| Platform | OVERALL |
|---|---|
| PlayStation 5 | 8.90 |
| Overall | 8.90 |
|
If there is one word to describe what Final Fantasy means to me it would be spectacle. Like for many FF7 was my big intro into JRPGs and it was a mindblowing experience because games didn’t have that scale and wow factor. All throughout the PS1 and PS2 Final Fantasy games would feel a step up in terms of graphics and pure spectacle than other games. Of course they have great ever changing gameplay systems and intriguing stories but what made FF stand out from all the rest is that you would get the most wow factor. Holy shit is Final Fantasy XVI the ultimate expression of that definition. The gaming field has a lot of massive epic scale games now, it has become harder for FF to stand out from the rest of the pack. Well when FF16 is “on”there is almost nothing like it, it puts even the biggest action franchises to shame. But of course a giant RPG is not just huge cinematic set pieces and thus comes the dilemma of reviewing a game like this which feels uneven at times but also left me breathless. Final Fantasy XVI eschews traditional RPG systems and tropes and goes full on Devil May Cry stylish action game. As a primarily action game fan this is a dream come true… or was it a monkey’s paw kind of situation. On one hand the battle system in FF16 is fast, fun, exciting. It rewards quick reflexes in its perfect dodges and parries. Using your ever growing skill set in correct situations result in massive damage on groups of enemies. Managing abilities that do stagger damage is key on larger enemies and can create openings when the boss is staggered , allowing you to unleash many high level damage skills before the stagger bar is depleted for max damage. There are long distance attacks, quick grabs, air juggles, jump stepping, shields with counters and all kinds of weird powers that can be combined to great effect. It’s a deep and robust combat system that any hardcore action game would be proud to have, I am actually kind of shocked at how precise and empowering it feels to fight in this game. A few things hold it back from reaching the highs of its action game brethren, for one the enemies themselves are usually push overs. Almost everything outside of a boss fight can be killed using very basic strategies, I felt like I was sleep walking through most of the fights. The moment I got my chocobo I stopped bothering fighting random junk mobs but those mobs weren’t done with me. Every side quest and a lot of the main quests have you fight hordes of basic enemies that offer almost no semblance of a challenge. Other action games supplement the combat with a scoring system so that even if the enemies aren’t providing a challenge your own performance is the challenge. There is a scoring system in the games optional arcade mode but that’s hidden away, more on that later. So while it’s fun messing around with Clive’s move set, WAY BETTER than pressing X X X on standard attacks on the thousandth junk random enemy you fight in old FF games, it doesn’t reach the highs of the genre it’s now trying to be. The other issue is the move set; there are basic core attacks which are the foundation of Clive’s attacks. This includes FF16s version of the stinger from DMC, basic dodging, charging up magic and sword attacks, being able to jump step on airborne enemies and so on. It’s a nice move set that allows you to do many basic combos on enemies but the real fun comes from the Eikon abilities which are all on cool down timers. You can have three Eikon sets (two moves each) equipped at a time and can quickly cycle through them during a fight. These moves are taken from the many bosses you fight and they have the element of the Eikon they are attached to BUT there are no elemental status effects of bonuses which is extremely weird for a FF game. So there are no enemies more weak to ice, or lightning, all those moves have are different properties in how much normal damage or stagger damage they do to an enemy. Some abilities damage groups with a wide AoE attack. Some are straight one enemy heavy damage dealing attacks. You start seeing patterns in some of the earlier move sets, one move is the heavy combo one, one launches groups of enemies into the air, one sets up a trap, one is an evasive or shield countering ability. It’s not until the end when you get moves that start to really shake up the combat, especially the final move set which feels so different than everything else that it almost breaks the game. I greatly enjoyed experimenting the various moves you learn. Each Eikon you absorb gives you four new abilities to master and a set circle button skill unique to that Eikon. Skill points earned during combat is used to buy these abilities and level them up, at max level you get the ability to use a move of one Eikon on others so you can really mix and match a move set. It’s all pretty deep with the ability to make some unique builds better at handling say large groups, some better against enemies that like to attack from afar and so on. My issue is that combat sometimes feels like it’s all about managing cool downs and that’s not ideal for an action game. The recent God of War has similar