Final Fantasy III: Final Fantasy 3 Eviltype

Final Fantasy 3 Eviltype is a patch of Final Fantasy 3 designed to completely rebalance the overall game, in such a way that it is as hard as reasonably possible without making it impossible for a theoretical newcomer to the game to still complete without unbelievable amounts of effort.

In less cheaply ripped-from-the-readme terms, Final Fantasy 3 Eviltype’s goals are to both vastly increase the game’s overall challenge, and to increase the usefulness of characters and equipment that were, in the author’s opinion, somewhat flawed.

The degree of changes vary, for how notable they are; Does anyone remember how the Epee was totally forgettable? Probably not, they forgot it. On the other hand, how many people noticed how, well, mediocre Umaro was? Quite a few people. These are the things Eviltype attempts to rebalance into more useful forms.

It attempts to do this by improving the flawed issues, though; Only a scant handful of negative “nerfs” were added(Three spells, one removed steal, and one altered Rage.), and only when they were felt absolutely necessary.

But don’t think this is going to be an easier trip because of this. Every single monster has been vastly improved on durability, damage, skillset, you name it, it’s been improved…except when you least expect it, and often how you least expect it!

Hopefully, you’ll enjoy it. Regardless, the goal I set out for when I made it was completed when I finished it; I enjoyed it. ^_^

Eviltype 1.1 adds a huge amount of small changes across the entire spectrum, ranging from more interesting late game boss designs, to retooling skillsets such as Steal and Sketch, to natural magic, to...essentially rebalancing every part of the game, rather than simply most of it, as well as retooling some of my less inspired enemy efforts.

And if that wasn't enough, it now attempts to please all the people, all of the time, with four new variation patches-one easier, for those that want to experience a better balanced FF6 without as much challenge, and three somewhat harder patches designed to nerf commonly complained about setups, curb high levels of grinding, and do both at once.

This is a substantial overhaul-I hope people like it! I think I may finally be done with this, unless some bugs are found, which they inevitably will be. :)

The Final Fantasy 3/6 Eviltype Project, Version 1.1 (hopefully final!), by SageAcrin.

Table of Contents:

-What Is Eviltype?
-No, Specifically, What The Heck Is Eviltype?
-How Do I Use This Thing?
-Not Really Asked Questions That Sounded Good To Put In.
-Tips. No, Not You Tipping Me.
-Insert Credits To Continue.

---What Is Eviltype?---

Final Fantasy 3 Eviltype is a patch of Final Fantasy 3 designed to completely rebalance
the overall game, in such a way that it is as hard as reasonably possible without making
it impossible for a theoretical newcomer to the game to still complete without unbelievable
amounts of effort.

In addition, it's an attempt to rebalance characters by boosting key unique equipment
and skills, and equipment by bringing inexplicably weak equipment up to par with the
best choices at a given time.

Admittedly, this goal has changed somewhat over time. Eviltype may well alter the character
of the original game at this point, mostly by attempting to rebalance PCs and spells enough
to produce no obvious "loser" options. But the heart of the goal-that you can play this
game exactly like you would FF6 and do as well, or better than you would originally-is still
there.

Just, hopefully now you can use originally non-optimal options in an improved challenge
setting.

---No, Specifically, What The Heck Is Eviltype?---

Short version: Large boost to enemies, large boost to PC equipment, large boost to
PC skills. The weaker the equip was, the larger the boost. The weaker the enemy,
the larger the boost. Pretty simple.

Okay, to get into more detail, Final Fantasy Eviltype does the following negative
things for your party:

-Nerf(That is, make weaker.) three spells-Ultima, Osmose and Quick.

-Make it so that you cannot steal Economizers. (Still dropped!)

-Altered the Nightshade Rage so that you can no longer Charm-and hence, instantly
win against-bosses.

Eviltype does the following positive things:

-Boost nearly every piece of equipment, in ways varying from subtle to "My god,
what the hell did you do to this piece of junk!?". *Waves hi to Czarina Dress,
and a lot of Locke's earlier weaponry.*

-Boosted a fair deal of both straightforward magic(Pearl and Flare, for instance,
are far better spells, these days.), Summons(Mostly boosted, when really applicable-
Palidor doesn't need a boost, but how would you?) and skills(Cyan fans will like this
patch. Cyan haters might find a use for him.).

Both of the former are more greatly detailed in the etinfo.txt file that should be in
the .zip with this readme.

-Rebalanced Rage, in the hopes that dipping randomly into the general skillset will
be more likely to get you something at least vaguely useful, instead of netting you
junk half the time. This was done in an odd fashion; All Rage skills actually had an
option to use two skills, but one was always Battle(Normal attack.). So, while
all Rages besides Nightshade Rage have kept their old skills, plenty now have new,
non-Battle commands.

