Final Fantasy XV

Retr0gamer

Expecting Witcher 3 story from anything, especially a Square enix game, is wishful thinking.

Shooby

I'm a big fan of earlier games in the series and am loving it so far! I was dubious about the real-time combat going in but it is really growing on me.

DeadlyByDesign

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Expecting Witcher 3 story from anything, especially a Square enix game, is wishful thinking.

Fair point man

Jerichoholic

The magic is so awkward to set up and assign, bad design in the menus on that one. Having a mare on Chapter 2

Trying to pick up mineral deposit after beating an annoying boss, but just then dropships keep dropping soldiers all over me and each wave I beat, another batch arrives. It doesn't seem to end. Had to run away.

goon_magee

Game is fantastic so far, though I do have a few major gripes like the camera being absolutely diabolical and the frame pacing issue on PS4 is mighty distracting. I'm not usually sensitive to things like frame pacing, I played Bloodborne to completion numerous times with the frame pacing issues present and barely noticed them, but here I'm finding them so intrusive that I think I'll wait for the issue to be patched as it's distracting me from what is otherwise a brilliant game.

Retr0gamer

I've asked already but how does the combat compare to Xenoblade?

I figured out my problem with magic from earlier, you have to hold B or O to aim it ffs , nowhere did that get mention on a tool tip or even in the tutorial that I saw. Oh well I know now.

RedXIV

Deleted User wrote: »

I figured out my problem with magic from earlier, you have to hold B or O to aim it ffs , nowhere did that get mention on a tool tip or even in the tutorial that I saw. Oh well I know now.

It is briefly (very briefly) mentioned in the tutorial but you don't really get the full concept of it there.

Evade

Is there a way of changing the objective distance marker to metric?

Evade

Evade wrote: »

Is there a way of changing the objective distance marker to metric?

It's driving me nuts too !!!!

Didn't see anything in the menus.

Evade

Deleted User wrote: »

It's driving me nuts too !!!!

Didn't see anything in the menus.

I did a quick google, apparently it's in metric in every other language but imperial in English because of the US.

Maximus Alexander

Driving me mad too. First thing I did was look through the menus for an option.

Maximus Alexander

Maximus Alexander wrote: »

Driving me mad too. First thing I did was look through the menus for an option.

The gas thing is if I look in my xbox stats it has one for distance walked and that is in meters

Evade

Can you unlock more car stereo tracks? I want some VIII and X/X-2.

Maximus Alexander

Evade wrote: »

Can you unlock more car stereo tracks? I want some VIII and X/X-2.

Yep you can buy them. VIII was at the shop at Longwythe if I remember right.

I has pretty much all of them see here for locations

http://ie.ign.com/wikis/final-fantasy-15/Final_Fantasy_Original_Soundtracks

Retr0gamer

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I've asked already but how does the combat compare to Xenoblade?

I think you need to accept the game for what it is. Comparing the combat mechanics with another rpg is pointless.
Let it be it's own game

Jerichoholic

Game is becoming unmanagable now, can't go anywhere at all without

Dropships pouring soldiers to fight you, you literally cannot go anywhere or complete any hunt quests. Is there a way to stop this, or is that the way it is from here on. If it is I'm so done with it.

EDIT: If you find yourself in that situation, just do the next main story mission and you'll be grand.

Retr0gamer

M!Ck^ wrote: »

I think you need to accept the game for what it is. Comparing the combat mechanics with another rpg is pointless.
Let it be it's own game

It's a fair comparison considering from the demo its closest comparison would be The xenoblade games. The demo for me was good but needed a bit of work since it didn't have the nuance and depth that xenoblade had but I've heard there's been massive improvements in the combat since. Xenoblade is the high bar I'd hold these pseudo MMO style combat systems up to so just wondering if it comes close or exceeds it and if that depth is there? And the fact I loved xenoblade means I know if it comes close to it or better I'd love it.

Any review I've read has been god awful and it's impossible to tell what the battle system is like which is the most important thing not the story. Xenoblade had an awful story as well but it was just so much fun exploring and getting into fights and I'm hoping this is the same.

Retr0gamer

Jerichoholic wrote: »

Game is becoming unmanagable now, can't go anywhere at all without

Dropships pouring soldiers to fight you, you literally cannot go anywhere or complete any hunt quests. Is there a way to stop this, or is that the way it is from here on. If it is I'm so done with it.

EDIT: If you find yourself in that situation, just do the next main story mission and you'll be grand.

I remember this being an issue in the demo with the solution being don't go out at night!

heebusjeebus

Retro, never played Xenoblade but if it's any help, the closest I can put the combat is to Dragon Age Inquisition (which I hated).
Not a huge fan of the combat in XV but I'm slowly getting the hang of it after 6 hours of play.
The game is addictive though. I found it hard to stop last night and it's the world and characters that is making this so enjoyable for me.

