Final Fantasy XIII demo thread

[cool breeze]

Can't believe anyone doubted the main FF team.  Like SMT4, the fact that this will be a fuck awesome rpg is a no brainer.

i'm sure i'll get slated for this but, hey fugg it ...

i'm sure it will be (awesome, the final game) , but nothing in this demo so far looks to differentiate this from, say, LO.

The tiny bit of the video I saw actually reminded me less of what the old FFXIII trailers promised and more about what the old Lost Odyssey trailers did, at least for how the flow of battle was visually.

[Kestastrophe]

why does the black guy have a bird in his afro?

[maxy]

Leave Chocobro alone

He is already my favorite FFXIII character,he should be in charge not that stupid skinny chick

[Himu]

Zazh is amazing.

[Himu]

.............

[Powerslave]

So when is Square gonna change their art direction again? It's been the same since FFX. FFVII, VIII and IX all had different styles. Hail the Playstation.

[WrikaWrek]

These guys have really inconsistent character design, and the black dude design is just offensive.

These little midgets better start acting like they don't live inside their own mangafag reality.

[recursivelyenumerable]

i'm sure i'll get slated for this but, hey fugg it ...

i'm sure it will be (awesome, the final game) , but nothing in this demo so far looks to differentiate this from, say, LO.

yeah, a demo of this kind of RPG is fairly useless for showing anything but flash, you don't have time to get into the meat of the gameplay or story so it's impossible to draw conclusions one way or another. 

[recursivelyenumerable]

(at best, if anything the LO demo was absolute garbage but it STILL managed to be as good as this over a year ago "on weaker hardware :/")

LO also had like 15 second load times for battles, this has 3 second load times

[dark1x]

It has its issues, but as I suspected, it's the best looking RPG we've seen this gen (which isn't exactly a difficult thing to do).

yeah, i'm not sure i agree. As i said before, the frame rate is worse than any other RPG we've seen to date, it looks pretty janky, and about on par with what LO did (at best, if anything the LO demo was absolute garbage but it STILL managed to be as good as this over a year ago "on weaker hardware :/")

And it's not only reduced to an ON RAILS RPG demo... they ACTUALLY FUCKING PUT IT ON RAILS. Jesus titty fucking christ.
Again, i'm sure the final game will be awesome but anyone applauding this or putting it on a pedestal or , for fuck sake, downtalking any other RPG to date needs a good hard kick in the minge.

oh and p.s. i'm glad to see sfags the world over finally came to their senses and realised the original was a CG mock up ("though they have 4 months, and i think it might end up looking like the CG"). Please form an orderly queue to apologise, no need to be shy, i am all forgiving though i may mock you.

Having viewed direct feed videos of it, it seems pretty stable and solid to me.  It's significantly smoother than Blue Dragon (which, while amazing looking, was embarrassingly choppy and full of screen tear) and smoother than Lost Odyssey.  I still think those are the best looking RPGs yet released this gen and FFXIII looks and runs better than either of them.  You should really drop the "weaker hardware" BS, we all know the 360 is a more capable machine.  I don't know why you continue to harp on this YEARS after the launch of PS3.  It's really not relevant at this point.

I never thought it would look as good as the CG, but I think they've done a fantastic job capturing those visuals.  The level of detail seems really high, the textures and shaders are great, and the animation is very smooth.  The only thing I really wish they had managed to include was per-object motion blur (similar to what we've seen in MT-Framework games, Killzone 2, and Crysis).  I think that would really have enhanced the experience.

As for the content of the demo itself, well, it seems very fitting for a demo to me.  The best RPG demos typically present a linear portion of the game.  What exactly did you expect them to include in this?  An open world to explore?  I don't understand the criticism.

I simply think some people are being unreasonable here.  There is no way they could have released anything that would not have resulted in negative comments from certain people.  In this particular instance (where we are talking about a JRPG), I do recall an argument between Bebpo and Dcharlie when Blue Dragon was first released.  Correctly so, Bebpo noted the poor framerate that is ever present in that game during battle.  It's abysmal as hell and the one blemish on an otherwise outstanding looking game.  On the other hand, I swear I remember DCharlie saying Bebpo was full of shit while claiming that the framerate was, in fact, smooth.  Well, the game was released around the world eventually, and everyone got to play it.  It wasn't a problem with Bebpo's 360, the game just runs like ass.  If someone can defend a framerate THAT low while slamming something like FFXIII (which is much smoother) then, well, there's something suspect about that opinion.

