Final Fantasy XV - A New Hope?

[Munaus]

Oh god, another one?

I'm just lost at words here, should I be hyped... or cry in a corner?

Or just say "meh" and continue with my life as if nothing ever happened?

I will leave to you 2 links that may give to you, the reader, a candle of hope if you've loved the series so far.

Or a shadow of despair, which there is no turning back from...

Youtube video

News

Comment below what you believe, think and your feelings for this...

or just blatantly ignore this thread

[Pulse95]

I might buy myself the website "FinalFantasy16.com" just so they pay me money for the ownership.

[Munaus]

Updating this with a bit worrying news:

the FFXIII team is already moving on to their next game, because Wada wants each team to be able to steadily release one game every two years from now on

Why this rush? They planned FF7 back in -94 but got late on programming until late -95. And that was with 120 programmers and artists. Now with FFXV, or whatever game they are currently working on, they have 200 employees rush to release every 2 years?

Why can't they just sit and discuss "whats good/bad, what does/doesn't fans like?" and work with that?

I doubt anything good will come out of this, but if anyone is slightly interested I will keep my eyes 'n' ears open. If you have any additional info please add it here.

[Jay?]

So, uh, i had a falling out with final fantasy when squaresoft merged with Enix.

Every final fantasy game released after that merger was terrible.

FFXI was just WoW with moogles

FFX-2 was too painful to bear, and seems to have been made for the sole purpose of ruining the Spira plotline by disneyfying the ending.

FFXII only required you to play it for an hour or two, and then it would just play itself.

FFXIII was... pretty, but completely insubstantial.

I'm willing to give the FF team a chance, but I'm afraid they're just gone for good.

[Munaus]

Snip

Sounds like you actually played the entire (half) series, from 7 to 13?

I never enjoyed any MMO's except Runescape (free to play ), so I was confident that the FF's after 9 would be bad.

But I gotta admit, whenever I walked past the game shelves and saw the 11th box with expansions included. I almost... almost wished I could play it. I mean, come on! It's Final Fantasy, after all!

[Jay?]

Sounds like you actually played the entire (half) series, from 7 to 13?

I never enjoyed any MMO's except Runescape (free to play ), so I was confident that the FF's after 9 would be bad.

But I gotta admit, whenever I walked past the game shelves and saw the 11th box with expansions included. I almost... almost wished I could play it. I mean, come on! It's Final Fantasy, after all!

I played everything from III to XII. What i know about XIII comes from a very reliable friend.

I actually thought that X was one of the best.The battle system was deep and fun, the leveling system was flexible, and the plot was very original.

Some of the voice acting was a bit wooden, but if you can emulate the PS2, you can play the Un-Dub PAL release, which had more content than the NA release.

[okamikk]

Sounds like you actually played the entire (half) series, from 7 to 13?

I never enjoyed any MMO's except Runescape (free to play ), so I was confident that the FF's after 9 would be bad.

But I gotta admit, whenever I walked past the game shelves and saw the 11th box with expansions included. I almost... almost wished I could play it. I mean, come on! It's Final Fantasy, after all!

how can you say runescape is enjoyable?

[Munaus]

how can you say runescape is enjoyable?

Free to play, exciting pvp, free to play, ore mining/fish fishing hype, free to play, insane market and item trading (way way back when you had to go to server 1 to get all your ore/fish sold and your text seen over all the others, textbot was useful back then) and it was the first mmo that friends at school showed me. Naturally I tag along and Woah! Did it already go 3 years? Where did those years go?

It was also free to play

Please don't clutter this thread with any other games than final fantasy.

[okamikk]

Free to play, exciting pvp, free to play, ore mining/fish fishing hype, free to play, insane market and item trading (way way back when you had to go to server 1 to get all your ore/fish sold and your text seen over all the others, textbot was useful back then) and it was the first mmo that friends at school showed me. Naturally I tag along and Woah! Did it already go 3 years? Where did those years go?

