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Final Fantasy XVI development in “the final stretch”

IFireflyl

Gold Member
This post is confusing to me.

First of all: there are different development teams. Even if your explanation for this cynicism is "XIV is an MMO," the team is comprised of, like, no one from FFXV. In addition, practically everything stated in interviews has made it extremely clear that the story in XVI is its highest priority.

I never said or implied that Final Fantasy XVI is comprised of members of the Final Fantasy XV team. I stated that the last four original, main-series, single-player Final Fantasy games have been sorely lacking when it comes to the story, and that this track record leaves me with a lot of doubt. I don't care about the teams. I care about the products. Square Enix hasn't proved to me that they care about the final product.

Secondly: in regard to your "moved away from turn-based combat," it's strange that you say this as if SE had no experience with real-time combat prior to XV. The same (or mostly? same) team worked on Type-0. XV's combat is indeed insanely flawed and horrifically balanced, but that doesn't have to do with it being real-time.

I think you read too much into that bit. My thesis was that they spent too much time in something other than the story. You know, the important part of a JRPG.

Third: practically every mainline FF works on making the graphics "pop." Though obviously since the HD era that's been to the series' detriment

Kind of an irrelevant point to make since I wasn't knocking them wanting to have good graphics. Again, the point was that they spent too much time on something other than the story.

Fourth: This part obviously is just subjective/tales from my flat ass, but I believe that the dismal state of the game's story is primarily due to the focus on the completely incongruent open world camping bro-trip gameplay. There was an interview from years back stating that the devs were against the open world, but Tabata said that his position on making XV an open world was something he would stand firm with. I think it's that, plus being forced to use the Luminous engine while it was still being worked on, plus Tabata taking over a project and clearly being very insecure about directing it... and you have XV.

I think you're far too focused on Final Fantasy XV and you need to realize that they screwed the pooch with the three main-series Final Fantasy games before that as well. They haven't released a truly great Final Fantasy game since Final Fantasy XII.

I get what you’re saying, but Naoki Yoshida is not a joke.

I’m not into the character designs of XVI, but XIV story wise is so good. I dont feel like i’m playing a MMORPG. I feel like i’m playing a full fledged GTA styled Final Fantasy. It actually feels like an FF game. The first for me since FFX.

It comes closest to that square magic.

In other words, as a MMORPG, XIV is a different beast.

And i havent even made it to Heavensward and the other expansions.

Dude actually managed to create something that resembles FF since X.

Tetsuya Nomura.. i dont dislike 7R. But the whole thing.. its a bit self centered. He’s kind of a joke with how he screwed up KH.

Tabata Hajime is a joke too.. genesis in crisis core wasn’t loved and type 0 isnt special.

That XIII dude is also a joke
“I brought with me a rose because it resembles Lightning” pff

But again Yoshi P is not a joke i can assure you

There’s reason to have faith in him
He’s the best square got

(Havent played Nier so dont know anything about Yoko Taro)

You could be right. I am focused on single-player JRPGs, and all I can say is that these have been lacking (story-wise) in the Final Fantasy series since Final Fantasy XII (some people would argue since Final Fantasy X). An MMORPG has a lot more flexibility to be worked and reworked.

What little I know about Final Fantasy XIV is that the initial launch was so bad that they essentially scrapped it and relaunched it as A Realm Reborn. You can't do something like that with a single-player Final Fantasy game. If you screw it up your only option is to pull the crap they did with Final Fantasy XV and release DLC to try to fix your mistake.

I certainly hope that the story for Final Fantasy XVI is awesome, but I've been disappointed for roughly a decade. Time will tell, but I desperately want you to be correct. :messenger_grinning:
 
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Much like turn based battles and world maps, pre-rendered CGI cutscenes are a thing of the past.
At best we'll probably get an intro and/or an ending in pre-rendered CGI, if at all.
Okay.

Kingdom Hearts III had over 40 minutes of CG cutscenes and that came out in 2019. Its 2020 DLC also added a few minutes on top of that.

FFVIIR has roughly 23 minutes’ worth with Intergrade included and that came out 2020/2021.

XV surely would have had more than just 3 had it not undergone many story changes and didn’t have a 111 minute CG movie counterpart.

