Will FFXV be a Spirits Within style disaster and bankrupt Square?

Calhoun

I hope it's not a failure, square are the company that got me into the rpg genre so I always have a soft spot for them.

Didn't like 13 so much, as has already been pointed out the illusion of freedom being removed really turned me off. The remake of 14 however was very nostalgic for me and if I wasn't already playing mmo'so I would continue playing it.

Retr0gamer

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Why exactly? It has a better story than the more celebrated entries in the series.

Hmm, I'd say the story is pretty awful as well but it's also told in an awful manner. There's nothing wrong with having a videogame with an awful story. What is a bigger problem is a game with a story, whether good or bad, that gets in the way of enjoying the game. FFXIII's story is told in a dreadful manner that really upsets the pace of the game. The fact that it's not very good rubs salt into the wound.

FFVII on the other hand has got a cliché ridden story that is utter nonsense and has ideas stolen from everything from Evangelion to Neuromancer but it never gets in the way of the game and keeps great pace throughout.

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Didn't know that. FFXIII must have been profitable at the very least for them to risk throwing even more money at those assets.

It probably was profitable but not to Squares expectations. The most expensive part of making a game are the art, model, music, sound and animation assets so if you have enough to make nearly three games lying around the clever thing to do is make three games out of them instead of wasting them.

ancapailldorcha

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Hmm, I'd say the story is pretty awful as well but it's also told in an awful manner. There's nothing wrong with having a videogame with an awful story. What is a bigger problem is a game with a story, whether good or bad, that gets in the way of enjoying the game. FFXIII's story is told in a dreadful manner that really upsets the pace of the game. The fact that it's not very good rubs salt into the wound.

FFVII on the other hand has got a cliché ridden story that is utter nonsense and has ideas stolen from everything from Evangelion to Neuromancer but it never gets in the way of the game and keeps great pace throughout.

Oh, don't get me wrong, the story is drivel. My point is that it's nowhere as terrible as some of the FF stories. Fair point with it impacting the gameplay though. Much as I love the game, it's fraught with problems not least of which is the constant hand holding.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

It probably was profitable but not to Squares expectations. The most expensive part of making a game are the art, model, music, sound and animation assets so if you have enough to make nearly three games lying around the clever thing to do is make three games out of them instead of wasting them.

Hmm... Fair enough. Seems like appalling planning on their point. I almost wouldn't believe it possible for a company this size to cock up like this.

Retr0gamer

Anyway the biggest crime that Square has committed was the remaster soundtrack on FFX HD :P

ancapailldorcha

I suppose this is heresy but I like the new battle theme. I've no idea why they felt it needed changing though. It was fine as it was. I've not played the remaster yet. I've Okami, Bayonetta, Dark Souls II as well as many others to get to first.

Retr0gamer

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Hmm... Fair enough. Seems like appalling planning on their point. I almost wouldn't believe it possible for a company this size to cock up like this.

There used to be a great podcast called warning a huge podcast that went into what went wrong at Square. Square had big problems of their staff being poached that they specialised them so much that they would not be attractive to employ. It got so bad in the art department that they had 'cobblestone girl' who's only job was to make cobblestone textures. This was grand in the PS2 era when budgets weren't so much but once the last gen hit art teams took up the vast majority of resources and Square didn't reorganise to meet the new requirements for game development. FFXIII was massively delayed and creating the crystal tools engine took a huge amount of time and during that time the idle art teams were told to churn out assets. By the time the coders and game designers caught up with the art team they had a stupid amount of assets.

Square have since totally reorganised around the western game development model so hopefully they can avoid such stupidity in future.

ancapailldorcha

Retr0gamer wrote: »

There used to be a great podcast called warning a huge podcast that went into what went wrong at Square. Square had big problems of their staff being poached that they specialised them so much that they would not be attractive to employ. It got so bad in the art department that they had 'cobblestone girl' who's only job was to make cobblestone textures. This was grand in the PS2 era when budgets weren't so much but once the last gen hit art teams took up the vast majority of resources and Square didn't reorganise to meet the new requirements for game development. FFXIII was massively delayed and creating the crystal tools engine took a huge amount of time and during that time the idle art teams were told to churn out assets. By the time the coders and game designers caught up with the art team they had a stupid amount of assets.

Square have since totally reorganised around the western game development model so hopefully they can avoid such stupidity in future.

Wow, I'd no idea it's development was such a disaster.

Varik

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Only FFXIII has been disappointing. FFXIV was a disaster but by all accounts they turned that into one of the best MMO's around in the end. I can't think of anything else they have published that has been bad with the exception of Dream Drop Distance but even then Birth by Sleep wasn't as obnoxious as other KH games

4m+ tomb raider sales and they're disappointed, what were they spending or expecting for that to be disappointing. The recent exclusivity for tomb raider, which will hurt them in the long run.

Can't think of any thing that was an outright success.

ancapailldorcha

Varik wrote: »

4m+ tomb raider sales and they're disappointed, what were they spending or expecting for that to be disappointing. The recent exclusivity for tomb raider, which will hurt them in the long run.

Can't think of any thing that was an outright success.

I think any game which fails to achieve COD level sales will be deemed disappointing.

Retr0gamer

Varik wrote: »

4m+ tomb raider sales and they're disappointed, what were they spending or expecting for that to be disappointing. The recent exclusivity for tomb raider, which will hurt them in the long run.

Can't think of any thing that was an outright success.

Well that was stupid CEOs and shareholders being unrealistic. I was more talking of the Japanese side. Their Mobile and handheld output has been top notch and been making a lot of money.

