Aside from review scores, whether Game Pass is good or bad for the industry, and crunch ethics (which is bad), difficulty options are part of the game discussion and aren’t going away. It’s a cycle; when launching a game like Elden Ring, Demon’s Souls, or Crouching Dragon – expect later this week – there will inevitably be back-and-forth about the difficulty of the game. Some people think games like Elden Ring are purely examples of game difficulty; there shouldn’t be easy modes that erode the integrity of the experience and somehow “ruin it for everyone else”.
Others argue that every game should have a set of difficulty options that, if you will, should let you waltz through a “story mode” experience — ignoring the substance of the gameplay in order to better assimilate the overall experience. Often at the expense of the developer’s intent for the game as a whole.for final fantasy 16The developers will hopefully come up with a solution that appeases both camps — allowing players to experience the game as intended while providing support for some players who might need it.
In terms of combat, Final Fantasy 16 is a little different from the series’ history. Final Fantasy XVI eschews the turn-based setting of the classic game–and, to a lesser degree, Final Fantasy VII Remake–in favor of entirely action-based events. Think Devil May Cry or Bayonetta a bit and you’ll get the right idea. Combat is quick, and it relies on you swapping between move combos on the fly, and you’ll need to weave dodges and parries in rhythmic timing to win even the most bog-standard encounters. It’s not something everyone accepts right away.
“We know that this move from command-based gameplay to real-time action can be overwhelming for players who aren’t used to real-time action games, or for those who just want to focus more on the story than the players. Scared. Action,” producer Naoki Yoshida explained to iGamesNews (via translator). “For players who are ready for action, we have the action-focused mode. For those who want to focus on the story, we recommend the story-focused mode.”
But what’s the difference? Are these difficulty settings or actual modes? No, not exactly. Instead, the answer lies in a set of accessories that the development team calls “timely accessories.” These accessories (up to two can be equipped at a time) make certain aspects of the game easier or more accessible. Clicking on Story Mode (at least in the demo) automatically applies two of these items to make the experience easier. It seems that in the full game, you can always choose whether to equip these items at will, and one of these items will take up an accessory slot if you choose to make things easier for yourself.
Whether you want to take the guesswork out of dodging impending attacks, or automate or simplify complex combinations, the development team has you covered.
There are five timely accessories:
- Ring of Timely Focus: Temporarily slows down time before being attacked, giving you more time to react
- Ring of Prompt Aid: no longer requires you to issue Torgal combat commands manually
- strike ring in time: Perform deadly combos by pressing X.
- Avoid the ring in time: Automatically dodges most incoming attacks.
- Ring of Timely Healing: Automatically use potion when HP is below a certain threshold.
In practice, these Timely Rings are very useful; if you’re having trouble there, they can identify and single out an area of the game and make it more manageable. I’m pretty used to playing these kinds of games–I grew up on Devil May Cry, for example–so I didn’t struggle too much with the demo. However, mastering the combat system and focusing on getting the parry timing right meant I often left my loyal schmuck Torgal standing there and not engaging. So equipping a ring associated with him means he’ll help me maintain my combo – and occasionally heal me – without me flicking through the combat side menu and ordering him to do so.
The other players I observed were armed with Timely Strikes rings, which operate a bit like “easy mode” in a fighting game: mash X, watching Clive pull off some advanced combos without player-side timing or positioning. Timely Focus is probably the most intrusive; slowing down the game and waiting for the player to cue can destroy the momentum and impact of a fight, rather than simply letting you dodge most attacks in the ring, but some players may prefer to have a chance to parry more actions, rather than simply avoiding them.
These rings are a great way for players to customize the experience of hardcore action around them, rather than simply diluting it so that the experience isn’t as good as the full version of the game. By identifying aspects of the game that can pose a challenge, and allowing players to toggle them on a mechanic-by-mechanic basis, rather than simply simplifying the whole thing, Square Enix may have found a realistic solution to a problem that has been plaguing gamers several times. generations.
But that doesn’t mean we don’t have to endure the discussions surrounding it again.
Final Fantasy XVI will be released on PlayStation 5 on June 22, 2023.
