Review: Final Fantasy XV, Episode Duscae

Every so often in the gaming industry something happens that turns everyone's head, regardless of your interests, whether that be an announcement, game release or something else. It would be fair to say that you could probably put the lead up to Final Fantasy XV as such an event.

I can see why this was chosen as the loading screen.

The game itself isn't due to be released until sometime next year, but that hasn't stopped people talking especially since it has been in development since 2006. What's more, Square Enix have sent us a teaser bundled in the console port of Final Fantasy Type-0, that being Episode Duscae.

After downloading the demo, we are given an opening menu with a backdrop of the night's sky, with all of the traditional options including subtitles and Japanese voice acting.

Once the game begins we see a cutscene with 4 young men inside a tent. An alarm (which it has to be said is incredibly annoying), is going off and 3 of the company are awake, while the main character remains asleep. Eventually (and not soon enough with for that alarm), Prince Noctis wakes up and the tent opens up to reveal a gorgeous tundra and woodland with quite the skyline, that provides the setting for around the next 5 hours of your life.

First off we are given an introduction to the combat system, which is happily simple to understand though a fair challenge to master. Noctis has several different attacks which he can use with different weapons kept somewhere in the void of the Final Fantasy world. Attacks can be made at close range or by warping, a function which you can also use to get around the terrain by transporting yourself to steel pillars. There are also several other attacks which Noctis has at his disposal ranging from jump attacks through to a whirlwind strike.

Pretty vicious looking spear Noctis has got there.

The aim of the demo? Well the group are on a bit of journey. For what purpose isn't explained in all that much depth. However,  the car they have been using for said journey has broken down in this visual paradise and a fee needs to be paid for it's repair. Thankfully, there's a nasty monster that needs slaying and the rewards happens to just about cover the money the group need for their car. So, monster slaying it is. There are several side quests that you can go on while in the demo, with some pretty powerful swords to find as well, though none of this is essential for completing the main mission.

On the way to finding the behemoth, the group run into harmless herd like animals as well as some not so harmless wolves. Alongside them there are also some armour clad soldiers that seem to have something against the group (I'm guessing that might just have something to do with 'Prince' Noctis). Though these battles are good for testing out different attacks and tactics, they quickly become tiresome and more a chore than a challenge.

The group will meet the monster on at least two occasions, firstly the battle will prove too much for them and they will flee. Second time round, if you elect to go into the creepy cave at the top of the map, the battle becomes much easier, if only because you gain the ability to summon a god to kill everything and anything without fail- I can't say I'm entirely sure how well this will work throughout the whole game.

There are alternatives of course, sell the odd bits you gain from fallen enemies to the shop to gain enough money (trust me, this will take a long time) or gain enough experience to kill the beast without your new supernatural power (again, probably going to take a while).

With a bro heavy company there had to be a gal somewhere...

Once you have your money, you can go to the garage to find a somewhat typical FF girl who has fixed and suped up your car for your onward journey, which is, unfortunately, where the demo ends. You'll be able to go back and play from just before the end to finish any other quests and find more items.

To sum up? Well it's looking promising. The graphics are simply stunning, and by next year you can only imagine they will be even better and more varied. The combat is fluid and quick paced, though you become too powerful too quickly and battles become boring before you've really got used to them. It's a minor point though and with some work it definitely can be improved. All of that said, not only am I confident that, upon it's eventual release, Final Fantasy XV will live up to all expectations and maybe just exceed some of them as well.

News flash: Runescape releases 200th quest

You’ll struggle to meet a gamer that hasn’t at some point in some way experienced the MMORPG, Runescape. Now on its second incarnation, 14 years after it’s creation the biggest free MMO out there is still going strong, with the release of the 200^th quest, Dimension of Disaster.

By no means the most well known MMO (a title that surely, still, belongs to WoW), as such a large free-to-play game, it must surely have contributed to the start of many a gamer’s love of the RPG genre.

The accessibility of the game is one of its most notable features, with almost 18 million players completing the most popular quest Cook’s Assistant. The 200^th quest brings players back to their humble beginnings as they are transported to an alternate reality at level 1 with no equipment, with the aim being to play through the beginner quests again (albeit with a few twists!) to escape the altered world and return to reality.

Games that changed the industry #7 The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

Imagine yourself locked in a prison cell when, totally inexplicably, the emperor of your world appears before you looking for an escape route through your cell. Naturally you follow him with the hope of getting out only to see that he meets a nasty end at the hands of some assassins. Before he dies, he tells you to take a message out into the world. Okay you say, I could do that. After arriving outside in this world however, all of a sudden you get a desire to become a thief and forget all about the emperor and his lousy last wish.

Image credit: Gamefaqs

That is Oblivion. Or at least it’s one of many different ways that you could start it. Like GTA:San Andreas (which I looked at a few weeks back), Oblivion is a game that really showed off what gaming could be.

As one of the first games to be released on the 360/PS3 generation of consoles, Oblivion set the bar for graphics, voice acting and gameplay extremely high. It also took the RPG genre to a new level, encompassing a huge free roaming world, with more customisable traits than I have time to mention. TES IV blew everything before it away.

Image credit: Wikipedia

The most impressive aspect of this game however is a point that I mentioned before: the amount of choice you were given not just in customising your character, but also in how the game played out was truly impressive. If you wanted to do the main quest before touching the rest of the game, that was fine. Equally though, if you never wanted to do the main quest, you didn’t have to, and your experience of the game would have been at least as good.

Oblivion made the technical jump everyone was expecting for a new generation game, but what made it so special was the enormity of the world it put before you. And if that wasn’t enough, it made way for a pretty special follow up as well – a certain Skyrim, or something?

Games that changed the industry #6 Halo 2

Since the mid 70’s it has been possible to play games against other people. By the early 90’s there were systems in place to allow for gaming over an online network.