LO also had like 15 second load times for battles, this has 3 second load times

Well, there's more to it than that.  LO not only had lengthy load times before and after each and every random battle, but it also had extremely lengthy load times between cutscenes and field exploration.  The FFXIII demo has one 14 second load screen before transitioning into realtime.  From there, it moves between cutscenes, battle, and field movement without any loading.  It's extremely fast.

[WrikaWrek]

It's the 360's fault.

Fucking xbox

[Himu]

the people complaining about the on rails demo need to play more square demos and shut up

[Howard Alan Treesong]

dcharlie, I regret to inform you this game does not look like LO, a game which sucks and looks like ass

FFXIII, at least, looks good

[maxy]

I agree with DC here,framerate is bit wonky,probably between 20-30 fps,in the middle...

As for the LO comparison,as far as i remember LO looked really great in combat,not seeing much difference here,as for field,hq hd videos needed...

Leaving teh graphicz aside,the most unimportant thing in rpg for me,i don't think that this demo is anything different from others,sure it has great production values,but in the end it still has

Bunch of (in)visible barriers,no you can't go there,look there is a circle on the ground you can now jump,annoying "stomp stomp stomp" walking,running sound.

There is also one thing that i noticed the friendly AI is not following you as close as it can,it just waits until you cross some invisible barrier and then quickly goes to predetermined spot.

But in the end i liked the combat,the way it goes from field to combat,so i am satisfied with the demo.

As for the bigger less linear areas,full game will have it,no doubt.

[Bebpo]

the people complaining about the on rails demo need to play more square demos and shut up

so let me ask you himu, and we can all agree...

are the on rails demo a fair indication of the game? (i'm agreeing they aren't)
do they tend to be good or bad?
and did your demo turn up?

FF games are on-rails.  FFXII is the most open FF and it's still pretty linear.  This will be nothing like FFXII and back to linear "on-rails" FF like FFX.  Which is fine because some of us enjoy linear jrpg experiences with great production values and good battle systems.

[Himu]

FF games can be linear but they're hardly "on rails". Bad use of words there Bebpo.

[Jansen]

the demo and full game could be shit on a disc and final fantasy tards will still eat that shit up and beg for square-enix to shit in their mouths again and again

[Rman]

I don't know.  I've kinda lost all hype for this game.  I think FF has lost me.

spoiler (click to show/hide)

But I'll probably still buy it 

[close]

[dark1x]

wait a god damn fucking minute again, this has nothing to do with WEAKER HARDWARE which i haven't mentioned a SINGLE FUCKING TIME in regards to this game. The game is running rolling in a few places and the frame rate is pretty bad CONSTANTLY, the direct video feeds (if you can't see the poor frame rate) simply means your mainly self given frame rate whore title should be somewhat questioned.

I seriously can't see how you can't see the janky frame rate. It's baffling.

It's not perfect, I suppose, but it's hardly bad.  Again, it's smoother than Lost Odyssey, Blue Dragon, Infinite Undiscovery, and Star Ocean 4 (on the field map).  There's odd little drops when attacks hit, but it seems pretty minor and the framerate stays steady for the most part.

That said, I am only basing this off of videos.  Sprsk posted some video on gamevideos.com.  Are you saying that the framerate in those videos does not represent the game in person?

An example:

http://gamevideos.1up.com/video/id/24385

I suppose my main point isn't so much about the framerate in this game as much as the fact that you pretty much excused and defended against the lower framerates in games like Blue Dragon while are taking jabs at XIII every chance you get.

Also, you did mention the "weaker hardware" thing when you first brought up Lost Odyssey.

Leaving teh graphicz aside,the most unimportant thing in rpg for me,i don't think that this demo is anything different from others,sure it has great production values,but in the end it still has

Bunch of (in)visible barriers,no you can't go there,look there is a circle on the ground you can now jump,annoying "stomp stomp stomp" walking,running sound.

I understand what you are saying here, but in the past few years, I've begun to appreciate linear games.  Too many companies started to take the open world route and I'm starting to find it incredibly boring due to the fact that you end up without any focus on scenario design.  When you go into an open world game you never really get that hand crafted feel of a linear game.  As RPGs start to open they begin to resemble MMORPGs, which I dislike.  I'm just tired of aimless open world games. 

I think Far Cry 2 and Crysis serve as great examples of what works and what doesn't in open world game design.  Crysis is a very linear game, but there is plenty of freedom WITHIN its linearity.  This type of design is my favorite and applies to many of my favorite games.  Far Cry 2, however, took a different approach and presented a much larger world and ended up failing to deliver any seriously compelling scenarios.  Freedom within linearity is the goal I think more games should strive for.

