The veteran series comes over all Football Manager
That a new Final Fantasy is polarising is news to absolutely no-one; the series has practically invited it by winning devotees with each entry, then reinventing itself for the next. Every fan has their favourite and their most hated, and the latest installment is no different.
Square-Enix's latest has all the potions, Shivas and chocobos you've come to expect; as always, no matter what the changes, the game is still a Final Fantasy through and through. What has made FFXIII the definitive Marmite entry of the series, though, is just how far they've gone in uprooting the mechanics of the JRPG.
For starters, the game is brutally streamlined. NPCs say their piece when you walk past with no chance to engage in dialogue, towns are little more than monster-free window dressing and shops are accessed through save points, and there are few enough of the first two. The limited exploration and idle chit-chat that flesh out RPGs take place almost entirely through cut-scenes, with a rich backdrop always being at the forefront of the story while never actually getting you involved.
It's a slap in the face for gamers who value the immersion these elements bring, but in many ways the game is better for it. For starters, the cast is the best since Final Fantasy VII; thrown together for a variety of reasons, the anger, resentment and inner conflict that both drives them and separates them is well realised; narrative lead Lightning takes her cue from series predecessor Cloud, but her flaws are much more relatable and human, and rather than fulfilling the classic JRPG archetype of the silent loner who learns to open up, she begins her quest for redemption much earlier in the game, and her helplessness as her efforts cause more turmoil that she is emotionally unequipped to deal with is extremely touching. After several games where the characters were relatively chummy, it is refreshing for the cast to be caught in the same quest, yet be utterly divided in their motivations and goals.
The narrative is helped along by a game that is paced significantly better than previous entries, and the world is rarely broken by anything as videogamey as a textbox from loitering NPCs; the lack of shopkeepers is more than made up for by the digital store-fronts, which are clearly a labour of love, and basic tasks like party management and weapon upgrades are a quick in-out job that let you concentrate on actually playing the game. In truth, the game plays a lot like FFX with the edges smoothed to a frictionless sheen; that is, until you hit the battles.
While FFX stripped away the time-sensitive gameplay of the ATB bar, the thirteenth installment does a swift 180 and hurtles over the opposite horizon. The ATB bar is now segmented, allowing for multiple attacks that take up a portion of the bar. Everybody attacks whenever they like, and the resulting clusterfuck makes for some of the most beautiful battles you've ever seen; characters dash and dodge, somersault and spin, and never will you see two opposing forces lining up and taking it in turns to club each other before returning to their designated spot. The tiresome old bugbear of watching a character swing a sword clean through an enemy as the word MISS pops up on screen has been largely banished, with most dodges occuring as your party leader somersaults clean over attacks purely out of happenstance. For a game that is still fundamentally turn-based, it does a better impression of a real-time action game than most action games do.
But with such explosive and balletic eye-candy, the entire focus of combat has changed. You only control the party leader, the AI doing an excellent job of managing your teammates, as well as your own actions when you pick the default Auto-Battle command. At first it seems as through the game is playing itself, but once you get a few hours in and the abilities start piling up, as do the number of enemies and the range of tactics you need to apply, it becomes clear that FFXIII plays less like a JRPG and more like a management sim.
The reason the battles are so gloriously eye-catching is because for the first time in a Final Fantasy your eye is constantly on the battlefield, not just the stat bar. Numbers and skill names fly up alarmingly fast, and to stay on top you need to watch the screen like a hawk, making quick reactions on the fly, and the Auto-Battle quickly becomes a godsend that lets you take stock of your current situation. The focus of combat is the Paradigm Shift, which determines the current role of your characters and the range of abilities they can perform; setting your party's Paradigms before battle lets you switch from a Commando-Commando-Ravager combo for all-out assault, to a Synergist-Sentinel-Medic selection to buff and heal your party when things start going bad. Because each Paradigm allows for only certain skills to be used, making smart decisions with your pre-battle preparations is crucial to pulling off the right combos in every fight, and the result is a Final Fantasy that demands on-the-fly tactical changes to a far greater extent than any other entry in the series, even if the majority of your actions are hand-picked by the AI.
The changes in FFXIII are at once small yet wholly game-changing; the initial linearity of FFX has been streamlined even more, and the Gambit system of XII has been tweaked from a slow-paced and methodical style of combat to one of the smoothest and most energetic gaming experiences of this generation. Square-Enix's latest is a Final Fantasy through and through, but relatively small changes, applied numerously with thought and care, have created a whole new breed of JRPG that hides traditional gameplay beneath a slick, modern game mechanic. Certain deviations from the formula act as stark reminders as to why they existed in the first place, but FFXIII is still a game changer that shows a stubbornly traditional genre just how much you can do with an aging style of play, and complemented with an excellent story, beautiful graphics and a genuinely human cast of characters, FFXIII has more than enough substance to carry you through to the end.
Verdict
Well paced gameplay and an engaging story complement a well-thought out combat system. For those who found previous entries too static and dull, this could be the one to change your mind.