A new change to 1.1-these are documented, thanks to superaielman, who was less
lazy than I was about getting a full list on this than I was. See the
eviltyperage.ods file for more info

-Rebalanced Sketch and Steal. One of the new alterations to 1.1 is that Sketch and Steal
have had their full skillsets altered. Steal is actually a fairly strong skillset at this
point, though it only rarely produces massively gamechanging impacts. Still, it's miles
better at producing slight upgrades for the time to your equipment or rare items than
before.

Sketch is not terribly strong-Relm is a character that is meant to function off statistics
and equipment in Eviltype(as she functioned in the original, in actual fact). Sketch does,
however, produce more relevant effects-often status that the target is vulnerable to, or
elemental damage the enemy is weak to. It's not strong, but it's a lot better than her
physical attacks. It's something.

-Rebalanced Lore. Lore was one of the skillsets I was most ashamed of leaving (somewhat)
untouched by the end of 1.0-It was, to my mind, one of the clear worst skillsets. However,
changing Lore changes a lot enemy skills, and 1.0 Eviltype was a gradual creation-much of
the rebalancing of equipment and skillsets was done relatively later. So, I was left with
the obvious choice of either ignoring the skillset or waiting a few years until I felt like
a major overhaul of the game complete with long test cycle. The latter is what happened.

-Rebalanced Espers. Shoutouts to improvements to FF3USME's interface(which also allowed me
to put in more script than I was originally able to. :))

This is fairly minor-mostly adding spells or small bonuses to Espers that notably felt less
important in the original game. Things like giving Bahamut high rate L2 spells won't be much
of a deal to most players, but helps me not be annoyed at little things like noticing that
L2 spells are stuck at like x5 in Vanilla FF6. Or that Drain is really hard to learn for no
good reason, forever.

-Rebalanced Natural Magic skillset. Mostly later in the game, to produce spells at or somewhat
before(depending on your levels) the point you'd normally get access to them. There was no
real reason to leave them as irrelevant in the lategame as they were. L99 Ultima? Come on.

Early magic is pretty similar, though Antdot was boring and got changed out for new spells.
It still exists, but it's now just on Espers.

-Eviltype does the things that you actually downloaded this for:

-Every single non-plot battle(and a few of those, just because) was greatly
increased in raw power. Durability, damage, often speed, occasional weaknesses
to status and elements were removed(Hardly a universal change, in this case, though!),
even fairly minor weaknesses such as those of the undead to revival were altered...
sometimes. ^_^ Even changes such as MBlock being added were implemented.
Basically, if you can change it, it may be changed!

(And yes, HP breaks 65k at points. It would be pointless to boost HP if I was
constantly making 65k HP bosses, now wouldn't it?)

In addition, a fair majority had improved(and occasionally, even completely
overhauled) skillsets. This varies case-by-case; No flat-rate changes were ever
made, outside of fairly broad ones("Enemies have more HP now and deal more
damage and usually are harder to simply wall with elemental defenses.").

However, Eviltype endeavors to keep the style of the original monster intact, on
some level. Don't expect a Evil Oscar to suddenly start using Love Token,
or Tritoch to use Tentacles on you. Exceptions are made for exceedingly
generic and pointless randoms, on occasion, but by and large, this holds true.

-Oh, and CzarDragon is the generic overpowered superboss in the Dinosaur
Forest that drops goodies and can be refought. I mostly wanted to make
a superboss. Is that so wrong!? (Oh, and I wanted people to stop leveling
in that forest. >_>)

-Oh, and now there's variations. Check out the ETVar.txt for more info there.

-Probably some stuff I'm forgetting. This patch took well over a year from
the exceedingly random idea conception to the product you downloaded, and a
fair deal of additional time on the 1.1 remake.

It's not simple to remember all that. ^_^;

---How Do I Use This Thing?---

Well, if you're sanely lazy, and have a PC, you will name the patch whatever
the hell your copy of the FF3 ROM is(Or name your FF3 ROM
"FF6ET11.smc", the same name as the default IPS. Whatever floats your
boat.), then either simply load the ROM into ZSNES or SNES9X. (As
far as I can find, they default to this option being on.)

(IIRC, these days the Mac version of SNES9X supports auto-patching,
but it has been quite a while since I've used a Mac.)

Alternatively, the 31337 haxor doods(Or those that just want to see what's
actually inside of Eviltype, something harder to do with just an IPS patch.)
can patch the game. SNEStool is the best way to do this; Simply select
the IPS file, select the game(Optimally not your original copy of it, unless
you want to go to the trouble of getting another copy if you don't like
Eviltype or just want something easier sometime.), and voila, altered copy.

