Final Fantasy XV Director Discusses the Gameplay

Ever since the Final Fantasy XV storm started at the Tokyo Game Show, some of us have sworn we won't play the game, some of us are disappointed, and many are super excited! Despite this, there is that overall air of confusion lingering around the whole thing. So much news has popped seemingly out of nowhere after having so little for so long. It's a good job that the director, Hajime Tabata has been on hand to try and clear up a few concerns...

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-The following interview snippets are from the interview at the Final Fantasy Type-0 HD Extended Talk Show-

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Q: Can you change the operational character?
A：Not in its current specifications. Everyone on the development team thoroughly looked into an Active Cross Battle system that made free use of attack, guard, and co-op functions, but as a result they arrived at the conclusion that changing characters would be too difficult. In order to create a new and interesting battle system, we ended up not being able to put in the character switching.

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Q: I can’t tell if it’s more like Kingdom Hearts or Final Fantasy Type-0. Which is it?
A: We explained that when you push the attack button, you invoke the standard combo, which is similar to Type-0. Considering the battle system as a whole, however, it is different from both Type-0 and Kingdom Hearts.

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Q: Haven’t you been poor at putting out information?

A: If our fans are uneasy about the information we have released, then our ways of issuing information may in fact be poor. Even though we didn’t have a lot of time, I wanted to make clear the current situation. In the future, our information releases might be poor, but I think we can receive your approval.

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As a bonus, Tabata has let us know when we can expect more information.

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“I get reports everyday from development staff about what was said on the internet. If we have material, I’d like to release development information again in a live broadcast like this on November 1.”

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You can read the full interview here, at Gematsu.

Tabata also revealed that he is finding the Final Fantasy XV car memes hilarious. He's roflcopter-ing so much he's letting you guys take some car meme assets like the one below to make more. Yippee for Tabata being a cool guy with a sense of humour right?

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Well, I can't say I like the direction this game is headed, but I really respect Tabata a lot. He seems like he's really trying to connect, listen, and respond to fans, and that's a lot more than what most of Square Enix is doing, so good on him.

Yep, Tabata is the type of person SE needs. It's not really his fault that FFXV has been a huge clustersmurf up until now. In the end, the game may be good, it may be not, but I rest assured Tabata will do his best to make the best game with what he's been given.

Why do they keep calling the car screenshots 'assets'? Such a weird word to use.

Must be a Japanese thing.

I do like the approach Tabata is taking and I hope he takes this whole presenting us with news thing to heart and we hear more as things move forward.

Not surprised the party switching was removed since it would have probably involved some serious work on retooling the engine to make everyone work. Considering we still haven't really seen the "meat and potatoes" of the gameplay engine, I have a feeling this decision will make sense in hindsight.

I will also agree with the group sentiment that Tabata has been handling the information about the game far better and he's certainly seems to be trying to make up for all the lost time this game has had considering we went eight years with nothing but two alpha concept trailers, Nomura considering to turn it into a musical, and vaporware rumor with little else to go on, it's about time we finally get some serious information.

Damn, on the no character switching, but at least this man is getting us a lot of info now after all these years.

He seems pretty confident. Somehow his confidence is reassuring. Unlike all their confidence in how much we must all love Lightning and FFXIII, I actually take a little stock in this guy's vision. Here's hoping it doesn't deflate too much

I love Tabata's laid back style and confidence. The fact that he released the meme templates is a good indication of the way he plans on treating/interacting with the fans in the future. It's really great to see!

He had a wonderful quote in an interview last week that really sums up why I think he's the perfect man for the job:

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"If we don't do something that people think is amazing, it's meaningless," Tabata said. "If we don't do something that's challenging, it's also meaningless."

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I see the word "co-op" and wonder if this game is going to be multiplayer, but he probably just means the A.I. partners.

Pretty much agree with everything that has been said about Tabata.