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A Chat With the Final Fantasy XIII Team
1up's Shane Bettenhausen had the chance to sit down for a chat with the team behind FFXIII. They discuss the multiple versions of the games planned, the character of the title's heroine, the futuristic setting, and just a little bit about the game's battle system. From the article: "At first sight, it might seem like an action game, but FFXIII inherits the long tradition of the numbered FF games, which is the active-time battle command system. We are trying to use a similar system to what you've seen, but the major difference is that the battle will be speeded up considerably. In the past, you had to wait to input commands, but our goal here is to reduce that waiting time as much as possible, so that the battles are greatly speeded up."
When will it really be the Final Fantasy?
Developers: We can use your help.
FFX-2 had battles that were so "speeded up" that they felt like... just a mess. I haven't gone past the first mission.
Are folks really so impatient that waiting a few seconds to input a command is just intolerable? I fire up FFIV-FFVI from time to time and just tool around in the battle system--I _enjoyed_ the old turn based system. Hell, the FFX system wasn't so bad, either. I guess they're trying to cut out either the "random battle" syndrome or just make them as "painless" as possible.
(Don't pin me as too slow to keep up, either. I've held my own in FPS since Quake.)
I think that's the first time I've heard FF's 1980's-style turn-based interface described as "active".
How can the FIRST response get scored "Redundant"?
because people who dont understand what "Final" in final fantasy means keep asking the same thing
The war with islam is a war on the beast
The war on terror is a war for peace
It's good to hear that FFXIII is going back to the roots with their battle system and not going along the same route as XII. Granted, we haven't received the game yet but the demo of XII really turned me off.
XIII is starting to sound like a game I'll enjoy. Of course, I still don't like the idea of announcing three of them at once. If I have to buy and play all three to get the complete story then I won't be a happy camper.
I really miss the old settings of the pre FFVII games. Bring back the epic tales of knights and castles, and leave the dull Blade Runner-esque cities to lesser games, I say.
Does he really mean, "All the mainline FF games?" Or did he leave off the word "odd?"
(Honestly curious; I've just played FFVII, which was ATB, and FFX, which was not, as I understand the term. So odd-numbered would fit my two data points.)
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We already had something like a high-speed Final Fantasy. Who here remembers Seiken Densetsu 3? Who here remembers just how well that actually worked, how it took place in real time, how you could quickly switch between characters to control them so you could micromanage battles, or how you could program the AI of your other characters to make them behave a certain way in battle to automate the process, and how easy it was to access items and magic in battle? It was pleasantly un-nightmarish while being fast paced and highly intuitive, unlike what FFXIII is looking to be at this point.
Meanwhile, somewhere, somebody on a Square Enix design team is scraping the bottom of a barrel labeled 'Creativity' with a rusty spoon... The line how they want to essentially make the female lead a 'female version of Cloud' really got me. Just let the series fucking rest until you come up with some good ideas, okay?
The American release was called Secret of Mana. I played a translated version of Seiken Densetsu 3 (Secret of Mana 2 I believe?) on an emulator and it was fantastic as well.
One of the coolest features of this game is that it was multiplayer. Someone could pick up the second controller and take control of one of the toons.
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Because every Final Fantasy thread includes an obligatory "How can it really be FINAL fantasy if blah blah" question and an obligatory "Actually here's the explanation" response. Both comments are redundant. (Mine is just off topic.)
FFX almost perfected the active-time battle system in my opinion. It kept the order of initiative preserved, kept you from getting pounded on if you needed to dig into the menus (which I hate), and allowed you to pound away as fast as you could select actions. FFX was just smooth.
The only was ATB could be made better is to eliminate any need to dig into menus without getting rid of the pretty. I wish FF XIII luck, but I'm not sure I like where the series is going with FF XII in terms of control schema.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
I think it's time to put the Final Fantasy series to rest. This one is going to be more of the same with fancier graphics. But it's still got the same tired gameplay, the same kind of over-used storyline and the same types of whiny, troubled characters.
The Final Fantasy games were good, but not after having been redone for the hundredth time.
They should just do one spectacular finale and leave it at that. Call it The True Final Fantasy.
Screw FFXII(I'm a turn-based fan myself. Long live FFX.). I want to know what this FFVersusXII thing is. There is a total void of information on it. The only thing that is stated is that Tetsuya Nomura (Kingdom Hearts and Advent Children) is leading the project. Just hearing that makes me salivate. Supposedly it will run parallel to the FFXII world and the "versus" in the title means something about changing directions. All very cryptic; all very exciting.
I didn't know it was possible to get excited about the FFXII suite of games before FFXII has even hit American shores, but it's happening!
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I believe your comment is redundant as well.
Beside's everyone knows FFVII was THE final fantasy to end all final fantasy....yet they keep making them.
Beer! It's what's for breakfast!
No, it's retarded. People pick RPGs for the strategic combat and the story -- or at least that's why I do. So if your combat is so dumbed down that it seems like auto-battle (esp. as the default option) is a good idea -- fix the friggin' combat. Make it hard enough that the player wants to play the combat. Make the combat fun. Do the work rather than trying to hide behind an automated system. I play games to play them, not to watch as AI fights for me.
Hopefully, we'll never be subjected to auto-battleH^H^H^H^H^Gambits again.
Do you think they meant the 360 by the "next gen platform"? It's not like them to be coy, why didn't they just say PS3? In fact in the next sentence they say
But we altered that plan and decided to make both titles on PlayStation 3.
Did you get that thing I sent ya?
...you wish you had named everyone the same as the villain (Kefka, Sephiroth, or what have you) to make the conversations more interesting. (C'mon Sephiroth, we have to go rescue Sephiroth from Sephiroth! et al.)
What sound do people on rollercoasters make? Hint: it's not Xbox 360.
The games are vastly different anyway. Going from FF7 to FF10 and unless you know the names of the games, you'd never know that they were by the same company.
Hmmm... Pie...