IGN FF16 review is almost like a critique of FF14's own issues

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Originally Posted by RitsukoSonoda

However when you compare the substance and gameplay from older games in franchises like God of War you see that those too have been trimmed to be more linear over time. Elden Ring was a case of the opposite scenario of refining and expanding on past titles as a Souls Game by applying the formula to an actual open world. Jedi Survivor is just the 2nd entry in that Jedi Souls type of game and Hogwarts Legacy was a stand alone game. They had to put more effort into things like their gameplay because they don't have a legacy built on the game's title to fall on yet. Cyberpunk2077 for the most part was just glitchy though combat aspects were found to have been trimmed or removed that were showcased in the tech demos they revealed at games events before it's launch.

Starfield I'll hold out on for a bit. I never bothered buying an Xbox X/S and Bethesda announced an "exclusive partnership" with AMD for the PC port which in the past has indicated titles not having support for Nvidia or Intel GPU specific optimizations. Kinda sad TBH because the first year or so of Bethesda titles tend to be the most interesting with all the bugs and glitches. And Bethesda saying it will be the most glitch free launch they will have ever done on a game doesn't mean much to me as that could still be more than any other buggy recent launch. :P

The primary issue IMO with FF16 is the actual game being designed as an action game. There isn't anything substantial enough to call it an RPG of any kind. Linear action games have a story and cast and generally give as many build options or more to players to progress and complete the game with. It's a switch as drastic as if the MCU decided to turn the next Avengers movie into a romcom harem anime.

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You are right about other franchises also becoming streamlined, but none do it to the degree that FF16 does. God of War on PS4 actually contains difficult encounters where making the right build could make a huge difference whereas you can pretty much randomly make a build in FF16 and win everything easily.

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Originally Posted by RitsukoSonoda

The primary issue IMO with FF16 is the actual game being designed as an action game. There isn't anything substantial enough to call it an RPG of any kind.

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Yoshida's comments on Call of Duty are quite baffing if they were accurately translated and meant to be taken seriously. He thinks CoD is like FF because you can save the world. That is the essence of FF to him. If the director of FF XVII wants to make it a FPS, he encourages it.

I find it strange that any leader in gaming would think gameplay is not an important component of their series. He puts all of the importance on the story, then the game genre can just be whatever. If you asked anyone in the past "What is Final Fantasy?" they would say it's an RPG series.

Even as an action game, FF XVI is insubstantial in some ways. Collecting weapons could have meant something if there were weapon types other than swords, such as axes and lances with different combo length and timing. Or you know, other playable characters with different strengths.

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Originally Posted by Rufalus

Even as an action game, FF XVI is insubstantial in some ways. Collecting weapons could have meant something if there were weapon types other than swords, such as axes and lances with different combo length and timing. Or you know, other playable characters with different strengths.

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The problem that I have with gear in this game is that weapons, belt and bracelets are basic stat sticks. Same premise as in FF14, it just goes up and the new sword will always be better than the last sword, no need to think. It's not even like you have options of high dmg-low stagger vs. low dmg-high stagger or neutral. And the armor is just def and hp.

If we look away from the timely accessories, all but one of them does something instead of just being numerical change (cool-down reduction, damage+%, etc). Berserker ring actually does change your playstyle a bit, making you more rewarded for timing your dodges for the bonus attack which changes both lunge and makes your 4-hit combo into a 6-hit combo.
But then you're basicly just handed this ring for doing anything and getting 85 renown. It's not something you find in a side-room of a dungeon or an optional dungeon.
Even something like Genji Gloves are given based on renown, and are a basic, universal +5%.

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Originally Posted by Kisshu

The problem that I have with gear in this game is that weapons, belt and bracelets are basic stat sticks. Same premise as in FF14, it just goes up and the new sword will always be better than the last sword, no need to think. It's not even like you have options of high dmg-low stagger vs. low dmg-high stagger or neutral. And the armor is just def and hp.

If we look away from the timely accessories, all but one of them does something instead of just being numerical change (cool-down reduction, damage+%, etc). Berserker ring actually does change your playstyle a bit, making you more rewarded for timing your dodges for the bonus attack which changes both lunge and makes your 4-hit combo into a 6-hit combo.
But then you're basicly just handed this ring for doing anything and getting 85 renown. It's not something you find in a side-room of a dungeon or an optional dungeon.
Even something like Genji Gloves are given based on renown, and are a basic, universal +5%.

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Well in the case of FFXIV every gear slot is just a stat stick as well. At least FFXI gave us gear pieces with interesting effects.