Varik

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Well that was stupid CEOs and shareholders being unrealistic. I was more talking of the Japanese side. Their Mobile and handheld output has been top notch and been making a lot of money.

CEOs and Shareholders, also know as those who actually have any say in how a company is run.

noodler

Its complete bullsh1t to dump the FF13 story in with that of other FFs imo.

7,8,9,10 all had way, way better stories. 8 fell apart somewhat in the second half and 9 a bit in the last quarter but its not even close.

Its the first time I couldn't bring myself to push through with a FF game - I guess they are just being made for different people these days.

hadoken13

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

I've Okami, Bayonetta, Dark Souls II as well as many others to get to first.

Get playing Dark Souls II as soon as you can, with the new DLC out there are loads of people playing and this game is a hellova lot more fun with invasions, co-ops etc.

ancapailldorcha

noodler wrote: »

Its complete bullsh1t to dump the FF13 story in with that of other FFs imo.

7,8,9,10 all had way, way better stories. 8 fell apart somewhat in the second half and 9 a bit in the last quarter but its not even close.

Its the first time I couldn't bring myself to push through with a FF game - I guess they are just being made for different people these days.

I don't see how. FFXIII tried to something a bit different. It failed but it's no worse than any of the PSOne games and FFX. I've not played FFIX and I wouldn't count FFVI as a PSOne game.

Noxin

lol, I seem to be the only one who doesn't mind the FFXIII story so far. Like I said, I'm currently playing through it and only hit Pulse but so far it has been enjoyable enough. Maybe I'm easily entertained? :P Or maybe it just becomes complete drivel from here on. Either way, Imma continue playing.

Icyseanfitz

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

I don't see how. FFXIII tried to something a bit different. It failed but it's no worse than any of the PSOne games and FFX. I've not played FFIX and I wouldn't count FFVI as a PSOne game.

at the end of the day its all personal preference, in my opinion 13 is the game that truly finished my love of FF's, its no way comparable to 7, 9 or 10 in terms of story/characters, it was so god damn convoluted i could barely figure out what was going on after 40 hours, the combat system was one of the best in the series but that wont save a FF for me.
what exactly did 13 do that was so different? 12 did something truly different in terms of game mechanics but i dont see what 13 did, it was a very polished pretty game with a good combat system and a narrative that was useless.

ancapailldorcha

Noxin wrote: »

lol, I seem to be the only one who doesn't mind the FFXIII story so far. Like I said, I'm currently playing through it and only hit Pulse but so far it has been enjoyable enough. Maybe I'm easily entertained? :P Or maybe it just becomes complete drivel from here on. Either way, Imma continue playing.

I quite liked the FFXIII story and characters. I read a lot so I can get my fill of well scripted fantasy elsewhere. It's drivel but it's enjoyable drivel and the characters are a lot better than casts of most FF games.

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

at the end of the day its all personal preference, in my opinion 13 is the game that truly finished my love of FF's, its no way comparable to 7, 9 or 10 in terms of story/characters, it was so god damn convoluted i could barely figure out what was going on after 40 hours, the combat system was one of the best in the series but that wont save a FF for me.
what exactly did 13 do that was so different? 12 did something truly different in terms of game mechanics but i dont see what 13 did, it was a very polished pretty game with a good combat system and a narrative that was useless.

I think I get annoyed because I get the impression for some reason that people are objectively damning FFXIII. I don't know. I really liked it and even preordered FFXIII-2 once I heard it was coming out.
FFXIII's battle system is very different to that of the rest of the series. The characters spend most of the game in small groups instead of being together for the whole duration of the story. There were flaws, big fat glaring ones at that but it was fun and better than I expected. I'd call it my favourite of the mainstream FFs but I've not played FFIX.
P.S. There is no justifiable reason to pre-order a game. None whatsoever be it GTAVI or Final Fantasy 80.

Icyseanfitz

yup i never pre order, you never know what your getting before hand, and i cant stand pre order dlc on principle

Rael

I'm sure Square will be fine.

Particularly after Microsoft propped up their balance sheet with a wodge of cash for the Tomb Raider timed exclusive.

Retr0gamer

People turned off FF by FFXIII are missing out on three cracking RPGs in FFXIII-2, FFXIII-3 and Bravely Default.

I wasn't the biggest fan of FFXII but you know what, I'd kill for FFXII HD with the zodiac edition additions on Vita. That and SMT Nocturne on Vita would make me so happy!

ancapailldorcha

Retr0gamer wrote: »

People turned off FF by FFXIII are missing out on three cracking RPGs in FFXIII-2, FFXIII-3 and Bravely Default.

I wasn't the biggest fan of FFXII but you know what, I'd kill for FFXII HD with the zodiac edition additions on Vita. That and SMT Nocturne on Vita would make me so happy!

Is Bravely Default similar to FFXIII?

Varik

Retr0gamer wrote: »

People turned off FF by FFXIII are missing out on three cracking RPGs in FFXIII-2, FFXIII-3 and Bravely Default.

I wasn't the biggest fan of FFXII but you know what, I'd kill for FFXII HD with the zodiac edition additions on Vita. That and SMT Nocturne on Vita would make me so happy!

Not a fan of the fact they don't have cross buy, I'd pay more for both a PS3/4 and vita version.

But I'd definitely buy 12 hd.

Retr0gamer

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Is Bravely Default similar to FFXIII?

It's closer to Final Fantasy Four Heroes of Light than anything, in fact it was originally meant to be a sequel to that game.

ancapailldorcha

Retr0gamer wrote: »

It's closer to Final Fantasy Four Heroes of Light than anything, in fact it was originally meant to be a sequel to that game.

Never heard of it. Might give it a go in the unlikely even I obtain a 3DS.