Noctis will be the ONLY playable character in FFXV

[Freya]

ffxv_scr_01.jpg

There was a live stream this morning where the team addressed more information they didn't have time to at the Tokyo Game Show. Director Hajime Tabata confirmed that Noctis will be the only playable character and you wont be able to switch between the other characters in Final Fantasy XV.

There you go: you wont be able to switch characters and you will only be limited to Noctis. They decided to do this due to complications Square Enix was having with the multiple character switching. They stated it was easier to focus on a one-character design. They plan on making this battle system unique to Final Fantasy XV. When asked if the battle system will play more like Kingdom Hearts or Final Fantasy Type-0, Square Enix said that at first it started off more like Kingdom Hearts, then certain features brought it more in line with Type-0 but now Final Fantasy XV's battle system has become its own thing entirely.

Tabata went on to apologize on behalf of Square Enix about the misunderstanding on the Playstation Store about the ability to switch characters.

What do you think? Does the battle system interest you? What about it's influences from both Tabata's Type-0 and Nomura's Kingdom Hearts?

[fat_moogle]

Well that's kind of disappointing, but I can deal with it. No Ignis fire combo for me

Oh well.

Also, I'm with Taiga. Doesn't really make much sense when we get so many playable characters in Type-0.

To add to this further I have a feeling that maybe Nomura was making XV too similar to Kingdom Hearts battle system and maybe that's the reason why he was kicked off of the game. So that when KHIII does release it won't be like a XV clone. Or now FFXV won't be a KH clone. Whatever way you want to look at it.

[Markus. D]

do what the westerns do and add a combat pause button !

[Hannibal_Khan]

did they say anything about the manual mode?

[Del Murder]

I like the idea of a brand new battle system, but I'm pretty disappointed in the lack of multiple characters in a main FF entry. That's one of the things that turned me off of Lightning Returns.

In a MMO or game like Mass Effect, it's different because you are creating the character's look, abilities, and personality from scratch. YOU are the hero rather than playing the hero character. I have to assume you will have a lot of control over Noctis's abilities but I doubt you'd get much control over the rest of him. So the success of FFXV will really come down to if Noctis is a good character or not; you're stuck with him either way. It's a big risk for SE.

Hoepfully Noctis is a more dynamic character than Lightning.

[Jinx]

I'm getting less and less excited about this game with every new bit of information we're getting.

[Wolf Kanno]

With the heavy use of single player controlled characters with A.I. partners in the genre that we've seen for the last oh... eight years or so, I'm not really bothered by this. It is a shame they couldn't make everyone playable because it probably would have felt like Xenoblade where every character played differently but as I said, since we've had party control kind of stripped from us for the last generation, I'm not terribly surprised or even annoyed.

[Del Murder]

'party control stripped from us last generation' -> mentions Xenoblade in the same paragraph....?

Obviously you can't micromanage in an action RPG, but as you mentioned with Xenoblade there are still games that let you change the PC and allow for different play styles. I don't see it as being 'stripped from us'. SE is just lazy.

[Wolf Kanno]

'party control stripped from us last generation' -> mentions Xenoblade in the same paragraph....?

To be fair, you are incredibly limited from designating what your party does in combat when not directly controlling them. As opposed to say FFX where you control every characters action every time. It's still a strip down.

[Fox]

I don't care even slightly as long as the systems are still engaging. Here is a brief list of some of my other favourite games where you have primary control over one character:

- Kingdom Hearts
- Mass Effect
- Metal Gear Solid
- Crisis Core
- Deus Ex

The list goes on. Frankly I should probably include all the 'Tales Of' games in there as well, because while you can switch to whoever you like there, how often does anyone play as the spell caster or the healer or the really slow guy with rubbish combos? Most of the time you just stick to one favourite for the whole game. There is no shortness of incredible games with single controllable player characters, so I'm happy to judge it purely on how interesting that character is and how successful the systems behind him are.

[FFFFsephychibi]

I'm okay with it. Still depressed I can't gun down enemies with Prompto.

Luckily we got better news like mp being drained if you hold down the defend button. We got a jump button. We have a name for the crystal swords thing "phantom sword" and it looks super cool. Plus short warps, anddddddd timing and directional button use for attacking. Sounds so much better.

[Del Murder]

Man I'd love for a game that reused the FFX or FFX-2's combat systems. They were the best.

[Wolf Kanno]

Man I'd love for a game that reused the FFX or FFX-2's combat systems. They were the best.

Well except for the parts where the design team dropped the ball like the easy difficulty/matching game combat, or all the stupid time wasting transformation sequence/sphere grid skill unlocking nonsense.

[Elpizo]

Hype down with about 95%. It's mystifying how, as consoles got more and more powerful, entries in the main series became less and less complex in terms of customization of characters and fighting. Maybe if they focussed less on pretty graphics... I miss the old days of turn-based party combat. At least then we had parties and multiple characters to control and manage. All this trout of flashy and fast paced action combat that seems to have the entire genre in its thrall is such a dissapointment.

[Spooniest]

Bah

Give me Final Fantasy IV on Steam, keep your single-player numbered entry