It was also free to play

Please don't clutter this thread with any other games than final fantasy.

you started it...

[Jay?]

I wouldn't say that 7 had the best graphics, most to blame was the psx limitation, but it was good back then. And yea, the music was great. I have a few of them on my Zen.

Gameplay was fun, but I thought it lacked gamers interaction. Mostly you could just glue down the "O" button (accept) and the characters would simply attack and win any enemy there was. Except a few bosses, of course.

The battle system COULD have been fun if there were a single difficult fight in the entire game. However, almost every fight throughout the game could be beaten by setting cursor memory and holding circle.

BUT the story!

The story made all that a minor thing. It was the story that gave the game its soul!

The super soldier theme, the way that Shinra corrupted the entire world for domination with Mako. Barrets anger with the destruction of his hometown and his oath to break Shinra. Yuffie's futile attempts to raise her country from the sink of defeat. Vincent's lamentation in the basement, where he hoped for naught but his own death.

Sephiroth realising his true origins, and razing everything in his rage. And of course the emo Cloud and Tifa, the couple that could never be a couple.

Final Fantasy 7 was cliche ridden, poorly written, and the villain, Sephiroth, was only intimidating because of his theme music. The fact that the sum of his character growth through the series was "I miss mommy" puts him leagues behind Kefka and Seymour in particular.

Then there's the ending, which was one of the most haphazard, slapdash finales in gaming history.

All these ingredients is what blew life in 7. It wasn't the graphics, any future game can beat that. Not the gameplay, lets be fair, it wasn't the best. Music? There can always be new music that others like.

Not a chance. the FF7 soundtrack was Nobuo Eumatsu's crowning achievement, not only in its inherent quality, but the way the composition set the tone for its associated content.

No, it was the story. The backgrounds around these characters is what was amazing in this game.

And I bet every gamer played a part in their own minds with the characters backstory. Feeling their hope, anger and sorrow.

Who hasn't had their dreams crushed, just like Cid?

Who hasn't had thoughts of suicide, after failing the ones you love, like Vincent?

Who hasn't had a family member leave forever, to never know the intentions, like Red XII?

/dramafanrant ends

These are all enormous cliches. Those characters are in EVERY rpg. The only powerful story elements of final fantasy 7 were the death of Aeris and the reveal of the nature of the lifestream. None of them progressed as people, and were defined exclusively by their "unique" backstory.

Compared to Final Fantasy 10, which had an actually well written villain, a bittersweet ending (which by the way is almost unheard of in video games) and, well developed characters who see actual human growth through the story.

The vast majority of the adulation the FF7 recieves is due to nostalgia. People remember it from when they were kids or teenagers, and FF7 was the highest quality RPG that was accessible. Anything better than that needed to be imported, or had poor graphics. They remember it as being shiny and new and unusual, but if you want a great story you need to go back to FF6, or forward to FF10., or better yet, leave the Final Fantasy franchise altogether. Shin Megami Tensei has some of the best writing in the gaming world.

[ErusPrime]

7 > 12 > 10 > everything else.

[Jay?]

7 > 12 > 10 > everything else.

You're joking right? You've got to be joking. 12 didn't even require you to take part in the battles after a few hours. The idea of 12 being better than 6 (or 10) is downright silly. 10 might come close, but 6 was fantastic in its balance, its story, it's gameplay (the esper system was one of my favorite level mechanics in the whole series) and it's character developement.

[ErusPrime]

I like the materia over esper as far as mechanics are concerned.

I never really got into 6. Back then I was more into chrono trigger and secret of mana which might be painting my opinion. I'd have to play it again.

I put 12 over 10 simply because I liked the art and how huge the side stuff was. I found 10's story line to be annoyingly convoluted and lost interest in even pretending to follow it.

To be fair, no FF game requires you to take part in the battles after awhile. That's why they have awesome art and story line.

you're right about the order though. It should be 7 > 9 > 12 > 10 > everything else.

