Final Fantasy 16
- Thread starter Old_Hunter_77
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So just did this insane fight with Titan...man...those Eikon battles keep getting better and better. I'm 35ish hours in and just when you think it can't get any more hype, it finds a way to.
It's ok he gets a new name about half way through.
The problem with this concept is that you don't really know what you're doing is right.
For example cid says the mothercrystals are sucking up all the mako energy and that's why the blight is happening. But I've destroyed two of them and the blight is not slowing down or improving which doesn't show us that we are doing the right thing at all. instead we get hardship and drama after drama with nothing improving and that isn't really a good method of encouraging the player to push on. There is no real evidence that we are doing the right thing.
What I really think this game needed was a more personal connection to a bad guy, which we should have with Titan for obvious reasons. Yet even though I believe he is my next big boss, there really isn't much drive on Clive's part to deal with him, or his mother for that matter. All he ever does is go, "Grrr my mother is doing terrible things. that sucks. anyway...." And I'm like what's the driving force here? What's pushing Clive forward at this point, because there doesn't really seem to be anything other than "I might as well do that I suppose" energy.
I find it strange and ironic both of the recent God of War games gets this right and better from what I'm hearing. Hell, the questioning of whether the protagonist is in the right and people call out the character, is done excellently in Metal Gear Rising.
So I have a theory about the aether not "going back" to the land, and that is that as long as any crystals remain they still suck it all up anyways, the remaining ones just suck up more, which would make sense since as you go on the enemies will get tougher from that. Though I'm working with incomplete information so there may be some other kind of justification.
The personal connection is to the cause of the phoenix gate incident, we just don't quite know what exactly it is yet. My theory is that the bad guy somehow acted through Clive there, but yeah no clue so far.
I think this aimlessness is kinda appropriate cause Clive lived so long trying to get revenge so once he lost that target he was kinda rudderless, which makes sense. Right now he's just helping everyone around and trying to keep his head and that's the limit. His mother I think he mainly wants to understand, more so than defeat.
I explained what an RPG is TO ME based on how the genre started. Just because the genre has turned into games that have stats and levels does mean I'm changing my definition of what an RPG is. Plus, there's plenty of games (including video games) that have player agency as the core component and those are the games that are RPGs IN MY OPINION. The reason one plays Disco Elysium is completely different than the reason one plays Final Fantasy, they are in completely different genres.
You failed to answer my questions like does adding stats and whatnot to the new God of War games make them RPGs? That would be completely asinine in my view to say old God of War is a character action game and new God of War is an RPG. Also, are the people playing RPGs on the Film Reroll podcast not playing an RPG then? Because they are playing a game with no leveling whatsoever so that breaks your rule of the basics of what determines if something is an RPG.
I spent yesterday evening with the game's post/non-story content: the timed combat trials scattered around the map, chasing some trophies, etc. And I have some thoughts about the game's combat as it related to previous discussions about what is even "good" combat.
Is FF16's combat "good?" Seems like a dumb question because it's the only thing about the game getting universally praised, at least by those accepting or liking the action combat (complaining about it not being turn-based or "real FF" or RPG is beside the point right now). Is it good action combat?
And IMO, it... is... sort of.
What is it "good" at? It is extremely good at giving you the power to execute sequences of action that look and feel absolutely amazing. Stringing combos where the animation on screen look awesome and stylish on their own but- impressively- also somehow match the input you gave it thematically and in pacing, on a micro fraction second by fraction second moment.
I mean like- you land a couple attacks with your fire magic while switching to ice magic to chhecking that your ice magic AoE ability has cooled down, point your camera at the big monster, hit the ice magic thing and Clive goes WHAA- giving you a quick pause to register that yes indeed your tactic is working- then he slams his sword into the ground the monster loses significant stagger and your whole brain has shifted from stagger to damage and off you go... like everything works so goddamn perfectly in these moments.
It is also good at build variety. With all these abilities, you can go for much frequent attacks, tanking, flying up in the air, building up to BIG attacks, and many combinations therein. Each ability is interesting and is fun to try out. I am impressed that there is a shield ability and it can actually be useful, that is not my experience in most games (please don't ask me for examples just for some reason I see shields and I go BLECH except this game).
What is it "bad" at? It is bad at actually feeling like a fight. Your primary attack is a sword and no matter which builds, equipment, levels or whatever, it always feels like I'm hitting a skyscraper with a spork- sure if I do it enough it'll go down but.. yeesh. Most of the time, actually hitting things with your spork sword is just biding time until your abilities charge. So combat consists of dodging around while spamming spork and checking our abilities for them to be available. That is where the "button mashing" feels comes in.
If you play more strategically- where you create a build with certain abilities you only use when an enemy is staggered or you're surrounded etc- then you are implementing your battle plan and this is really what you should be doing but then it feels like playing a meta not having a fight.
