I'd like to say a few words about this little goodie.
For the low, low price of 57 bucks, you can own this three-book boxed set from Dark Horse Comics containing three artbooks and 576 pages full of Yoshitaka Amano's drawings for the Final Fantasy series, from FFI to FFX, packaged in a handsome satin-covered slipcase sporting Amano's rendition of Cloud.
Book One covers the NES/Famicom Final Fantasy games. It also has most of the monster illustrations, since many of the more famous Final Fantasy monsters first appeared in the Famicom/NES games and these games were less character-driven than later entries.
Book Two covers the SNES era Final Fantasies and is considerably thicker than the other two books. Here, many of you will see all your familiar 16-bit favorites, from Cecil to Gilgamesh to Terra, as well as all the bad guys. These games tended to cleave most closely to Amano's preferred artstyle.
Book Three covers the PS1 and PS2 eras. While these games are more closely associated with Tetsuya Nomura's illustrations, Amano actually did a sizable amount of concept art for these games. Final Fantasy IX, in particular, was meant to more closely resemble Amano's style in line with it being billed as a throwback to the oldschool Final Fantasy style. It's pretty interesting to see Amano's take on Cloud, Tifa, Aerith, Sephiroth, Squall, Tidus, and Yuna, along with the rest of the characters in these titles. In 2001, for its Final Fantasy X preview issue, EGM even had a cover sporting a Yoshitaka Amano illustration of Tidus and Yuna which I believe is in this book as well.
I've really enjoyed this Final Fantasy collectible, as I'm a longtime series fan and I love artbooks. The edition you see for sale nowadays, The Slipcase Edition, released in June of last year, is actually a reissued edition. The original edition was printed in a very limited print run, and also included a book called "All About Amano" which included photos and interviews with Mr. Amano, an animation flipbook, a print, and a card signed by Mr. Amano. This limited print run was released in 2012 and quickly sold out, where it now commands a staggering price on eBay. However, the Slipcover Edition on its own contains more than enough artwork to satisfy hardcore Final Fantasy fans and is well worth getting.
Sounds neat. I didn't like the way Amano drew people, but I loved how he drew monsters and clothes.
That surprises me a bit. Most of your favorite Final Fantasy characters were illustrated and designed by Mr. Amano.
I just saw this at my comic store today on the shelf.
My wife bought mine at Barnes and Noble. Gamestop was selling it for awhile too, if I recall correctly.
I have this! It's absolutely ... breathtaking :)
It really is. I wish I'd known about the original boxed edition with the All About Amano book, but I'm happy with the artbooks. That's a lot of Final Fantasy as is. I also own an original 1994 artbook of illustrations from Final Fantasy V and Final Fantasy VI.
I'm not a Final Fantasy fan, really, but artbooks appeal to me, and it would be really cool to see what would have been with a different artist.
That's mostly with the Nomura-illustrated PS1 games. The NES and SNES games featured Yoshitaka Amano's illustrations or sprites based on those. For the PS1, Amano's style was considered too delicate for the PS1's polygon graphics, so they went with Tetsuya Nomura instead.
Yeah, I know. I did read your blog. lol I meant it would be cool to see what sprites Amano came up with.
Those books look really nice. Is this a limited time thing? I added them to my wishlist on Amazon. Not like I have any money right now lol.
It probably is, but not like the original super-deluxe edition. My wife found mine at a local Barnes & Noble. It's been on the market since June of last year, so it should be readily available.
Where is the $57? I have only seen it for $90+.
I've seen it on Amazon for $57 on sale right now.
Nice. They want $20 for FF 13, though. Lmao!
Thanks for the heads up. I'm a huge fan of Amanos work, I have a few of his art books that a payed insain amounts of money for at import shops. I will have to track this down.
I must see how Tifa was drawn in book 3. NSonic79 WANT!!!
Finally Got this [here], Yay!