ah, so this really IS like FF14
5 Likes
Iād be interested in hearing you explain what you mean by both games having a similar approach to combat.
i beat this yesterday - the combination of Eikons i was using in the end (see above) more or less made every fight trivial once i had the right combo of moves, which is fine and usual for most Final Fantasy games, breaking the game over your knee.
idk - i donāt feel too compelled to write about this game for some reason. i think it was a good time and a good game, but i also see why it might not be selling as well as Square would have hoped (this is assuming that sales arenāt 100% tied to the smaller install base of the PS5), and it makes me a little concerned for the new DQ, too. i stand by the idea that this game is very much a FF game, but after the first 15-20 hours it loses a lot of its momentum and then youāre sort of stuck in this world that is both technically beautiful to look at, but also boring to an extent.
the game is gorgeous to look at but way too brown.
one of the main plot points is essentially recycled from FFXIV, but because this game is shorter, the idea is less developed and therefore less engaging.
i do enjoy the return to ecoterrorism, though.
there are some real beautiful moments in the game, but there is so - much - dialogue. there is just so much writing and 70% of it is meaningless chatter.
iāll probably do another run of the game on āFinal Fantasy Mode,ā but for now, itās back to finish other games iāve left unfinished, and back to SF6 training.
11 Likes
I still havenāt finished the Chronolith Trials for the extra accessories because I am of the mind that these may be pretty essential to avoiding carpal tunnel on NG+
I actually think most of the more resonant character scenes happen right at the end of the game as sidequests but for a game that has so-much-dialogue (as you put it) it really is odd how much of the earlier dramatic conflicts get so little time at all (especially Hugo being a horny 1-Dimensional warmonger)
3 Likes
Jill finally gets some backstory and it sucks. Going back to the Iron Kingdom just felt like a rush through to get the crystal destroyed and over with. The guy she gets revenge on is less a depressingly religious zealot who mightāve genuinely believed he was doing the right thing but heās just a facelss villain of the week. Her arc sucks. I guess theyāre gonna start developing her as Cliveās love interest but if they werenāt clearly doing this for the last 5 years why is it now a thing? She had to kill viking lava pope to feel ready I guess.
We get a new character and theyāre pretty mid.
3 Likes
i love how this game attempts to give off this hardcore-as-fuck vibe and includes some more brutal violence and swearing and sex or whatever, but within a few hours itās clear that Clive (lol) is just a big olā soft-hearted sweetie pie
4 Likes
This game does the traditional long-JRPG thing where several hours in, you reach a point where the game opens up. Usually, this is the point where the prologueās on-rails gameplay gives way to a more exploratory experience. The player is allowed to finally traverse the wider world at their own pace and find the hidden corners of it.
In Final Fantasy XIV, however, the world opens up in a very different way. World traversal largely remains streamlined and guided, but instead you are granted new and robust tools for exploring the gameās lore. There are three different overdesigned systems for diving into the gameās setting, characters, and plot. Iāve never seen anything like it in a video game.
The closest design analog I can think of is the 90ās educational CD-ROM. This game essentially contains a full AAA remake of 1998ās āEyewitness History of the Worldā, but all the history is made up:
The UI is very well-thought out! Itās wild that this level of instructional design has been devoted to a subsystem in a Final Fantasy game. It feels like it was motivated by a combination of love for the world theyād created and anxiety that itās too complicated for the average player to follow.
Itās kind of fun to dip into this stuff but there is a LOT of it. I can imagine a type of player who would absolutely love this though.
11 Likes
Thereās nothing more relaxing in the game than getting back to homebase and taking a bath in the lore. Itās not that the lore is insanely good itās more just that these systems have your back if you just wanna dabble or check a connection or npc name. Itās crucial that you canāt access the lore away from home. Really feeds the relationship with the hub.
8 Likes
Apologies for the delayed reply. I kinda consider Diablo to be a flattened-out approach to what XVI is trying to do? Both games youāre cycling through abilities and managing your cooldowns, thereās numbers flying around, thereās particle effects. Youād think the full 3d approach would enhance the experience but somehow Diabloās combat has an actual rhythm and flow, XVI is just a boring mess in my opinion.
