Yoshi says FF16 initially a PS4/PS5 game. Decision made PS5 only in middle of dev. Also says It may Be Time 4 Younger Gen. to Handle FF 17

[Nhomnhom]

Combat was a bit too simplistic tbh, it was a DMC clone, but somehow they were TOO fearful or overwhelming the player too much so pretty early on there was nothing new that you could do and you can just do the same combos over and over for most of the game.




That's most almost all JRPGs studios and Square Enix is included in that as well. Side content is always an afterthought, and doesn't often feed into themes of the main storyline at all.

Like, if you take the lowest tier of side content in Witcher 3 and you take low tier side quests in JRPGS, this is what you get.

The Witcher 3: Villager ask you to kill some random Wolf/Ghoul nearby that's killing the village.
JRPGs(for the most part) : Villager ask you to kill some random Wolf/Slime, that's causing issues.

They're the same right? Not exactly...

The Witcher 3: Through dialogue and context clues, you learn that the reason why you're being paid by the village is because there's an invasion from Nilfgaard and the reason why the villager is asking you is because his local lord is sending his soldiers and most of his monetary capital for the war efforts and peasants have to fend for themselves, heck they had to pool their money because they're getting taxed to shit because of the war. It's all connected.

JRPGs : Through dialogue you learn that you're being asked to clear the Wolves/Slimes, because the villager's older brother has caught the famous Japanese cold and he's out of commission for 2 weeks and near death. Literally tells you nothing about the town or the greater world. It's just some nonsense reason as to have another quest that gives X reward on a checklist.

If side content is this bad, I much rather not have it there at all. It just pollutes the game or wastes my time.

BG3 for example has none of this, everything has a similar quality.

I would understand a few bad quest in FFXVI if they had a clear purpose in world building but they are all pretty weak and later in the game some very low quality quests are also introduced as main quests.

 

[Evilnemesis8]

If side content is this bad, I much rather not have it there at all. It just pollutes the game or wastes my time.

I get it, but its an industry standard for the genre. You've got to hit that X hours of gametime mark. So they do it because they have to, but they don't do it properly, which is a big problem.

Honestly if I had to guess why top tier Western RPG studios are much better at side content than JRPGs in general. I would hazard a guess and say that the bigger writing credits in WRPGs is probably the main reason. I would not be surprised if most of the side content is written by the quest designers themselves in most JRPG while the smaller amount of writer(s) are busy with the core worldbuilding and narrative.

 

[Nhomnhom]

I get it, but its an industry standard for the genre. You've got to hit that X hours of gametime mark. So they do it because they have to, but they don't do it properly, which is a big problem.

Honestly if I had to guess why top tier Western RPG studios are much better at side content than JRPGs in general. I would hazard a guess and say that the bigger writing credits in WRPGs is probably the main reason. I would not be surprised if most of the side content is written by the quest designers themselves in most JRPG while the smaller amount of writer(s) are busy with the core worldbuilding and narrative.

Being industry standard is not a decent justification to include low quality content in games. They need to step their game up, BG3 had only high quality content, well written and well animated and I got like 250h+ out of it.

I'm not a big JRPG guy but In the 3 Persona games I played (3,4 and 5) I didn't feel like there was any lack of attention or drastically lower quality to side content.

 

[AshHunter216]

The guy went and made a Jon Snow Final Fantasy and gave us a very straight forward game that is so forgettable if it wasn't for the pretty graphics, not to mention pushing PS5 down to 30fps 720p

The game only drops to 720p in the 60 fps mode. Seems like a somewhat poorly optimized engine.

 

[AllBizness]

I can tell FF16 started dev on PS4, the graphics are amazing but not quite as crisp as something like Demons Souls remake. FF16 is my 2023 GOTY.

 

[Johnic]

Honestly, with all the hype around it, the game felt disappointing to me. had an interesting world and a somewhat interesting story but it felt soulless.

FFX, a linear game from the PS2 era, felt like it had a much more bigger world. XVI's exploration felt shallow, and that gameplay...

I REALLY disliked the FFVII remake gameplay. After 16 released, I felt relieved that it exists. Because it feels much better than what we got with XVI. They wanted to have their cake and eat it too. They made the game for a "wider audience" and managed to make a game that caters to no one. It lacks even the basics of FF gameplay, like elemental damage. I have no idea what they were thinking.

 

[Box]

The Ultima thing just doesn’t fit the game at all.

Most Final Fantasys have you fighting an ancient God he'll bent on taking over the world. It's always been a staple of the franchise.

 

[rofif]

Absolutely loved ff16.
Played in quality30fps mode and it's one of better playing 30fps games this gen. Maybe thanks to heavy motion blur which is good but also no deadzones on the controller and responsive controls. Some other 30fps games feel like dogwater in comparison

 

[anonpuffs]

FF17 going back to pixel art would be kind of interesting but it would be really hard to pull off financially, will people be willing to spend $70 for a 2D/2.5D pixel art game?

FF16 had a lot of potential but they made some key mistakes that made it much less enjoyable than it could have been:
-they didn't include much lightheartedness in the game, FF has always had silly things in them to break up the drama
-over reliance on mmo style sidequests that were boring af
-poor performance in areas made the game less fun
-tuned to be wayyy too easy by default. They didn't trust their audience to not be braindead
-completely underbaked crafting and equipment system, why even have it? Useless loot
-Only superficial RPG elements; made an action game but all the abilities being spammable made the end-game action-game portion not really that engaging. Would have liked longer cooldowns, but rewarding combos with cooldown reduction

 

[Remember_Spinal]

FF17 going back to pixel art would be essentially SE throwing in the towel on their biggest franchise.

