I'm now many hours into the epic that is Final Fantasy XVI. The game takes place in the medieval fantasy world of Valisthea where nation-states bring the power of Eikons to bear in their endless wars over the Mothercrystals.
Eikons are XVI's iteration of Espers/Aeons/Summons, and we see familiar faces like Shiva and Ifrit now rendered as army-flattening kaiju. The thing is, each Eikon is embodied by a Dominant - a person who channels the magic of that being through them, casting magical spells this way when they aren't fully transforming into the towering monstrosities.
Gameplay in XVI is much more action-oriented than the Final Fantasy of yesteryear. But even as FFVII Remake found a way to hybridize the menu-searching strategy of its original incarnation with the frenetic action expected in modern games, XVI leans all the way into the action side of things, creating gameplay that is actually much more similar to the recent God of War games - though I'd say the pacing is faster while the difficulty is lower.
In fact, when you start the game you can choose "Story-focused" as a difficulty, which gives you a number of jewelry pieces that will cause Clive (the player character) to automatically execute combos and dodge attacks. Personally, I think this takes away basically the only sources of challenge in the game, and so would only recommend this for those who are really struggling (I do occasionally die to bosses - but the big bosses have checkpoints mid-fight that reset you to full health and give you plenty of potions and hi-potions, so I don't think I've ever died more than once on a single encounter).
Honestly, I could have done with a bit more strategy - my gameplay style in combat is to pretty much just use my two magical special abilities for each Eikon I'm channeling, then swap to another Eikon and use theirs, and once I had a third to use (which does take a while,) I'd use their abilities and by then the cooldown abilities of the first Eikon were ready to use again, so I could repeat the process. While some monsters might be more vulnerable to the magic of, say, Geruda instead of Phoenix, I'm basically using all of my abilities all the time, which sort of leaves little choice.
While you'll often be accompanied by party members Cid and/or Jill, the only other character you have any control over is Torgal, your pet wolf, though I haven't found him to have much of an effect (I've read he can be used to set up combos?)
Still, for all my complaints, the combat is fun, and I've learned to mix lunges, jumping attacks, and other techniques to change things up a bit.
The story of the game is complex, but there are numerous systems and NPCs in the game that are designed to make it easy to follow. During any cutscene (which, blessedly, can be paused) you can hold the touchpad on your controller and get a few little one-paragraph summaries of the characters and plot elements that the people are talking about in what they call the "Active Time Lore" system. There's also a guy in your main hub who collects an encyclopedia of these sorts of tidbits and another one who keeps a timeline of the world (important given there are numerous time-jumps and lots of wars and territory shifting hands between factions).
I will say, and this should come as no surprise to those who read this blog regularly, that while it's a refreshing departure to return to medieval fantasy without the steampunk, magitek, or modernity of other FF titles, I do actually prefer the unconventional science-fantasy vibe of, for example, VII (I'm eagerly awaiting Rebirth).
The influence of Game of Thrones on this game is undeniable, which I might have been more excited about five or six years ago - though this has the advantage of being pretty unapologetically magical. Still, I would not have expected to see an M-rated Final Fantasy game when I first became aware of the series as a kid. (I don't recall if the ESRB even existed at the time.)
The game does have some fantastic voice acting - Ralph Inneson as the heroic outlaw Cid (because of course there's a Cid) is a stand-out. The story is also compelling, though it can be a real bummer (a pair of side-quests you can do while you make your way to the capital of the Holy Empire of Sanbreque left me shocked at how absurdly dark they went while still having that kind of classic half-assed side-quest presentation).
I don't know if it opens up later in the game, but the crafting system in this also feels kind of underwhelming. At one point in the story you get gear that is far better than anything you can craft or upgrade at the blacksmith's, at least for a good chunk of it. Likewise, the weapons and armor you get don't really have a lot of nuance to their stats - weapons are basically always just strictly better or worse than the one you have (again, 7R, VII Remake, or whatever you want to call it, gave you a lot of incentive to swap out weapons and try out different focuses with your gear).
I've gotten far enough in the game that I have a pretty good idea of who the final boss is, though there are a ton of supporting and/or secondary villains whose role in the game remains to be seen. I think I've just hit level 30 (maybe 31?) and some reviews I've seen say that they beat the game in the 40s, so I guess I've got a good chunk to go. I have been doing every side quest (which aren't always very good, though you'll want to do some of them, as they'll unlock things like your Chocobo mount).
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