Yahoo Finance Final Fantasy 16 hands-on: Yoshida looking for an action-packed break out from series 'stagnation'
It’s pretty safe to assume that after 15 main entries, any game series would start to stagnate. Games have evolved massively since the first Final Fantasy was released in 1987 and as Square Enix approach the release of Final Fantasy XVI in 2023, it knows it is time to change.
It is a risk, of course. Whenever something is so successful you can create over a dozen follow up titles from it it might be best to stick to what you know. If it ain’t broke and all that. But Final Fantasy’s director Naoki Yoshida has different ideas. “I saw that, at least from the perspective of players, the series was stagnating,” he tells The Telegraph. He thinks that there were fans that wouldn’t return to the series no matter what a new game would be about because they don’t want to “get involved with it”.
“We wanted to get those players to come back to the series, or try out the series for the first time, but we had to give them a reason to come back. We had to give them a reason to come in and try it out for the first time. We needed to give them something new, something that was going to excite them and feel innovative and also something that felt accessible to them.”
Traditionally Final Fantasy has been a turn-based combat game. You fight, defend, or recover your characters and then the opposition has their turn to do so too. Square Enix has been shifting away from this format as action has progressed within the industry and for FFXVI there has been a full break away from turn based and multiple character controls, to focusing on one guy, his sword, and his dog.
Final Fantasy XVI is a story of war and revenge. With a darker undertone focuses on how far the people of Valisthea will go to claim more power, protect the people they love, or seek vengeance on those who have wronged them. This time you play Clive Rosfield at three points of his life: as a teenager, as a young 20 something, and then amore wizened mand in his 30s. Part of one of the major royal families of Valisthea, Clive is haunted by the destruction of his home, and is accompanied on his adventure by his dog Torgel and a cast of Game of Thrones-esque characters.
In between the tens of hours of cutscenes --some of which enthralled me during the preview from gorgeous visuals to the voice performances-- you fight your way through thousands of enemies. As someone who loves third-person action, this element of the Final Fantasy XVI preview has got me itching to return to the game as soon as possible, but it is a massive departure from the turn-based combat the series began with. A complete break from its traditional format.
To support this new action style, Square Enix brought in Capcom veteran Ryota Suzuki who designed a lot of Devil May Cry’s latest battle systems. He says: “In my career, I’ve concentrated on making games that are for heavy action users, so I feel I have a good idea of what those players want. But this time I had to focus on a new type of group, a group that loved the series but maybe had never got into action games.
“If you look at other titles that try to make their games accessible for non-action game players, what a lot of companies do is add an auto battle mode. You’ll turn on auto battle, and you won’t do anything, it’ll just fight for you. Then the battle is over and you can continue the story, but I didn’t want to do that for Final Fantasy XVI.”
Final Fantasy XVI’s action is hair-raisingly fast. Look away for a second and you might miss attacks, dodging opportunities or enemy signals you should be looking for. What calms this boiling pot of action is the game’s new accessibility option, though I hesitate to call it that. Within the menus there are three slots for accessories that alter the game’s field of play. If, for example, you find the addition of controlling Clive’s dog Torgal overwhelming, you can relinquish that responsibility to a ‘ring’ that will take it over for you. There are a few accessories of this sort such as one that slows time when you’re about to be hit and gives you the opportunity to dodge out the way, or another that links moves and combos together so you don’t need to memorise the buttons you should press.
These are great for opening the door to people who aren’t so well versed in action games generally, and negate the need for difficulty settings. However, it should be noted that true accessibility, for those with disabilities or other gaming requirements, shouldn’t really be limited to just these three slots. I had plenty of fun with these accessories on and off, as it kept the flow and rapid pace of combat intact without compromising on how cool I felt while fighting. There is room for improvement for the game to be truly accessible but hopefully feedback from accessibility advocates will inform Square Enix that more can be done to support their needs.
“I wanted to create something that would support these players that weren’t good at action games but still give them the chance to play,” says Suzuki. “Thinking about the hurdles those players face comes down to having too many things to think about, having too many things to juggle during battle, and how we can reduce that. Maybe they don’t have the fastest reflexes so we need to scale it so that reflexes aren’t a problem for those players either. So we created these accessories that make the game more accessible to those players. It not only makes it more accessible but it also makes it fun because that's what’s important. We want to show these players that had never played action games before that action can be fun. This game can sort of be a gateway into the world of action games.
“That being said, we don’t want to create a system that’s just for those players because there are also the action gamers that we wanted to create something that again was easy to get into but also had a very, very high ceiling.”
The combat is punchy, flashy and challenging without the accessories on. There are two combat types in FFXVI: one playing as Clive and another as an ‘Eikon’. Clive’s combat is lightly magical, using a sword combined with powers you receive throughout the game. These vary in flavour, from one that gives you more speed, to another that gives you a blocking mechanism. You can swap magic on the fly throughout a fight, giving you a lot of power over what style of combat you want to use second by second, attack by attack.
The second combat are the huge boss fights that allow you to take control of Godzilla-esque monsters called Eikons. These Eikons are described as weapons of war, huge and dangerous magical beings that manifest in people who are blessed (or cursed) with their power. Those with the power of the Eikons are either treated like royalty or slaves depending on where they manifest over the continents. In climactic moments of the story you’ll manifest as an Eikon and fight another one of these monstrous beings. Each one of these battles is apparently a unique set piece, unlike anything else in the game. The Eikon battle I played was silly and enjoyable; like taking part in my very own Pacific Rim style fantasy.
Both combat systems made me feel powerful and in control of the situation. Without the accessories, I sometimes struggled to grasp exactly what dangers Clive faced, though we were dropped into a part of the game a few hours in so any build up to that difficulty had been missed.
The performances of the characters were also surprisingly good, especially considering how cheesy Final Fantasy can get. The section of the game I was faced with allowed me to hear Clive Rosfield, played by Ben Starr, in his element, and every cutscene was written well and performed excellently. Rosfield’s sidekick in this section is Cidolfus Telamon, or Cid, played by Ralph Ineson who you may know as Dagmer Cleftjaw in Game of Thrones or William in The Witch. His voice sounding like chewing through gravel in the most delightful and deeply Yorkshire way. Accents are consistent throughout the game, and once an area on the map had an actor playing the part; they all had to naturally sound like they were from the same part of England or even Europe. If that’s the case, you’ll be able to tell where characters are from in the fictional land of Valisthea upon hearing them speak.
The most prominent critique of the game so far has been the response to diversity questions. Last year, in an interview with IGN Yoshida was quoted saying: “Ultimately, we felt that while incorporating ethnic diversity into Valisthea was important, an over-incorporation into this single corner of a much larger world could end up causing a violation of those narrative boundaries we originally set for ourselves. The story we are telling is fantasy, yes, but it is also rooted in reality.” This did not sit well with lots of fans.
The upshot is that the game is yet to be released and the game explicitly has an area of Valisthea that is undoubtedly based in the desert with Middle Eastern and North African influences. The comments from Yoshida are disappointing as it’s known that Europe wasn’t a completely homogeneous place during the medieval period, but additionally that magic and monsters aren’t “causing a violation” of narrative boundaries but a diverse cast would.
However as far as the action goes, Final Fantasy XVI is looking to break out of the 'stagnating' cycle Yoshida is concerned about. New players as well as traditional Final Fantasy fans would do well to keep an eye on its release.
Developer Square Enix Publisher Square Enix Formats PS5 Released 22 June 2023
