“And thus did our journey begin…”
You’re a wide-eyed, adventurous youth, that sees the world through a vision painted in vibrant hues of wonder. It’s your friend’s birthday, and the stars align as you, along with two others are going to spend the night at his home. The thrill is palpable because it’s the first time you’re spending the night at a friend’s place—a realm usually off-limits according to the unwritten rules of your mother’s parenting playbook.
You love video games. You always have. Some of your first memories are sitting in your father’s lap as he plays Sonic the Hedgehog and X-Men on the Sega Genesis. Just last year the universe smiled upon you, bestowing a Nintendo 64 and a Gameboy into your eager hands. It’s lead you on a path toward infatuation with the worlds of Pokémon and Super Mario. Yet, in this tapestry of nostalgia, a new thread weaves in—the enchanting notes of a little game named Ocarina of Time, your sole deviation from the familiar.
But back in the present, the birthday boy unveils something else that is unfamiliar to you—the PlayStation. Prior encounters were confined to store kiosks, but now, in the warm glow of your friend’s living room, the PlayStation becomes a symphony of novelty. He pulls out a plastic case, revealing a disc for a game he says is called “Final Fantasy VII”. You didn’t know games could come on CDs, nor have you ever heard of Final Fantasy. You have no idea what to expect as he snaps the game disc into the console, and it begins to whirr.
You’re instantly struck by the visual allure of this game. The painterly backgrounds, the lifelike character models, and the music, unlike anything you’ve ever heard in a video game, leave you utterly astonished. It’s more than just a game; it’s a portal to an undiscovered realm where moments of joy become indelibly etched onto the canvas of your memories.
Captivated, you and your friends take turns between playing and watching each other until the first light of dawn breaks. In those magical hours, not a single worry occupies your thoughts.
Final Fantasy is not merely a series; it has inexplicably become a part of my personal growth, evolving synchronously with my own journey–a steadfast companion that has consistently stood by my side, much like a trusted friend.
While not every attempt at evolution has been an unqualified success, the enduring truth remained—Final Fantasy retained its distinctive essence. It was still the person you knew.
Through shifts in tone, aesthetic, mechanics, and lore, there has always been a discernible throughline that defines the essence of Final Fantasy. This enduring thread of continuity is what fuels my excitement when contemplating the new horizons the series will explore and why I was anticipating its arrival on new hardware.
Much to my chagrin, Final Fantasy XVI has left me more disappointed than I could have ever imagined a game in the series could. That’s because XVI is a confused, over-embellished mess resulting in a work that seems to have strayed far from the core of what defines the series’ identity. While continuing the series’ ethos of reinvention and eschewing all of its RPG systems is not an inherently adverse decision, the execution is often abysmal.
That’s because now Final Fantasy is a bleary action game that lacks the mechanical depth or focus necessary to produce an enthralling action experience. While flashy and well-animated, the combat system is woefully straightforward and repetitive due to being restricted to a singular combo sequence heavily reliant on Eikon abilities kept primarily on cooldown for optimal damage output.
Ironically, this makes the gameplay feel much more like three Final Fantasy XIVs in a Dante costume than embodying the essence of a Devil May Cry game. With a low skill floor and ceiling, the game falls short of delivering a truly gratifying action experience that fosters individual player expression. As a consequence, nearly every combat encounter unfolds in a uniform manner, requiring little more from the player than the management of cooldown rotations.
The game exhibits a persistent inclination to rip control away from the player, particularly during crucial boss encounters. Rather than allowing players to get into a flow, it frequently interrupts the player’s agency to initiate cutscenes or quick-time events. Furthermore, for an action-centric game, it notably lacks in challenge; I managed to navigate through the entire game without dying once.
Moreover, while most action games typically span 8 to 12 hours and steadily introduce upgrades and new abilities, this game follows a different trajectory. It extends combat in the same monotonous combat patterns for prolonged stretches of 5 to 8 hours before infrequently introducing new abilities through Eikons, disrupting the expected pace of progression.