That said, I'll always prefer a completely linear, on-rails kind of game to a wide open "go anywhere" experience.

[demi]

No point in arguing, everyone here will buy it

[recursivelyenumerable]

haha, the first part of the Versus trailer is edited so dumb

[Himu]

the new versus trailer sux

agito trailer owns

[recursivelyenumerable]

Lightning and Snow seem more mature than most FF or RPG characters lately.  I personally don't mind playing dumb teenagers, but maybe some of the people who complain about that will be a bit happier with this

[MCD]

> Lightning
> Snow

> Mature

not with those distinguished mentally-challenged names.

[recursivelyenumerable]

okayyyyy

[tiesto]

I think Far Cry 2 and Crysis serve as great examples of what works and what doesn't in open world game design.  Crysis is a very linear game, but there is plenty of freedom WITHIN its linearity.  This type of design is my favorite and applies to many of my favorite games.  Far Cry 2, however, took a different approach and presented a much larger world and ended up failing to deliver any seriously compelling scenarios.  Freedom within linearity is the goal I think more games should strive for.

That said, I'll always prefer a completely linear, on-rails kind of game to a wide open "go anywhere" experience.

I've never played Far Cry 2 or Crisis but I totally agree with you... I'll always prefer a more on-rails, tightly scripted game, "go anywhere" experiences tend to fall short for me, since either they run out of interesting scenario setups, or become much too easy to break. MGS series, Half Life 2, are some good examples for what you are looking for, I think "freedom within linearity"

[Third]

Already looks better than any released jrpg.

And it's early build, too.

SE setting the bar very high again.

[MCD]

okayyyyy

are you RAGING right now? i bet you are.

[recursivelyenumerable]

i'm raging because i can't get the Windows shell metadata API to do what i want, actually

[MCD]

oh.

i raged because firefox 3 for some reason disabled whole keyboard buttons while trying to quote your post.

[Himu]

> Lightning
> Snow

> Mature

not with those distinguished mentally-challenged names.

They're code names

[recursivelyenumerable]

that's only Lightning IIRC.

[demi]

The battle music is so awesome. Consider me on the hype train. All aboard the X360 express choo choo

[recursivelyenumerable]

I actually don't like the regular battle music that much, though my opinion might change if I got to hear a decent audio quality version (in which I can actually hear all the parts distinctly).  The transition between the starting serious/heroic section and the hopping violin section seems too sudden and forced, though there does seem to be a violin part in the first section that might help smooth things over if I could hear it clearly.

Boss music is ! though

[WrikaWrek]

I wish more games had this kind of budget.

[Himu]

http://www.gamersyde.com/news_7707_en.html

[dark1x]

http://www.gamersyde.com/news_7707_en.html

The image quality actually looks really good.  I'm surprised.

[Himu]

http://www.andriasang.com/e/blogs/anoop/2009/04/16/ffxiii_demo_translation/

translation

[Third]

So, the demo seems to be almost 6gb in size. 
Almost one hour gameplay, though.

I wonder how many discs the X360 version will have.

[WrikaWrek]

So, the demo seems to be almost 6gb in size. 
Almost one hour gameplay, though.

I wonder how many discs the X360 version will have.

 

10 min demos normally occupy over 1 GB these days, so holy shite, if you want more than 1 hour of game in your 360 you gotta spin that shit triple style, muahahahaha

 

[Jansen]

i've downloaded shitloads of demos 1-2 gigs in size that have 15 mins of gameplay

you simply shouldn't assume anything from demo size. well not unless you're a moron like the tards that truly believe no one as s-e is currently working on the 360 port

ncsx better ship to me today!

[Himu]

The FF collector in me is going to get both versions

[Jansen]

i might get both

if there is a CE i'll get that for ps3 and the regular edition for 360. if there isn't a CE (lol) i'll just get it for 360

[Jansen]

oh someone on b3d is claiming the cgi cutscenes are 1080p and the game is using 4xAA (it also upscales to 1080i/p!)

would be pretty sweet if true

[maxy]

Probably 0.5GB of game data,the rest are 1080p movies.

Also that dude at b3d is not a certified pixel counter ,so we will have to wait a little more...

[Third]

I hope the PAL and NA regions get the game at the same time.

Otherwise I'll have to buy two versions, just like with FFXII. 