Got a nice pic from Prompto last night:

http://i.imgur.com/mZvjhkq.jpg

(How the hell do i re-size from imgur?)

Jerichoholic

I've played Xenoblade a little. Xen's combat is not as free as FFXV if you get me, there's a little bit of turn waiting going on in Xenoblade whereas this is more Monster Hunter.

Possibly

Maximus Alexander

I haven't played Xenoblade so I can't really tell you, but from watching a YouTube video it looks quite different from what you get in XV. Xenoblade looks, from the videos at least, a bit more organised? It looks like the combat is a little more static and there is a rythm to the opponents' behaviour, whereas XV is quite frenetic, even chaotic at times to the point that it can be hard to keep track of what's going on. It's fun, but it doesn't feel elegant, if that makes sense.

Retr0gamer

I suppose it feels more active with groups of enemies (you'd usually try to avoid groups in the Xeno games).

I'm guessing stamina bar balancing is a big mechanic.

I really want to get this but I'm not even scratching the surface of Xenoblade so by the time I'm finished that it will probably be on PC

I wonder what the sales figures are for this. I hear Square really needs this to sell extremely well considering how much it's cost to develop. Famitsu released a statement saying it was the fastest ever selling FF in Asian regions but turned out it was the usual Famitsu bull**** with 5 million copies shipped not sold to Asian regions. It would be nice to see FF back in a premium position. It's a rare example of a series that completely changes its gameplay with each iteration rather than becoming stale.

OldGoat

Customisable chocobos, 'nuff said, happy now.

Unearthly

About to start.

Watched Kingsglaive earlier. Thought it was decent even if the main character looked like Jordan fecking Henderson voiced by Jessie

pumpkin4life

Only played it for an hour yesterday, won't have time till Christmas.

No pervy 14 year old Rikkus for hairy Japanese bastards.

No cheesy anime crap.

No moody emo my daddy didn't hug me protagonists.

This is fùcking great lol.

heebusjeebus

Unearthly wrote: »

About to start.

Watched Kingsglaive earlier. Thought it was decent even if the main character looked like Jordan fecking Henderson voiced by Jessie

Watch Brotherhood too. Can't recommend it enough.
Kingsglaive gives you info on the world but Brotherhood really helps understand the characters you'll be rocking about with.

Retr0gamer

pumpkin4life wrote: »

Only played it for an hour yesterday, won't have time till Christmas.

No pervy 14 year old Rikkus for hairy Japanese bastards.

No cheesy anime crap.

No moody emo my daddy didn't hug me protagonists.

This is fùcking great lol.

Eh what about the j-pop band protagonists?

gryfothegreat

I've never played Xenoblade Chronicles (I did watch Chuggaaconroy's LP of it) and I think the only real similarities between the two are that you have an auto attack and a skill tree you spend points to expand. There's no waiting for skills to recharge and there's no chaining skills of the same colour. It's much more like a hybrid of Dragon Age (auto attack and combo, spells like bombs, friendly fire), The Witcher 3 (blocking and dodging) and Arkham Asylum (parrying) with a little Tales (direction of analogue stick changing attack, link skills with party members, advantage depending on whether you attack from the front or behind) in there for good measure. I really like combat in all of those games so this is a good thing! The weapon switching and mana draining when you defend and regaining it when you take cover... I can't find any parallels to that.
Another thing is that it doesn't really have a healer class, which is something I'm glad games are dropping. It's awful having to keep the healer character in your party at all times. They begin to feel like dead weight after a while. Sharla was so useless in Xenoblade!

pumpkin4life

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Eh what about the j-pop band protagonists?

You can't get everything you want in life :P

Also, I don't mind myself some good j-pop it must be said:

Jerichoholic

It's great all round, but those god damn

Imperial dropships

are ruining my fun.

Chase3

I'm about 30 hours in at this stage. It's not a great game, but it's pretty good. It was never going to be 'Witcher 3' good.

The combat is my favorite part, with warping, weapon changing and link attacks, you can get creative and it flows very well. Ignore magic.

The car is terrible, use it for fast travel only, explore on your chocobo.

The story is so thin, it's a lot more like Dragonage inquisition than past FF's. It's all about the open world and side quests, most of which are awful.

There is an infinite sprint trick hidden. On Xbox, When sprinting with B, tap X just as your stamina bar runs out, you flash green and your stamina bar refills instantly. Very handy.

Be sure to grab certain skills early on, such as the ones in exploration that award AP for travelling on chocobo or by car.

I hope the story gets better, I preferred the older FF games. However running around, exploring and fighting is a lot of fun. The game needs some polish, and you should be able to drive off road, but I've had zero bugs of any kind.

It seems like they really took the 'it's too linear' FF13 criticism to heart. I'd recommend it, but ultimately, I don't think this is the Game that's going to save or reinvigorate Final Fantasy.