Speaking of pace, XVI is one of the most poorly-paced games I’ve ever played. It falls into a predictable pattern that is not unlike the main story in XIV since you’ll be undertaking 45-minute to one-hour missions that are primarily cutscenes (that often have admittedly high peaks of spectacle) before spending hours running around performing errands like picking up dirt or killing wolves.
This may have been fine on its own since side content often enriches the world and imparts a distinct essence to it. VII Remake masterfully achieved this, as its focus on the ordinary in side quests significantly contributed to the overall humanist experience.
For instance, an early side quest involves Clive delivering meals to the hideout’s residents, a task that recurs later in the game.
Ostensibly meant to underscore Clive’s character evolution and his growing connection with those around him, the lack of endearment in both Clive and these characters results in this endeavor feeling more like inconsequential padding.
It doesn’t help that the world of Valisthea is an uninteresting dark fantasy facsimile that lacks any defining traits other than series pastiche. Despite attempts to convey vastness across the continent, the game predominantly features diminutive, quaint villages, failing to offer the grandeur of bustling cities seen in earlier titles. While large, distant cities occasionally tease the horizon, these remain inaccessible, confined to linear story segments. This limitation is regrettable, considering the considerable effort invested in crafting detailed and visually appealing landscapes.
There were so many instances where I felt something akin to what I often felt playing XV: a sense of exploration driven by intrigue from the environment. I’d catch sight of captivating landmarks on the horizon, enticing mu curiosity. Occasionally, they might appear trivial, but sometimes they would end up being legitimately impressive dungeons. All of this takes place in a seamlessly interconnected world, encouraging and emphasizing the joy of exploration with your party.
XVI regrettably fails to offer any definitive fulfillment in this aspect. The world is a series of barren, disjointed hubs that could fit into a thimble and merely pad the game’s run time.
Even the set pieces and boss fights are mostly glorified cutscenes with player control taken away, often at multiple junctures during combat, to set up a quick time event. Most of the game is on autopilot, and combat often feels like a formality… a genuinely great decision for an action game.
The vestiges of RPG systems in XVI serve as little more than window dressing, only coming off as lip service to previous titles. While you can level up and acquire or craft weapons, their absence wouldn’t significantly impact the gaming experience. Weapons merely serve as objective upgrades, enhancing damage and stagger potential without introducing any elemental advantages or trade-offs for specialized performance. Consequently, this lack of depth fosters a sense of hesitancy and a lack of confidence in the game’s new direction, leaving XVI feeling muddled and uncertain in its approach.
XVI falls short in delivering an engrossing narrative. The storytelling unfolds as a sluggish, uneven journey that veers away from its core thematic elements midway. The intricate exploration of themes like slavery and bureaucracy? Abruptly abandoned in favor of a divergent quest to confront a divine entity.
This makes producer Naoki Yoshida’s statements about the lack of inclusion of non-white people humorous since the game gets quite ridiculous and rarely finds itself grounded in “reality”. Hence, the idea that brown people can’t exist in a fantasy setting with kaiju battles in space is worthy of all the ridicule it received. It’s also really funny how it tries to justify Clive’s family’s slave ownership because they were nice to their slaves.
Final Fantasy XVI is a shallow and hollow experience with nothing to offer besides production values. Everything exists in service of spectacle, and what we are left with is a game so obsessed with cinematic prestige that it is bereft of substance.
There are flashes of brilliance. In a different world, this game, with its combat and scope, could have been a somewhat solid open-world RPG. Or if the scope was reigned in and more complexity baked into the combat system, a solid, linear action game.
Also, for a game that seems to harbor such an active disdain for its legacy, the ending tries desperately to tug on nostalgia strings to evoke pathos. The result is a lazy, intellectually insulting narrative climax that is entirely unearned.
The Final Fantasy series has always made reinvention the point. If one game in the series was not your favorite flavor, the next installment could be. However, I do not think that will be the case moving forward. With this game being a critical and commercial success, coupled with bloated budgets and long gestation periods, I believe this is the direction we can expect the series to take. This is a problem because XVI sacrifices so much of the essence of Final Fantasy without leaving much left to take its place.
