“This is a fantasy based on reality.” Square Enix used this in the original trailer for Final Fantasy Versus XIII, and it looks like they’re living up to it.
Final Fantasy XV has come a long way from its Final Fantasy Versus XIII days. The story has been re-worked, new characters have been brought in, and there's even been a change in director. Tetsuya Nomura had started the project, but handed it over to Hajime Tabata, who was the director of Final Fantasy Type-0. In the most recent Active Time Report, Tabata tells of the decisions they made regarding the story. They had decided to stay as faithful as possible to Kazushige Nojima’s story for Versus, while also working towards giving XV a complete story that could stand on its own.
In the end, they attempted to make everything fit, but some factors just weren’t working out. One of these is the character of Stella, who was meant to play the heroine opposite Noctis. Stella’s character and role weren’t making much sense in the context of FFXV, so the decision was made to cut her from the story. They’ve introduced a new character in her place: a heroine named Luna, who will play a different role in the story. More details about her will be discussed in the future.
Also cut from the game was the opening scene in Versus XIII, where a party taking place in the castle in the crown city of Insomnia is disrupted by the enemy forces of Niflheim. This scene had to be removed to give way to story development, and Tabata is careful not to tell us what replaced it, as it could be considered a spoiler.
Cutting that opening scene does not mean that the City of Insomnia will cease to exist, though. In fact, they’ve preserved it specifically because they anticipated that the fans were expecting some gameplay in that location. The original plan had been to begin combat after the opening scene, when the Niflheim army attacks the city, but they’ve changed it so that the City of Insomnia will allow for gameplay at a different point in the timeline.
Tabata makes clear that the game they are working on is no longer Versus XIII. It has begun to come into its own as Final Fantasy XV, and the team is working hard on it so that they can present something beautiful to the fans of the series.
And beautiful it is! Thank goodness Square Enix hasn’t been stingy with showing us sneak peeks of what they’re working on, and have released their second tech demo. There’s an adorable little disclaimer that this is still a work in progress, and that their plan is to make it even better:
A completely dynamic, realistic environment will be part of the package in Final Fantasy XV. The team is aiming for realism, and while some of these details may seem small, they contribute to the overall gaming experience. It looks like they’ve got realistic light and shadows down, and the environment has achieved what could almost be called spontaneity. Sudden rain clouds, anyone?
Even the character’s skin has been given attention to. FFXV being built exclusively for next-gen consoles has opened doors in terms of how much detail designers can now put into our games. The characters now have glowing skin, as opposed to just flat flesh tones.
Has anyone ever paid attention to in-game cars? Normally they're given a synthetic “sheen” that looks very plastic. Noctis’ car has been given plenty of detail, from the shimmery automotive paint down to the chrome mags. We’d get in and drive it ourselves, if it was possible.
The food did not escape the developer’s eye for detail, either. While the graphics of the food itself seem a little crude at the moment, the physics simulation is very much on point. Shove your bowl and the soup swishes back and forth, drop your plate and the food will fall behind before eventually plopping onto the plate again. Character Artist Yuki Matsuo mentioned making cuisine look so good, “the players can taste it.” We’ll try not to lick our screens.
All of these efforts are working towards the goal of removing the disconnect in the movement of all the factors. No levitating plates or unusually still soup, no hover hands when a character is trying to support themselves against a surface. AI won’t be “dumb” anymore, and factors can move independently from one another. We’ve seen a couple of examples of “wind blowing through character’s hair but clothes staying perfectly still,” and the FFXV team is doing everything to ensure that won’t happen here.
It’s obvious that it will still be a while before we can get our hands on the completed game, but it would seem that Square Enix hopes to appease its fans with a small offering: Episode Duscae 2.0. Players had gripes with the initial demo, saying it handled poorly, and that combat was boring. They heard about these complaints, and promised to deliver an updated version, which will only be available to those who already own Episode Duscae. Looks like they’re delivering on that promise, even following their “early June” announcement. Check out how it looks in this video:
Things are looking cleaner and sharper, but we won’t really know how it handles until it’s released. We’re hoping that they’ve addressed the players’ concerns and that this updated demo will run smoothly.
It looks like Square Enix is really putting a lot of work into this project, and Final Fantasy XV is turning out to be a visual feast; will you be partaking in it? Episode Duscae 2.0 will be released on June 9th.
