Square-Enix Magazine - News on battle system, story, characters, gameplay, etc.

SQUARE ENIX MAGAZINE

Battle System
- You will have the ability fight alongside befriended monsters.
- You can pick and mix several different monsters in preparation for a battle.
- Monsters will have special abilities which will be similar to that of the Eidolons in FFXIII.
- The battle system will retain paradigm shifts.
- The battle system will be even faster and more dynamic than that of FFXIII.

Gameplay
- Gameplay will feature puzzle-solving elements.
- While FFXIII was 'story-driven', this game will be 'player-driven' with elements of interaction and choice.
- There will be a new game progression system which encourages the player to explore the world and various challenges on offer.

Characters / Storyline
- Noel will act as protagonist in the game.
- FFXIII's characters will all feature in FFXIII-2, and "every one of them will have some involvement in the story - albeit in an unexpected fashion."
- The game will have a 'darker' tone.
- The player detailed alongside Lightning in the logo is still being kept secret by SE for now, but they have stated he shares a relationship with Noel Kreiss.
- Noel grew up in Gran Pulse in a very different environment to that of Vanille & Fang, and was ignorant of life on Cocoon. He has survived in harsh conditions where you have to fight monsters to survive, and is burdened by a heavy destiny.
- Lightning will go into battle at the very beginning of the game wearing the armour featured in FFXIII-2 trailers.
- While FFXIII featured the gods Lindzei and Pulse, it will be Etro who will feature strongly in FFXIII-2. Feathers floating around Lightning in trailers symbolise Etro.

It also mentions enhanced graphics - which is crazy, as FFXIII's graphics were already good enough. xD

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Originally Posted by Loony BoB

- Noel will act as protagonist in the game.

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So a new character will be the protagonist, not Lightning or Serah? Well, this should be interesting.

Although, FFXIII really didn't have a single protagonist. Lightning is about as much the protagonist of XIII as Terra is in VI.

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- The battle system will be even faster and more dynamic than that of FFXIII.

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:( That translates into less control.

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Originally Posted by VeloZer0

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- The battle system will be even faster and more dynamic than that of FFXIII.

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:( That translates into less control.

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wow....so basically you just want more turn-based action like the old titles? I'm glad SE is not going in that direction. The battle system was one of the most innovative the series has seen in a LONG time. If they want it to be faster and more dynamic, then all the power to them. RPG's are all going down the "action" path and real time strategy is almost (except for a few cases) out the door for the most part. I love how SE is not following the mold from other companies and are trying something different!

/rant

Well, I'm with Velo on this one. I much prefer old-school turn-based battles than 'just mash X for Auto-Battle'. It's not unreasonable to want that in a FF game since that's what I-X basically were. I understand that to increase speed of battle you generally have to sacrifice control, but I would have thought the FFXIII was the extreme and the battles in this game would get a tweak in the other direction, rather than becoming more fast and automated. Really, I just want to control all my characters. That's what bugged me the most about XII and XIII.

I'm disappointed that Lightning isn't the starring role when that was what was implied when this game was first announced. I hope Noel isn't a douche. I'm also disappointed that it sounds like you won't have any PCs outside Noel and Serah, but it's too early to tell at this point.

Other than that, everything sounds pretty cool. :D

I apologize for liking turn based. Some people like it, some people don't. It is in no way obsolete.

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...so basically you just want more turn-based action like the old titles?

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No, I want a turn based system that has been improved with decades of experience. I am not anti-change, I just am a fan of something more strategic.

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The battle system was one of the most innovative the series has seen in a LONG time.

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I agree. But Most Innovative =/= Best. I think they did a good job with it, but control and strategy are why I was attracted to RPGs over action titles in the first place.

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...RPG's are all going down the "action" path ...
...I love how SE is not following the mold from other companies...

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Saying RPGs are all going down this path and applauding going down this path as being original are two contradictory statements in nature.

Is it good that SE is innovating? Yes. Do I feel they are fixing what isn't broken while not addressing their real problems? Also yes.

I, too, love turn based battles and would very much like to see another I through X style battle system someday, though I didn't expect it with this game, and I liked XIII's battle system.

Yeah, I don't mean to imply that I didn't like XIII's battle system. I played the game the whole way through, after all. I just prefer more control, and I really disliked stupid rules like 'game over if party leader dies'. That's a really dumb rule in an FF game.

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Originally Posted by VeloZer0

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...RPG's are all going down the "action" path ...
...I love how SE is not following the mold from other companies...

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Saying RPGs are all going down this path and applauding going down this path as being original are two contradictory statements in nature.

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Okay wait, I think you misunderstood the last part. When I said RPG's are heading down the "action path" I mean titles like Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Fallout, Elder Scrolls, etc. When I said SE's not following the mold, I meant they're not indulging in "press ____ to swing sword" or "pull trigger to shoot" for their main entry this generation. SE is definitely shifting it's tactical aspects to the gameplay, but their not doing it in the way that the WRPG developers chose to go. That's what I was applauding. Sorry for the confusion. And just to be clear, I wan't trying to bash turn-based combat or anything. I love the classic FF titles and Persona is one of my favorite JRPG series so it's not like I hate it or anything. I thought you were one of those "anti-change" people parading the interwebs. SE does make occasional jumps into the turnbase realm from time to time (albeit it's usually a portable entry), but I think their main entry AAA console titles should bring something new to the table that's all.