If that’s the case, I fear I might have to disembark from the journey, left with nostalgia for what once was, rather than anticipation for what might come.
You’re older now. The weight of the years makes it increasingly challenging to muster the fervor for pursuits that once ignited your passion. It feels like just yesterday you were eagerly tearing through the packaging of a pristine PlayStation 2, enveloped in sheer elation at the prospect of delving into the world of Final Fantasy X. Yet, paradoxically, those moments now seem shrouded in mist. The vivid tapestry of memories has gradually receded into indistinct relics, their vibrant hues fading into a subdued palette of somber grays.
The friends with whom you forged a foundational memory on the day of discovering a beloved video game series have become mere echoes in the corridors of distant recollection. Decades have elapsed since your last exchange, and thoughts of them now rarely arise.
In the intervening years, new friendships have blossomed, and others have withered away. The ebb and flow of companionship has charted a course that, much like your own journey, has gradually distanced you from the familiar shores of home. As the currents of time carry you further away, the recollection of those once-cherished moments becomes increasingly elusive, obscured by the passage of experiences and the ever-expanding horizon of your life.
Have the hues of enthusiasm faded into a more muted palette? Is this a natural evolution of the human spirit as it traverses the landscape of age? Acknowledging the inevitability of change, you recognize that transformation can often herald improvement, even carrying the potential for exciting developments.
A new Final Fantasy’s release is imminent, and the initial spark of excitement dims under the weight of tempered expectations. A new friend, attuned to the significance this series holds in your heart, surprises you with a fresh copy of Final Fantasy XVI, blissfully unaware of the skepticism clouding your anticipation. Embracing the notion that change can breathe life into the familiar, you decide to immerse yourself in the new chapter.
Yet, after a few hours of exploring this new realm, a sobering reality settles in. It resounds a contemplation that has resonated within you concerning existence itself. The experience leaves you pondering whether a subtle cynicism has woven its threads into the fabric of your once-unbridled optimism. Your journey through the corridor of time has left you with a reluctant acceptance of the present—it is what it is.
“…and thus did our journey end.”
You’re a wide-eyed, adventurous youth, that sees the world through a vision painted in vibrant hues of wonder. It’s your friend’s birthday, and the stars align as you, along with two others are going to spend the night at his home. The thrill is palpable because it’s the first time you’re spending the night at a friend’s place—a realm usually off-limits according to the unwritten rules of your mother’s parenting playbook.
You love video games. You always have. Some of your first memories are sitting in your father’s lap as he plays Sonic the Hedgehog and X-Men on the Sega Genesis. Just last year the universe smiled upon you, bestowing a Nintendo 64 and a Gameboy into your eager hands. It’s lead you on a path toward infatuation with the worlds of Pokémon and Super Mario. Yet, in this tapestry of nostalgia, a new thread weaves in—the enchanting notes of a little game named Ocarina of Time, your sole deviation from the familiar.
But back in the present, the birthday boy unveils something else that is unfamiliar to you—the PlayStation. Prior encounters were confined to store kiosks, but now, in the warm glow of your friend’s living room, the PlayStation becomes a symphony of novelty. He pulls out a plastic case, revealing a disc for a game he says is called “Final Fantasy VII”. You didn’t know games could come on CDs, nor have you ever heard of Final Fantasy. You have no idea what to expect as he snaps the game disc into the console, and it begins to whirr.
You’re instantly struck by the visual allure of this game. The painterly backgrounds, the lifelike character models, and the music, unlike anything you’ve ever heard in a video game, leave you utterly astonished. It’s more than just a game; it’s a portal to an undiscovered realm where moments of joy become indelibly etched onto the canvas of your memories.
Captivated, you and your friends take turns between playing and watching each other until the first light of dawn breaks. In those magical hours, not a single worry occupies your thoughts.
Final Fantasy is not merely a series; it has inexplicably become a part of my personal growth, evolving synchronously with my own journey–a steadfast companion that has consistently stood by my side, much like a trusted friend.
While not every attempt at evolution has been an unqualified success, the enduring truth remained—Final Fantasy retained its distinctive essence. It was still the person you knew.