XIV had a CG cutscene included at the end of a Raid and Yoshida was stopped from doing that again because he went over budget.

Stranger of Paradise has an opening and ending CG.

Brave Exvius has like well over 15 minutes of CG accumulated at this point.

Every Call of Duty released in the past 6+ years has had tons of CG cutscenes.

The upcoming Star Ocean has CG cutscenes.

The upcoming Sonic game has CG cutscenes.

Halo 5 had CG cutscenes, 2 Anniversary had every cutscene in CG, Infinite without DLC has an intro, Wars 2 had tons of CG cutscenes.

Blizzard games obviously still have CG cinematics.

Destiny 2 has plenty of CG cutscenes in the base game and in every Expansion, including the most recent one that just came out a couple of months ago.

Then on Nintendo’s end we have games like Kirby, Super Smash Bros., Donkey Kong, etc. all of which have CG cutscenes.

Please let me know if you need more examples.
 
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mortal

Gold Member
Okay.

Kingdom Hearts III had over 40 minutes of CG cutscenes and that came out in 2019. Its 2020 DLC also added a few minutes on top of that.

FFVIIR has roughly 23 minutes’ worth with Intergrade included and that came out 2020/2021.

XV surely would have had more than just 3 had it not undergone many story changes and didn’t have a 111 minute CG movie counterpart.

XIV had a CG cutscene included at the end of a Raid and Yoshida was stopped from doing that again because he went over budget.

Stranger of Paradise has an opening and ending CG.

Brave Exvius has like well over 15 minutes of CG accumulated at this point.

Every Call of Duty released in the past 6+ years has had tons of CG cutscenes.

The upcoming Star Ocean has CG cutscenes.

The upcoming Sonic game has CG cutscenes.

Halo 5 had CG cutscenes, 2 Anniversary had every cutscene in CG, Infinite without DLC has an intro, Wars 2 had tons of CG cutscenes.

Blizzard games obviously still have CG cinematics.

Destiny 2 has plenty of CG cutscenes in the base game and in every Expansion, including the most recent one that just came out a couple of months ago.

Then on Nintendo’s end we have games like Kirby, Super Smash Bros., Donkey Kong, etc. all of which have CG cutscenes.

Please let me know if you need more examples.
Why are you naming off other franchises when we're discussing Final Fantasy?
None of that is relevant or has any bearing on how Square Enix teams decide to utilize pre-rendered CGI in their games.
I'm also not arguing the disappearance of CGI from the entire industry, as that clearly isn't the case.
Also, Kingsglaive is an animated film, not a video game. It's a different medium entirely, so that's irrelevant.

In FF titles, the whole point of them initially was so they could better visually showcase pivotal plot points that the game engine itself could not due to limitations.
These are considerably expensive to produce and take up a lot of space. So as visuals in these games continue to improve, there is less and less incentive to rely on them going forward.
This is why there are fewer and fewer of them in each new installment.
 
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I never said or implied that Final Fantasy XVI is comprised of members of the Final Fantasy XV team. I stated that the last four original, main-series, single-player Final Fantasy games have been sorely lacking when it comes to the story, and that this track record leaves me with a lot of doubt. I don't care about the teams. I care about the products. Square Enix hasn't proved to me that they care about the final product.



I think you read too much into that bit. My thesis was that they spent too much time in something other than the story. You know, the important part of a JRPG.



Kind of an irrelevant point to make since I wasn't knocking them wanting to have good graphics. Again, the point was that they spent too much time on something other than the story.



I think you're far too focused on Final Fantasy XV and you need to realize that they screwed the pooch with the three main-series Final Fantasy games before that as well. They haven't released a truly great Final Fantasy game since Final Fantasy XII.



You could be right. I am focused on single-player JRPGs, and all I can say is that these have been lacking (story-wise) in the Final Fantasy series since Final Fantasy XII (some people would argue since Final Fantasy X). An MMORPG has a lot more flexibility to be worked and reworked.

What little I know about Final Fantasy XIV is that the initial launch was so bad that they essentially scrapped it and relaunched it as A Realm Reborn. You can't do something like that with a single-player Final Fantasy game. If you screw it up your only option is to pull the crap they did with Final Fantasy XV and release DLC to try to fix your mistake.

