Final Fantasy XV (was Versus XIII)

[Unit-01]

@Flare - I am pretty sure Ardyn is going to be the big bad in FFXV.

It reminds me so much of Kefka, and there are a lot of similarities.
-Adviser to an Emperor
-Created or helped create the Magitek soldiers. Kefka in his case was the first Magitek enhanced person with Terra being next.
- Don't really know what he is planning. At-least most people at this point don't.

Possible Spoiler

Spoiler

He might go and betray the King to take power, in Chapter 0 people are saying that's some weird wacky combo of Ifrit and Ardyn, and much like Kefka he goes and takes the power of the summons. It's all unconfirmed at this point and I don't 100% believe it myself.

That looks amazing

Spoiler

shame we don't have Nyx in the game

That may not be the case actually. We've gotta wait and see.

@Lex - Yea I read that huge spoiler leak a while back. Some of it has already come true, but other parts not so much.

 

[Lulcielid]

During yesterday ATR there was a segment about a FFXV Drama CD and what kind of contents we might be hearing in the CD.

Here is a translation provided @aitaikimochii
http://aitaikimochi.tumblr.com/post/150585668496/ffxv-atr-drama-cd-summary-translation-aitaikimochi

 

[Kuja9001]

Didn't a higher up say at one point that the whole "near death experience=getting powers" thing was still in from the Versus days?

 

[Lulcielid]

Didn't a higher up say at one point that the whole "near death experience=getting powers" thing was still in from the Versus days?

There has been no words coming from any of the higher ups confirming if it's still in XV or not. However, pamphlets from Gamescom did "confirmed" that this thing still exist in the game but, outside of that no other promotional material for XV ever mentions it.

https://twitter.com/Nova_Crystallis/status/766080726865502208

 

[Unit-01]

Also I didn't realize this until I took a closer look.

A few things here in this one picture.
-The crystal in the middle is being held by a bunch of chains.
- Noctis is partially stuck inside the crystal.
-Ardyn is saying in this scene "Noct, killing you as a mortal will bring me scant satisfaction. Claim the crystal's power. Arise as the True King." (Source being the NA trailer - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2j8IAXM4jfk )

If this doesn't point to Ardyn being the main antagonist I don't know what does then.

 

[trash panda]

If this game has good writers, I won't be able to tell if Ardyn is a hero or antagonist. I'm not expecting that out of a Final Fantasy game of all things, but still. Good storytelling makes you wonder whether or not the villain really is evil.

Also, his hair isn't crazy enough or silver enough for him to be considered a villain in my book.

 

[Ghost X]

Unpopular opinion: For a game that wants to sell more than FFVII, graphics alone won't do it. If the story writers responsible for Kingsglaive and Brotherhood are also responsible for the story of the game, in my view, there is a lack of quality and depth evident. If I were in charge, and my game had epic storylines and themes that pushed the boundaries and would be talked about for decades to come, I'd not have used those as appetisers.

 

[lithiumkatana17]

How many Final Fantasy trailers point out someone blatantly obvious to be the villain, only for us as gamers to play through the story and find out there's something/someone else pulling the strings entirely?

As for Ardyn, yeah, he seems like the villain at this point, but I highly doubt he'll be the end all for this story.

 

[Lulcielid]

FFXV Writer(s): Saori Itamuro

Kingsglaive Writer(s): Takashi Hasegawa

Brotherhood Writer(s): Akio Ofuji, Susumi Akizuki

Edit: You could consider Kazushige Nojima another writer for FFXV since Itamuro script is an adaptation/revision of Nojima's original script for Versus XIII

 

[Splintered]

Dissidia 012 Final Fantasy
2011 RPG Planner, Scenario Writer

This in fact does not inspire confidence...

 

[Lulcielid]

Dissidia 012 Final Fantasy
2011 RPG Planner, Scenario Writer

This in fact does not inspire confidence...

Dissdia 012 had 5 RPG Planners:

Saori Itamuro
Tatsuaki Ohba
Yayoi Hattori
Nanako Saito
Gimpei Tomoe

Akiko Ishibashi as co-writer with Itamuro

Nanako Saito as script writer assistant.

Naoko Koda as event planner.

Point is, Saori Itamuro is not the only one responsible for Dissdia 012 quality of writing.

 

[Splintered]

Yeah, but speaking as a person who liked Dissidia 012 and wants FFXV to succeed: all of Dissidia 012's story was horrible. All of it.

Well, maybe Kefka had a decent line in there, but that goes to the strength of his character.

