draexem
Novice
- Joined
- Oct 13, 2006
- Messages
- 75
Latest news from square :wink:
http://www.bravenewgamer.com/2010/04/sq ... inematics/
Square Enix has just announced in an exclusive interview with Brave New Gamer's recently organized Factorial Investigation's Bureau or "FIB", that Final Fantasy XV, the next title in the long running role-playing series, is nearly sixty percent finished in it's development and would feature "...true next generation uninteractivity..." and "...over sixty hours of exhaustively irrelevant, meandering cinematics." This breaking news comes just one month after the developer's blockbuster release of Final Fantasy XIII, and before the official completion of Final Fantasy XIV, an MMORPG (massive multiplayer online role playing game) entry to the series.
In reference to the developer's latest flagship title, series veteran and long time Final Fantasy Producer Yoshinori Kitase explained it was the company's intention all along to take the series in this new direction.
"With Final Fantasy XIII we merely scratched the surface of bringing a deep, overly emotional narrative experience through the gradual elimination of engaging and entertaining gameplay," Mr. Kitase said. "Our goal with Final Fantasy XV is to take the series to a revolutionary new level by harnessing the ample power of this generation's video game platforms to overcome the award winning gameplay conventions that limited us in the past."
To elaborate on this point Mr. Kitase presented a slide show outlining the correlation between the complexity of stories in previous Final Fantasy titles with the advancement of gaming technology.
"Here," Kitase said pointing at the arrival of the Playstation, "It was here with Final Fantasy VII that we were finally able to begin the process of shifting the focus from Final Fantasy's revolutionary, fun combat systems to overly inflated, masturbatory cinematic presentations."
Mr. Kitase then began to cite Final Fantasy VII's predecessors, emphasizing the gradually increasing reliance upon CGI sequences to convey each game's story, leading all the way up to the mark denoting Square's most recent Final Fantasy title.
"See, we're here now." Kitasi emphasized, jabbing his finger at the small dot on the slide meant to represent the present era. "The visual capabilities of todays video game consoles no longer binds us to the hindersome practice of keeping players entertained with satisfying gameplay mechanics and endlessly explorable world maps. We can simply tie the narrative together using hours upon hours of self-serving computer generated imagery, allowing the player to not be bothered with actually playing the game."
It was at this point that Mr. Kitase invited artist and character designer Tetsuya Nomura into the meeting room, who at the time was sporting an effeminate sandy blond hairstyle, to discuss some of revolutionary gameplay changes to be featured in Final Fantasy XV.
"In order for us to provide the most unexplained, plodding story for Final Fantasy XV we had to almost...uh, almost completely eliminate player interaction with the game." Nomura explained, becoming briefly distracted mid-sentence by his own reflection on a nearby coffee cup. "To accomplish this we decided to completely revolutionize the player's, should we even be calling them that now? We decided to completely revolutionize the viewer's understanding of what to expect from a full priced video game."
Mr. Nomura at that time reached into his jacket pocket and presented a Sony Playstation 3 Dual Shock controller. "The way we accomplish this-see, watch what I'm about to do now. We simply get rid of the controller."
At this time Nomura tossed the dual shock controller over his shoulder without an ounce of apparent care or whimsy.
"This encourages the player, I mean, the viewer, to simply sit back and embrace the artisitic, overly visualized proverbial vomit on screen. Mainly because they have no other choice."
It was after this reveal that Mr. Nomura, clearly becoming excited with the interview, exchanged some words with Mr. Kitase on whether or not to reveal another new, arguably anti-gameplay oriented feature for Final Fantasy XV. Mr. Kitase was at first resistive to Nomura's request but soon relented.
"Since we reached a decision to completely abandon the primary source of input for Final Fantasy XV, we decided to take this opportunity to introduce revolutionary new motion controls to the series using Playstation Eye and Natal." Nomura said, "Of course, this won't require the player to perform any conventional type of physical actions to play Final Fantasy XV, after all we don't want to distract from the-how would you call it-senseless, emo bullshit narrative Final Fantasy XV has to offer."
As Mr. Nomura was explaining this a demo unit was brought in to the meeting room. On the screen there was an in game cinematic for Final Fantasy XV, the details of which we are not permitted to discuss.
"The way we utilize the power of motion controls," Mr. Nomura explained, "Is by checking the direction the player's eyes are looking while the cinematic is playing. When a person plays Final Fantasy XV the camera device will be able to see whether or not that person is watching the screen. If the person's eyes looks away from the television set, Final Fantasy XV will automatically pause and alert the player that they are not watching the boring as hell cinematics."
Mr. Nomura then demonstrated this new feature by letting the game play itself by looking directly at the screen, then breaking eye contact to look at another reflection of himself in the room. At the time Mr. Nomura looked away from the game the screen darkened and an alert message flashed advising the player to watch the TV screen accompanied by a rapid high pitched bleeping sound.
"As you can see, this dramatically opens up Final Fantasy's accessibility to a wider audience" Mr. Kitase explained, "If there is only one thing a person must do to play Final Fantasy XV, its to simply watch Final Fantasy XV."
"A Playstation Eye or Natal will be required in order to play Final Fantasy XV." Mr. Nomura added.
No official release date was disclosed for Final Fantasy XV though Mr. Nomura did subtly hint at a late 2015 release.
"We've still got a long way to go to create all of the sixty plus planned CGI for Final Fantasy XV, though now that we need not worry about tacking on an actual gameplay component progress is moving forward nicely." Mr. Nomura commented.
At this point Mr.Kitase and Mr. Nomura allowed us to ask a single question related to the future of the Final Fantasy series. When questioned regarding some of the negative criticisms facing Final Fantasy XIII in regards to the games overly linear gameplay and removal of other tried and true gameplay staples to the series, Mr. Kitase had this to say:
"We believe we know what a person wants when they settle down in front of their television, game controller in hand, after a long and stressful day at office or call center. That person wants to observe sixty hours of the most nonsensical self-indulged visual sensory rape, not just play some video game."
http://www.bravenewgamer.com/2010/04/sq ... inematics/