Through shifts in tone, aesthetic, mechanics, and lore, there has always been a discernible throughline that defines the essence of Final Fantasy. This enduring thread of continuity is what fuels my excitement when contemplating the new horizons the series will explore and why I was anticipating its arrival on new hardware.
Much to my chagrin, Final Fantasy XVI has left me more disappointed than I could have ever imagined a game in the series could. That’s because XVI is a confused, over-embellished mess resulting in a work that seems to have strayed far from the core of what defines the series’ identity. While continuing the series’ ethos of reinvention and eschewing all of its RPG systems is not an inherently adverse decision, the execution is often abysmal.
That’s because now Final Fantasy is a bleary action game that lacks the mechanical depth or focus necessary to produce an enthralling action experience. While flashy and well-animated, the combat system is woefully straightforward and repetitive due to being restricted to a singular combo sequence heavily reliant on Eikon abilities kept primarily on cooldown for optimal damage output.
Ironically, this makes the gameplay feel much more like three Final Fantasy XIVs in a Dante costume than embodying the essence of a Devil May Cry game. With a low skill floor and ceiling, the game falls short of delivering a truly gratifying action experience that fosters individual player expression. As a consequence, nearly every combat encounter unfolds in a uniform manner, requiring little more from the player than the management of cooldown rotations.
The game exhibits a persistent inclination to rip control away from the player, particularly during crucial boss encounters. Rather than allowing players to get into a flow, it frequently interrupts the player’s agency to initiate cutscenes or quick-time events. Furthermore, for an action-centric game, it notably lacks in challenge; I managed to navigate through the entire game without dying once.
Moreover, while most action games typically span 8 to 12 hours and steadily introduce upgrades and new abilities, this game follows a different trajectory. It extends combat in the same monotonous combat patterns for prolonged stretches of 5 to 8 hours before infrequently introducing new abilities through Eikons, disrupting the expected pace of progression.
Speaking of pace, XVI is one of the most poorly-paced games I’ve ever played. It falls into a predictable pattern that is not unlike the main story in XIV since you’ll be undertaking 45-minute to one-hour missions that are primarily cutscenes (that often have admittedly high peaks of spectacle) before spending hours running around performing errands like picking up dirt or killing wolves.
This may have been fine on its own since side content often enriches the world and imparts a distinct essence to it. VII Remake masterfully achieved this, as its focus on the ordinary in side quests significantly contributed to the overall humanist experience.
For instance, an early side quest involves Clive delivering meals to the hideout’s residents, a task that recurs later in the game.
Ostensibly meant to underscore Clive’s character evolution and his growing connection with those around him, the lack of endearment in both Clive and these characters results in this endeavor feeling more like inconsequential padding.
It doesn’t help that the world of Valisthea is an uninteresting dark fantasy facsimile that lacks any defining traits other than series pastiche. Despite attempts to convey vastness across the continent, the game predominantly features diminutive, quaint villages, failing to offer the grandeur of bustling cities seen in earlier titles. While large, distant cities occasionally tease the horizon, these remain inaccessible, confined to linear story segments. This limitation is regrettable, considering the considerable effort invested in crafting detailed and visually appealing landscapes.
There were so many instances where I felt something akin to what I often felt playing XV: a sense of exploration driven by intrigue from the environment. I’d catch sight of captivating landmarks on the horizon, enticing mu curiosity. Occasionally, they might appear trivial, but sometimes they would end up being legitimately impressive dungeons. All of this takes place in a seamlessly interconnected world, encouraging and emphasizing the joy of exploration with your party.
XVI regrettably fails to offer any definitive fulfillment in this aspect. The world is a series of barren, disjointed hubs that could fit into a thimble and merely pad the game’s run time.
Even the set pieces and boss fights are mostly glorified cutscenes with player control taken away, often at multiple junctures during combat, to set up a quick time event. Most of the game is on autopilot, and combat often feels like a formality… a genuinely great decision for an action game.
