Hironobu Sakaguchi is a legendary game developer and best known for his work as the creator of the Final Fantasy series. His work after leaving Square Enix was a bit more experimental, with titles developed by his own company Mistalker, such as Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey for the Xbox 360. However, the title I feel deserves more attention is Mistwalker’s collaboration with with Nintendo to create The Last Story for the Wii. The Last Story, as its name may suggest, is a spiritual sequel to Final Fantasy and uses a mix of real time and automatic combat.
The Last Story was originally going to be left in Japan, but the success of Operation Rainfall led to the game being brought to the west by XSEED, much to the delight of fans. The game had a great story, excellent gameplay and even had unique online gameplay options. However, there is one slight issue and that is the fact that the game has remained on the Wii ever since its release, and that needs to change given how much time has passed..
The Last Story had a visual style that was held back by being in standard definition on the Wii and the online gameplay is no longer available after the Wii’s online was shut down. A port to Switch in HD would allow the game to shine again and give fans a chance to see how great the game was. The online modes could be added back in and even expanded on to build on what was already in the game at launch, and allow the developers to also take full advantage of improvements to online gaming since the game’s release.
Mistwalker has used the characters from The Last Story in Terra Battle for mobile devices in the year’s since the game’s release, and there is clearly love for the IP, but not enough people played the game when it first came out. This is most likely due to The Last Story coming out at the end of the Wii’s lifespan when many were already getting ready for next gen with the Wii U. A new release on the Switch would allow far more people to play the game, as well as providing an ideal system for people to enjoy it on.
Mistwalker could also take the opportunity to make a variety of gameplay improvements and changes like Monolith Soft did with Xenoblade. This can be in the form of refining the menus, clearing up some of the gameplay mechanics, enhance the user interface and make potential improvements to the music. Content that was considered for the game in development but not used could be factored in as well, or perhaps a new additional bit of gameplay could be developed for such a remaster. Mistwalker could even tie in Terra Battle in this way if they so desired, considering the crossover the two games had.
In the end, The Last Story is an experience that should get a second chance on the Switch and is simply too good to languish on the Wii, and Nintendo and Mistwalker need to bring it over in some form to the hybrid system.