It is also "bad" at letting you actually do all the cool stuff while actually playing the base game- and this is the combat's greatest failing. All that stuff I said about combos and abilities and strategy- if you're like me and mostly just wanna beat the game (and I do include side quests), you don't really need to worry about all that until the last couple boss fights and the most difficult monster hunts. No, you can just spork spam in between watching the endless cut scenes.
I suspect most players will beat FF16 without experiencing the best part about the game and that is a shame. They will complain about boring combat and they will be right. Fans of it will lecture them about how they didn't really dig into its deeper mechanics and they will be right in terms of that actual fight.
So in my opinion, this is bad game design, really bad- they should be encouraging players to experience the full range of gameplay through the game's core driving force which, in this case, is story. Yet they chose to allow- encourage!- us to beat the story without worrying too much about doing cool combat shit. Ugh.
This is why I maintain Witcher 3's combat is "good"- because it's good in context of the game. It fits with the quests, it's not there to give you sick combos and git gud skill checks, it's their to provide interaction and tension for quest progression.
The opposite extreme in style but also good is of course Soulsborne, where combat is the point and the "story" is just context for it so you experience core game THROUGH combat, and the mechanics are designed for that. Story, world design, mechanics, all working hand-in-hand in very different ways, each that fit what those games offer.
So where this leaves me w/ FF16- well I was able to complete 6 of the 7 times trials and got stuck on the last one. I wanted to see if I could do everything in NG before considering NG+, but if I can't beat this trial after a few more attempts that'll be it for me. A NG+ run where I skip the cut scenes and side quests to just focus on combat is intriguing, but I also am not up for re-doing those big kaiju battles because of course all that good combat stuff doesn't apply and they are so, so long.
And really how much can I- a general casual- get out of more combat? Because once I've tried all the abilities and messed around with builds, I've found the "optimal" approach (close to the one described on PowerPyx's NG+ guide) taking advantage on the last ability you get, which means that combat is again repetitive.
Which all means: I start the game, combat is repetitive boring button mashy. After like half the game, combat gets good cause I have abilities and experimentation and variety. For a short while near and post end game, combat is REALLY great in a silly way. Then with my optimal build, it gets back as it was at the very start- repetitive button mashy, just with more colors.
Is FF16's combat "good?" Seems like a dumb question because it's the only thing about the game getting universally praised, at least by those accepting or liking the action combat (complaining about it not being turn-based or "real FF" or RPG is beside the point right now). Is it good action combat?
And IMO, it... is... sort of.
What is it "good" at? It is extremely good at giving you the power to execute sequences of action that look and feel absolutely amazing. Stringing combos where the animation on screen look awesome and stylish on their own but- impressively- also somehow match the input you gave it thematically and in pacing, on a micro fraction second by fraction second moment.
I mean like- you land a couple attacks with your fire magic while switching to ice magic to chhecking that your ice magic AoE ability has cooled down, point your camera at the big monster, hit the ice magic thing and Clive goes WHAA- giving you a quick pause to register that yes indeed your tactic is working- then he slams his sword into the ground the monster loses significant stagger and your whole brain has shifted from stagger to damage and off you go... like everything works so goddamn perfectly in these moments.
It is also good at build variety. With all these abilities, you can go for much frequent attacks, tanking, flying up in the air, building up to BIG attacks, and many combinations therein. Each ability is interesting and is fun to try out. I am impressed that there is a shield ability and it can actually be useful, that is not my experience in most games (please don't ask me for examples just for some reason I see shields and I go BLECH except this game).
What is it "bad" at? It is bad at actually feeling like a fight. Your primary attack is a sword and no matter which builds, equipment, levels or whatever, it always feels like I'm hitting a skyscraper with a spork- sure if I do it enough it'll go down but.. yeesh. Most of the time, actually hitting things with your spork sword is just biding time until your abilities charge. So combat consists of dodging around while spamming spork and checking our abilities for them to be available. That is where the "button mashing" feels comes in.
If you play more strategically- where you create a build with certain abilities you only use when an enemy is staggered or you're surrounded etc- then you are implementing your battle plan and this is really what you should be doing but then it feels like playing a meta not having a fight.
It is also "bad" at letting you actually do all the cool stuff while actually playing the base game- and this is the combat's greatest failing. All that stuff I said about combos and abilities and strategy- if you're like me and mostly just wanna beat the game (and I do include side quests), you don't really need to worry about all that until the last couple boss fights and the most difficult monster hunts. No, you can just spork spam in between watching the endless cut scenes.
I suspect most players will beat FF16 without experiencing the best part about the game and that is a shame. They will complain about boring combat and they will be right. Fans of it will lecture them about how they didn't really dig into its deeper mechanics and they will be right in terms of that actual fight.