The vestiges of RPG systems in XVI serve as little more than window dressing, only coming off as lip service to previous titles. While you can level up and acquire or craft weapons, their absence wouldn’t significantly impact the gaming experience. Weapons merely serve as objective upgrades, enhancing damage and stagger potential without introducing any elemental advantages or trade-offs for specialized performance. Consequently, this lack of depth fosters a sense of hesitancy and a lack of confidence in the game’s new direction, leaving XVI feeling muddled and uncertain in its approach.
XVI falls short in delivering an engrossing narrative. The storytelling unfolds as a sluggish, uneven journey that veers away from its core thematic elements midway. The intricate exploration of themes like slavery and bureaucracy? Abruptly abandoned in favor of a divergent quest to confront a divine entity.
This makes producer Naoki Yoshida’s statements about the lack of inclusion of non-white people humorous since the game gets quite ridiculous and rarely finds itself grounded in “reality”. Hence, the idea that brown people can’t exist in a fantasy setting with kaiju battles in space is worthy of all the ridicule it received. It’s also really funny how it tries to justify Clive’s family’s slave ownership because they were nice to their slaves.
Final Fantasy XVI is a shallow and hollow experience with nothing to offer besides production values. Everything exists in service of spectacle, and what we are left with is a game so obsessed with cinematic prestige that it is bereft of substance.
There are flashes of brilliance. In a different world, this game, with its combat and scope, could have been a somewhat solid open-world RPG. Or if the scope was reigned in and more complexity baked into the combat system, a solid, linear action game.
Also, for a game that seems to harbor such an active disdain for its legacy, the ending tries desperately to tug on nostalgia strings to evoke pathos. The result is a lazy, intellectually insulting narrative climax that is entirely unearned.
The Final Fantasy series has always made reinvention the point. If one game in the series was not your favorite flavor, the next installment could be. However, I do not think that will be the case moving forward. With this game being a critical and commercial success, coupled with bloated budgets and long gestation periods, I believe this is the direction we can expect the series to take. This is a problem because XVI sacrifices so much of the essence of Final Fantasy without leaving much left to take its place.
If that’s the case, I fear I might have to disembark from the journey, left with nostalgia for what once was, rather than anticipation for what might come.
You’re older now. The weight of the years makes it increasingly challenging to muster the fervor for pursuits that once ignited your passion. It feels like just yesterday you were eagerly tearing through the packaging of a pristine PlayStation 2, enveloped in sheer elation at the prospect of delving into the world of Final Fantasy X. Yet, paradoxically, those moments now seem shrouded in mist. The vivid tapestry of memories has gradually receded into indistinct relics, their vibrant hues fading into a subdued palette of somber grays.
The friends with whom you forged a foundational memory on the day of discovering a beloved video game series have become mere echoes in the corridors of distant recollection. Decades have elapsed since your last exchange, and thoughts of them now rarely arise.
In the intervening years, new friendships have blossomed, and others have withered away. The ebb and flow of companionship has charted a course that, much like your own journey, has gradually distanced you from the familiar shores of home. As the currents of time carry you further away, the recollection of those once-cherished moments becomes increasingly elusive, obscured by the passage of experiences and the ever-expanding horizon of your life.
Have the hues of enthusiasm faded into a more muted palette? Is this a natural evolution of the human spirit as it traverses the landscape of age? Acknowledging the inevitability of change, you recognize that transformation can often herald improvement, even carrying the potential for exciting developments.
A new Final Fantasy’s release is imminent, and the initial spark of excitement dims under the weight of tempered expectations. A new friend, attuned to the significance this series holds in your heart, surprises you with a fresh copy of Final Fantasy XVI, blissfully unaware of the skepticism clouding your anticipation. Embracing the notion that change can breathe life into the familiar, you decide to immerse yourself in the new chapter.
Yet, after a few hours of exploring this new realm, a sobering reality settles in. It resounds a contemplation that has resonated within you concerning existence itself. The experience leaves you pondering whether a subtle cynicism has woven its threads into the fabric of your once-unbridled optimism. Your journey through the corridor of time has left you with a reluctant acceptance of the present—it is what it is.
“…and thus did our journey end.”
Marley
9 months ago