I certainly hope that the story for Final Fantasy XVI is awesome, but I've been disappointed for roughly a decade. Time will tell, but I desperately want you to be correct. :messenger_grinning:
I have no confidence that ff 16 will have a good story or writing. The writing for 7 Remake I thought was the most cringe inducing I've experienced in a game in some time (esp cloud and aerith) and the story itself diverged too much for me from the Original.

Their dialog and stories feel ..awkward and stilted to me.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
No offense, but this is 100% irrelevant to my point, and I'm not going to go read up on something that I don't care about. I don't need to "educate myself" on something that isn't going to benefit me in any way.
I will not take offence, but what you are saying is a bit odd. This will benefit you in order to understand why people quoted his credentials and FF XIV (how the story was one of the things he got right, almost as if it were a single player RPG) and why some may feel quoting the 1.0 launch as odd.
 

IFireflyl

Gold Member
I will not take offence, but what you are saying is a bit odd. This will benefit you in order to understand why people quoted his credentials and FF XIV (how the story was one of the things he got right, almost as if it were a single player RPG) and why some may feel quoting the 1.0 launch as odd.

I have played every non-MMO Final Fantasy game (other than Type-0, Tactics Advance, Tactics A2, and any of the mobile games). The story for the last four main series, single-player games (the Final Fantasy XIII trilogy and Final Fantasy XV) were severely lacking in comparison to previous titles. Final Fantasy XIV's story means nothing to me because I don't know what it is, and I have no desire to play an MMORPG.

My only focus on Final Fantasy XIV in general was to show that they screwed that one up in the beginning as well, and they had to scrap it and completely start over like 2 or 3 years later. If that had been a single-player game they would have simply given up on it. The only reason it went on to become a success is because MMORPGs have a lot more freedom in what they can correct or retcon. It's awesome that you and others in this thread think so highly of Final Fantasy XIV, but at the end of the day it's still an MMORPG which is in an entirely different gaming class than a single-player JRPG.

As I have already said, I am cautiously optimistic. I'm a long-time Final Fantasy fan, and I replay my favorites at least once a year. I want Final Fantasy XVI to be a success, but I'm not going to get hyped up and let down like I did with Final Fantasy XIII, Final Fantasy XIII-2, Lightning Returns, and Final Fantasy XV. But I truly hope they blow me away with Final Fantasy XVI's story.
 
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samoilaaa

Member
No offense, but this is 100% irrelevant to my point, and I'm not going to go read up on something that I don't care about. I don't need to "educate myself" on something that isn't going to benefit me in any way.
isnt the dude that made ff14 in charge of the story ? from what ive seen 16 has a very different tone than 7 remake
 

IFireflyl

Gold Member
isnt the dude that made ff14 in charge of the story ? from what ive seen 16 has a very different tone than 7 remake

I feel like I keep going in circles and answering these same questions, lol. I don't know anything about Final Fantasy XIV's story, and I'm not going to play it because it's an MMORPG. I'm hopeful that Final Fantasy XVI's story will be good, but Square Enix has released far too many sub-par single-player Final Fantasy games recently (regardless of who they had for their development teams) for me to be excited. I cannot, and will not, get hyped up about a guy who did the story for an MMORPG that i don't play. But I'm hoping he brings back great story-telling.
 

Katajx

Gold Member
I have no confidence that ff 16 will have a good story or writing. The writing for 7 Remake I thought was the most cringe inducing I've experienced in a game in some time (esp cloud and aerith) and the story itself diverged too much for me from the Original.

Their dialog and stories feel ..awkward and stilted to me.
Remake didn’t bother me, but sadly I feel this way about a lot of the localization these days 😢
 

Hobbygaming

has been asked to post in 'Grounded' mode.
I loved the trailer and I'm into the story already and the combat looks really good. This will be a day one purchase
 

Kumomeme

Member
I have no confidence that ff 16 will have a good story or writing. The writing for 7 Remake I thought was the most cringe inducing I've experienced in a game in some time (esp cloud and aerith) and the story itself diverged too much for me from the Original.

Their dialog and stories feel ..awkward and stilted to me.
if the same writer for Heavensward did the writing, then you can place your faith that it gonna have really good writing. Nojima didnt involve at all with CBU3.
 
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