cool down powers but I feel the basic move set of that game is so robust that those moves felt like bonus attacks where in FF16 these cool down moves are you core attacks and your basic moveset is just a thing you use to pass the time until you can really attack again. To me that hurt the overall combat and holds it back from top level status. It’s still a great combat system, I would prefer it to many action adventure games combat systems and it’s kind of unfair I am comparing it to the very best the genre has to offer but clearly that’s the comparison Square was going for when designing this system so I think it’s fair. This combat system brilliantly shines during the many big boss moments. This is when your load out can have a big impact. This is when your timing with dodges and counters is important. When managing your cool downs allow for the most damage. It all works because the enemy is an actual threat, it’s a damn shame they didn’t allow their new game plus hard mode as an option the first go because this game excels when you fell threatened. There is a bounty side quest which gives you large bosses to kill; this was side content worth playing as they are some of the most fun fights in the game. Of course so are the show stopping massive boss battles which I will talk about later cause they are so much more than just this normal combat system. So ultimately when the game is challenging the player, when you feel you need to concentrate and every move you make in battle matters this combat system sings, flaws and all it’s a blast to play. Final Fantasy is a departure in many ways than just combat. For one you play as one character, Clive Rothfield, and there is zero party management. You do have other NPCs join and leave your “party” throughout the game but they have almost zero impact on the combat. The only character that does have an impact is your lovable pet wolf dog Torgal which has its own very basic commands which can help in combat. Gear has been simplified to being just three slots, a sword, armor and belt. Seeing that there are no status effects there is basically zero strategy in how to equip Clive, simply buy or craft the best gear and done. There is some customization to be had with accessories of which you can have three and these can affect the damage and cooldown times of specific abilities. EXP is earned an automatically used to level up Clive at which point the game automatically raises all of his stats evenly. The only real choices you get to make is where skill points go and those are freely returned so you can respec as many times as you like. There is very little of any strategy outside how well you do in combat and that sort of stings in what used to be an RPG, also hurts in a game this big to not have more gameplay systems to manage. Honestly the new God of War games feel more RPG like than FF16, that’s saying something. This games structure is also pretty different in that there are actual action game levels and then the traditional exploring sections. In the action levels there is no map, there is nothing to do but go forward and fight enemies. It feels exactly as a DMC level would feel. They have loads of enemies, sub bosses and end in a unique large boss battle. These happen at key parts of the story and often time take you to one time locations that you will never revisit again. Most of the game is in exploring mode which is your traditional maps with characters to talk to and quest markers to follow. These maps can be quite large but they aren’t exactly open worlds in the traditional sense. Each region of the world has an interconnected map that has pathways that lead to a town, those in turn lead to a large field which in turn leads to more paths that lead to another town and so on. These fields are filled with trash enemies wandering around waiting to be fought and occasionally some items and chests to find with crap rewards that are all basically meaningless. It’s a shame there isn’t much to do when exploring the world cause the locations are usually beautiful, begging to be explored if not for how empty they actually are. The only thing that could be considered a secret are these monoliths that serve as secret challenge levels that only get unlocked in the final part of the game. I loved these challenges as they make you go through a series of battles using only one specific Eikon’s abilities and scores you based on mastering their use. Bounties make use of the maps as some tell you where to find them and a few actually only describe a location and you must deduce where they are, I liked those as it let me think a bit but it’s also annoying as getting around is kind of slow even with a chocobo and multiple fast travel points. Most of the time you will be going from main or side quest marker to another. The world is there simply to feel like you are part of a grand globe trotting adventure which I do feel the game excels at feeling like being on a massive journey. Side quests will take up a lot of your time between the action levels, these can be hit and miss at the start and only become great at the end. The actual gameplay part of side quests is almost always go to market kill thing and talk to