Final Fantasy XV is OK. SPOILERS AHEAD.
It’s actually dishearteningly disappointing, by the end, but more on that in a second.
What started as a “universe-building/sharing” spinoff to FFXIII, 15 used to be called Final Fantasy Versus XIII and was slightly different as a story. But time caught up to the development team and, eventually, they needed a fifteenth game in the franchise and, well, they had a lot of assets going nowhere. And behold! FFXV was born.
Gameplay-wise, it is a sharp right turn from the norm; real-time based combat, single player control (though you can issue commands to your party members – who almost never switch out, aside from narratively important moments – such as special moves or using items), and a huge open world with side-quests, hunts, and the like. Imagine FFXII fused with the most average-to-slightly above average parts of The Witcher 3. Gone are random encounters, turn-based combat (though there is an option for something similar which is pointless), and the god-awful linearity of FFXIII (though this returns, somewhat, in the game’s final portions).
And this change is to the game’s credit: FFXV’s world is gorgeous to explore, interesting to traverse, and full of stuff to do. A lot of is same-y, yes: hunts get repetitive and some of the quests are the fetchiest of fetch quests (seriously, there are a pair of “types” – one is giving repair kits to broken down car owners, the other is providing healing items to injured hunters. These require no skill as you have a shop in your car that sells the items, so you find a guy on the map? Just buy the cheap item and hand it over). But some of the quest lines with voice acting and interesting characters offer unique challenges and a variety of objectives, such as dungeon crawls, photo assignments, and hunting for rare gems. These side stories help flesh out the world and offer you reasons to make repeat trips to old locales, or to head further into the depths of dangerous areas you wouldn’t normally go.
Then there’s the car. FFXV offers the Regalia, an automobile you will spend a ton of your 100ish hours (I ended up at 98 and change, doing a ton of side content but not touching post-game stuff aside from getting the flying version of the Regalia for a trophy). In it, you can blast classic FF tunes, take leisurely drives to objectives on the map, or spend time customizing it at Cindy’s garage in Hammerhead. When it can fly, after you beat the story? It’s an amazing feeling. Noctis does say “where we’re going we don’t need roads” and it was so on the nose and dumb that I chortled violently.
The story, though, is where this game falters. You play as Prince Noctis and his three pals, Prompto, Ignis, and Gladio. These guys are awesome and some of the best developed characters in games (aside from Prompto, who is fine up until a late-game rescue reveals a ton of information on him that is wholly irrelevant and unnecessary) and they are great companions for the journey. You really get a solid feel for them as the game progresses.
But the primary issue I have with the game’s story is that so much of the necessary info is tucked away in supplementary content. There was a short, multi-part anime series (pictured above) called “Brotherhood” that gave backstory to all the Chocobros and delved into the start of their journey a bit. This is essential because you don’t have any idea how these characters met up or why they are friends or how they get along in the game. You are simply told.
And then there’s Kingsglaive:
This is a full length CG movie that takes place in-between a couple of the first chapters in the game and it is essential. See, you are supposed to be getting Noctis to a wedding with his childhood love, Luna, but while on the road, the “Evil Empire” invades Insomnia, your kingdom, kills your father (the king, picture above) and steals the Crystal, a magic power source that is ill-defined and never well explained as to its meaning. You watch this movie and so much of it makes sense, but then you play the game and, well, very little of it matters. The Crystal, the Emperor, Nyx (a member of the royal guard) and his sacrifice, all of it. It’s pointless and is only a plot point: The empire invaded, your dad is dead, now what?
From here it starts narratively devolving into “get the god’s blessing” but each time you go to meet one (these God’s are classic FF summons like Shiva, Titan, Ramuh, etc.) the Empire shows up and kills them at the same time… but you still earned the blessing so you can summon them… even though they are dead? You come across Shiva’s giant corpse late in the game but after you look at her dead body in the frozen wastes you can still summon her, and she plays a part in the story, she does things. I don’t get it.
You invade the Empire’s capital city and defeat the Emperor but he’s already a demon, some of the bad guys you’ve done battle with are already dead or dying, and then there’s Ardyn.
This is the real bad guy. Or is it Ifrit? I don’t know. Who cares.
His story comes suddenly and in such a massive info dump in the final chapters. And let me stress: up until the meeting with Leviathan, this game is open world. You can go wherever and do whatever. As many hunts, side quests, level grinding, fishing, etc. I spent nearly 100 hours on this game and probably close to 70 of those were in the first half. Once you tangle with the giant sea serpent, the game goes full-on FFXIII Corridor. You can leave the corridor and return to the world you were exploring at inns and stuff, but it is a chore and sometimes the inns are spaced so far apart – narratively – that you go a few chapters with no option to return to the side quests. And the chapters are faaaaast. I think it was 10 and 11 that I finished in, like, 40-50 minutes. That shouldn’t be the case.
The final showdown with Ardyn, Ifrit, and a bunch of powerful monsters is also muddled by a ten year time jump, more linearity (you go back to the open world but you are forced to get a ride from an old friend and then escorted in a straight line, more or less, to the ending) in a World of Ruin (FFVI callback that is weak as hell because you don’t see ANY effects of this world state, you’re simply told). And then you finally use the Ring, the focal point of the Kingsglaive movie, you meet the spirits of the former kings – including Noctis’ father – and then… they just kill Ardyn and the game ends. And what was Ifrit doing there? Who knows.
Forums extrapolate on this story a ton and that’s great. I love reading fans delve deeper into the narrative of great games. But when some of these narrative choices are so esoteric and require so much game exploration, supplemental materials and texts, and some guess work, that’s not good enough for me. I have a general sense of what happened, now, because of the dedicated work of people who care about the game much more than I do, and the first 3/4 of the game made complete sense, so this game has a story that is better told than XIII’s, but – man – that ain’t saying much.
All in all, FFXV offers a ton of fun stuff to do (there is so much post-game content: secret dungeons, hidden weapons, massive monsters to hunt and kill, etc.) and when you’re adventuring, you’re going to have fun. The combat is simple and snappy with depth for those wanting more to do than simply pressing one button to win, it has some confusing puzzles to work out, and it has some genuinely interesting characters. I just wish the writing staff had had more time flesh out some of their plots. This could have been the best.
As it stands, though, it is a solid game, a great look ahead for the franchise, and – who knows? – Square-Enix has already added content, offered explanatory DLC, and promises that the game isn’t dead after release, so we might see more depth added in the months and – possibly – years to come. I’m excited to see what else this world has to offer and will gladly come back to the game in the future to do some post-game adventuring when I have the time.
FINAL SCORE: 7/10
Side Note:
The soundtrack to this one is awesome. Not talking about the CD’s for the car featuring classic franchise tracks, but the game’s score. It is relaxing at times, it is engaging at others, and mysterious when it needs to be. And the combat themes are all great. No single standout track, but that’s fine. Sum of its parts and all that.
Added August 30, 2017
Updated the post to reflect the standard format showing ‘A “Review”‘ and added appropriate tags. Fixed a couple of typo-type issues.
skylerbartels 