2 Likes
75% update
The Titan fightās intensely 00s musical changes are a good example of unhinged moments where the game revels in its peaks. But they come very sparsely and are separated by caverns of sidequests that drag, particularly in the desert section. Itās kinda exhausting how often sidequests end with the same tone: āIt sure is great when you have a helping handā; āanything to help a friend in needā; āhe can rest easy nowā. Some sidequests end in bigger cutscenes but a lot of the extra development about the hideaway feels so late. Like what has Clive been doing for 5 years? Surely extra details of peopleās origins were mentioned at some point. Thereās some that attempt interesting things but are undercut by the usual 5 wolves were spotted outside of town, please sir wonāt you kill them?
One sidequest lead to a goblin nest but another person who was investigating the goblins says to leave them alone since they just fighting for their survival and arenāt really a threat. Cool. The very next side quest the same area asks you to cut down on entire group of goblins about 200 metres down the road. I think the side quest writing team just didnāt speak with each other much, or they canāt keep pace with what Clive is, a special anime powers boy with Godlike abilities. Like it makes sense that he is a person that might care about these people but almost every combat encounter I walk into I just roast everyone with the Phoenix ability. Itās starting to feel cruel.
Speaking of the Titan fight, Ifrit was doing some X-games shit and probably shouldāve conjured a brimstone skateboard. Itās also great how thereās never any non-plot-critical witnesses to these fights that literally decimate local landmarks.
Dionās little narrative is cool although the gay kiss is massively overhyped like most cases in blockbuster franchises. I like that they manage to get us to care about Dionās personal struggle despite his goals not really aligning with Cliveās ultimately. He doesnāt wanna see his horrible empire usurped, the actions of which he has presumably supported for the most part, yet he feels sympathetic. I guess heās just lower on the hierarchy of enemies that constantly do things to make you dislike them.
Iām nearing the end very slowly, but the game does feel strangely padded and without a good balance of peaks and troughs. Some of the stuff you do at the hideaway is just very boring (would it kill them to let you run) and doesnāt get into the more interesting aspects of the world. I do kinda like how you barely spend any time in major cities since your perspective is mostly that of an outlaw, but youād think the information you have access to would be higher given what is needed to coordinate attacks on the major resource centres of the world. The Final Sin is some much-needed background flavour to the world which seems to be very history-less for most of its 8 centuries since the bearer accord or w/e. For all the lore, there is a frustrating degree to which certain rules are underexplained. Like I feel like I should have a full manual explaining current understanding of how dominants come to be, and which have appeared so far.
Uncle Byron really feels like a classic Sakaguchi noble doofus character. The only thing he lacks is being a weird womaniser.
The Bahamut crystal fight section reminds me of the old-fashioned CG tentpoles that FF are known for. Whatās weird is these shouldnāt still carry the weight they do but somehow, they make them special. I feel like it comes down to how many little sparkles of crystal they can render. Itās always a cut scene that ends in huge destruction that marks these cutscenes out. CG renders of characters canāt carry the spectacle like they used to. Major destruction also has big world implications that fit with FF world progression.
This economy is insane. There is no need to craft ANYTHING. Music is the only real money sink and new weapons may as well just be given to you when you level up.
Oh, also Iāve fully automated combat as far as I can. I can understand what theyāre going for, but I canāt be arsed to wreck my hands for an FF playtime of DMC stuff. Interestingly some residue of strategy remains in the automation. Some moves just work better for how the autocombo tool selects them and some can set-up damage chains well with those constraints whereas others are just nonviable like many of Ramuhās toolset. Titan practically makes you invincible since you can still be killed in some special cases where the dodge dodges you into a continuation of the same enemy combo. Titanās block just eliminates this problem since the autocombo knows when itās needed. Generally, AOE skills work better and are quicker for finishing encounters without the need to set-up or precision aim.
For all its problems Iām still enjoying it but not sure if this is me just enjoying watching key scenes. The game feels like everything was compromised to balance moment-to-moment combat which is not the worst thing and some encounters are really good. I assume this and the incredible music is the FFXIV DNA. It does sometimes feel like an MMO has been stripped off certain features to make this game work but I wouldnāt resort to the pejorative āsingle-player MMOā. Itās just that the most impactful parts have been brought over whereas the complexity and economies of an MMO have been rebalanced out of the experience. Iām not sure what my point is here but it makes the game an interesting hybrid that I think is partly the source of my enjoyment in spite of all the problems Iāve just ranted about.
