Jeremy Gallen's Game Reviews

Driving Prince Noctis

In 2006 Square Enix announced the production of a subseries within their greater Final Fantasy franchise entitled Fabula Nova Crystallis Final Fantasy XIII, with its flagship title, the main thirteenth entry of the series, releasing in 2009. Other entries initially announced were Type-0 and Versus XIII, all of which went through delays, the former eventually releasing a few years later alongside direct sequels to FFXIII, although the latter descended into the depths of development hell. It would eventually emerge the next decade as the fifteenth mainline series entry, with a rerelease following entitled Final Fantasy XV Royal Edition. Did the final product justify its protracted development?

Final Fantasy XV occurs on the fictitious world of Eos, which, aside from Insomnia, capital of Lucis, the empire of Niflheim dominates exclusively, seeking control of a magic Crystal the Lucian royal family protects. When NIflheim attacks the capital and steals the Crystal, it’s up to Prince Noctis Lucis Caelum, heir to the throne, to rescue it and defeat the Empire, along with three of his loyal retainers. The storyline generally doesn’t strike new ground, given elements such as an evil empire and other themes filched from prior Final Fantasies, although the lore is incredibly intricate, and the cast is reasonably endearing.

The execution of the translation is solid for the most part, with occasional self-aware humor and eccentric battle lines such as Prompto’s “Hi there, opening!”, although the choice of his name and others, such as King Regis, Insomnia, and Niflheim, are somewhat uncreative and in some cases, such as the monarch’s name and Noctis’s photographic retainer, asinine. Still, the dialogue for the most part sounds natural, with a noticeable absence of spelling or grammar errors, although the lip movement is often way off and indicative of the game’s Japanese origin. Regardless, the localization very much helps the fifteenth entry more than hurts.

While most prior series entries featured significant turn-based elements in addition to action mechanics, Final Fantasy XV almost completely goes the latter route, players able to outfit Noctis and his allies with different means of attack such as various weapon types, accessories, and ally skills that require a portion of a gauge that fills while the player attacks the enemy. Combat triggers whenever the player approaches enemies on the vast overworld or in dungeons, players able to lock targeting onto one specific foe akin to other action-driven games such as the Kingdom Hearts titles and hack away with whatever weapon the controlled character has active.

Been through the desert fighting a Mesmenir with no name

However, in a nod towards previous Final Fantasies, active and wait modes are available, as is a hybrid of the two, with the latter triggered whenever the player does nothing, with an extensive bar gradually depleting allowing players to ponder their next move (and pausing, luckily, halts any action completely). Players can switch between targets, and even scan them, which may or may not take some time, to unveil enemy strengths and weaknesses, key to triumph in combat, although one issue is that even if a player has scanned a specific foe before, they must do so again in subsequent battles in order to unveil their affinities and other stats.

Final Fantasy XV has an interesting take on magic and MP compared to prior series entries. Both are separate, with players crafting the former through energy acquired from fire, ice, and lighting stashes on the overworld, able to hold up to ninety-nine units of each. In the game interface, they can craft up to three uses of each elemental spell through a certain number of units or combination of two or three, to equip to one of four slots to use it manually in combat. While enemies have elemental strengths and weaknesses, the actual use of magic is somewhat awkward, as the action of battle doesn’t stop while the player attempts to target a specific area to use spells, sometimes leading to unexpected results, but luckily, this doesn’t break the system entirely.

What, then, is the use for MP? The fifteenth mainline entry features special moves known as Warp Strikes, where Noctis can perform teleportational attacks against enemies, or convey himself to grab onto a ledge before striking foes from up high, which consumes the stat typically reserved for magic. Players should be careful not to overuse Warp Strikes, as they can lead Noctis into “statis”, which limits his ability until MP slowly recovers, but luckily, the player can keep ample consumables to recover it, so for the most part, it’s a nonissue.

Final Fantasy XV features numerous other twists on typical roleplaying game mechanics, such as the loss of all HP not resulting in a character’s death, but instead being put into Danger status, where an ally must “rescue” them to avoid actual unconsciousness, which will revive them with lower maximum health, the max mercifully recoverable with Elixirs. Actual death requires the series’ standard Phoenix Downs, and the demise of all characters, naturally, results in a Game Over, though given the game’s (mostly) generous hard save and autosaving systems, death usually doesn’t squander significant chunks of the player’s time.