[Himu]

I'll get a CE for ps3 and regular edition for 360 sometime down the line

[WrikaWrek]

Some of the in game cut scenes are really sub par, would some pretty mediocre animation. After the likes of MGs4 and Res5, it's hard to swallow such a huge game like FFXIII not having on par animations and overall quality in the in game cinemas.

[dark1x]

Some of the in game cut scenes are really sub par, would some pretty mediocre animation. After the likes of MGs4 and Res5, it's hard to swallow such a huge game like FFXIII not having on par animations and overall quality in the in game cinemas.

You can't expect perfection in a massive RPG no matter how huge your budget is.  We saw this last generation with FFX and The Bouncer.  The Bouncer set the bar for cutscene quality on PS2 (prior to MGS2) with some incredibly well animated, detailed, 60 fps realtime cutscenes.  FFX, despite having a much larger budget, was nowhere near as impressive in regards to its cinematics.

I still don't see anything particularly wrong with the cinema scenes.  They seem well animated to me while offering plenty of fine details.  For an RPG, it's about as good as it gets at the moment.

Also that dude at b3d is not a certified pixel counter ,so we will have to wait a little more...

Still, I think it's pretty obvious (from those direct feed shots above) that they are at least using 2x AA (though it does look like 4xAA to me).  The image quality is much better than I had expected.

[recursivelyenumerable]

Why would they use 2x or 4x FSAA, but not offer the option of rendering at a higher (1080p) resolution?  Isn't FSAA just rendering at a higher resolution internally and downscaling?

Bouncer was also developed by Dream Factory which was a technically elite studio at the time, though they fell apart after (or during) its development ...

[dark1x]

Why would they use 2x or 4x FSAA, but not offer the option of rendering at a higher (1080p) resolution?  Isn't FSAA just rendering at a higher resolution internally and downscaling?

Not quite.

Still, anti-aliasing can actually be superior to a higher resolution in many cases.  1280x720 with 4x AA looks much cleaner than 1920x1080 with no AA, if you ask me.  This becomes pretty clear when you start messing with PC games.  1080p does add some detail and clarity, but edges are jagged without anti-aliasing even when the pixels are much smaller.  Now, 4x AA at 1080p is fantastic looking.

[recursivelyenumerable]

Isn't that just similar to how old console games can look better on old analog TVs than on clearer displays, though?  In general, I'd rather see more detail than have my eyes fooled into not noticing that detail's not there.  It's why I always preferred the look of PS1 games to N64 games.

[WrikaWrek]

GTAIV is a 30 / 40 hour game, and has great in game cut scenes.

This game also has some really shitty character design here and there, and what's up with the characters having more japanese features than ever, but not looking japanese? Do the japanese have a problem with how they look?

The pacing in these 40 min, if it's the initial 40 min of the game, is horrible. Not feeling the game at all from this demo.

[recursivelyenumerable]

What's wrong with the pacing?  It just looks similar to FF7 to me in that sense.

[WrikaWrek]

What's wrong with the pacing?  It just looks similar to FF7 to me in that sense.

They are trying to open up the game with a big action set piece, but then you spend too much time just walking in this straight line through a bridge, fighting the same duo of characters over and over.

It needs to be much more intense, like tak tak tak bam, holy shit, and when it's over you're like "whoa, that was an amazing opening", this on the other end is like "zzZZZZZzzzzzZZZZzzzz"

[recursivelyenumerable]

Yeah, FF7 opened exactly the same way, and I don't remember anyone ever complaining about the pacing at the beginning being slow. 

[WrikaWrek]

Final Fantasy 7 is like 10 years old or some shit. Who cares, shit evolved.

Never liked that game anyway.

[recursivelyenumerable]

The beginning is really intended just to get you used to the basic battle system, with some flashy action in the cutscenes to hype you up.  Personally, I prefer RPGs to start in a low-key way like Chrono Trigger, letting you explore towns and fields a bit before they pull out the big setpieces, but a lot of people seem to like the FF7-style artificially hyped-up opening.

I don't like FF7 either, but its opening was and is popular.

[Himu]

FF7's opening is amazing. It starts off with a bang and it succeeds where about every other rpg, western or japanese, fails. Whoever doesn't like FF7's opening is an idiot, I'm afraid.

[recursivelyenumerable]

FF7's opening is amazing. It starts off with a bang

Yes, which is what I don't like about it.  I like my long-form entertainment to start off more low-key and build up gradually, instead of having to hype themselves.  The worst is when games open with a commercial for themselves (e.g. Parasite Eve and Chrono Cross demo movies).  I bought the game already, you don't need to keep trying to sell me on it.