And look…i love octopath and triangle strategy but those are the niche of niche games. They will never do more than a couple million in sales even if multiplatform. The FF brand would fall into obscurity

 

[ethomaz]

Most Final Fantasys have you fighting an ancient God he'll bent on taking over the world. It's always been a staple of the franchise.

Yeap but that ancient God build up thought the story.
Not a random dude from nowhere like Ultima.

Just to quote tow os most popular...

Kefta (start as human, and yes he go building himself, becomes Emperor, become a real God, destroy the world, etc)
Sephiroth (start as human, dies, Jenova cells took his place, reunion cells happens, become a entry one with lifestream... aka God)

When the story of FFXVI start to show Ultima it becomes weird.
Even the re-encounter with his mother (that should be something epic) become dull because they lost the mother personality from the start of the game lol
A mother that choose to make anything to have power even betray/kill her kids... ends killing herself because lose a child that was not her child but Ultima ilusion.... it was totally out of her character.

 

[Box]

Yeap but that ancient God build up thought the story.
Not a random dude from nowhere like Ultima.

Except ultima was built up during the story, did u not pay attention to the active time lore and the games actually story?

A mother that choose to make anything to have power even betray/kill her kids... ends killing herself because lose a child that was not her child but Ultima ilusion.... it was totally out of her character.

She milled herself from the shock that her child may never have been real and just a creation of Ultima, Rea's the active time lore it's even implied the kid wasn't real.

She spent all those years raising a kid that wasn't even real

 

[ethomaz]

Except ultima was built up during the story, did u not pay attention to the active time lore and the games actually story?




She milled herself from the shock that her child may never have been real and just a creation of Ultima, Rea's the active time lore it's even implied the kid wasn't real.

She spent all those years raising a kid that wasn't even real

Maybe I not paying attention was the reason FF fans consider FFXVI’s worst villain in the franchise

Nah it is totally random and without lore… they try to explain a bit at the end but that just make things worst.

BTW Ultima was used as final boss in FF Tatics (well if you count a raid expansion in FFXIV) and you can see how it was better there with actual plot and development.

 

[Box]

Maybe I not paying attention was the reason FF fans consider FFXVI’s worst villain in the franchise

Nah it is totally random and without lore… they try to explain a bit at the end but that just make things worst.

BTW Ultima was used as final boss in FF Tatics (well if you count a raid expansion in FFXIV) and you can see how it was better there with actual plot and development.

Ff13 did this as well with the data logs, the game is actually super deep if you read those data logs. The issue is most people ignore that so they don't get 80% of the lore.

FFXVI makes a lot more sense if your constantly reading the active time log, ive noticed a lot of complaints come from people who never read it.

If you ever replay the game you should read it, trust me it clears up a lot of the lore issues.

Don't get me wrong though FFXVI did have some issues like the whole Odin section felt rushed especially after the epic Titan and Bahmut boss fights.

I also don't like how Jill was tossed to the side near the end, Clive and Jill should have been some Fire and Ice power Couple.

 

[JAHGamer]

Honestly, with all the hype around it, the game felt disappointing to me. had an interesting world and a somewhat interesting story but it felt soulless.

FFX, a linear game from the PS2 era, felt like it had a much more bigger world. XVI's exploration felt shallow, and that gameplay...

I REALLY disliked the FFVII remake gameplay. After 16 released, I felt relieved that it exists. Because it feels much better than what we got with XVI. They wanted to have their cake and eat it too. They made the game for a "wider audience" and managed to make a game that caters to no one. It lacks even the basics of FF gameplay, like elemental damage. I have no idea what they were thinking.

it catered to me, I loved it. No elemental damage was a dumb oversight though, my only gripe with the game besides performance. Would've been a great way to incentivize using different Eikons. The gameplay is amazing though, especially the last Eikon abilities, they're so fun, the gameplay definitely has a lot of depth,

 

[Gamernyc78]

Ff13 did this as well with the data logs, the game is actually super deep if you read those data logs. The issue is most people ignore that so they don't get 80% of the lore.

FFXVI makes a lot more sense if your constantly reading the active time log, ive noticed a lot of complaints come from people who never read it.

If you ever replay the game you should read it, trust me it clears up a lot of the lore issues.

Don't get me wrong though FFXVI did have some issues like the whole Odin section felt rushed especially after the epic Titan and Bahmut boss fights.

I also don't like how Jill was tossed to the side near the end, Clive and Jill should have been some Fire and Ice power Couple.

Alot of ganrs have done this for years. Dead Space had data logs, Horizon data logs, etc.

 

[Dr Bass]

It is a great game but could be better.

Start to middle it is really shine but after the Bahamut arc it lost the appeal… I had to take a two weeks vacation from it to get vibe again to finish it.

The Ultima thing just doesn’t fit the game at all.

Some great characters (Cid) in contract with some plants (Jill). Character development is near non existent including Clive.

Battle system / gameplay is not bad but it lacks options and depth… you end basically doing the same thing all the time.

The potential was there and that is great for a new FF game.

So, it's a great game ...

but it just had bad story, villain, characters, and gameplay?

 

[toadsage44]

Game was shit. Played it for 5 hours and just couldn't get into it, with its stupid mission-based gameplay, basically zero RPG mechanics, boring combat, uninteresting story, and meh visuals. I felt like a complete fool for thinking that I needed to get a PS5 ASAP to play this one. After the way they've run Kingdom Hearts, and now Final Fantasy, into the ground, I'm starting to lose faith in Square. Their only saving grace is the smaller games they put out, most of which are remakes/remasters.

 

[anonpuffs]

So, it's a great game ...

but it just had bad story, villain, characters, and gameplay?

the things you listed weren't bad though

 

[Dr Bass]

the things you listed weren't bad though

Well, yeah, they were.

But I was just summarizing his post because that’s what he said, and it came across as funny to me.