Final Fantasy XV has quickly become the most talked about game this week with its surprising appearance at Tokyo Game Show. Its trailer was unlike what many expected, showing four main characters driving a car around in an open environment, pummeling enemies along the way.
A live stream has just ended which provided a ton of information about Final Fantasy XV and the demo that will be released for free in the near future. Here’s what you need to know.
- Final Fantasy’s roots. Square Enix is purposefully to make Final Fantasy XV feel like it’s made for fans of the series, while adding new elements.
- Kingdom Hearts inspired. It originally was being designed to play very similar to Kingdom Hearts. Some of those qualities have been cut out during development, though the action combat is more similar to Kingdom Hearts than any previous Final Fantasy game.
- No demo spoilers. The demo won’t incorporate any major story elements. It’ll mostly be a demo of the combat and open-world environment.
- A substantial demo. The demo is roughly one hour’s worth of one of the earlier sections of the game, but Square Enix expects players to spend three to four hours playing it.
- No boss battles in the demo. Square Enix has emphasized that the boss battles are absolutely breath-taking, and wants to save them for the final release. There will be no bosses in the demo.
- Dodge and block. While in combat you can block and dodge. It’s very much an action oriented style of gameplay.
- Character specialization. Each character in your party has a different fighting style, meaning they all have their own strengths and weaknesses. Making smart use of these combat styles is an integral part of the battle system. Also, you can combo with characters.
- Day/night cycle. There’s a full day/night cycle in the game, which will make its way to the demo. Director Hajime Tabata has been very surprised by the power of next-gen consoles, and this is one benefit of increased processing power.
- Almost done. The demo is said to be “70 – 80% complete”. An early 2015 deployment is likely, with a final release of Final Fantasy XV in 2016.
- A simple plot. Square Enix is going with a more basic story this time around, which it says is centered around “the boys trying to get back a stolen crystal from an enemy country”. The world will be similar to that of Final Fantasy Type-0 and Final Fantasy XIII, although it’s not the same.
Related: Final Fantasy XV TGS 2014 Trailer
So yes, it’s going to be a while longer before we get our hands on Final Fantasy XV, but it’s looking like it’ll be worth it. In the meantime, here’s a demonstration of the game straight from Tokyo Game Show:
