Current Events > I am on the fence about getting FFXVI

(+) Yeah! (+)

Good story

Horrible pacing, horrible sidequests, and the gameplay never evolves.

Have fun picking flowers for your neighbors cause thats 70% of the game

Looks like it's down to $30 on PSN atm, which is a good price point for it. It's really fun after your toolkit opens up a bit a few hours in.

It's not a typical JRPG, though, so it might not be what you're looking for for that itch.

I played it when it first came out.

I enjoyed it well enough to finish it but it's kind of forgettable. I don't see myself doing a second playthrough.

This will not scratch that JRPG itch, since it hardly resembles one.

BlueAnnihilator posted...

This will not scratch that JRPG itch, since it hardly resembles one.

This. You wouldn't pick up Devil May Cry because you're in the mood for a JRPG, would you?

going through it now, it is kind of a slog. bosses seem to just be giant damage sponges that you whittle down their HP when they are staggered. some boss fights seem to drag on for too long with little variety because it's now an action game. story seems kind of a mess, like they had a good framework but just took small bits instead of a full story. the RPG elements are minimized as well

doesn't help that the time skips kinda just throw additional characters at you. clive just goes "oh hey new person i've known for 5 years but the player has no idea who you are" but multiple times. a real FF story should have been about gathering these people to help fight back

It's a decent game with lots of flashy moments but if you're looking for a JRPG then you might wanna pass this one

If you are looking for a good action games or JRPG, 16 is neither

Unless you can get this game for 30 bucks or less, pass. Might hit that price at Black Friday. The game has many faults on every aspect except music

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

SMT V and Octopath 2 should both work for scratching a JRPG itch, as should Bravely Default remastered (unless they messed up the remaster horribly). I'm not familiar with the others here.

If you want to scratch the JRPG itch, and mind I'll say FFXVI is a great game in my books anyway, I would heavily recommend the Romancing Saga 2 remake, Revenge of the Seven. As long as you don't mind games that can be kinda tough.

I enjoyed the gameplay and story. The gameplay isnt as deep as it advertised and the pacing and sidequests are valid criticisms. Still I enjoyed it more than any mainline game since 10.

its a good game, but it should have about 20-30% of the content cut and it would have been a better game for it

It's good. It can be much better, but it's the best single-player mainline FF I've played since 10.

I liked the game a lot.

I think its my favorite DMC style game of all time even if its a lot simpler than most games in the genre

The game would probably be more likes if it wasn't called Final Fantasy. People expected something different

PowerOats posted...

The game has many faults on every aspect except music

What about story?

its 4 hours of going to different towns to find the ingredients to make a sandwich to get a key to unlock another npc that wants you to catch 10 lightning bugs and bring each one to a separate NPC in separate towns
then a cool hour-long dungeon
then back to 4 hours of picking flowers etc for npcs

rinse.repeat

the giant boss battles look cool but theyre shit

the story has its neat parts but they basically abandon it between dungeons.
and I remember it goes completely forgotten eventually for a long while lol. the demo was the good part of the game

I fucking loathed that game. No character arcs, awful use of worn tropes, combat's not strong enough to carry a game that long, worldbuilding restricted to lectures from a character in your base, "mature" storyline for 13 year old edgelords, pointless exploration, gear is just straight upgrades.

There's one good NPC.

vigorm0rtis posted...

I fucking loathed that game. No character arcs, awful use of worn tropes, combat's not strong enough to carry a game that long, worldbuilding restricted to lectures from a character in your base, "mature" storyline for 13 year old edgelords, pointless exploration, gear is just straight upgrades.

There's one good NPC.

still massively better than 15 though

I think Final Fantasy XVI is a good game but go for SMT V Vengeance if you want to scratch that JRPG itch. I havent played Octopath Traveler 2 yet but Im sure thats a good JRPG game as well.

Final Fantasy XVI has three glaring problems in my opinion. The story starts off fairly interesting but devolves into something generic in the second half of the game. Thats a shame since the game starts off really well with the story. The prologue is excellent.

The gameplay is actually fine. The problem is that it never evolves much. Once you find what works for you when playing Clive, the main character, you can spam that until the final boss. It really doesnt help that XVI lacks a proper party system and RPG battle system elements.

Last glaring problem are the side quests. From a narrative standpoint, many of the side quests are great and expand the side characters quite well. There are some really good, heartwarming moments that many of the player base probably missed out on because they chose to skip the side quests which is unfortunate. Structurally, many of the side quests suck to actually play especially in the beginning of the game where you carrying supplies from point A to point B for example.

