At a latest hands-on for Remaining Fantasy 16, we acquired to play a superb six hours of content material from throughout the sport. Although all from a work-in-progress construct that Sq. Enix was cautious to notice had been particularly designed for the media tour, a lot of what we performed seemed to be just about the ultimate model of the sport.
You do that job for lengthy sufficient and also you get fairly good at figuring out when one thing has been stitched collectively for a hands-on versus when it’s accomplished – and this sport seemed to be nicely and really completed at this occasion, virtually a full two months from launch. There’s an air of confidence round how completed it’s, in actual fact – I’ve been informed that there’s no day-one patch to tighten issues up, as a result of it’s simply not wanted. The sport is completed, polished, prepared. It’s a stark distinction to Remaining Fantasy 15, which had a messy last preview that was adopted by a last-minute sharpening delay earlier than the preview embargo even lifted.
That’s the primary main level I’d make about Remaining Fantasy 16, in actual fact. It’s clear that that is essentially the most assured and full main-line Remaining Fantasy sport at launch because the PS2 period; it’ll match as much as the superb launch state of Remaining Fantasy 7 Remake. From a fit-and-finish perspective, I’d confidently say that high quality is now not a query. The dialog shifts, then, to the sport as a murals and design – and if persons are going to be selecting up what it’s placing down.
That’s what results in this headline, actually. To color a full image, I acquired to play the primary 4 hours of Remaining Fantasy 16, adopted by a pair extra hours’ of content material from later within the sport. Of the preliminary 4 hours, the primary virtually two hours contains the sport’s prologue – and that is the content material the general public will be capable to expertise in its upcoming demo.
The time period ‘vertical slice’ is mostly bloody silly exec-level converse that isn’t usually very appropriate with the style through which video games are made – however this phase of FF16 is without doubt one of the finest examples of that time period in motion I’ve ever seen. Within the prologue you play as a youthful model of Clive, FF16’s protagonist, experiencing a small characterful slice of day-to-day life earlier than occasions unfold that set him on the trail to his grownup life – which is the place the sport actually will get going. Nonetheless, primarily based on what I performed of the remainder of the sport, just about every little thing you have to see is within the prologue.
There are each light character-developing story scenes and bombastic motion. FF16’s brutality, which is actually new for this entry, is on proud show. Troopers and docile handmaidens alike get their throats slit in full view of the digicam. Clive heads on a preppy non-essential mission with two momentary celebration member NPCs (sadly not referred to as Biggs & Wedge), that mission appearing as a tutorial for fight and culminating in a battle in opposition to an iconic FF enemy. Throughout this time, you’ll stage up and get used to the fight, and by the point you come from this mission you’ll be prepared for the true factor – which is for the perfect, because it all then kicks off for actual. All of it builds to, in fact, a bombastic Eikon battle.
It’s, broadly talking, all there. It seems like these two hours are the whole sport compressed and shoved right into a blender. There’s components that aren’t right here, in fact – extra difficult fight powers, upgrading Clive and his gear in full, extra open-ended areas, and full context on the narrative’s occasions – however anybody with a half-decent online game data can extrapolate what these shall be like primarily based on these first few hours and the data that God of Battle 2018 was a serious structural touchstone for FF16’s improvement.
That is the precise factor Remaining Fantasy 16 wants, too. It is a sport with a wildly totally different proposal of what a Remaining Fantasy sport will be – and it’s additionally undoubtedly aiming at a broader viewers, lots of whom don’t know the franchise intimately. That makes this demo very important, actually: it’ll enable newcomers to see how totally different this FF is to their preconceived notions from informal observance of a 30-year historical past, and it’ll additionally enable present followers to determine if this entry continues to be for them or not.
Principally, everyone ought to play FF16’s demo. You’ll come out of it with a really robust thought of if this sport is for you or not.
Past the Demo
It is a preview, in fact. And so that you in all probability wish to know what I feel. And, nicely… gosh, it’s difficult? I feel Remaining Fantasy 16 is superb, although as a sequence fan for years, I’m nonetheless not 100% satisfied that is what I wished from the sport – although I drastically loved my time with it regardless.
The fight, which is extra Satan Could Cry than anything, has that character motion edge. In a boss battle, with the music pumping, you’ll end up shuffling to the sting of your seat. I may sense my shoulders rocking forwards and backwards in time with the rhythm of the music and the fight. Harder encounters, like bosses, noticed me slowly slipping into one thing of a trance. That’s all the time a sure-fire signal of some good-ass battles.
One factor pulled from different FF video games is the idea of ‘stagger’, the place you construct up strain on an enemy to place them right into a semi-stunned state the place they’re extra weak to large assaults. That turns into the rhythm, even for small enemies – strain, strain, stagger, unleash. Even with grunts, that second of launch as you blast them full-power is extremely satisfying.
There have been a whole lot of arguments about how a lot of an RPG FF16 actually is – and we’ve even had the builders wryly poking enjoyable on the discourse in a PAX panel. It’s worthy of dialogue, although. And the reality is, that is in all probability the least classically RPG a numbered Remaining Fantasy has ever been. Relying on the place you stand, that may be for good or ailing in equal measure. One of many issues I cherish most about Remaining Fantasy is its chameleonic skill to alter to match the instances. And so I welcome the brand new route.
If you happen to’re attempting to place a finger on precisely what it’s like, the action-versus-RPG tug of struggle will be summed up in little issues, actually. Like how, regardless of being a sport centered on grand elemental creatures, there’s no elemental side to fight. Utilizing hearth strikes on the ice-clad Shiva means nothing. Or in therapeutic – you possibly can’t garner an enormous stack of Potions to brute pressure via fight in that traditional RPG approach as a result of there’s a therapeutic restrict, so you possibly can carry about 5 potions complete.