someone, so there isn’t really anything unique happening in them, it’s all about enhancing the story. Every major NPC you meet along your journey will have their own side quest storyline which culminates in usually a well told story, it won’t reach top video game writing levels but it’s really better than most side quests found in games. The issue is the first half of the game has so many MMO style boring fetch quests that it conditions the player to not want to do the side quests when later on they left a big impact on my enjoyment of the game. Part of it is how they are presented, the main story has well directed and motion caped cutscenes. The side quests in turn feel like bad stage plays with minimal animations and characters entering and exiting a scene as if they are in a play. This all changes toward the end of the game when these storylines and cutscenes all of a sudden have full animations and big emotional moments. I ended up loving many of these characters and these stories were an essential part of feeling the weight of the world on Clive’s shoulder, to feel like what I was doing was impacting lives. Ultimately I think the side quests are a success. As for the main quest and overall story in Final Fantasy XVI, it’s an absolute home run. To me this is probably second only to FF7 in the story department and Clive is up there with Cloud as the best main character this franchise has ever had. Clearly taking inspiration from Game of Thrones, this is the first mature rated Final Fantasy game complete with sex scenes and lots of cursing which can feel a bit childish at the start but kind of fits the world as you settle in. All the deranged family dynamics you get in GoT is present here, there is plenty backstabbing, some shocking deaths, and really bad people doing really bad things. Where it differs from GoT is this has clear heroes and villains and by the end settles into the most FF final battle a FF game could have. Part of me would have liked more of the political intrigue and juicy dynamics between rival characters but I can’t say I was disappointed by the traditional group of characters go to save the world from an evil thing in the most epic way possible. It becomes a power fantasy and I am all for that. Even though Clive doesn’t really have a traditional RPG party he still has plenty of teammates that all serve important roles for the base hub community they have and a few go on missions with him. It’s a great cast full of memorable characters and if you do the side quests you get to know them very well. The standouts are Cid, the gruff manly rebel with a heart of gold. Jill, the childhood friend turn love interest. Gav, scout extraordinaire and second hand man to Clive. Many more populate the hideaway as you lead this group of outcast on a mission to save the world and change the way they view magic users, or bearers in this world. FF16 is full of slavery and bigotry against people born with the ability to use magic like Clive, it makes his mission all the more important. I think the story hits on many levels from family drama, political intrigue, social commentary and classic JRPG conflicts. The main quest starts off fast with an excellent prologue and goes right into high action moments with many of the linear levels coming at a rapid pace. Many of these levels culminate in best part of this game which are the epic Eikon battles. During major boss battles you take control of Ifirit, the legendary summon from many FF games of old, as he battles other Eikon’s who are also well known FF summons. These battles are cinematic setpieces that put the player in all kinds of gameplay situations. Early on you have a sort of basic Godzilla style fighting match. One boss turns into a panzer dragoon style shooter. But most of the later battles has Ifirit develop his own Clive like move set, just super powered to the point that it feels like some dragon ball Z fighting game. The gameplay might not be as deep as the Clive controlled boss battles but I appreciated the variety and the insane spectacle of these battles. My jaw agape, eyes wide, just in awe of what I was playing. There was one boss battle that lasted like an hour and it was the most incredible battle I maybe have ever played, it put God of War of old to shame. And that wasn’t the most amazing fight in the same game! Hours later I thought NOW this one can’t be topped! It’s those incredible setpiece moments that stay with you long after the game is gone. A game that you lose yourself in for many hours and is excellent might be an overall better game but without those big moments you may not remember specific moments like you do these setpieces. Why is MGS so popular, it’s a game series built on big memorable setpieces. MGSV, the one with by far the best gameplay, is considered by many to be the worst MGS game because it lacked in those moments. When a game’s story, music, graphics and gameplay all rise together to a crescendo where you the player are in the zone feeling all that emotion, it feeding your actions, there is nothing like that in entertainment. Those are the 10 out 10 moments in gaming to me and this game had multiple moments at that level. Sadly that is but a fraction