CardName – Final Fantasy
Date Reviewed: May xx, 2025
Ratings:
Constructed: 3.38
Casual: 4.00
Limited: 4.13
Multiplayer: 3.50
Commander [EDH]: 3.75
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale. 1 is bad. 3 is average. 5 is great.
Reviews Below:
You never forget your first, and Final Fantasy IV was my first game from the series. I played the SNES version that was mislabeled for America as number II, and although its translation errors and oddities are very clear in hindsight, I didn’t even notice at the time. I was hooked from start to end; I cried at all the sad parts, and my heart raced the first time I lifted off in an airship. And my mind was absolutely blown by the Lunar Whale sequence – I didn’t think the Mysidian Legend was going to be fulfilled with an actual factual spaceship.
The original Lunar Whale may have been pixel art, but this card is coming to make the same impression on a generation of Magic players. Let’s be clear: Smuggler’s Copter this is not. But it has plenty to offer, in that first wondrous impression and beyond. Seeing an extra card and getting to play it when you meet the conditions is an established and sometimes powerful concept. It’s a big flying blue creature for decks that care about such things, and legendary for decks that care about legendary things. It’s arriving just in time to synergize with Aetherdrift‘s vehicle gameplay, and Edge of Eternities will soon bring at least one more space whale for the inevitable theme deck. And even further beyond all that, if you like anything about it down to its look, go and play Final Fantasy IV – it may well do for you what it did for me.
Constructed: 3
Casual: 4
Limited: 4
Multiplayer: 3.5
Commander [EDH]: 3.5
One of the themes of Final Fantasy seems to be vehicles and equipment to represent various Things, and some of those seem fairly pushed overall. The Lunar Whale, coming from Final Fantasy IV originally as the ship meant to take you to The Moon (old RPGs were sometimes a bit wild), is maybe not absurdly pushed, but it combines a comically low crew cost with some pretty decent value and evasion. A 3/5 is hard to shoot down, and the information is useful in letting you decide how to proceed; if you attack with it, the top of your library is fair game for the rest of the turn, which does open up some rather interesting shenanigans if you have the right pieces. It’s a decent value card for blue, a fairly middling offensive color, and while I would be surprised to see it become a Constructed powerhouse, it has some intrigue.
Constructed: 3.75
Casual: 4
Limited: 4.25 (evasive threats that dodge sorcery-speed creature removal are solid in Limited)
Multiplayer: 3.5
Commander [EDH]: 4
I believe the Lunar Whale returned in Final Fantasy XIV, which took heavy inspiration from IV when crafting Endwalker, but I’m not intimately familiar with the game.
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