And although the likes of Jill and Cid will be a part of you in battle as celebration members, they largely appear to be there for aesthetic causes. The celebration banter as you stroll round is beautiful, however in battle they could as nicely not be there, awkwardly shuffling forwards and backwards earlier than tossing out an assault that lands with the ferocity of a butterfly. There’s actually not one of the grand team-up assaults of FF15 or the puzzle-box fashion multi-character design of FF7R. It seems like they’re current in battle extra out of obligation to FF’s popularity as having a ‘celebration’ of fighters than anything. There may be no less than another fruitful ally, nevertheless: Torgal, the canine who is a continuing companion that may lengthen combos and heal on command.
These design issues extra carefully resemble character motion video games – however that’s actually what FF16 is, no less than in its fight.
FF16 Producer Naoki Yoshida is correct when he kicks again and says that is nonetheless an RPG, although. That style is available in all sizes and styles, and FF16 has lots for followers of it. Clive ranges up and grows. There’s a variety of drugs slots, upgrades, and abilities to be unlocked. And in Satan Could Cry, you’re not going to discover a facet quest by going off the overwhelmed path in a zone – so it does differentiate. It’s necessary to know that it’s all lighter-touch, although. And that’s by design.
When it comes to the open-ended components, we must always shortly speak concerning the sport’s construction and zone design. So far as I can inform, FF16 seems to have the identical form of ‘hub and spoke’ design as present in video games like God of Battle. As soon as the story settles into its rhythm, your ‘residence base’ shall be Cid’s Hideaway, a sort-of traditional headquarters with all of the mod-cons of Mass Impact’s Normandy. There are retailers, NPCs to improve issues, you’ll choose up and switch in a whole lot of facet quests right here, and also you’ll return right here frequently to take inventory earlier than heading out on story missions.
The zones you head out to from the hideaway will both be extra dungeon-like – with a transparent linear path that ushers you from one story beat and battle to the subsequent – or open-ended. The open areas are maybe finest considered ‘open zone’ somewhat than ‘open world’: they’re giant areas which have a linear goal aim inside them, however will be extra absolutely explored. Inside Remaining Fantasy, an honest comparability might be The Calm Lands in FF10 or Gran Pulse in FF13, although the one zone I noticed was in all probability bigger than the previous however smaller than the latter.
What stays unclear is the ratio of those areas. Within the later levels of the hands-on, I discover one, Three Reeds, with roaming enemies to combat and some facet quests to select up. Principally, although, the areas I performed had been of the extra linear selection: grand castles that look stunning as you cross via them, however design-wise walled gardens that you may’t discover very a lot of. I’m hoping for some extra widely-explorable cities and castles within the last sport.
The vibe I get from the preview is that FF16 shall be a sport that’s greater than the sum of its components. I walked away from the hands-on expertise very happy and excited for the ultimate sport, nevertheless it’s additionally truthful to say that I didn’t have a ‘wow issue’ second, one thing that actually made the sport stand out. There’s nothing so courageous as FF7’s visible spectacle or FF12’s Gambit System, as an illustration.
I feel within the thoughts of the builders that is what the Eikon fights are for, with their large, PS5-justifying spectacle. However truthfully… I simply discovered the 2 I performed a bit rote. It simply wasn’t interactive sufficient for me. Much more attention-grabbing was a combat in opposition to a personality who was half-transformed into their Eikonic type – resulting in a tense and thrilling one-on-one combat within the common fight system.
There’s nothing improper with a sport not having one thing that knocks you in your arse with how shockingly good it’s, although. FF16 looks like the form of sport the place a bunch of excellent concepts come collectively to make one thing nice, even when it’s much less prone to provoke a tidal wave of social media posts about how good it’s. Generally the alchemic stability of a bunch of excellent stuff we’ve already seen elsewhere working in good concord can ship a greater expertise than a sport that has one thing really earth-shattering in it. In actual fact, a number of of the perfect Remaining Fantasy video games – like 9 – have been video games precisely like this.
If there’s an X-Issue, although, it’ll in all probability be the story. I can already inform that when it comes to voiceover and efficiency, that is undoubtedly going to be a sequence excessive. The entire English-language solid – who recorded first, earlier than their Japanese counterparts – are good, evocative, and likable. And British! Which is all the time a bonus. And whereas I get vibes that I’ll be capable to predict the place it’s going, I reckon the narrative is taking some courageous swings, no less than within the context of what Remaining Fantasy tales usually are. FF16 will hit totally different.
That truth leads us to the one query this preview can’t reply, in actual fact. Critiques from video games critics who know FF nicely received’t reply it, both. That query being: can FF16 discover a new viewers?
Earlier than FF16 was even publicly introduced, I used to be informed that Sq. Enix knew that the route they had been taking the title in would alienate a not-insignificant portion of the prevailing FF fanbase. However that was a calculated threat, and arguably precisely what the sequence must do. It is a Remaining Fantasy for a brand new period, eventually, particularly an FF for individuals who love Sony’s status third-person motion titles with all their cinematic aptitude and artistry. Will this sport lose some entrenched old-school FF followers? Completely. Will it garner a brand new viewers? I actually hope it does.
As initially envisioned by Hironobu Sakaguchi, Remaining Fantasy is supposed to be a sequence that consistently morphs and adjustments. After a good quantity of spinning its wheels, FF16 is eventually a sport that returns to that imaginative and prescient, seems on the world round it, and decides {that a} regeneration is required. Remaining Fantasy itself goes via Phoenix’s Rebirth Flame – however for such a rejuvenation, some issues should burn. It’s a courageous guess, and I can already inform the sport goes to be robust. I simply actually hope it finds its viewers.