It is interesting how nowadays we associate SE with bringing in a completely new battle system for every FF, but prior to the tenth installment in the series they only changed the battle system once. The party system changed every game, but the battle system was a fairly static ATB.

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...but I think their main entry AAA console titles should bring something new to the table that's all

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I tend to think the exact opposite. :p Keep the core FF brand as a fairly predictable experience. Every game should be different, but more in line with the changes FF1-9. New IPs should be used for experimentation, and when they hit on something truly excellent they can build their own series out of it. If they are completely re-inventing the wheel every time what does 'Final Fantasy' mean other than a label to put on something to increase sales?

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...and I really disliked stupid rules like 'game over if party leader dies'. That's a really dumb rule in an FF game.

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I still can't fathom why they didn't let us change party leaders in battle.

I'm with Velo and Del on this, except unlike the rest of you, I will freely admit I didn't like XIII's battle system cause it lacked control and is not as strategic as people like to treat it. I'm kind of sad that SE has forsaken fully controllable ATB to cater to fans who want more action style battle systems that look like cutscenes. I still feel there are ideas that can be used to expand turn base combat *cough* Insert broken record reference to MegaTen and the Press Turn combat system whereas I find the newer iterations have no real means of expanding without basically just becoming action games.

Besides, I find actually controlling the badass combos and moves I pull off to be much more satisfactory. Why watch a canned stock footage of whoop ass when you can play games like God of War and Devil May Cry and manually do it all and know your character is a badass cause of your skill? Its fine for Limit Breaks and special moves, but building a combat system to make all combat like this, not only diminishes the awesome factor of seeing such moves, but its pretty annoying when the developers don't trust the player to have the skill to pull it off themselves, so they automate it. Watching your party juggle a big ass Behemoth was pretty cool when you first saw it, by end game, its lost all its luster, and you just wish he enemy would finally die so you can get your loot and get to where you want to go.

On topic, I'm not surprised they are keeping the combat system, and I actually like the monster party member idea cause its rare that I see a game botch it up. Course I didn't think XIII would suck as much as I thought it would, but some things like to overachieve. Still, the changes made so far are promising, and even what gameplay I've seen on videos has made this sequel look much more promising than its predecessor. Will I buy it on day 1? No, I pretty much have no plans of ever picking the game up. I might borrow it from a friend, and even that is unlikely. I've already moved onto new shores, and hoping Type-0 gets a Western release, so I can have something FF to play while I watch Versus XIII finally get released when everyone is more interested in finding out what Microsoft and Sony's next gen consoles are going to be released.

I liked XIII's battle system. I also like turn based systems. I do think that the main series should be innovative rather than forcing that on the spinoff games - but then, I don't think we should have so many spinoff games to begin with anyway. I would rather they spent more time focusing on the main series. But yeah, innovative is good. That can mean any part of the game, but if it means the battle system, so be it. I found XIII's system enjoyable because of the speed at which it moved and the ease at which you could change strategy and still have your team do pretty much what you would be asking them to do if you did have complete control. I can't think of a way off the to of my head that they could have made such a fast battle system without sacrificing control.

Having said all that, I do wish you could switch party leader mid-battle and I do wish that if your party leader died, the party leader role was simply switched to another character automatically.

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Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno

Its fine for Limit Breaks and special moves, but building a combat system to make all combat like this, not only diminishes the awesome factor of seeing such moves, but its pretty annoying when the developers don't trust the player to have the skill to pull it off themselves, so they automate it.

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I agree, but at the same time I think

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Watching your party juggle a big ass Behemoth was pretty cool when you first saw it, by end game, its lost all its luster, and you just wish he enemy would finally die so you can get your loot and get to where you want to go.

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It didn't lose it's lustre for me - I enjoyed it all the way through the game. As for wishing the enemy would finally die so you can get your loot - it was the fastest battle system out there, battles were surely over much faster than they were using the old and very slow ATB system.

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On topic, I'm not surprised they are keeping the combat system, and I actually like the monster party member idea cause its rare that I see a game botch it up.

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It's so far come across to me as the new Summon skill, but we'll see how it goes. If you can all fight alongside the monster, great. If it doesn't slow down the pace of battle, great. But if it's just like Eidolons in FFXIII, I'll barely ever use them.

Actually, it depends on how you set-up your characters but for the most part barring IV, IX, and X, ATB is pretty fast in the rest of the series. Compared to some of the fights in XIII? no, but some of those fights are over so fast its not like I even had a chance to enjoy the spectacle. Yet, fights like the ones against Barthandelus, and some of the bigger Pulse creatures are incredibly long fights, I don't think I ever had a fight with Barty that wasn't over ten minutes long just cause he has HP up in the Yiazmat levels, so while most of the pointless fights are fast, it has its fair share of drudgery fights as well.