Honestly the game is fine even with the flaws. The main problem is if you want to do hard mode it's locked behind new game+, side quest are boring(optional which is good that you don't need to do them. Just go for ones that are important like unlocking the chocobo to ride.) lastly lacking some rpg stuff like elemental mechanics/no other playable characters/etc. Altho the party argument they did say way before the game came out it'd just be Clive mostly.

If your picky about the price then yea games been on sale for like $20-30 which you can get it for that or even lower. Better than paying $70 unlike some games out there I know

Smt v and octopath is definitely a recommend too. Can't say about atelier games since I lost interest and not for me imo.

Maybe Square Enix doesn't think it needs 2 main traditional jrpg series. They would just have Dragon Quest for that and transform Final Fantasy into action games

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

15 at least tried to be a JRPG, but development hell and having much of the story not be in the game doomed it.

16 didn't even try to be a RPG, much less a JRPG.

Zikten posted...

What about story?

I really liked it and I though it was one of its strongest aspects. It benefits from actually being comprehensible compared to something 15 or 8.

Hayame_Zero posted...

I really liked it and I though it was one of its strongest aspects. It benefits from actually being comprehensible compared to something 15 or 8.

True, the story (the main story, not the weak sidequests) is great. Simple, but says a lot and shows a lot too. Well, except for all the stuff that happens off screen and is only told in dumb map info dumps, but eh.

I actually even like the villain. Simple motivation, he does some pretty devious stuff, gets the upper hand most of the game, is incredibly intimidating at times, and has an ick factor that none of the other FF villains did.

it depends on what you're after.

If you want a good story with lots of spectacle moments, it's got that. Probably the best of modern FF (aside from some parts of 14).

If you want party management or turn based stuff it's very decidedly Not That.

As a spectacle-fighter it's good. It's not *quite* DMC but it's not really trying to be and does what it's trying to do well enough.

the pacing kind of falls apart in the back third of the game though, even worse than most FFs that go "you have the airship now we're accelerating the plot to nonsense speed"

Voidgolem posted...

it depends on what you're after.

If you want a good story with lots of spectacle moments, it's got that. Probably the best of modern FF (aside from some parts of 14).

If you want party management or turn based stuff it's very decidedly Not That.

As a spectacle-fighter it's good. It's not *quite* DMC but it's not really trying to be and does what it's trying to do well enough.

the pacing kind of falls apart in the back third of the game though, even worse than most FFs that go "you have the airship now we're accelerating the plot to nonsense speed"

Yeah unfortunately the story decides to slam on the brakes A LOT. Definitely for padding.

I thought 16 was a decent game overall but has a lot of glaring flaws that drag it down.

But if you want JRPG this absolutely ain't it. Of the ones you listed as considering, the only one I played was Octopath 2. Solid JRPG gameplay in that and the core character stories are okay, but still suffers from not enough overlap on party member stories. I would also recommend Expedition 33 if you haven't already played it.

Most of that stuff has been covered already so just kind of adding my voice to the clamor.

BlueAnnihilator posted...

This will not scratch that JRPG itch, since it hardly resembles one.

Likewise neither the DMC/Bayonetta combat action either..

As someone who genuinely likes 16, I would not recommend it to scratch a JRPG itch. Beyond being from a franchise known for JRPGs, it has basically nothing to do with them.

Gonna give another vote to Expedition 33.

I enjoyed it more than FF13 and FF15, but that isn't really saying much.

The game is gorgeous, and the eikon battles are a fun spectacle. The music is great. The story is pretty forgettable, though the world building is pretty cool if you're into that kind of thing. The side quests are bad, you can tell the team that made this game was very FF14/MMO inspired because they feel just like MMO fetch quests.

The combat is boring. You gain new eikon powers throughout the course of the game but every boss fight followed the same pattern: You do little to no damage with regular attacks, and have to wait around for your eikon powers to be off of cooldown to do any real damage.

Despite it's flaws, I still enjoyed the initial playthrough enough and 100%'d the game. I did not play any of the DLC, and I don't know if I will ever play through it a second time. It was kind of a one and done game for me.

solosnake posted...

still massively better than 15 though

Honestly, I think FF16 only beats FF15 in the main story. For combat, exploration and music, I liked 15 more than 16