7 Likes
4 Likes
i just came in this thread to say that clive is hot and i would do a lot of lava ringed things to him. i also wanted to say that i really want this game but i refuse to purchase a ps5 so i gotta wait for the pc release. what iāve seen of gameplay makes it seem solid tho. canāt wait to dive into this story w/ all the lore and secrets and cozy final fantasy stuff that made me love it growing up. clive hot tho. yeah.
1 Like
This line stood out to me too, lol
2 Likes
Finally finished it. I think overall I enjoy its peaks and it does hang together thematically quite well by the end, but thereās just a lot of fluff and I would probably recommend not doing most of the side quests except for the late game ones that have more main story implications or better rewards.
I made some notes from the mid-game onwards which Iām just gonna list. Spoilers.
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Going to space in the Bahamut fight is one of two big moments that stick with me from the game, and they are both Eikon fights. I think they stand out as contrast because as far as FF games go this one has the least strange grandiosity, and it can feel like after time you are picking flowers for merchants. Itās just a very strange feeling doing these mundane side quests after being the first people in space.
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Dion has a nice arc but is a bit underutilised sometimes. You root for him, but his ultimate sacrifice feels a bit undercooked. His little medicine girl thing goes nowhere.
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Ultima is revealed to be manipulating the leaders of Ash in a bizarre scene where he just appears as the Kingās naked mother āIf you do as I say Iāll be your naked mother for a bit, k?ā.
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Tharmr cuts a Moses break in the waves with his dark powers (Shadow Moses, is this something?) and you have a fight on the seafloor. Because of Ultimaās plan, no one is really allowed to kill Clive. So, when gestures are made to threaten him like having the entire ocean collapse on him it feels weird. Also, presumably Clive and Jill ran miles across the sea floor to shore in an ice tunnel under the crashing waves which would surely have outrun them? This is then followed by Clive and Jill just sitting naked in front of a campfire on a beach back-to-back. They barely get any extended scenes together and this one just comes out of nowhere. Clive suddenly decides it is more useful to have Shivaās spells rather than another dominant on the team and so sucks out Jillās essence with their permission. I think Cliveās rationale is she shouldnāt have the burden anymore since he can just finish off the last crystal, but itās not really made explicit. Also, weird given that Jillās powers literally saved them in the preceding scene. Weird fucking scene.
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Why do the writers hate Jill so much? Sheās hugely underwritten and features throughout the story constantly. She is the main love interest, but we barely get any sense of that. You must never says or does anything interesting. There is no sense that after the five-year timeskip that she and Clive ever became a couple and her story culminates in a fairly decent sidequest becomes at right at the end of the game to suggest that they care for each other in more than an implied way. Even her own scenes facing her demons and the iron kingdom are just fluff. She clearly had a shit life but we donāt get any resolution that feels earned. Also, it is implied that she is suffering from the Bearerās curse but in her mandatory nude scene she doesnāt seem to have any stone parts on her body. I guess because it wouldnāt be sexy. Very frustrating.
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God thereās a lot of sidequests and they unlock in dreadful waves. Iāve mentioned it before, but this is where the game feels the most like an MMO team were at the helm.
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Gav should basically be on the cover of this game. I think heās just a beneficiary of favoritism thanks to Clive, but he is also apparently a legendary Scout. He is the only person regularly helps out on missions who doesnāt have magical powers. He and Clive have more on-screen chemistry than any other two characters including Cliveās love interest. Like just make them a couple, why not? I want a scene where he sucks out Gavās scout essence.
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Finally, you get to Ash, but Odin put up an electric fence. Ash is a nice bit of isolation. Felt like a PS2 game because of how deserted it is. The final island of Ghost of Tsushima did this a little bit to where it certainly feels like the world is underpopulated because there is just nobody around. The reason itās underpopulated doesnāt really pay off as a horrifying fact or really make much sense given the conflicts that then happening between Ash and Storm. It would have been neat to see more evidence of internal resistance and struggle but whatever.
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Sleipnir and Tharmr have conversations with each other. It is later revealed that Sleipnir is just a thing Tharmr can conjure. What is going on in these scenes?