I might even go so far as to say 9 > 7 > 12 > 10.

[Jay?]

Materia? I don't mind the system. There were enough fun things to do with it that it COULD have been great if the "hold circle=win every fight" method didn't hold true throughout the game. I only had to think about one singe fight in the entire game, and that was against Emerald Weapon.

9 was too cartoony, and too grindy for my taste, but that's accounting for taste so i won't go there.

To be fair, no FF game requires you to take part in the battles after awhile. That's why they have awesome art and story line.

That isn't true. FFX boss battles stayed hard right up until the final battle, unless you did massive amounts of arena-grinding, in which case the extra challenge-bosses were even harder. FF8 fights maintained difficulty throughout the whole game, unless you used exploits. The earlier games got easy if you did too much grinding, but that was an age of speed runs and simpler systems.

I found 10's story line to be annoyingly convoluted and lost interest in even pretending to follow it.

Are you sure it wasn't just the hollow voice-acting that turned you off? (that is totally a legitimate complaint, btw) my only complaint about the story was that there WEREN'T enough convoluted subplots.

[ErusPrime]

If you're grinding in FF, like you should be, all the battles are easy excepting the additional challenge stuff. The difficulty of the battles wasn't based on your stats. I had very little problems with the bosses in FFX, but I did the grinding. Same with FF8. The card game is what became the best challenge in the game.

10's story line is ridiculous. If they could just pick a damn direction and stick with it I might have enjoyed it more. Voice acting aside, which was also terrible, the story just wasn't interesting.

and 9 is the tits because it's cartoony.

[Xylord]

The battle system COULD have been fun if there were a single difficult fight in the entire game. However, almost every fight throughout the game could be beaten by setting cursor memory and holding circle.

Final Fantasy 7 was cliche ridden, poorly written, and the villain, Sephiroth, was only intimidating because of his theme music. The fact that the sum of his character growth through the series was "I miss mommy" puts him leagues behind Kefka and Seymour in particular.

Then there's the ending, which was one of the most haphazard, slapdash finales in gaming history.

Not a chance. the FF7 soundtrack was Nobuo Eumatsu's crowning achievement, not only in its inherent quality, but the way the composition set the tone for its associated content.

These are all enormous cliches. Those characters are in EVERY rpg. The only powerful story elements of final fantasy 7 were the death of Aeris and the reveal of the nature of the lifestream. None of them progressed as people, and were defined exclusively by their "unique" backstory.

Compared to Final Fantasy 10, which had an actually well written villain, a bittersweet ending (which by the way is almost unheard of in video games) and, well developed characters who see actual human growth through the story.

The vast majority of the adulation the FF7 recieves is due to nostalgia. People remember it from when they were kids or teenagers, and FF7 was the highest quality RPG that was accessible. Anything better than that needed to be imported, or had poor graphics. They remember it as being shiny and new and unusual, but if you want a great story you need to go back to FF6, or forward to FF10., or better yet, leave the Final Fantasy franchise altogether. Shin Megami Tensei has some of the best writing in the gaming world.

Fart.

Sephiroth, was only intimidating because of his theme music.

True. But what a theme music it was! Paris frogs were never as cool.

[Jay?]

If you're grinding in FF, like you should be, all the battles are easy excepting the additional challenge stuff. The difficulty of the battles wasn't based on your stats. I had very little problems with the bosses in FFX, but I did the grinding. Same with FF8. The card game is what became the best challenge in the game.

10's story line is ridiculous. If they could just pick a damn direction and stick with it I might have enjoyed it more. Voice acting aside, which was also terrible, the story just wasn't interesting.

and 9 is the tits because it's cartoony.

What? I never grind in final fantasy. you particularly didn't need to in 8. the enemy levels in FF8 were scaled, so you would face a similar difficulty from the final boss at level 15 as you would at level 99.