Retr0gamer

One last very important question. What's the soundtrack like?

Say what you will about the three FFXIII games the sound tracks were absolutely incredible and dare I say it, the best in the entire series. I'm hoping they keep the bar set that high.

Chase3 wrote: »

It seems like they really took the 'it's too linear' FF13 criticism to heart. I'd recommend it, but ultimately, I don't think this is the Game that's going to save or reinvigorate Final Fantasy.

I think of any RPG series Final Fantasy has the best ability to make a comeback. The fact that each Final Fantasy is so radically different from the last means it's a series that can make radical changes and not really be betraying its roots (although some idiotic 'fans' call for a return to old school final fantasy roots when really there's no real roots to speak of). The name will always have some cache so it will always be ready for a come back.

nix

So from what im reading, everything except the story is good...Which is something that used to be key with these games... Is it really a bad story? Which FF would it be better than story wise? Just so we have a comparison..

Selling like a mofo!

http://gematsu.com/2016/12/final-fantasy-xv-first-day-shipments-top-five-million-fastest-selling-title-series

Retr0gamer

nix wrote: »

So from what im reading, everything except the story is good...Which is something that used to be key with these games... Is it really a bad story? Which FF would it be better than story wise? Just so we have a comparison..

Honestly, people give the FF stories too much credit. They've never been that good, just well paced at best to keep the game flowing well. I wouldn't put too much cache on it being bad. It looks more like say Xenoblade where the fun is the exploration and side quests. From what I've seen it looks more in line with FFX-2 where it's all a bit of silly fun anyway.

Retr0gamer

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Honestly, people give the FF stories too much credit. They've never been that good, just well paced at best to keep the game flowing well. I wouldn't put too much cache on it being bad. It looks more like say Xenoblade where the fun is the exploration and side quests. From what I've seen it looks more in line with FFX-2 where it's all a bit of silly fun anyway.

Thats really what I've been doing so far 20 hours in and I've not progress chapter 3 yet. There are 14 chapters

Maximus Alexander

Approaching 7 hours and I've yet to leave Chapter 1. Only distant sightings of plot so far as a result but I'm having a great time. :pac:

gryfothegreat

M!Ck^ wrote: »

Selling like a mofo!

http://gematsu.com/2016/12/final-fantasy-xv-first-day-shipments-top-five-million-fastest-selling-title-series

Five million shipped, not sold; this is no indication of how well the game is selling, only how much the retailer expects to sell. Titanfall 2 was a victim of high shipping and low sales. Retailers ordered huge stock but ended up discounting it to try and get it off the shelves.

I don't know how well XV is going to do in Japan. The old guard of FF players, the ones who grew up with VI and VII, have aged out of the target market, and the current crop of kids are going to be much more interested in Dragon Quest, Monster Hunter and Yokai Watch. FF just isn't one of the big three JRPGs anymore. Additionally, Japan really liked XIII and Lightning compared to the much cooler reception it got in the West, console sales overall are dropping in Japan and Persona 5 and Pokémon Sun/Moon both came out relatively recently. I can't see XV selling as well as people are expecting it to, regardless of how good the game itself is. I do think XV will do well worldwide, given that it's an open-world adventure RPG and we Westerners love those

nix

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Honestly, people give the FF stories too much credit. They've never been that good, just well paced at best to keep the game flowing well. I wouldn't put too much cache on it being bad. It looks more like say Xenoblade where the fun is the exploration and side quests. From what I've seen it looks more in line with FFX-2 where it's all a bit of silly fun anyway.

Well i enjoyed the story alot in 7 and 10, 9 was great also but in my opinion fell on its face at the end. 8 was good up until the whole orphanage reveal. 12 and 13 i didnt like..

but it has always at the very least, tried to tell a good story. Which is something i always look forward to above all else in final fantasy games and has always tried to deliver. Up until X anyway..

Retr0gamer

I think 12's story would have been good until Matsuno left. I mean Matsuno wrote the story for Tactics Ogre which is probably the finest story written for a RPG or even any game and his writing in Vagrant Story and FF Tactics wasn't far off.

While the games you mentioned had enjoyable stories they're hardly exceptional but then I think a well paced story is a lot better than a better story that gets in the way of the actual game and bogs it down. Square really nailed that pace with FF4 and subsequent games kept that formula... until 13. I'm not sure what happened but by FF13-3 even the developer Tri-Ace was in full piss take mode.

Icyseanfitz

nix wrote: »

Well i enjoyed the story alot in 7 and 10, 9 was great also but in my opinion fell on its face at the end. 8 was good up until the whole orphanage reveal. 12 and 13 i didnt like..

but it has always at the very least, tried to tell a good story. Which is something i always look forward to above all else in final fantasy games and has always tried to deliver. Up until X anyway..

yup same as me, god i loved the world/characters/story in 7/9/10. 10 was the first ps2 game i played after gta and i was hooked from the start til the end, Maybe it was because i was only like 15 but i loved that game, (even the voice acting didnt put me off). x-2......that didnt happen :pac:

I bought 12 on release, loved the exploring side of it but just couldnt get into the story or world. figured that was just down to the game not working with me.