Yet, 1994 there was only mere quarter of a million subscribers to the ‘Sega Channel’, but as of April 2013 there were an estimated 143.6 million online gamers worldwide. Obviously, there have been many different factors in affecting the mass rise in online gamers but I think one of the most significant was the rise of Xbox Live in 2002 but more specifically, the release of Halo 2 at the end of 2004.

In many ways Halo 2 is a largely forgettable game. Arguably the least memorable single player campaign in a very successful franchise and as such by no means defining in the first person shooter genre. It cannot claim to have brought a new level of graphics that was seen by the Xbox 360/PS3 generation of gaming. On several fronts, it is distinctly average.

Not that forgettable though.

Of course, I would not be writing about it if it was not influential and the effect of the mass success of the game’s online multiplayer cannot possibly be overstated. The huge amount of players to pick up the online gaming mantle was simply immense. With a wide range of maps and weapons that built upon the solid foundations laid down by the single player campaign, it cannot be seen as at all surprising.

Try now imagining turning on any console without at least the option to get yourself online. It is, frankly, unthinkable, and if anyone were to suggest that it was, you’d probably think they’d been hidden under the rock for the past ten years.

Not everyone loved Halo and just as many still don't care for Xbox Live, but you’d be hard pressed to find a gamer who doesn’t see the importance of online gaming and that is what Halo 2 gave the industry.

Games that changed the industry #5 Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

Do you remember opening your shiny new Playstation 2? All the perks of the original Sony console but with something that seemed much more refined and futuristic about it – plus you could watch DVD’s, and let’s face it, that did change the world.

            

Enough about a once new console. I’m more interested in the best selling game of that console, arguably the best in its prestigious and long running franchise, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

            

This gives real impetus to the ‘Game that changed the Industry’ tag line of the column. A truly massive game for its time both in terms of sales and in game space. Though there had been other open world games before this point, none had really brought all of the key aspects together coherently in the way GTA: San Andreas did. 

This was the first truly open game to make a big impact on our consoles.

            

One of the best things about the free roaming in San Andreas though was its ability to keep you interested. There was a main plot along with numerous side ‘quests’ for when running around causing complete havoc lost its appeal. The refreshing openness to maintain a balance of crazy and down right ridiculous really made this stand out in what was turning into the very serious business of video games.

            

Beyond the gameplay aspects, which undoubtedly give the game a place in this column, there is another important reason here that could be taken by any of several big games in the period. For the first time in thirty-five years it wasn’t Nintendo that was making the best games. There were other serious options out there and people were beginning to think that actually these new options might actually be better.

            

Selling 27 millions copies, this was the best selling game of 2004 and on the PS2, making it the 10^th best selling console game of all time with several very successful follow ups. Not all that surprising really, is it?

Games that changed the industry #4 Pokemon Red/Blue

After Super Mario Bros. made an appearance in the last article in this series I think you’d forgive me if the following game was not as impressive.

But because I wanted to be the very best (I hope you appreciate that)why I have picked the beginning of another of Nintendo’s star franchises: Pokémon. Like Mario, every knows what Pokémon is (even if that only means Pikachu), but more than Mario, Pokémon Red and Blue spawned a plethora of other media including cartoons and Magna, in what can only be described as a cultural phenomenon.

            

That aside, you might ask why are these games so popular? Well, when released in 1996, the two original games followed the basic formula of catching Pokémon, (it’s my real test), training them (that’s my cause) and collecting gym badges before challenging the Elite Four to become the Pokémon champion.

Choose anyone of Charmander, Squirtle or Bulbasaur as
your first Pokémon 

It sounds familiar because if you’ve bought any of the other main sequence Pokémon games since then, you will have had largely the same experience. Pokémon as entities tend to be too cute to brush off or so macho that you really did want to prove to the world that you could catch them. Pokémon Red and Blue are not significant because of impressive graphics or great storylines, but because they gave gamers the chance to live an experience that they would want to relive again and again.

Beyond that however, they offered a simple storyline that could be understood by young children while giving the option to make things more complicated for those who wanted to replay the game over and over.

There were plenty of games that could have gone after Mario in this series, but Pokémon Red and Blue are here because they are two of the few games that have made such a long lasting impact alongside their Italian plumbing friend.

Games that changed the industry #3 Super Mario Bros

Most gamers have a character that defines gaming for them. Think Master Chief, Crash Bandicoot, Sonic, Pikachu and so on. Of all such characters though one stands above all other almost undisputedly and he is of course the worlds favourite plumber: Mario.

Mario first appeared in the arcade game Donkey Kong in 1981, but that’s not the game that is synonymous with his character. That would be Super Mario Bros.

Since it’s release in 1985 on the NES, Super Mario Bros. sold over 40 million units making it the best selling game ever until the release of Wii Sports in 2006.

The game was more complicated than previous Mario entries with more features and levels. The player would control Mario in his attempt to reach Princess Peach from the evil Bowser saving Toads on the way. The player had to pass obstacles and enemies while collecting coins by jumping up and hitting boxes in the air.

Since its release in almost thirty years ago it has spawned several re-releases on new Nintendo consoles with various other games being released in the franchise. Despite this, no follow up since Super Mario Bros. has come close to being as successful or as recognisable.

Most early games on this list are really considered to be forerunners to something bigger and better in the future, the way through to modern games if you like. Here though we have an exception, Super Mario Bros. not only defined one of the most successful franchises ever, but also cemented the Platform genre as one that will exist forever.

Mario’s first major outing then is still as playable today as it was 29 years ago. And on that note I’d say have a Google search, find a flash version of the old original- or better yet drag out someone’s old NES and play it like it was meant to be played. Go on, you know you want to.