I've also had, more recently, much better experiences with LunarIPS as a simple
and easy patcher. So feel free to give that a spin.

(There is a similar patcher for Macs, but I can't recall it. Hm. Oh well.)

The patch should work with both the 1.0 and 1.1 versions of the game.
It did the time I tried it, at any rate. It was designed for 1.1, if it helps.

Don't ask me what other patches it runs with, though, and I have no clue
if it works with the japanese version of the game.

Incidentally, I've heard reports of Eviltype producing some rather...interesting...
effects, such as enemies tossing Fire Skeans at you in the first few fights of the
game. This isn't supposed to happen. If it does, there is an IPS Header Converter
on Romhacking.net that may be worth trying. I can't check as I haven't had any of
my testers reproduce this issue to my knowledge. Sorry. Regardless, it's not
supposed to happen.

Do not:

-Attempt to run Final Fantasy 3 Eviltype, the IPS patch, as a game. That
doesn't work.
-Attempt to ask me for a FF3 ROM. That doesn't work either.
-Attempt to taunt Happy Fun Final Fantasy 3 Eviltype. That works, but
not how you think it will.

---Not Really Asked Questions That Sounded Good To Put In.---

Q: Why did you name it Eviltype?

A: A Communist told me to.

(Truth? Fiction? Or something more...?)

Q: Why the hell did you bother?

A: I wanted to play a harder version of FF6.

Certainly, hard mode patches already exist, but fundamentally, they alter the PC
end of things too much; For the most part, the game...simply stops feeling like FF6.
It becomes a game with FF6's graphical engine and a battle system that
resembles FF6's as much as FF4's does, in the cases of the ones I'd tried.

That's kinda depressing. Of course, the problem is, the alternative-altering enemies
to bring them up to the level of the PCs-is exceedingly time-consuming, as to truly
manage it, you have to do what I did-alter every single enemy. So it made sense.

But I still wanted my version of the game to play.

So, basically, I made it so I could play it.

Q: Why the hell did you bother? (Mark II)

A: Oh, rebalancing PCs?

That sort of grew out of the idea. Basically, I wanted to make every PC as useful,
in my opinion, as any other character; That is, I wanted to create a narrow range
of PC power, instead of a fairly broad one as it existed.

For instance, take Umaro. Please. However, Eviltype added around a dozen
boosts to his unique equipment, and, surprisingly enough, actually made him useful.
(Don't just take my word for it, the couple of people that have tested the game to
completion agreed! But try him out yourself.)

Similarly, Cyan's unique equipment pales compared to even the likes of an Enhancer;
highly disappointing indeed. So, that was boosted. Locke is a character who relies
on physicals for his damage a fair deal of the time; Why not give him better weapons
than most people? And so forth.

Basically, I felt like it.

Q: Why was the first public release numbered 1.05?

A: Because there are some two dozen versions of it, ranging from Alpha/Beta range,
to various revisions of the version I put out for private testing, to the current version.

I could have put those versions into a version history, but it's wasted effort, really.

Q: Do you plan on releasing various later versions?

A: Probably not, though there's a few things that may change this;

There's some Colloseum quirks I keep meaning to test; It was... not altered much,
despite the enhanced enemies, so I'm not perfectly sure every single enemy in
there's defeatable! >_> Probably, but...

Otherwise, I've been pretty happy with reception of Eviltype, and I'm 99% sure I've
got all the enemies in the game altered.

Q: How long did this take you to make?

A: Silly, that's not a question anyone but me cares about.

But I believe I started mid-January 2005, and altered the master file a few weeks ago.
Call it 19 months.

Actual work hours, though? Couple hundred? I honestly have no idea.

1.1 took another 60 or 70 hours. It was a lot less work since I only changed about 20/30%
of the enemies, knew how to actually script, and generally was more competent at this.
It was still a lot of extra work though, I hope it's liked. :)

---Tips. No, Not You Tipping Me.---

-Enemies are harder.

*Gets backhanded.* Ow.

-Status weaknesses are fairly often intact, as compared to the original FF3. Vanish
is the exception.

If something works inordinately well on a boss, status-wise, it has a 50-40-10 shot
of working in Eviltype.

The 50 is when it works, the 40 is when it fails, and the 10 is when it humorously
blows up in your face. (Hey, it earned the name Evil. ^_^)

-Undead can be revived still, but undead bosses react humorously or inexplicably.
Unless they're ball lightning. Then they sorta die. Try to guess the undead boss!
I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

-Read the spell and weapon info file. This gives you better tips than I can randomly
come up with, since it tells you all the hidden benefits of equipment. I'd have altered
equipment descriptions, but it's not like the changes would have fit in many cases.
Also, more work.

