I don’t recognise Final Fantasy 16 as the franchise I used to love – Reader’s Feature

metro.co.uk:

A reader is unimpressed by the new Final Fantasy 16 trailer and wishes Square Enix would create a more traditional modern entry.

I hesitated trying to write this Reader’s Feature, after seeing the Final Fantasy 16 trailer on Thursday evening. I didn’t want to have a knee jerk reaction and I also didn’t want to come across as one of those gatekeeping, reactionary jerks that always complain about everything being different and wishing things could stay the same way forever. I’m not like that, I swear, but I have to come to grips with the fact that Final Fantasy is not for me anymore.

I have played and enjoyed the franchise ever since Final Fantasy 7 on the PS1 and have gone back to play every other mainline game and many, many spin-offs. Everything about those spoke to me as a gamer: the over-the-top anime stories and characters, the turn-based combat that didn’t require any arcade skills, and the amazing artistry of the visuals and soundtrack.

Some of these elements still exist in the modern games but I already felt them start to get away from me after Final Fantasy 12, when the focus moved firmly onto action-based battles and sci-fi settings mixed with a lot of real world elements. The fantasy, for me, was becoming less interesting and less identifiable as the franchise I knew. And then I saw the new Final Fantasy 16 trailer.

I’d already seen the reveal trailer last year and had concerns, but the new gameplay footage confirms to me two things: the battles are completely action-based and the setting is so Westernised it’s barely identifiable as Final Fantasy. It just looks like a generic Tolkien-esque world mixed with Game of Thrones and a million miles away from other Japanese made fantasy settings, like Final Fantasy 9.

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