As for getting bored with combat, I did, just because every fight was virtually the same. Chain break the enemy juggle him to death. Until later when you fight the big things and it becomes: Make Vanille the lead, summon, spam death. I rarely found myself doing anything differently and watching my party juggle enemies just reminded me of Star Ocean 2 where juggling is pretty much your guaranteed strategy for victory, or the fact this combat system is pretty much Xenosaga Episode 2's combat system (though in X2 you can also smash enemies into the ground and combo additional smashes) so its not like I can't get this fix from other games that predate it, sometimes almost by ten years, but with the added bonus of having control over my party. I'm not even going to get into how much this game recycles enemy types. Juggling Behemoths does lose its luster when they are regular mooks that show up every other dungeon.

As for the enemy system, they are actually your third party member from what I've gathered, each one being specifically designed for a paradigm role. I'm thinking its something like having a Behemoth as a Commando, a Goo monster as a Ravager, or a Machine as a Sentinel. At least that is my understanding, so its not so much a summon system as much as its paradigm shifting with your monster determined by what you need your third Role to be. I'm more concerned to see if any of the returning cast will be playable besides Lightning, cause this system pretty much sets up all you need for a three man band.

Okay, if you're including boss fights, there are a lot of boss fights in other games that just go on a bit too long, too. It's just for the sake of difficulty levels. For people who aren't completley leveled up, these fights become difficult, too.

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As for getting bored with combat, I did, just because every fight was virtually the same. Chain break the enemy juggle him to death. Until later when you fight the big things and it becomes: Make Vanille the lead, summon, spam death. I rarely found myself doing anything differently and watching my party juggle enemies just reminded me of Star Ocean 2 where juggling is pretty much your guaranteed strategy for victory, or the fact this combat system is pretty much Xenosaga Episode 2's combat system (though in X2 you can also smash enemies into the ground and combo additional smashes) so its not like I can't get this fix from other games that predate it, sometimes almost by ten years, but with the added bonus of having control over my party. I'm not even going to get into how much this game recycles enemy types. Juggling Behemoths does lose its luster when they are regular mooks that show up every other dungeon.

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Doing this when you have other enemies out there that are still alive can end badly depending on the enemy, but oh well. You're right, I suppose, that it is a strategy that works well for most enemies. But then, if you look at almost every other FF, there is a familiar strategy that works on all enemies, too. For me, it went like this: Attack, Attack, Attack, Attack, Attack, Attack, Attack, Attack, victory. :p

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As for the enemy system, they are actually your third party member from what I've gathered, each one being specifically designed for a paradigm role. I'm thinking its something like having a Behemoth as a Commando, a Goo monster as a Ravager, or a Machine as a Sentinel. At least that is my understanding, so its not so much a summon system as much as its paradigm shifting with your monster determined by what you need your third Role to be. I'm more concerned to see if any of the returning cast will be playable besides Lightning, cause this system pretty much sets up all you need for a three man band.

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Ooh, that sounds great. Where did you hear that, out of curiosity? I've not seen any info about this outside of the magazine. Not sure if I missed something in there... but yeah, that sounds pretty cool =]

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Originally Posted by Loony BoB

Okay, if you're including boss fights, there are a lot of boss fights in other games that just go on a bit too long, too. It's just for the sake of difficulty levels. For people who aren't completley leveled up, these fights become difficult, too.

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Name one long fight in the older games that isn't an optional boss creature. Barthandelus is just a ridiculously long fight, all three of them.

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Doing this when you have other enemies out there that are still alive can end badly depending on the enemy, but oh well. You're right, I suppose, that it is a strategy that works well for most enemies. But then, if you look at almost every other FF, there is a familiar strategy that works on all enemies, too. For me, it went like this: Attack, Attack, Attack, Attack, Attack, Attack, Attack, Attack, victory. :p

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Except I could also choose to pelt it with magic or the whole group, I could steal from it, I could use a special technique that sometimes required additional special inputs, I could use a Summon for quick damage, switch out a party member, change some of my characters equipment, draw magic from it, actually play a real defensive role for my party, haste my whole party with one spell cast, hell, in wait mode of FFX, I could blankly stare at the screen and thing about the meaning of life between trying to remember if I did my laundry and what I want for breakfast in the morning. In XIII, I just hit auto battle cause 9 out of 10 times the computer chooses exactly what I want to do, playing sentinel/medic/buffer is incredibly boring, and in some fights, I watch my A.I. party wipe the enemy before I even choose my third command for Ravager. My only role is to babysit the A.I. and make sure it goes into a defensive paradigm shift when they get beat up too much. Even in XII, I was at least given full control of my party's A.I. script, not just canned A.I.:p

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Ooh, that sounds great. Where did you hear that, out of curiosity? I've not seen any info about this outside of the magazine. Not sure if I missed something in there... but yeah, that sounds pretty cool =]

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This was the explanation I heard during some live E3 coverage of the game when a SE rep was trying to describe the monsters role. They had one of the Jelly monsters as a third player, playing a Ravager role in the battle they demoed. Granted, I was only half paying attention, and this was a demo, so there is a good chance I could be mistaken.