Let's make a Final Fantasy XV!

[Wolf Kanno]

Oh boy, this may be long...

Battle System:
Bring back ATB, it's not dead and it offers more in terms of strategy than what you've been coming up with for the last couple of generations, the problem has been the fact Square has been making the games too easy so they stay accessible for newbies. Yet series like Demon's Souls/Dark Souls, and MegaTen have shown there is a market for challenging games. You don't have to make it as hard as those games but it doesn't mean I should be using basic attacks to win every battle. So stop with the health restoring save points and auto heal after battle, make items harder to acquire and more useful, bring back enemy gameplay variety with enemies that are immune to physical, ones that have brutal party killing counter attacks for abusive skills, boss fights that require more strategy than hit it with my limit breaks/summons. Also ditch the A.I. or at least make them optional again like XII (just give us a better interface if we choose to ignore it) cause if we slow the games down a bit we the players won't need any of that nonsense.

The other strength of using ATB is that you can make the cinematic in battle more focused. The issue with XII and XIII is that there is so much action going on the screen you can't really pay attention to the finer details. ATB would allow for the artist to go wild with cool animations and special spell effects, just make sure we have a skip function for them if we don't want to bother. Final Fantasy used to be a series known for being cinematic and I feel the most recent entries have made us feel more like an MMO or action game.

Use X's version of Summons, it was a good idea that was marred with shoddy balancing, but I feel the idea could create so much more potential for strategy if you just played with it more. I also like the Summons being something more than just a ten minute Black magic spell so let them be playable and customizable.

In terms of customization systems... Part of me wants to say FFTactics style job class system but another part of me would like multiple elements like VI, have the characters have unique classes and stats but then also give me the ability to mess around with them. I'm thinking of something in line with what you could do in Breath of Fire 3 and 4. This way, my characters can be unique outside of personality and limit breaks but also give me the ability to really shake things up if I want.

World Design:
Dear Squenix, I need your employees to sit down with a Wii and play Xenoblade (you know, that game made by former employees for your company) and then I want you to play Dragon Quest VIII (you know that game series you own but you hired someone decent to make it for you) and now I want you to merge those ideas together.

From Xenoblade, I want the massive world I can explore and by explore I mean go almost anywhere. I want to jump, and I want to swim and I want to fall to my death sometimes but all of this makes the world feel so much more alive. You need to take this games scale and up the ante. From DQVIII I want you to see how it's possible to still do world maps, give me my expansive world I can walk around and explore, but when I hit ocean, I want a boat or an airship and I want their to be an old school style map.

Love story:
Make it a side story and don't let it overshadow the main plot. I was fine with VIII doing it cause it's theme was love but then you did it in FFIX and X as well so no, bad Squenix, this isn't Hollywood where you have to have some kind of boy meets girl love story crammed in whether it makes sense or not. Speaking of which, can we do a game without the boy meets girl love story? I honestly feel it would be more appealing and work better for writing to do a more mature story, perhaps about an established couple falling out of love, or perhaps former lovers brought back together due to story circumstances, now trying to deal with each other and their past relationship with each other. You finally gave us a story about the bond of child and parent from the parents perspective in FFXIII, can't we finally get a love story from two characters who didn't just finish puberty?

Characters:
Whatever you do, don't do a spunky young girl/boy, don't do a dark brooding loner, don't do a calm, apprehensive but strong willed (while staying meek) female lead, if you're going to do a non-human character, at least let them play more of a role in the story, I often feel like they are only there to be the token fantasy race requirement.

********************************************************************************************

I'll post more as I think of them...

[ShinGundam]

Is Final Fantasy REALLY in desperate for massive landscapes, open and non-linear maps? what is the big deal about them?

[Wolf Kanno]

Is Final Fantasy REALLY in desperate for massive landscapes, open and non-linear maps? what is the big deal about them?

Immersion and giving the examples I gave(Xenoblade,DQVIII), I wouldn't say I want non-linear maps like Skyrim, just ones that create a sense of proper scale and allow me to explore my surroundings. There's a big difference from experiencing a world you explore and one you briskly walk by while reading a brochure about it.

Also...

Villains:
No more obvious pretty boys or evil ladies in fetish gear. Seriously, I feel it's time we do an Eldritch Abomination again. I would love to see a Lavos or Jenova type villain. With a little more thought, I would actually like to have a villain who isn't blatantly evil, I would like to see a villain whose goals are actually noble. They tried to do this in XII with Vayne but appeared to have chickened out before the very end. I would love to see another Delita type character as well, someone who has good intentions but gets corrupted by the system.