Fulfilling special objectives in combat can earn supplemental AP.

Victory nets all players experience and maybe monster parts they can sell for money. However, in another deviation from the RPG norm, leveling doesn’t occur instantaneously (with The Dark Spire being the last game I played that featured such a mechanic). Rather, the player must rest at inns, in trailers, or camp in the wilds, where they can have Ignis cook a dish that grants temporary combat bonuses, and after resting, all characters then receive their experience for occasional level-ups. Ignis may also learn new recipes from ingredients gathered on the overworld, or from purchasing and consuming food from vendors in towns or at rest stops.

The fifteenth Final Fantasy features a growth system like the tenth’s Sphere Grid, albeit with multiple grids where the player can invest AP gained from fulfilling special battle objectives, exploiting the magical weaknesses of enemies, or performing various other activities on the overworld such as driving a certain number of miles. These can grant bonuses such as manual control over Noctis’s allies, increased damage from Warp Strikes, stat bonuses from having climbed a certain number of levels experience-wise, and so forth. Some of the more advanced nodes require truckloads of AP to unlock, though mercifully, the game is beatable (at least on the easiest difficulty), without acquiring them.

All in all, Square Enix did a nice job assembling the game mechanics, with the adjustable difficulty accommodating to players of different skill levels (enforcing the pre-title screen notion that FFXV is a “Final Fantasy for newcomers and veterans”), along with plentiful strategy for combat given the RPG mechanism of enemy strengths and weaknesses. As mentioned, however, there is issue with the need to rescan even enemies the player has fought before to reveal their affinities, along with the awkwardness of the magic system. Regardless, tutorials are available that concisely explain the gameplay systems, and in the end, Final Fantasy XV is genuinely enjoyable in terms of battle.

However, the fifteenth entry’s non-combat gameplay could have used more polish, evidenced by the frequent loading times the player experiences when booting up the game or transitioning between certain segments. Furthermore, while most of the time the player can record their progress anywhere on the overworld, and an in-game clock tracks playtime, saving sees much more restriction during story missions, with as much as over an hour between hard save opportunities. While the game does allegedly autosave at many moments, furthermore, most of the time these receive no indication in the saved game list. Many other elements of control, however, fare better, such as the clear direction of the storyline and various missions, easy shopping and character management, nonproblematic controls, fast travel among driven routes, and such, but the developers could have made more effort at times to increase the game’s user-friendliness.

There is a fair bit of driving, though luckily, you can fast-travel through traveled routes.

The fifteenth Final Fantasy, though, fares aurally better, with plenty of new and old tracks, many of which the player can listen to during the many driving sequences, although there exists a slight overabundance of ambience in pedestrian overworld travel. The voice acting is solid for the most part, though some characters such as Prompto can become annoying after a while. Regardless, the music and sound generally prove solid.

The same goes for the graphics, which utilize a realistic style akin to previous Final Fantasies, with most characters having good designs and proportions, the scenery appearing realistic and with good texturing (though some occasionally seem blurry and pixilated when seen close-up), the color schemes being believable, and such, though there are occasional technical issues regarding the framerate. Regardless, FFXV looks like it belongs on the PlayStation 4.

Finally, blazing through the game straightforwardly can take as little as thirty-six hours, although countless sidequests exist along with postgame content, a New Game+, Trophies, and the ability to replay any chapter upon completing the game, to enhance replayability, the only real hindrance being the limited saving at certain points.

All things considered, Final Fantasy XV came out surprisingly well despite its trip through development hell, given its solid gameplay mechanics, superb lore and characters, great audiovisual presentation, and lasting appeal. However, there are issues the development team could have refined more such as the stinginess of the save system at times along with the loading, the derivative story, and a few impurities in the visuals, but otherwise, the fifteenth installment successfully brought the series in a new direction and is accessible to newcomers and veterans, and I very much anticipate what’s yet to come in the forthcoming sixteenth mainline entry.

This review is based on a playthrough to the standard ending of a copy borrowed by the reviewer, without the postgame content started or completed.