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I like Ultimaās dialogue and I think this game has nice words spoken by nice voices (Harpocrates, Sleipnir, Dion, Ultima) but the plot doesnāt hang together very well. The side stuff is really dry, and Ultimaās plan is very silly. A lot of the political intrigue doesnāt really have much of an effect on anything by the end. The scale and stakes are basically only known to a select few people and the same few stand against a single collective God entity that most people donāt know about. The presentation of all of this is frequently impressive but Ultima is very dumb. His plan is bad and heās an idiot. Hubris is literally his canonical debuff.
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Metia being snuffed out was a nice ambiguous morsel at the end and has already got absurd fan theories going. Given the theme of hope in the game and the resolution to Joshua and Cliveās relationship it seems pretty clear to me that Clive sacrificed himself to resurrect Joshua, and abolish magic. He gets ultimate God power and chooses to stick to his main goal. Metia could be some ancient satellite Ultima put in place to make magic possible or if itās just a symbolic removal of hope. I also like the implication that Ultima originally came from the moon.
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The final QTE punching Ultimaās face was so silly I loved it.
Itās a weird game. I really like some encounters but thereās yawning voids of chore mixed in. The eikon fights ended up being probably the best parts which is funny because thatās what people were worried about the most.
7 Likes
This is one of those games that makes me feel insane. Almost all of the reviews/impressions Iāve read (not here) seem to have the same basic consensus:
-The Boss Battles/Eikon fights and the Soken score are a highlight.
-The sidequests might be some of the worst in any game, ever.
-The battle system is flashy and looks/feels great but the game is so easy itās hard to engage with it in any real capacity
-The equipment/upgrade/levelling system is completely inconsequential and there are literally zero interesting decisions
-There are very few interesting decisions to make when choosing abilities
-The story starts strong but falls apart fairly quickly
-Outside of Clive and Cid, the characters are bland, all of the female characters are extremely underserved, and Jill in particular is so passive and inconsequential she feels like she was added to the game after the fact.
-Great game, 10/10, Final Fantasy is BACK baby
And I agree with all of these points, except that I found the negative so far outweighed the positives that I couldnāt stomach another minute and felt very sour towards the amount that I had played (up through the second timeskip). The lack of any real stakes in the battle system was the ultimate killer, though. It made all of the mook fights basically pointless and the boss fights tests of mental endurance, and turned the entire thing into a real slog for me. Maybe when they release it on PC they will include a harder difficulty or someone will mod one in.
9 Likes
itās absolutely impressive that, three years on, thereās still almost no reason to get a PS5. pretty unprecedented!
20 Likes
Iāve owned basically every console since the NES at some point and considering I also own a basically fine gaming PC, I think the PS5 is the first one which I cannot in any way retroactively justify my purchase, and I see nothing on the horizon that will change that. Itās the worlds ugliest 4k blu ray player at this point.
Wait, no, spending $100 to trade up to the PS4Pro model was one I regret in hindsight too. I could have used that money to buy my family a good fish dinner or something instead.
6 Likes
Yeah I think ultimately I like the attempt more than the game itself. They are taking a lot of stabs at stuff even if it amounts to a lot of fluffy fluff. Those crystals sure do look good but yeah Iāve spent a lot of moneyā¦
2 Likes
Iām just glad this game is done and over cuz for the past year ffxiv has been barebones as fuck
12 Likes
I do think overall the game would be fine or even good if there just was something mechanically interesting going on. The story is OK (though much like the most recent FF14 expansion I got confused by it a lot mainly because no one seemed to be reacting to what seemed to me to be extremely seismic events), and itās definitely enough to hang a mechanically fun game on. But when you have to grind through hundreds of braindead mooks that are both dumber and sturdier than musou chaff it just feels like Iām watching a movie that I have to keep rapidly pressing buttons to keep playback going.
I think the battle system would need a major overhaul though. Reduce the parry/perfect dodge window timing significantly, drop the enemy HP values, make groups of enemies WAY more dangerous/aggressive, add more boss AOE attacks like in FF14, add an elemental weakness system. Maybe someone will mod something in when the game gets released on PC eventually and Iāll have a blast with it.
4 Likes