Sidequests:
I want you to look at how you did the pacing of sidequests in FFX and FFXIII and then I want you to shoot the person(s) responsible for thinking that there is no way I could possibly not want to do anything for 40 hours but watch your drivel of a plot. Give me something to do while I'm playing through, and don't have all the sidequests unlock once I reach the end of the game, I really hate games that do this. Sometimes I get bored and I want to do wander around, I do this even in the games I love so yeah... I don't mind if you want the bulk of the quests to unlock at the end but give me a few sidequests optional locations and mini-games to do before the full gambit opens up. It's just stupid to believe at the climax where you know everything is at stake and the world is going to end if you don't do something to decide now is a good time to help pick up apples and start gambling at a casino for stuff. It's really anti-climatic.

As for types of sidequests, beyond mini-game territory, I would prefer a smaller amount of quests but ones that are filled with a bit of story to them as well. I want that ultimate dungeon or optional boss feel like its a part of the world and not something you tacked on for the hardcore players only. Mark Hunts are fun, but I would prefer to have 10 of them if they were the same quality as the Gilgamesh fight over having over 50 of them that largely feel like busy work. Also, let my ultimate weapons have personal quests to obtain, no more of this making them stuff. VII did it mostly right.

Music:
Can we let music be important again? I mean I'm sorry but while XII and XIII do have some gorgeous tracks, outside of being ambient noise for dungeons and the battle themes, the music just lost it's spark as a narrative focus. This genre used to live and die on the quality of its music and games like FFIV, VI, VII, and IX have their most dramatic moments helped by the strong soundtracks they have. I blame Voice acting for causing this problem but here's an idea, can I just choose not to have voices. I can still read and it might make the silly subject matter feel more serious if I don't have to hear it out loud. That way, you can tell your composers to write some beautiful music again that really helps set the mood of the scenes and feel like a part of them. I want to start humming themes again while I play.

[ShinGundam]

Immersion and giving the examples I gave(Xenoblade,DQVIII), I wouldn't say I want non-linear maps like Skyrim, just ones that create a sense of proper scale and allow me to explore my surroundings. There's a big difference from experiencing a world you explore and one you briskly walk by while reading a brochure about it.

That is fine and all, i still can't bring myself to think a map filled with monsters are suddenly more important to FF fans than say a large scale city with complex structure similar to Midgar or Lindblum. Honestly i will take more big cities and countries with many activities and NPCs over an empty lands.

[Wolf Kanno]

Who says FF fans don't want the cities to reflect that as well, besides, barring XIII I would say FF never lost that element. Half the damn cities in XII required maps to find your way around due to how huge they were. I feel when other fans say they want a large world, they mean the whole shebang, not just the countryside, but also the towns and cities. What fans want is a real breathing world.

[Jinx]

I'm not sure if this could be executed well (or at all) but I think it'd be cool to go back to classes. Maybe use a point system as you level up, and where you distribute your points changes your stats. And later (taking from FFI) your character/class levels up. And maybe for each original class has two or three options of where their class would go.

For example, a Black Mage might become an Elementalist (meaning they only use elemental magic, or possibly use both types of magic, but elemental is stronger) and a Caster (same as Elementalist, but with non-elemental magic.) I actually think FFXIV has a job system kind of similar to this.

[Fynn]

You know, TB, your post actually reminded me of how much I love the job systems (which is also why I can't wait to get a new iPhone so that I can play Dimensions ). But I think it is possible, I mean, X-2 did it and it did it in a very fun way. The classes were broken there, though. I would love to see a return of the FFV/Tactics system, where you can mix and match abilities from other classes.

[Wolf Kanno]

I'm not sure if this could be executed well (or at all) but I think it'd be cool to go back to classes. Maybe use a point system as you level up, and where you distribute your points changes your stats. And later (taking from FFI) your character/class levels up. And maybe for each original class has two or three options of where their class would go.

For example, a Black Mage might become an Elementalist (meaning they only use elemental magic, or possibly use both types of magic, but elemental is stronger) and a Caster (same as Elementalist, but with non-elemental magic.) I actually think FFXIV has a job system kind of similar to this.

This actually sounds a bit like Sword of Mana's leveling system, though I feel your idea gives more of an impact since the classes in SoM you unlock mostly dictate bonuses to weapon and magic types as opposed to changing skill sets

[Edge7]

I pretty much agree with Fynn's OP completely. I also agree with many of Wolf_Kanno's points, my only dissent being ATB; I'm perfectly content with XII's battle system, though I would make a few changes in interface. I also was charmed by the romance in FFIX, so while I wouldn't mind seeing the "boy meets girl" archetype gone, I wouldn't roll my eyes at it (once again, if done right).

