Epic monster battles will be at the heart of Final Fantasy XVI
The thing Naoki Yoshida is most excited about in Final Fantasy XVI is the eikon battles.
In speaking to The Verge, Yoshida, the game’s director, talked about how earth-shattering, knock-down, drag-out fights between some of the franchise’s most prominent and popular monsters featured heavily in this latest single-player, non-remake entry in the 35-year-old JRPG series.
Summons — aka espers, aka aeons, aka eidolons, aka GF (lol) and now eikons — have been a fixture in the Final Fantasy series, representing a kind of “break glass in case of emergency” option in combat. Over the years, players have had varying levels of control over them with the power to call them forth for a one-time big hit like in Final Fantasy VII and IX, issue commands to them directly like in Final Fantasy X, or to summon them as NPC combat allies like inFFXII. But Final Fantasy XVI seems to offer more to summon combat than just having a big dude show up to beat on other dudes for you.
“We have these epic summon versus summon battles,” Yoshida said, speaking through a translator. “And these are not only going to be in cutscenes. The players will be able to actually get into those battles and control an eikon of their own and feel the excitement from the inside, not just from an outside type of view.”
Eikons are at the heart of all the trailers, media, and lore we’ve seen of Final Fantasy XVI so far, and focusing the game on these creatures of immense and awesome power is key to Yoshida’s vision.
“We envision Final Fantasy XVI as like a giant, high-speed roller coaster that will take players on a thrilling ride both story- and gameplay-wise.”
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