So bought 13 on release, started off liking it but it went to crap quickly. Ruined my faith in the series ever being good again. Didnt play the x-2's of 13.

And now im waiting to hear every non spoiler detail of this game and whether i can trust it or not haha. Characters (at least the main 4) are meant to be good, But i am hearing bad stuff about the story (which is one of my big draws for a good FF).

I'd say a lot of fans are in my shoes having been burnt by 13.

RedXIV

I think if you are likely to be a "forgiving" Final Fantasy Fan, you'll enjoy this for what it is. As Retr0 said, the game does constantly reinvent itself so it has definitely changed from 13 and to be honest, it does seem far more upbeat than the usual emo style characters.

Evade

Cooking can be very overpowered. I just whipped up something that gives me 600 HP and 120 attack. Noctis' normal max HP is 627 at the minute.

I love how the AI will jump and sprint and glide etc on their chocobo's it's like how real coop partners would behave

nix

I bought the bloody thing anyway, €53 for the special edition was too good to pass up. Considering gamestop are selling the standard edition for €70.. Feckin cowboys!

Im not in a rush to get stuck in, ill watch kingsglaive and the anime to sink the hook in first

Calhoun

RedXIV wrote: »

I think if you are likely to be a "forgiving" Final Fantasy Fan, you'll enjoy this for what it is. As Retr0 said, the game does constantly reinvent itself so it has definitely changed from 13 and to be honest, it does seem far more upbeat than the usual emo style characters.

I personally think that FF had to reinvent itself, as technology and the definition of what this generation of players expect out of RPG changes it has to keep up at some level.

A big flaw for me for 13 was how much it felt like it was on rails, they all are on rails but the others felt so large back in the day when you played them.

nix wrote: »

I bought the bloody thing anyway, €53 for the special edition was too good to pass up. Considering gamestop are selling the standard edition for €70.. Feckin cowboys!

Im not in a rush to get stuck in, ill watch kingsglaive and the anime to sink the hook in first

Reserved a copy in argos going to pick it up tomorrow .

Chase3

Some more tips:

You can easily run away from anything, even at night, you are safe. Just warp or run out of the red circle on the map, Same goes for drop ships.

You can fast travel in the car to some places. You can also fast travel from the map screen to wherever you last slept or to the location of your car. Handy!

Play until chapter 3 before you explore too much. I did a LOT of side quests in chapters 3 and 4. I'm massively over leveled for the story now which is annoying.

The ascension upgrades I like best: Less MP cost for warping. Faster stamina regeneration. Gain AP while riding on chocobo. Unlock extra accessory slots for characters. Libra to see what enemies are weak to.

Cooking is powerful, but not necessary. Save up some EXP and stay in a motel or hotel to get bonus 1.5 EXP. Or if you have plenty of GIL, stay in the spa at the ferry port for 10,000 GIL and 2.0 bonus EXP.

In combat: Attack from behind for bonus damage and link attacks. Use your friends special attacks as often as possible so they level them up. Carry different weapon types with Noctus, some enemies are weak to one type.

One last thing, just hold the defense button when it pops up to block, I kept trying to time it even though the tutorial explained it. I must have missed it.

F1ngers

Chase3 wrote: »

Some more tips:

You can easily run away from anything, even at night, you are safe. Just warp or run out of the red circle on the map, Same goes for drop ships.

You can fast travel in the car to some places. You can also fast travel from the map screen to wherever you last slept or to the location of your car. Handy!

Play until chapter 3 before you explore too much. I did a LOT of side quests in chapters 3 and 4. I'm massively over leveled for the story now which is annoying.

The ascension upgrades I like best: Less MP cost for warping. Faster stamina regeneration. Gain AP while riding on chocobo. Unlock extra accessory slots for characters. Libra to see what enemies are weak to.

Cooking is powerful, but not necessary. Save up some EXP and stay in a motel or hotel to get bonus 1.5 EXP. Or if you have plenty of GIL, stay in the spa at the ferry port for 10,000 GIL and 2.0 bonus EXP.

In combat: Attack from behind for bonus damage and link attacks. Use your friends special attacks as often as possible so they level them up. Carry different weapon types with Noctus, some enemies are weak to one type.

One last thing, just hold the defense button when it pops up to block, I kept trying to time it even though the tutorial explained it. I must have missed it.

Also for unlimited sprinting, release circle(PS4) when the stamina bar get's to the "s" - you get a small speed boost and the stamina bar fully replenishes immediately.