By 1991, Square had gone from being just another small games company to one of the most respected software houses in japan. The Final Fantasy series had already become one of the most popular game lines in the country, and the release of the original Final Fantasy in America in the previous year had begun to pave the way for the international fame that was to follow. Perhaps the most important step the company ever made, though at least until the release of FFVII on the PlayStation was with Final Fantasy IV. The fourth game in the series was the first RPG game be released on Nintendo's new console, the Super Famicom. A 16-bit machine with an impressive array of custom graphics and sound chips, the SNES was a gorgeous piece of kit at the time, and the Japanese gaming world was eager to see what Square would do with the machine's greater power. They certainly weren't disappointed. FFIV was an 8Mb SNES cartridge, and it put the vastly more impressive graphics and sound of the SNES to good use. The characters and monsters were larger, more colourful and much more detailed than before, the look of the game's magic was improved, and the summon spells were awesome. The extra capacity of the SNES cartridge, and the machine's greater processing speed and memory, were stretched to provide garners with one of the most complex, engrossing and imaginative storylines ever to appear in a videogame. FFIV returned to the 'fixed' character concept first used by Square in FFII, casting the player as Cecil, a Dark Knight and captain of the Red Wings (an elite force of military airships in the Kingdom of Baron). As the game began, though, Cecil questioned the desire of his king to capture the Elemental Crystals, and was sent to deliver a strange package to a nearby town. When the package exploded, destroying the town and nearly killing him, Cecil and his friend Kain vowed to fight against the King's power-mad ambitions. As the pair made there way through the game they befriended nine other characters. After its massive success in japan it was unsurprising that FFIV wa translated into english and released in America, where it enjoyed healthy sales and critical acclaim. However, due to the fact that FFII and FFIII were never released in the states the game was renamed Final Fantasy II, beginning a tricky numbering policy which was only stopped when FFVII was released as FFVII. There were two versions of FFIV released in Japan - the 'standard' game and an easy version intended for younger players - FFIV Easytype. Easytype is the version the American FFII is based on, which you can download from this site.