---Insert Credits To Continue.---

Thanks to Grefter, for coming up with the name Eviltype. (Is my reference to him
being a commie a mysterious in-joke or something more sinister? You decide.)

Thanks to Meeplelard(Who needs to die. As usual. ^_^) and NeoElfBoy for testing
the patch fully. I'd have never known Doom could slaughter your entire team
with one well placed Dark Hood, or that I somehow managed to miss multiple
Kefka's Tower enemies, without you guys!

Thanks, too, to Nephrite and superaielman, who playtested 1.1's rather major revision.

Thanks to the RPGDL (www.rpgdl.com) for putting up with me rambling about
my hacking project. In general, though, the RPGDL is good at handling RPG rambling.
Check it out, there's tons of random RPG information there! If you're bored enough
to be down here, you're bored enough to check out a site! There's even a large topic
devoted to Eviltype discussion there, in the game design and modifications forum,
as well as a couple other projects from some other talented people.

Thanks to Lord J for making his awesome FF3 editor, FF3usME, with which this was
100% made. ^_^ Thanks! Without that utility, I probably never would have started,
even if I was mostly using it to add in hex strings towards the end there. <_<

And thanks to you for being bored enough to both download this *and* for some
silly reason actually read the credits.

---Random Errata That Doesn't Deserve To Be In A Table Of Contents---

If you're wondering how to contact me...you don't. I mean, it's possible enough...
I'm just not handing out my E-Mail address(No offense meant, it's just that I never do.),
and don't feel like making a throwaway account just for the purposes of...possibly a
dozen questions. <_< If you can somehow find me in a non-mail way, more power
to you, I'll probably be flattered. Probably.

Or you can just poke around on the forum topic I mentioned above. That works too.

Oh, and while I only plan on uploading this to Romhacking.net, anyone can feel free
to host it, so long as they're not directly making money off of it, claiming it for their own,
or other similarly asinine things. ^_^

Version History:

1.05: Initial public release.

1.06: Had CzarDragon tested, found a minor error in FF6 mechanics where removal
Special attacks don't work right; Basically, Czar in the final stage would use a move that
did nothing but make people invincible! It's fixed now, albiet by changing the Special...oh,
and jacked his HP up a bit. ^_^

1.07:

-The Evade bug patch compatible edition that I should have made back ages ago!

-Evade values completely overhauled. Enemy evades are, for the most part, around
the same as their MBlock...although more enemies to start with had higher evade,
and more additional enemies gain evade(As, more PC weapons boost evade casually.).
It's not a lot of evade. Usually.

-That's okay, though, since PC evade values on weaponry were also boosted. Mostly
to match the MBlock value boosts, but not always-I mean, if everything was the same
that'd be boring.

-Beads and Cursed Ring dropped to 20% and 10% Evade respectively. What I would
have made them if evade actually worked. No other changes to them. A lot of equipment
got some random tweaks that are now listed in the new etinfo document.

-Overall not a bad hour's work. I still haven't tested any of this with the evade
patch in place, but the evade values are all designed to be compatible now. There's no
reason the game shouldn't be perfectly playable with the evade bug patch in place now,
short of some spectacular mistype I missed. Note that this does *not* add the
evade patch it's self. That's not my work and I wouldn't feel right at all using
it as part of my patch, not when it's so easily found by it's self. And not
when it changes something basic about the game, something Eviltype avoids. This is
no criticism of the patch, bugfixes are awesome and all, but making it optional
feels like it fits the spirit of Eviltype the most.

Eviltype 1.1:

It's been a long time. Our current situation is as follows:

- 20% to 30% or so of enemies revised. Usually not with straight up difficulty, but
with more interesting battles. A few enemies even got nerfed!

- Tons upon tons of new tweaks to skillsets and spells, along with new categories of
changes like Espers being altered and Sketch/Steal getting rebalanced. And natural
magic. And so many things.

- So many changes to equipment that it would take ages to list them. Look the etinfo
up!

- Variations! Currently undertested, these are designed to try to approach comments
about things people liked and didn't like about Eviltype, and make the game a more
enjoyable experience for everyone. Some changes are just mutually exclusive from the
core patch-but why ignore ideas?

Final Fantasy III (USA).sfc - NOINTRO
CRC32: A27F1C7A
MD5: E986575B98300F721CE27C180264D890
SHA-1: 4F37E4274AC3B2EA1BEDB08AA149D8FC5BB676E7
SHA-256: 0F51B4FCA41B7FD509E4B8F9D543151F68EFA5E97B08493E4B2A0C06F5D8D5E2