In Edge’s Chapter, the fifth installment of Final Fantasy IV: The After Years, you play as Edge, ruler of the ninja kingdom of Eblan and his four students as they struggle to gather information regarding the events that have struck the world. 

The game starts pretty much the same as all the other chapters; one of the heroes from the original Final Fantasy IV realizes that something isn’t quite right with the world due to all the death and monsters and various other tragedies that occur within a day of each other, and so Edge decides to find out what’s going on by sending his four most trusted ninjas on reconnaissance missions.  This episode functions has the feel of a “greatest hits” of the previous six chapters, repeating dungeons already seen with new characters.  On the one hand, one could argue that this highlights some of the high moments thus far.

However, I see it as a way to skip having to design a new dungeon and/or dungeons for this chapter.  Of the six dungeons in this chapter, only two are new to The After Years, and they are both dungeons that are literally copied tile by tile from Final Fantasy IV.  A third dungeon is technically new, but it is actually the outside of another dungeon.  Also, since five of these six dungeons must be tackled with one character, the game becomes quite difficult in a hurry.  Add to this the twin problems of no random encounters on the overworld and few opportunities to buy items and you have a recipe for an insanely difficult challenge.

There is some good here, though.  This episode is longer than any of the others, with the possible exception of the first episode.  My play time clocked in at around 8 hours, which isn’t that bad for three bucks.  The end of the episode also features some inventive moments for a 16-bit RPG as well.  The rest of the quality features of the series also appear here: quality plot, excellent translation, and of course the classic Final Fantasy IV soundtrack.

In conclusion, I’d recommend picking this one up.  If you like your RPGs to be a little forgiving, you might wanna skip it.  Otherwise, pick it up; you won’t be disappointed.

	System:	WiiWare
	Genre:	RPG
	Experience:	Finished the Chapter

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