I still feel like FF16 needs to be renamed Final Fantasy Rising Revengence and a new RPG commissioned for the 16th main line title entry. The thing TBH that bothers me the most is these western "gaming journalists" have basically shown they're completely oblivious to the majority of reasons why veteran FF players aren't gushing with praise all over every part of FF16. However I bet they'd lose their minds if Activision decided to make the next mainline installment of the Call of Duty series into a turn based strategy game. There were plenty of titles out there to look at for ways to effectively keep RPG elements in an action game to make a proper action RPG but completely ignored in order to give us a short linear action game with pretty visuals and a very solid soundtrack that's less of an RPG than God of War Ragnarok which doesn't try at all to market itself as an RPG.

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Originally Posted by RitsukoSonoda

Well in the case of FFXIV every gear slot is just a stat stick as well. At least FFXI gave us gear pieces with interesting effects.

I still feel like FF16 needs to be renamed Final Fantasy Rising Revengence and a new RPG commissioned for the 16th main line title entry. The thing TBH that bothers me the most is these western "gaming journalists" have basically shown they're completely oblivious to the majority of reasons why veteran FF players aren't gushing with praise all over every part of FF16. However I bet they'd lose their minds if Activision decided to make the next mainline installment of the Call of Duty series into a turn based strategy game. There were plenty of titles out there to look at for ways to effectively keep RPG elements in an action game to make a proper action RPG but completely ignored in order to give us a short linear action game with pretty visuals and a very solid soundtrack that's less of an RPG than God of War Ragnarok which doesn't try at all to market itself as an RPG.

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This is quite true.

You could wear level 1 gear and your rotation will basically be the same thing.

There are no meaningful changes outside of leveling up, once you level nothing you do will change your job in a meaningful way.

Didn't they once say they don't make interesting gear cause min/maxers would basically ruin all their hard work at developing interesting gear?

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Originally Posted by Kisshu

The problem that I have with gear in this game is that weapons, belt and bracelets are basic stat sticks. Same premise as in FF14, it just goes up and the new sword will always be better than the last sword, no need to think. It's not even like you have options of high dmg-low stagger vs. low dmg-high stagger or neutral. And the armor is just def and hp.

If we look away from the timely accessories, all but one of them does something instead of just being numerical change (cool-down reduction, damage+%, etc). Berserker ring actually does change your playstyle a bit, making you more rewarded for timing your dodges for the bonus attack which changes both lunge and makes your 4-hit combo into a 6-hit combo.
But then you're basicly just handed this ring for doing anything and getting 85 renown. It's not something you find in a side-room of a dungeon or an optional dungeon.
Even something like Genji Gloves are given based on renown, and are a basic, universal +5%.

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Gear stopped being unique since FFIX where a lot of them had special properties attached. I suppose FFX was also like this but not to the extent that FFIX does, since you had more gear slots

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Originally Posted by Nav_Fae

Didn't they once say they don't make interesting gear cause min/maxers would basically ruin all their hard work at developing interesting gear?

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Yes. Though whether they genuinely believe that or if it's just a convenient excuse to maintain the status quo is anybody's guess. I've always found it dubious because quite a lot of players don't really operate with efficiency in mind and they've probably driven away more players through having no real meaningful choices to make in the game in general than through any confusion caused by the game being 'too complex'.

I personally never bothered with high end raiding in this game because I found the loot system to be so bland.

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Didn't they once say they don't make interesting gear cause min/maxers would basically ruin all their hard work at developing interesting gear?

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Doesnt matter in the end, as the min/maxers WILL create a meta "to be OPTIMAL you must use this and this and this and not that as you lose 0.00000001 dps" as well as the usual bring the class not the player.

Sorry but true. When you hear people spouting about issues with a miniscule difference in dps, thats what we will see. or the other usual gatekeeping "why do you "need " this gear it is for RAIDERS only..etc etc.

Min / maxers are spreadsheet addicts writ large.

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Originally Posted by VelKallor

Doesnt matter in the end, as the min/maxers WILL create a meta "to be OPTIMAL you must use this and this and this and not that as you lose 0.00000001 dps" as well as the usual bring the class not the player.

Sorry but true. When you hear people spouting about issues with a miniscule difference in dps, thats what we will see. or the other usual gatekeeping "why do you "need " this gear it is for RAIDERS only..etc etc.

Min / maxers are spreadsheet addicts writ large.

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That literally does not matter in FF14. People play suboptimally all the time. They don't meld their gear, they play suboptimal jobs, they randomly click on buttons. Only place it matters is week 1 Savage.

