Weeks after the new release final fantasy Games are always filled with endless, exasperating arguments and social media infighting. “Final Fantasy 16” is no exception. But I think this time, people are asking the wrong question.
A quick look at my twitter (when it works, anyway) inevitably brings up all the words one would expect; There’s been a lot of back-and-forth about whether it’s well-written, pondering the game’s difficulty (or lack thereof), and a relatively new debate – whether FF16 is “enough” as an RPG.
Now, I must raise my hands: I am as much responsible for this debate as anyone involved in it. In iGamesNews’s FF16 review, I listed the game’s RPG credentials as a particular weakness, summing it up as a good action game, but not really a good RPG. So, is it enough to be an RPG? I don’t know, maybe — your mileage may vary depending on what you’re looking for. Outside of the general scope of critical analysis, though, I actually think this is the wrong question to ask.
Instead, let me ask this question: Should Final Fantasy XVI be an RPG?
I know how some people will answer this question. would be blasphemy. But let’s put aside our preconceptions about what this series “should” be because, as discussed earlier on iGamesNews, it’s a dumb debate. I’d even resist the urge to berate one of the absolute best Final Fantasy games (i.e. FF Crystal Chronicles: My King’s Life) for not being an RPG at all. Instead, I just want to talk in a vacuum about the merits of FF16 itself and say…if it wasn’t an RPG, it would probably be a better game.
As someone who does RPG type sites for a living, I hate to say this. But RPG feature creep is real, and it’s been around for a long time. How many games are smothered by the need for irrelevant gear, stats, and menus? Here at the RPG Site, we joke that “everything is an RPG these days,” but that irony comes with a tinge of frustration as game after game fails to explore what makes the genre interesting or exciting. People are excited. Sometimes this type of cross-pollination brings undeniable gold – but more often than not, it’s an exercise in ticking boxes.
This reminds me of Final Fantasy XVI. Ticking the box feels like a rather savvy way of describing the design here: the mechanics, systems, and ideas in this game seem to be there because they “should” be there rather than actually being in line with Square Enix’s creative business unit 3. Created games combined.
A lot of it revolves around the expectations of Final Fantasy as an RPG series, and the weakest element of an otherwise excellent game is undoubtedly the hooks designed to give it RPG credentials.
For example, FF games traditionally have party members, so while FF16 only has the protagonist Clive Rosfield (Clive Rosfield) controlled by you, he is joined throughout the adventure by AI-controlled companions whose purpose is to Evoke the feeling of fighting in a team. “FF15” was the same at launch, but “FF15” has team members who are constantly vocalizing, constantly moving, and eager to join the team attack, which makes people feel immersive. In FF16, you rarely feel like you’re actually fighting alongside anyone, even if there are squad members present.
This is largely thanks to the combat system built for FF16. It’s more Devil May Cry than Final Fantasy, a good, snappy, well-rounded action game, with some RPG tweaks like special moves on cooldowns, and stat-based attacks . The combat is really good – crunchy, satisfying, exciting – but it also informs most of the other design choices. For better or worse.
For example, party members can be pretty incompetent, since real AI companions like in FF15 are too unpredictable for this sort of optimized, combo-driven combat. FF16’s relatively few character skills also seem like a relevant choice; the sprawling RPG skill tree doesn’t fit well, and it’s hard to balance, so Clive’s move set is rather limited.
Many of the same arguments can be applied in many ways. The treadmill of crafting and buying new gear feels quiet, as the real payoff here is getting better at action combat and learning better combos. Even the difficulty debate can be said to have something to do with it. The developers built an amazing action combat system, but worried about alienating RPG players who didn’t like action games. So they re-tuned the difficulty and made the game really easy in the process.
This is even replicated in pacing and such away from combat–the rather unremarkable role-playing quests slow down the story. All of these things seem to have to be present in the game to meet the expected breadth and depth. Oddly enough, FF16 is a slightly worse game.
All of this is to say: Final Fantasy XVI is a very good game, but its RPG ambitions may be stymied. It’s impossible to really know what happened during its development, but from the outside it looks like the team did have a great idea for a killer action/adventure game – but then felt obligated to put a lot of RPG features. In support of the Final Fantasy name.
Which brings us back to the topic of inspection. FF16 feels even stranger because we all know that Final Fantasy is an RPG series. But FF16 must be judged on its own merits, not by how the franchise has performed in the past. So, looking at the game, many of its weakest aspects stem from role-playing…one can’t help but wish it wasn’t an RPG anymore. Even if that means a non-RPG Final Fantasy game.