Final Fantasy key art and set symbol | Image credit: Wizards of the Coast and Square Enix

Saturday, June 13th, 2026 marks the one-year anniversary of Final Fantasy, Wizards of the Coast's astoundingly prolific collaboration with Square Enix. This collaboration is the result of a multiple years-long effort between both companies to create something remarkably special. To this day, it is the best-selling Magic set, with preorders alone selling out faster than the runner-up, Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth. In this article, we will examine the core of what made this set and its offshoots so very special, and look at some of its most notable cards within Commander. Let's dive into it!

The 16 Stories of Final Fantasy Make Countless Moments of Priceless Nostalgia

Final Fantasy (the Magic set) contains sixteen full video games worth of content. It's pretty obvious that all sixteen stories within the mainline Final Fantasy storyline are going to be too expansive to elaborate on in vivid detail in this singular article. Having said that, somehow, Wizards of the Coast managed to fit most of the important story beats of each video game into their release. To do this resulted in the set selling even better than Lord of the Rings, as mentioned in the introduction.

How did this work? Simply put, each of these games' plots has a large number of iconic moments encapsulated in the annals of video game history. Wizards painstakingly worked with experts at Square Enix to recognize the most iconic parts of each video game in order to ensure that things were represented in equitable amounts. Some games were represented more than others, based on the overall audience reception to each one (something also well-documented).

Furthermore, some of the moments in these games were grim or serious, but a few others were fun, heartbreakingly emotional, or even downright memetic. For one instance of the last sentiment, look at SuplexSuplex. This card represents what many players see as the character SabinSabin's shining moment in Final Fantasy VI. It's also a very optional moment, and one that's easily missed during the character's battle with the Phantom TrainPhantom Train, a psychopomp locomotive. The lives of Sabin and CyanCyan are on the line, and Sabin has to do something. If you've ever suplexed the Train, you'll know how good that feels.

Simply put, it's moments like this that Wizards of the Coast and Square Enix both understood players would appreciate. To that end, there are so many scenes in this set that matter a ton to players, and this is only part of why Final Fantasy succeeded so well as a Magic set on the whole.

The Commander Decks

In addition to the main set, this release had four extremely hyped-up Commander precons available. They were based on four of the mainline games: FFVI, FFVII, FFX, and FFXIV. Respectively, the commanders of these decks were Terra, Herald of HopeTerra, Herald of Hope, Cloud, Ex-SOLDIERCloud, Ex-SOLDIER, Tidus, Yuna's GuardianTidus, Yuna's Guardian, and Y'shtola, Night's BlessedY'shtola, Night's Blessed. The first three of these commanders had some varying degrees of success. However, Y'shtola is in another tier of popularity altogether, as she is currently the #3 most popular commander in the format.

Final Fantasy's Popularity Stats

With that, let's look at some of the statistics of the top five most popular commanders from both Final Fantasy and its Commander releases:

MTGFIN

• At #5 is Choco, Seeker of ParadiseChoco, Seeker of Paradise, a character from FFIX that has 17,239 decks at its disposal at the time of writing. This Bird-typal Bant () deck is ranked overall at #86 on EDHREC.
• The #4 most popular FIN commander is Kuja, Genome SorcererKuja, Genome Sorcerer, a character hailing from FFIX as well. Kuja has a rank of #74 with 18,190 decks databased online at this time.

• At #3 is Sephiroth, Fabled SOLDIERSephiroth, Fabled SOLDIER, the iconic antagonist of FFVII. This monoblack powerhouse has a ranking of #28 most popular and has 25,675 decks in EDHREC's databased sites.
• The #2 most popular Final Fantasy commander from the main set is Kefka, Court MageKefka, Court Mage, another powerful double-faced commander. Kefka comes from FFVI, and is ranked just above Sephiroth at #27, with 25,890 decks databased

• The #1 most popular commander from the main set is Vivi OrnitierVivi Ornitier, a card originating from FFIX that's so strong that it's even managed to get banned in Standard. Vivi ranks at #9 overall in the Commander format's popularity rankings.

MTGFIC

• The 5th most popular precon commander from the release is Celes, Rune KnightCeles, Rune Knight, a character from FFVI. She commands 10,128 decks right now and has an overall popularity rank of #215 on EDHREC.
• At #4 is Terra, Herald of HopeTerra, Herald of Hope, the face commander of the FFVI precon. She leads 15,992 decks at this time with an overall popularity ranking of a clean #100.
• The 3rd most popular commander from the Final Fantasy precons is Tidus, Yuna's GuardianTidus, Yuna's Guardian of FFX. He leads 17,425 decks and has a popularity rank of #83 on EDHREC at this time.

• At #2 is Cloud, Ex-SOLDIERCloud, Ex-SOLDIER, a powerful Naya () commander and the protagonist of FFVII. With a ranking of #30, he commands a formidable number of decks, with 25,474 currently databased.

• Finally, leading the pack by leaps and bounds is Y'shtola, Night's BlessedY'shtola, Night's Blessed, a character from FFXIV. We've discussed Y'shtola all over this website, especially lately, as she's been steadily rising in the ranks. Right now, Y'shtola has a staggering 43,355 decks at her disposal and is ranked at #3 among all commanders in the entire format!

Conclusion

A year later, this set has truly proven its mettle within the sacred, hallowed halls of Magic: The Gathering history. Universes Beyond or not, hopefully more sets come out that are even half as good as Final Fantasy was. Heck, I'm still holding out hope for a Dragon Quest collaboration in the near-future!

But enough about my hopes and dreams. Let's hear from you, dear readers! How did you feel about Final Fantasy as a Magic set when it came out? And, how do you feel about it now? Did you build any Commander decks based around its many characters? How many of those do you still have? Sound off in the comments below!

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