So actually, more interesting gearing would only be a boon to this game because most people don't care about min/maxing nor do they care about optimal compositions. If they actually did the only jobs we would see in alliance raids would be triple DRK, Sch/Ast, and Brd/Blm/Nin/Drg/Mnk.

I have to wonder what a review for FF16 would look like if it didn't have the Final Fantasy brand recognition. Seems like so long as it has Final Fantasy in the name, it just needs to be marginally competent to get a 9 or 10

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Originally Posted by Rolder50

I have to wonder what a review for FF16 would look like if it didn't have the Final Fantasy brand recognition. Seems like so long as it has Final Fantasy in the name, it just needs to be marginally competent to get a 9 or 10

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From what I've generally seen and heard, it'd probably be considered somewhere around a 6 or 7 out of 10. A fairly good game, but nowhere near a masterpiece.

Well. Physical sales of FF16 have apparently tanked in Japan. Says they dropped by 90% after the first week. Now we just need someone to confirm if Digital sales did something similar.

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Originally Posted by Rolder50

I have to wonder what a review for FF16 would look like if it didn't have the Final Fantasy brand recognition. Seems like so long as it has Final Fantasy in the name, it just needs to be marginally competent to get a 9 or 10

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The name certainly worked in their favor for sales, but I'm not sure it had an impact on reviews.
It can work both ways. Players and critics could also be harsher on a product because its part of a franchise which invokes a certain quality standard.
Many argued back in the day that FFXII would have been an instant cult classic if it wasn't called FF.

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Originally Posted by VelKallor

Doesnt matter in the end, as the min/maxers WILL create a meta "to be OPTIMAL you must use this and this and this and not that as you lose 0.00000001 dps" as well as the usual bring the class not the player.

Sorry but true. When you hear people spouting about issues with a miniscule difference in dps, thats what we will see. or the other usual gatekeeping "why do you "need " this gear it is for RAIDERS only..etc etc.

Min / maxers are spreadsheet addicts writ large.

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I can't actually tell if you're for or against stats and varying equipment.. But what I will say is, when Mario Kart has more stat and equipment variation than both XIV and XVI combined.. We got a problem. lol

And regardless of meta, I'll still always pick Yoshi. My fun is my fun.

Hmmm, no, while fF14 expansions have a lot of cutscenes they aren't "as" prevalent and present as in FFF16 the BIG difference also in an mmo like FF14 is that it is AFTER the story and cutscenes that you get a consequential END GAME and a huge part of the game opens to you, while in FF16, when you finish the story, you don't have this huge library of content (raids, craft, expert dungeons, collectibles, mounts, pets, item chase, cosmetic chase, gold saucer, chocobo races, savage dungeons, deep dungeons, bozja, ultimates, fates, many many many ways into completionism).

And yet FF14 still has a lot of the final fantasy magic in it, despite pushing us toward killing gods and destroying aether, that is a Yoshi P vision i don't like and i wish the game doesn't completely fall into, i wouldn't like having a mmo stripped of viera, roethgars and catgirls / boys even if it ment a huge cataclysm leaving only them morphed into humans (you can see a few examples of this in some humans that have the stature and thickness of rothgars and roegadyn in FF16 that are a callout to these specific humanoids) FF16 feels like a humanized down world of what was FF14 a thousand of year after we got the world of eorzea rid of primals, the 12 previous gods and 12 current gods, Hydaelyn "when there is nothing left you can only count on yourself, believe in you" is a clear warning sign that the mmo story wants to stir to this direction of "human" are only what is going to be left roaming the world at some point. And i'm not fond of a final fantasy stripped out of it's fantasy, clearly this is what it would be.

I see Yoshi P's vision of Final Fantasy as something really sad stripping it from it's core juice and heart as more of a finance individual then a real creative type respecting FF's lore, mythology and creatures, i don't want FF to end up being just a medieval "without most of the fantasy" online.

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Originally Posted by Katt_Felista

Hmmm, no, while fF14 expansions have a lot of cutscenes they aren't "as" prevalent and present as in FFF16 the BIG difference also in an mmo like FF14 is that it is AFTER the story and cutscenes that you get a consequential END GAME and a huge part of the game opens to you, while in FF16, when you finish the story, you don't have this huge library of content (raids, craft, expert dungeons, collectibles, mounts, pets, item chase, cosmetic chase, gold saucer, chocobo races, savage dungeons, deep dungeons, bozja, ultimates, fates, many many many ways into completionism).

