Coolest monster design.

[Sam]

Which game has the coolest monsters? I find that the monsters really take a sideline in final fantasy forums, which is a shame, as they are essentially half the game. So, which third-gen monsters were the coolest?

[Luna Lovegood]

Not to be beating a dead horse, but FFVII's monsters I think were the best designed, bearing in miond that nearly all of the monsters in subsequent games were based (if somewhat loosely) on those from FFVII

[My Final Heaven]

I'll go with 8, being that 8 didn't use the trick of taking the same monster model and recolouring it many times throughout the game or adding doodads to it or whatnot. I'm going purely from a concept basis here of course, because from a combat and intelligence (or lack thereof) perspective 9 was far superior to either 7 or 8. But for the look of them, 8. It had the coolest looking robot monsters (I'm thinking of the war walker in the SeeD training mission. That thing is awsome all around) it had the best soldiers, both the Esthar soldiers and the Galbadians, The Draconic monsters were I believe the most diverse set in any FF game yet, the only thing lacking was thier ability to give me any kind of a challenge because Aura+Lionheart = gg noobs.

[Angry Bear]

FFVIII was the best for me.

I liked the monster models, and even their attack patterns better than those in either FFVII or FFIX. There were many modern-to-futuristic looking enemies, a good number of them being humans or military vehicles, which I found a good deal more fun defeating than those in FFVII of IX.

As monsters gained levels in FFVIII, their attack patterns changed and they gained access to new abilities making enemies change as you fought them; a very good feature in my opinion. The primary weakness of the monsters was that they were very easy to deal with, as low HP or Aura gave instant access to the playable character's best attacks. That isn't a flaw with monster design however, simply gameplay.

FFVIII is simply my favorite for design.

[Ugly Casanova]

Wha?

[Aston]

My favourite monsters have to be, cactuar, tonberry , and behemoth :]

[Words of Ivory]

I'm going to have to go with popular opinion here.

Much as I don't like VIII (for reasons I've covered in other threads), FFVIII had some really bloody great and hugely detailed designs for it's monsters, which hold up quite well even now.

[Aston]

FF9 werent up to par, i don't think. They didn't exceed ff8 , or ff7 in my opinion.

[Sosha]

I went w/ 7, of course.
They were the trend-setters of this generation. 8's monsters looked similar, in graphics, but almost weaker (in terms of monster design). All games have their very odd monsters - like bunnys, wolves or machine spiders, or even Houses (7)
I think 7 just had an overall better battle system.. which made engaging the monsters more in-depth and more "battle-like". You got magic, limts and summons all against invasive monsters that will sometimes live through it, counter it or stop u from using it altogether.
The enemy-skill materia was a nice touch too. Using a magic set up that let u learn the abilities of only certain, sometimes powerful enemies.

8's version of the limits were too hard to use, I don't think I ever really got the hang of that one.
I also liked the more 'anime style' monster creation in 7 - where as 8 tried to go for more of a realistic approach. Considering the graphic capability that the PSone had, I think 7's decision to stick w/ a more 'cartoony' character design was a better call, rather than trying to make humans look more human and the monsters looked cartoony - because of the graphics. So, in turn, the ppl looked ok, in 8, but the monsters kinda seemed out of place; especially those one guardians of the garden, those creature guys (i forget what and who they were ;o)
In 7, the characters looked like they came out of an old-school anime and so did the monsters. You got classiscs like the Cactuar and the Tonberry and even the Chocobo! I didn't see any chocobo's in 8!!!

[FFking]

I think FFIX had the best monsters. FFVIII's monsters was just the same all the time. And those dinosaurs....just f*ck em....

[Aston]

Errm, ff8 had chocobo forest, right?

But i''m not sure if that was a battle..

[Philbro]

Final Fantasy 8 as some of the bosses were cool designed.

[Black Dusk]

I thought that the baddies from FFVII were good, though FFVIII's were a lot more developed and generally better looking in impressiveness. I also liked the bosses best in FFVIII, although FFVII had the weapons (which were awesome bosses) I thought some of their other bosses weren't as impressive as those in FFVIII, and I thought FFIX didnt have enough bosses for the length of the game, though generally those bosses were pretty good too.

So yeah my fav's are FFVIII

[Biukin]

When U put all of the monsters side by side FFIX has to be the best the monsters were detailed really well but if you guys are talking about which monsters were the most original ideas i would go with FFVII the reason that the FFVII monsters were the most original is that there were creatures of every element like under wate monsters and such but my favorite monster is the red one that you steal the nut from to make a Black Chocobo

[Jamie]

When you say monsters i always think "Ruby Dragon" FF*. That made me think ooooh funky town when i saw that.

FF7 had a serious of problems for me. One was size. You could have some sort of giant bird thing be the same size as cloud at some points. Two they were just random, like that attacking house in the slums??? And Three the detail on anything modern like mechanical was just pure shoddy.

FF8 had a good detail especially on boss battles and the fact you face alot of humans and human made machines just makes it realistic. It also is the only game to really bring to your attention that NPCs know there are monsters out there.

FF9 was alright and detailed but as its bosses were few and far and its optional bosses consisted of basically two and it kind of has a really boring middle im just going to go for 8.

[RedCloud]

7 used a lot of monsters from 6, but then, so did all the other games. But these monsters will varied and took many bizarre forms. They were good in that way.

8 was more into the soldiers and machinery you had to take down, and there were some really good monsters in that way.

9 was very traditional in its monsters, so it was like going back into the old days of Final Fantasy.

[Voxona]

I love FFVIII monsters... they are colourful, weird looking and different to all the others.

[Spira]

VIII for me because the design and feel of the monsters gelled really well with the game..

In a way it matches up to the somewhat european influences of VIIIs architecture, and mixes in futuristic elements.

VII imo had too many monster variations and some were lame or didnt make sense (the house and weird humanoids for example).

IX, was ok but the monsters felt too.. conventional. Its kinda like you've seen them before, probably keeping in line with IXs homage..

[DDR God]

i will go with IX just because the a lot of the monsters are pretty origanal and some just look really weird and funny

[Garland]

VI had the best monster kill noise and effects. VIII did have the best soldiers (IX was all girls :O) and IX was the most artistic, and influenced monster art for titles like CC, which look almost exactly the same. All around i give it to IX, though my favorite designs really go to the series's outside the golden age