The name "Final Fantasy", and its origin...

[Julius Seeker]

I have seen people write in the past that it was due to it supposedly being Square's last game because they were going out of business. Actually, the name seems to be the result of the best sounding name that could be abbreviated as "FF".

Akitoshi Kawazu, who is best known for the SaGa games (including Final Fantasy Legend, and the successor series, Final Fantasy Chrystal Chronicles) had this to say:

It was something that was decided a long time ago, so my memory might be a bit faulty, but I think one of the things we had decided up front was that we wanted a title that could be abbreviated as FF. That abbreviation has special meaning. So we came up with many different titles, and Final Fantasy was one of them. From there, I think we were quick to make the call. There were some concerns about calling something ‘final’ from the get-go, but in the end we all warmed up to it. On a side note, one other option we liked was Fighting Fantasy, but it was the name of a game-book series by legendary game designer Steve Jackson, so we canned the idea. I wonder what would have happened if we didn’t realize this and went with the Fighting Fantasy option.

Can you imagine if it was called "Fighting Fantasy" instead? Not quite the same ring to it. =P

[kali o.]

I dunno. I trust Sakaguchi's comments on the origin over this guy. But maybe the origin lies somewhere in the middle. That said, man I remember Jackson/Livingstone books. I actually used to shoplift them, lol. I was a crook for books -- how sad. I think I still have a box with like ...well, I dunno how many, but man I had alot. Wonder if they will ever be collector items.