That a new Final Fantasy is polarising is news to absolutely no-one; the series has practically invited it by winning devotees with each entry, then reinventing itself for the next. Every fan has their favourite and their most hated, and the latest installment is no different.
Square-Enix's latest has all the potions, Shivas and chocobos you've come to expect; as always, no matter what the changes, the game is still a Final Fantasy through and through. What has made FFXIII the definitive Marmite entry of the series, though, is just how far they've gone in uprooting the mechanics of the JRPG.For starters, the game is brutally streamlined. NPCs say their piece when you walk past with no chance to engage in dialogue, towns are little more than monster-free window dressing and shops are accessed through save points, and there are few enough of the first two. The limited exploration and idle chit-chat that flesh out RPGs take place almost entirely through cut-scenes, with a rich backdrop always being at the forefront of the story while never actually getting you involved.
It's a slap in the face for gamers who value the immersion these elements bring, but in many ways the game is better for it. For starters, the cast is the best since Final Fantasy VII; thrown together for a variety of reasons, the anger, resentment and inner conflict that both drives them and separates them is well realised; narrative lead Lightning takes her cue from series predecessor Cloud, but her flaws are much more relatable and human, and rather than fulfilling the classic JRPG archetype of the silent loner who learns to open up, she begins her quest for redemption much earlier in the game, and her helplessness as her efforts cause more turmoil that she is emotionally unequipped to deal with is extremely touching. After several games where the characters were relatively chummy, it is refreshing for the cast to be caught in the same quest, yet be utterly divided in their motivations and goals.
The narrative is helped along by a game that is paced significantly better than previous entries, and the world is rarely broken by anything as videogamey as a textbox from loitering NPCs; the lack of shopkeepers is more than made up for by the digital store-fronts, which are clearly a labour of love, and basic tasks like party management and weapon upgrades are a quick in-out job that let you concentrate on actually playing the game. In truth, the game plays a lot like FFX with the edges smoothed to a frictionless sheen; that is, until you hit the battles.
While FFX stripped away the time-sensitive gameplay of the ATB bar, the thirteenth installment does a swift 180 and hurtles over the opposite horizon. The ATB bar is now segmented, allowing for multiple attacks that take up a portion of the bar. Everybody attacks whenever they like, and the resulting clusterfuck makes for some of the most beautiful battles you've ever seen; characters dash and dodge, somersault and spin, and never will you see two opposing forces lining up and taking it in turns to club each other before returning to their designated spot. The tiresome old bugbear of watching a character swing a sword clean through an enemy as the word MISS pops up on screen has been largely banished, with most dodges occuring as your party leader somersaults clean over attacks purely out of happenstance. For a game that is still fundamentally turn-based, it does a better impression of a real-time action game than most action games do.
But with such explosive and balletic eye-candy, the entire focus of combat has changed. You only control the party leader, the AI doing an excellent job of managing your teammates, as well as your own actions when you pick the default Auto-Battle command. At first it seems as through the game is playing itself, but once you get a few hours in and the abilities start piling up, as do the number of enemies and the range of tactics you need to apply, it becomes clear that FFXIII plays less like a JRPG and more like a management sim.The reason the battles are so gloriously eye-catching is because for the first time in a Final Fantasy your eye is constantly on the battlefield, not just the stat bar. Numbers and skill names fly up alarmingly fast, and to stay on top you need to watch the screen like a hawk, making quick reactions on the fly, and the Auto-Battle quickly becomes a godsend that lets you take stock of your current situation. The focus of combat is the Paradigm Shift, which determines the current role of your characters and the range of abilities they can perform; setting your party's Paradigms before battle lets you switch from a Commando-Commando-Ravager combo for all-out assault, to a Synergist-Sentinel-Medic selection to buff and heal your party when things start going bad. Because each Paradigm allows for only certain skills to be used, making smart decisions with your pre-battle preparations is crucial to pulling off the right combos in every fight, and the result is a Final Fantasy that demands on-the-fly tactical changes to a far greater extent than any other entry in the series, even if the majority of your actions are hand-picked by the AI.
The changes in FFXIII are at once small yet wholly game-changing; the initial linearity of FFX has been streamlined even more, and the Gambit system of XII has been tweaked from a slow-paced and methodical style of combat to one of the smoothest and most energetic gaming experiences of this generation. Square-Enix's latest is a Final Fantasy through and through, but relatively small changes, applied numerously with thought and care, have created a whole new breed of JRPG that hides traditional gameplay beneath a slick, modern game mechanic. Certain deviations from the formula act as stark reminders as to why they existed in the first place, but FFXIII is still a game changer that shows a stubbornly traditional genre just how much you can do with an aging style of play, and complemented with an excellent story, beautiful graphics and a genuinely human cast of characters, FFXIII has more than enough substance to carry you through to the end.
Verdict
Well paced gameplay and an engaging story complement a well-thought out combat system. For those who found previous entries too static and dull, this could be the one to change your mind.