So in my opinion, this is bad game design, really bad- they should be encouraging players to experience the full range of gameplay through the game's core driving force which, in this case, is story. Yet they chose to allow- encourage!- us to beat the story without worrying too much about doing cool combat shit. Ugh.
This is why I maintain Witcher 3's combat is "good"- because it's good in context of the game. It fits with the quests, it's not there to give you sick combos and git gud skill checks, it's their to provide interaction and tension for quest progression.
The opposite extreme in style but also good is of course Soulsborne, where combat is the point and the "story" is just context for it so you experience core game THROUGH combat, and the mechanics are designed for that. Story, world design, mechanics, all working hand-in-hand in very different ways, each that fit what those games offer.
So where this leaves me w/ FF16- well I was able to complete 6 of the 7 times trials and got stuck on the last one. I wanted to see if I could do everything in NG before considering NG+, but if I can't beat this trial after a few more attempts that'll be it for me. A NG+ run where I skip the cut scenes and side quests to just focus on combat is intriguing, but I also am not up for re-doing those big kaiju battles because of course all that good combat stuff doesn't apply and they are so, so long.
And really how much can I- a general casual- get out of more combat? Because once I've tried all the abilities and messed around with builds, I've found the "optimal" approach (close to the one described on PowerPyx's NG+ guide) taking advantage on the last ability you get, which means that combat is again repetitive.
Which all means: I start the game, combat is repetitive boring button mashy. After like half the game, combat gets good cause I have abilities and experimentation and variety. For a short while near and post end game, combat is REALLY great in a silly way. Then with my optimal build, it gets back as it was at the very start- repetitive button mashy, just with more colors.
I feel like the simple fix to this would be to have monsters weak to certain things so that the player would be encouraged to try a different eikon or skill set up in different area's of the game. It doesn't have to pile on complexity, it merely has to offer strategy because strategy breeds experimentation in the average player. Crazy players will come out with insane combo videos (as there have been already) and that wont change. But to get your run of the mill player to do things you have to encourage them by offering situations where doing different spells would be far more effective.
That sort of thing could help, of course, but it would really have to work in how quest and progression is designed. For example, I would hate to encounter a fire monster that was vulnerable to my ice magic but I didn't have my ice magic equipped because the previous monster was ice, so I die and have to change my loadout. That would be incredibly frustrating and I wouldn't be surprised if that's why they didn't include elemental effects in the combat.
I don't think there's a simple fix, it's baked into the game. It was a deliberate choice to put advanced DMC/Bayonetta combat IN a FF16, but to not make it actually THE game.
Listening to it now... they also cite Witcher 3 as doing successfully what FF16 fails to in terms of world design, character presentation and quest design. So it's not just me that still thinks that way, hahah.
I knew it had some of that design, I just didn't think it went that deep. Though I started realizing that after looking at Jim Sterling's video from last week, and looking at some of the comment sections in that video. So I was proven wrong in that regard.
One of the fundamental things that Japanese developers consistently fail at, its side content. Most JRPGs have side quests as an after thought, completionist content is cataloging every blade of grass and flower, or uber boss fights.
While hard bosses are fine they are strictly endgame things, and there is always a problem with general side content to do that can be done along side the main game. Ff7remake fails at this, xenoblade fails at this, tales games fail at this.
The only exceptions i can think of are the Yakuza games and Persona games.
You are not wrong, but I feel most western developers having messing this up too. Not to the extent of most Japanese developed games, but this past decade has either had lousy side quests or side content that's just a horrible waste of time.
Actually I kind of feel like the Western RPG's have the opposite problem, in which the side content is really good but the main quest is dogshit. Fallout 4 comes to mind where the main quest makes no sense but the side quests are great, side quests are SO good in fact they make you not give a shit about your kidnapped kid.
Simmons and Andrew actually bring this up briefly when it comes to some of the Assassin Creed or later Far Cry games. Though that leads to the opposite problem of fatigue setting in, and not wanted to buy even bother with the main quest. As you mentioned earlier. And while certain Western RPGs have better side quests in comparison, there's the issue of not caring about the main quest if it's done that poorly. Then again, this is kind of why I don't bother with most Western RPGs. Simmons and Andrews are also brought up a good example with Mass Effect 2. Both the side quests and the main quest s are great. While there aren't as many planets explore like the first one, it's considered a good thing, because of the smaller scale, the open-endedness or small open world becomes more organic and packed with better and tighter flowing game content.
Size of the world is meaningless if there is nothing to do in it. Or what's there is a hassle to travel to.
That's one of the things the Yakuza games gets so right, the city in which the game takes place is very small in open world terms, but there is so much shit to so within that small world that you never notice how small it really is.