I am worried about FFXV, I've been carefully lowering my expectations on the entry because I think hype is cancer, and I'm afraid of it going a little south. I'm not sure about their decision to replace a lot of the key staff with people who worked on their Vita games, not that I have no faith in Tabata, but that FFXV is such a huge project.

I have no issue with divorcing myself from Versus XIII, I think it's unfair to compare characters like Stella and Luna and wanting all your feelings from the initial trailer to magically transform into this completely different game. But man... there's a lot riding on this story to give it to developers who haven't really preformed to gold standards yet. And if this goes bad, they'll be the ones to be blamed.

I don't know. I'm going to stick with the "hopeful, but cautious" position.

 

[ForceStealer]

*shrug* I think it will be good, and I look forward to playing it, but I'm not beside myself with hype over it.

The success of successful Final Fantasy games were not solely attributable to high quality writing, or graphics, or art style. But a great confluence of all those factors to create something better than any one of those features may have been on their own.


Another thing, to be honest, is I have lost all concept of what counts as "good writing." People seem to take it as a foregone conclusion that all video games, even the good ones, have bad writing. And I don't know why. I haven't studied writing or anything so I have no doubt there are particulars to the craft I don't know, but I find it hard to believe that all the people that make this claim have more expertise.
It's just always weird to me when people make remarks like that, especially about something they like. Praise a game's story that they've loved for many years and in the same breath express the accepted fact that video games have crap writing. ...well how crap could it be if you so resonated with it? I guess I just don't understand the yard stick. I mean, I feel like I can identify truly bad writing. The stilted dialogue in the Phantom Menace, indeed Dissidia 012's convolutedness and one-note characters (though I would say it was a significant improvement on the first one), the absurd jargon spouted at you in an average game of Call of Duty, etc. But I have basically spent all my life being told that the games/books/movies/shows I like have shit writing and I've never understood it.

 

[Kuja9001]

I am worried about FFXV, I've been carefully lowering my expectations on the entry because I think hype is cancer, and I'm afraid of it going a little south.

I have my hype meter set at 0-5 for everything so its impossible for me to get upset.

 

[Lulcielid]

 

[Obsidian Fire]

@Force: I know what you mean. Most of the stories I read nowadays (regardless of medium) are considered worse writing then the stuff I read in elementary school/jr high (our house had a lot of classic literature in it). Give me a videogame/webcomic/manga/fanfiction with a decent storyline and I'll be pretty happy. Heck, some of those manage to do things "good writing" can't do because of ways their writers take advantage of the medium they're writing for. Good writing at the end of the day is subjective; what I've found matters more is if the work is internally consistent with how it handles characters and world-building.

 

[Alex Strife]

I think some people confuse "good writing" with "good story". They can go together but they can go separately as well.

As in, I can have a story that's fantastic but poorly written / presented, and I have a story that's very simple but it's masterfully presented.

 

[Blade]

If you're the type who ignores celebrities that go to the Oscars and only care about whether or not the Academy is doing their film judging well, then yeah, 'good writing' is important.

If you're the type who squees whenever Sephiroth or Squall show up, 'good story' is MORE important.

In the case of FF Writing, I won't say it's ever great in any sense in general.

The story itself only sets the premise. The GAME and your experiences with it are the 'real story'.

That's why videogames shouldn't be judged like movies, despite the grey areas that are there.

 

[Kuja9001]

 

[Lulcielid]

Appearently Shiva will be summoned under random conditions at random times, unlike the other summons that do have a set condition you need to meet in order to summon them.
http://www.novacrystallis.com/2016/09/more-on-final-fantasy-xvs-shiva/

 

[Lulcielid]

Tabata: Currently no plans for a Final Fantasy XV PS4 Pro bundle.
http://www.novacrystallis.com/2016/...-a-final-fantasy-xv-ps4-pro-bundle-after-all/

 

[Lulcielid]

List of some of the Final Fantasy tracks you can listen in the Regalia (car) in FFXV. From FFI-FFXIV and even Dissidia and FFType-0. This is not a full list, just the tracks that have been revealed thus far.
https://twitter.com/RedMakuzawa/status/779817727074504704

 

[Flare]

^There's a lot of XI and XIV songs in there. I hope they add more music from like IX, X, XII, and XIII

 

[Shademp]

SIMPSONS DID IT

 

[Lulcielid]

Someone tried to come up with what Noctis’s forgotten dessert recipe could be assumed to be like. Have fun making a dessert for the prince.
http://mymainisacook.tumblr.com/post/149760571025/brotherhood-ffxv-noctiss-forgotten-dessert