of the entire package. As the game went on the pacing got out of whack. Where the start of the game had many action levels back to back, the second half of the game flips that to where now action levels are spread out between large segments of the open world complete with many side quests. Even if you skip all the side quests the main mission has a bunch of side quest like missions until you reach the next big moment. Without all the RPG character building elements or anything resembling a mini game of any kind, the game feels a bit one note outside the big moments. Again for me personally, since I did all the side quests, bounties, challenge missions I did enjoy even the downtime moments but it’s hard not to feel the momentum swing wildly from most hyped I’ve ever been playing a game to why is this a fetch quest now. The overall difficulty is too easy, I could only recall one bounty that was too high level for me. Even if you die during a boss you start at a generous point in the fight with all your potions refilled. The major bosses and high end bounties are thrilling to battle though and feel just right. There is an arcade mode that is accessible at your base which allows you to replay every action level, this time with a scoring system and with limited potions. To me this is how the action should have been played, a scoring system would have made even boring fights somewhat interesting. Plus doing a full level on one life with few potions is an actual challenge. The scoring system is kind of strange though, it seems to benefit specific abilities more than others, instead of being about varying your attacks in a great combo. On your first playthrough arcade mode has no leaderboards, these open up only on Final Fantasy difficulty mode which unlocks after finishing the game. This mode adds tough monsters into early parts of the game and raises the levels of everything, it’s a bigger challenge and I wish this was an option for your first run. To access the final fantasy mode arcade mode complete with leaderboards you have to replay the entire game and only when you beat a level in the story do you get to access the arcade version, why do I have to do it all again… annoying. There is an even harder ultimaniac mode for the arcade mode, this is a crazy hard mode where you get one potion, every enemy takes off half your health and they have a bunch of healers. Bless those who can master this mode, it’s way too much for me. Also the scoring system in this mode is totally broken. I like having these modes, wish they were integrated better though, still at least there is something for those that want to completely master the action. Graphically the game is absolutely stunning. In many of the battles there is a sea of particle effects that are so impressive I can’t image it being done on older hardware. The worlds are detailed and vibrant with some of the best art design the series has seen. Models are detailed, the faces and animations though aren’t at the level of say Sony studio games but still high end. An extremely impressive collection of voice actors bring all these characters to life, with the core main actors all delivering excellent performances that make their characters believable even in the most fantastic of settings. The music deserves endless praise, if this isn’t the soundtrack of the year I would be shocked. This is one of the best FF soundtracks around, filled with memorable tunes that have been stuck in my head for weeks. All the battle music works on that level to get you primed for the action, during the epic boss battles the score seems to be showing off as much as the graphics are. Here is a classic AAA game, as top of the line as it gets with almost zero glitches or issues, thank you for delivering a well made game from day one. The only negative on the technical side is the performance mode does not maintain close to 60fps and its resolution is not great, shame cause the 60fps helps combat . I stuck to 30fps and high resolution, it was stable and stunning to look at. Final Fantasy XVI is a resounding success for square after the disappointing FFXV and the divisive FFXIII. This game brings back that feel of FF being an event game, something that you know will push the envelope of graphics, of sound and be memorable and fun. I feel FFVII Remake is still better but that being a remake feels like cheating, how hard is it to mess up the best FF game. For them to make a new Final Fantasy game that is a complete package from day one and this well made, with this interesting take on the action and story, this feels like the franchise is back to the PS2 days. I wish it wasn’t so uneven on the pacing and gameplay front, perhaps abandoning all RPG ties was not the best idea, that holds it back from being a truly excellent game. The highs are so high though that even though this game has some big shortcomings I will remember it far longer than I would many better overall games. I am just happy to see Final Fantasy get its mojo back, with FFVII rebirth up next the future looks bright. |
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Posted by Dvader Tue, 25 Jul 2023 01:59:58
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