, which was the only mainline Final Fantasy game to come to Europe until FInal Fantasy 7 finally made its way there.

Okay, now that we've gotten that confusion out of the way, what should we say about the game itself? Well, we can start with its appearances - which are fairly simple, being a Game Boy game. There's enough variation to keep areas distinct and to keep new enemies interesting, but it won't win any awards. The graphics actually remind me a lot of Link's Awakening, just a bit more repetitive. The most impressive things you'll see are the bosses, since they're fairly large and actually move about the screen.

The sound isn't anything to majorly write home about either, but the melodies are nice and make good use of the Game Boy's sound hardware. They're simple, but nice on the ears. The sound effects are relatively similar, giving a pleasant audio experience all around.

Now, we can talk a bit about the gameplay itself. I often hear about Zelda being referred to as an RPG - personally, I disagree, since it feels more like an action-adventure game to me. This feels like what Zelda would be like if it were an RPG - the real-time combat is very similar to Zelda's, but the game uses a bunch of underlying RPG mechanics to deepen the experience. You're given a variety of weapons, spells, and items to choose from - ranging from equipping basic swords and armor to equipping pickaxes to swing and break walls with the B button. You've also got a reason to experiment with your options, since some enemies will resist certain types of damage! Underneath all of this, you've got a traditional experience and leveling system, giving you a good reason to kill enemies - surprisingly, you can even choose to build your character a specific way! You can choose to focus on one of four stats, increasing that one stat by 3 and improving two of the others by 1 each, letting you choose what you feel like having your hero specialize in. This is exactly my cup of tea, as primitive as it may be.

One thing I will say is a little less complex, though, is the storyline. It's got your standard JRPG plot twist, of course, but the plot is relatively simple, and told without too much dialogue. There's definitely a limit to how much English dialogue you can fit onto a Game Boy cartridge, but it still feels like it could have used a little more. There's still an interesting plot to be had here, though, revolving heavily around a girl you meet very early on in the game. One thing I will comment on - it's clear that Nintendo's policy of not letting games directly say "die" was still active, given any character death is marked by saying they "passed away" instead. It means the same thing, but I suppose it slipped past the censors somehow? That, or they realized they couldn't remove death as a concept from every game's storyline.

For being a Game Boy RPG, it's incredible how much depth this game actually has. Not only is there plenty of gear and stuff to mess around with, there's also quite a bit of game here. This one will easily last you a number of hours: you'll be wandering around, solving puzzles, traveling the world, and grinding away at that experience counter the whole time...you know, maybe I do just really like watching numbers go up after all.

As for difficulty, this game definitely has its more challenging moments - you'll need to find your way around, solve puzzles using the magic you're given, and navigate some hostile environments, especially a volcano filled with ludicrously deadly lava. However, it's not as bad as you might think - as long as you're keeping your level up to or ahead of the curve, you'll be more than strong enough for most threats you see, and the game gives you plenty of tools to work with. If that's not enough, you can always ask your companions for help! Yeah, you can have companions following you around, something you wouldn't expect from an action RPG on the Game Boy. While they don't directly run up to and engage the enemy or have their own stats, they have their own abilities - some will fire projectiles, though they won't target the enemy. Others will do specific things with the ASK command to assist you - the most useful one would be the girl, whose ASK command slowly heals you, bit by bit, for a large portion of your HP! You'll genuinely feel it when you don't have access to her.

That's not to say the game doesn't have its flaws. It can get a bit repetitive, especially if it's not your kind of game, and the item management can get a bit irritating. You've only got a certain number of item slots, and some of those are gonna have to be used up by key items, keys for opening doors, and "Mattok"s for breaking open walls. If you don't have enough, then, well...you might just have to leave and get more! It's also dangerous to save while in a dungeon if you don't have a surplus of them, since locked doors and breakable walls will respawn after you load your game. If you're not careful, there are spots in the game where you can get trapped without anywhere to go! Thankfully, you probably won't run into this unless you're going around without any supplies.

Overall, even if this game didn't originally carry the Final Fantasy name on it, it definitely earns the right to carry the Final Fantasy name. You can see which parts became staples of the Mana series, like many of the iconic creatures that appear throughout its entries, and which parts were left to the mainline Final Fantasy games like Chocobos and the Final Fantasy spell list. If you're looking for a simple, but enjoyable action RPG on the Game Boy, this is one of the best choices you could go for.