First impressions of Final Fantasy Airborne Brigade

As Final Fantasy fans continue to debate whether the iOS version of Theatrhythm is worth paying £100 for, another game appeared on the App Store to beg for their attention.

The game in question is the immensely popular Final Fantasy Airborne Brigade, a Mobage-powered social airship battler in which players battle familiar espers like Ifrit, Shiva, and Bahamut.

Final Fantasy Airborne Brigade attracted some 3 million players spread across Japan and Korea since its launch earlier this year, so we were curious to see how it played.

Unfortunately, its gameplay can be summed up by one word: "automatic".

You don't play Final Fantasy Airborne Brigade so much as you watch it. Sadly, without any sort of soundtrack or sound effects, this becomes a terribly dull experience.

The art style, enemies, and item names are all sure to appeal to those of us who are a little too into Square Enix's series of roleplaying games, but there's really nothing for players to do except tap Advance" as their character marches around field stages dispatching of enemies at random.

Worse yet, the controls don't change much in battle. You select whether you want to do a more conservative attack or launch an all-out attack, and your characters auto-attack until they, or the boss, is defeated.

If there's one thing that can be said for Airborne Brigade, it's that it is an extremely casual-friendly title.

At current, the English version of Final Fantasy Airborne Brigade is only available in North America on App Store or Google Play.