And yet FF14 still has a lot of the final fantasy magic in it, despite pushing us toward killing gods and destroying aether, that is a Yoshi P vision i don't like and i wish the game doesn't completely fall into, i wouldn't like having a mmo stripped of viera, roethgars and catgirls / boys even if it ment a huge cataclysm leaving only them morphed into humans (you can see a few examples of this in some humans that have the stature and thickness of rothgars and roegadyn in FF16 that are a callout to these specific humanoids) FF16 feels like a humanized down world of what was FF14 a thousand of year after we got the world of eorzea rid of primals, the 12 previous gods and 12 current gods, Hydaelyn "when there is nothing left you can only count on yourself, believe in you" is a clear warning sign that the mmo story wants to stir to this direction of "human" are only what is going to be left roaming the world at some point. And i'm not fond of a final fantasy stripped out of it's fantasy, clearly this is what it would be.

I see Yoshi P's vision of Final Fantasy as something really sad stripping it from it's core juice and heart as more of a finance individual then a real creative type respecting FF's lore, mythology and creatures, i don't want FF to end up being just a medieval "without most of the fantasy" online.

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I fail to see that with that last point you made. Nowhere is there a complete "killing" of the fantasy elements. If you actually played the full game of FFXVI the further you go in the further it delves into the typical FF formula of ancient magic and gods trying to mess up your good Saturday.

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Originally Posted by Rolder50

I have to wonder what a review for FF16 would look like if it didn't have the Final Fantasy brand recognition. Seems like so long as it has Final Fantasy in the name, it just needs to be marginally competent to get a 9 or 10

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This is actually the best way to look at games and movies. You find out that "bad" games are actually quite good and "good" games are actually quite horrible.

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Originally Posted by Atelier-Bagur

I fail to see that with that last point you made. Nowhere is there a complete "killing" of the fantasy elements. If you actually played the full game of FFXVI the further you go in the further it delves into the typical FF formula of ancient magic and gods trying to mess up your good Saturday.

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I thought I was going to play an engaging game, not just watch Kingsglaive 2.

Monsua - I don't think I could have said it any better myself.

On one hand, I have to acknowledge how great Yoshi P. is at managing, as along with money from FF11 Yoshi P. helped the company make a turn around, and i'm grateful for that. But I just don't see him as a creative visionary and if anything he hasn't really shown an ability to innovate or "better" gameplay in either FF14, or FF16. They just copy and then homogenize from there. And from what I have seen in his interviews via the FFXI 20th anniversary, and one of the FF16 press releases, he seems to have this idea that everything should be homogenized, easier, and that traditional RPG elements don't work.

These are sentiments I fully understand from a business and financial perspective, but its not something I want to hear from a leader of arguably the biggest creative team at one of my favorite gaming companies where their focus should be on trying to come out with the best product they possible can. And now with the success of Baldurs Gate 3, it seems like a lot of the excuses and arguments for things that we have been told aren't manageable or that aren't profitable are being shattered as myth, since a much smaller team has accomplished alchemizing gold.

That said, I have to 100% acknowledge that Yoshi P. has garnered his own (i think mostly non endemic) fan base, and they do generally outnumber the fans who are more likely endemic to games with RPG elements. My real worry is that because of that, I wonder what SE's action will be from here on forward. I mean I honestly consider myself a casual, as in I can play games considered "hardcore" (FF11) casually without spending 5 hours a day and don't always pick the hardest settings, but I like to actually try in games given I have the time. But this fan base seems to be that of "Ultra Casuals" who obviously don't hold the same gamer values so to speak, and actively shoot down any criticism that could be used to make the games better. If that's the case, it makes me so insanely hopeful for FF7R2. Yeah i'm not stoked that the best game SE has come out with in a while is a remake, but I REALLY appreciate the fact that the team is actively working on innovating the genre, something SE used to be known for, and pushing the boundaries of what an RPG can actually be combat wise, without relinquishing what made Final Fantasy's gameplay the gold standard for RPG's.

Anyways this is just a game/franchise, and I don't have any personal ill will toward Yoshi P., I just think that his creative visions is so far removed from my personal tastes which Final Fantasy as a brand used to perfectly nail. And admittedly it kinda hurts and it worries me for the future as he currently has a very high standing in the company.

I'mma be real. I'd rate FFXVI at like a 5-6 out of 10 at best. It's middle of the road. The story is somewhat serviceable, but it plays like it's a product of uh... well, lemme put it this way:

Kid: "Mom, can we get Devil May Cry?"
Mom: "We have Devil May Cry at home."

Devil May Cry at home:
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...6068/image.png