As far as a main character, I don't mind "dark and brooding", but only if done right. There's a huge difference between "I'm a loner because I don't want to be abandoned", and "I keep to myself because I caused the destruction of a village", or even PTSD. Personally though, I'd love a character like Auron or Balthier; they ooze confidence without seeming stuck up (my main problem with Lightning and Tidus, even if they went about it differently). I liked Cloud, but that was because despite having a dark and broody past, he was confident and it took something serious to slow him down (until the compilation). If we do have a teenage character, make him upbeat without being annoying, like Zidane, or, if you must, make him introverted and akward, but avoid too much emotional melodrama.

Although in all honesty, my dream RPG would have someone like Spike Spiegel as the main character: someone who has quite a few problems (these problems being serious, yet never blatant-in-your-face. Like, the direction his life is going/existential doubt), but never lets them show. He's charming, rarely gets angry, and yet doesn't hesitate to kick ass (so I guess, once again, like Balthier).

[Flaming Ice]

More of an open world with lots of side bosses.

Side bosses can add different things in the game to make it more interesting (like leviathan is the king of the sea, etc, it just provides a bit more detail into the world).

Also, choices. For example: Pick *so and so* character to join then a different character won't join you. Help save a village or it'll be destroyed later. Makes things more interesting.

[Loony BoB]

Music:
Can we let music be important again? I mean I'm sorry but while XII and XIII do have some gorgeous tracks, outside of being ambient noise for dungeons and the battle themes, the music just lost it's spark as a narrative focus. This genre used to live and die on the quality of its music and games like FFIV, VI, VII, and IX have their most dramatic moments helped by the strong soundtracks they have. I blame Voice acting for causing this problem but here's an idea, can I just choose not to have voices. I can still read and it might make the silly subject matter feel more serious if I don't have to hear it out loud. That way, you can tell your composers to write some beautiful music again that really helps set the mood of the scenes and feel like a part of them. I want to start humming themes again while I play.

Completely agree with this. I only actually realised how good the soundtrack of FFXIII was once I heard them in YouTube, because I completely zoned out the music throughout much of the game. Make the music go loud whenever characters aren't talking, minimise the sound effects so they don't overpower the music (I think footsteps and other sound effects actually have an even more negative impact on the music than voiceovers), stuff like that. And while I don't mind voice acting being kept in, it doesn't mean you can't have silent scenes where the music takes over. Let's put it this way: If VII had voice acting, the Aeris death scene (the best music for a scene ever in my opinion, and I don't even like Aeris) would still be nothing but music. The music makes the scene, not the other way around.

At least XIII-2 had the music more prominent, but it was also very repetitive since the majority of songs were all based on Serah's theme. A step in the right direction, though.

[Miriel]

I would like a main character who is an older woman, who is also badass. A la Helen Mirren.

[Quindiana Jones]

There're lots of interesting ideas in this thread. It's an enjoyable read. I chose to comment due to Miriel's desire for a badass old woman playing the lead.

Hell yes, that would be awesome. I want someone like Stagecoach Mary as a lead (i.e. a completely over the top badass who doesn't take even the smallest nugget of trout from anybody). We've had laissez-faire protagonists, we've had mopey, cheery, heroic, kind, selfish, insane and sometimes just plain old vanilla protagonists. I want an anti-hero, damnit! SE have come close a few times, but they've never had a truly "I don't give a smurf. I'm just here because I want to hit things/get revenge/punish these puny mortals" type of character.

[maybee]

I would like a main character who is an older woman, who is also badass. A la Helen Mirren.

There was a old woman character in The Last Remnant she was pretty cool. Though she didn't look old or aged at all, she looked about 20 from memory. Which was odd.

[Loony BoB]

There're lots of interesting ideas in this thread. It's an enjoyable read. I chose to comment due to Miriel's desire for a badass old woman playing the lead.

Hell yes, that would be awesome. I want someone like Stagecoach Mary as a lead (i.e. a completely over the top badass who doesn't take even the smallest nugget of trout from anybody). We've had laissez-faire protagonists, we've had mopey, cheery, heroic, kind, selfish, insane and sometimes just plain old vanilla protagonists. I want an anti-hero, damnit! SE have come close a few times, but they've never had a truly "I don't give a smurf. I'm just here because I want to hit things/get revenge/punish these puny mortals" type of character.

SE would look at this post and say "Right, let's make another Squall."