Stranger of Paradise Trailer and The no-more-available Demo released this E3 of 2021. This game (subtitled as "Final Fantasy Origin") is said to be a retelling of the original Final Fantasy.

It's interesting how the trailer sets a darker tone. The protagonist just repeatedly says he needs to kill Chaos. He says Chaos name 6 times in every possible phrasing. He's also saying it while killing a bunch of monsters. There wasn't any blood in the trailer yet I felt the game is bloody. Stranger of Paradise probably aims to be the darkest Final Fantasy title yet.

Heavy Spoilers Below

What interests me the most about it, is the fact that the player party is "The prophesy's very own Warriors of Light." Those are the heroes of the first Final Fantasy game. While they don't have a set character design, none of them has the design or personality traits of the party shown in this retelling.

This made me wonder: "Could the party in Stranger of Paradise be the same party of Final Fantasy 1?" As such I wanted to recap the story of Final Fantasy for myself, then bring up my theories.

Final Fantasy 1: The Forgotten Journey

The game is set in an infinite time loop, in which the past and future counterparts of the dark monster Chaos keep reviving each other.

The warriors of light are tasked of reclaiming the crystals light. In order to do so, defeat the four fiends that took it. They start by saving princess Sarah from the rouge knight Garland who kidnapped her. The Warriors of Light then journey around the world to defeat the four fiends save the light of crystals. In doing so, the world.

They defeat the four fiends but eventually learn that a monster from the past called Chaos would revive them. The party travels in time to defeat it only to learn that his true identity. Garland. The party defeat him and break the time loop. They return to their own time, but since Chaos doesn't exist anymore, they don't have any memories of the world they have saved.

Once I heard someone says describes Final Fantasy 1 story with: "If you succeeded, your journey didn't happen in the first place." That's confusing, creepy but kind of awesome at the same time!

Stranger of Paradise Theories

Taking Final Fantasy 1 story in consideration. Anything can happen. The party of FF-Origin can be the same party of FF1 but in another timeline/retelling. Maybe something happened to the real Warriors of Light in this timeline so they passed the torch to these new guys? If they're someone related to the new protagonist, it would explain why he's always so angry.

They can also be a failed Warriors of Light group. The time loop of the original Final Fantasy spans over 2000 years. It's not hard to imagine that many people tried to claim the prophecy title through-out the years. Especially if Chaos did something to them first. If this theory is correct, then the game will most likely have a downer ending.

The weird thing though is that Garland still exists in this game, He was defeated soon after kidnapping the princess in the original. He didn't know that he'll turn into Chaos before that, but he does seem to know it in Stranger of Paradise trailer. So maybe this story isn't in the same timeline?

What do you think?

I haven't read many comments about this new Final Fantasy game, but I believe my theories aren't far off from the fandom's right now. I don't have a PS5 to try the Demo, and I'm not interested enough to buy this game.

I enjoyed writing this though... I always thought that FF1 story is special.

• First image is taken from the trailer for Stranger of Paradise. Third image is from the thumbnail. The image in between is taken from here.

• This is also posted on Hive's PeakD.