Grinding is the hallmark of a bad singleplayer campaign. You should be able to progress smoothly through the storyline provided you follow about half of the side plots. You didn't need to grind in FF6, FF8, FF10, or at least the first half of 12. This is the case in most decent RPGs outside of the final fantasy franchise as well.

As for the storyline, how far did you get? everything starts to twist in together about halfway through the game, and by the time you're 3/4 in, there are no sideplots, everything contributes to the primary goal.

As for the cartooniness of 9, i found it incredibly off-putting. Maybe if i had played it when it came out, when i was 11 or 12, i would have liked it, but i didn't go back and play it until i was 18. It just didn't feel right.

Fart.

True. But what a theme music it was! Paris frogs were never as cool.

Not my favorite version of the Sephiroth theme, I thought it was better as pure classical. Still, point is made. You could apply his music to just about anything and make it menacing.

[ErusPrime]

how can you survive ff8 without grinding. that's the one where you have to steal magic and then use it so many times to actually learn the spell and in addition to gaining xp for levels you had to get AP for your junctions to learn new abilities.

I beat FFX multiple times. I liked the mechanics of the game and the difficulty of the side quests. I just hated the story. Yeah it all comes together but just because it makes sense doesn't mean it's good.

[Jay?]

how can you survive ff8 without grinding. that's the one where you have to steal magic and then use it so many times to actually learn the spell and in addition to gaining xp for levels you had to get AP for your junctions to learn new abilities.

I beat FFX multiple times. I liked the mechanics of the game and the difficulty of the side quests. I just hated the story. Yeah it all comes together but just because it makes sense doesn't mean it's good.

I thought the story was quite excellent. The stressing of duty over ease, the way they handled wakka being kinda racist, the anti-religious overtones, the fact that Tidus willingly gave himself up not to save the world, but to improve it, even after finding strong value in his own life.

FF8 was actually incredibly easy without grinding. Just nab a few spells here and there, and make sure to hit the in-map draw points as you go along. Other than that, it's all about smart junctioning and making sure your characters have a good mix of commands, abilities, and you have people put into specific roles. I beat FF8 at level 11 one time. it was very interesting.

Also, you don't learn spells in FF8 ever. Spells are more like items in 8, you have a limited number of spells instead of a limited amount of MP. As for AP, the majority of mandatory boss battles gave tons of AP, but no XP. You can actually go through then entire game without leveling up at all.

[Munaus]

lol, I came here to fight Jay (lv 100), but I see that ErusPrime is at it. Sooo... Ima just gonna sit on a bench and wait, and hope Jay has enough energy to be of any challenge to me :)

[flamingsalad]

Dude, that's just Agni's Philosophy. A tech demo. Nobody ever said that it was FFXV.

Like that FFVII on PS3 tech demo was never a teaser for FFVII HD.

[Munaus]

I never said THIS IS FF15 !/¤&!¤!!!!! OMG TUTALLY REALZ!!111

This is all the info there is. However this part is interesting.

Although no one noticed until now, a U.S. trademark was filed last month for none other than Final Fantasy XV.

That, and the fact that the site the quote comes from is ffXVhome.com, pretty much means that a 15 is coming. That tech demo? I dont know what it is... but it's pretty.

I doubt that they WONT make a 15, why shouldn't they? FF is their crown jewel, its like thinking "yea bethesda wont make any more Elder scrolls, they have got enough money of it already". Square Enix will continue with FF until the franchise is officially dead. Or until another company buys it.

[Jay?]

Or until another company buys it.

I really hope this happens (even though it won't). The name Square Enix is really a misnomor. Squaresoft didnt merge with Enix, it was devoured slowly and painfully, from the inside out, so that Enix could wear Square's face like a mask, and sell things to all Squares old buddies.

[ErusPrime]

It's true. The later Star Ocean games aren't as good as Star Ocean 2.

[Jay?]

It's true. The later Star Ocean games aren't as good as Star Ocean 2.

Ugh, now you've gone and made me think about star ocean: till the end of time.