Final Fantasy Versus XIII director – Tetsuya Nomura – has provided a small update on the progress of the game, and it doesn’t look like we can expect it anytime soon. Speaking via Twitter, he had the following to say;
“Versus has had many difficulties, and past method of production have been completely inapplicable, but these are the difficulties of birth, so we are working hard.
There have been many questions regarding fields. It’s not a completely open world. It’s like the 2D FF games in HD. Although, in terms of looks, it’s not a top-down view, it’s like the screenshots that have been released. You’ll move through the world from that view.”
This means that the action will play out in a third person view, with the camera behind the back of the game’s protagonist. He also went on to say;
“Agito and Versus have different production styles and progress states, but they’re both presently undergoing voice casting. 3rd Birthday’s recording will end shortly. Next up is Agito.”
Don’t expect to catch a glimpse of the game at Gamescom either. In a later Tweet, Nomura said that it will not be shown at the European gaming event.
Source: Andriasang
tonycawley
I’d rather both versus 13 and 14 get delayed a while and end up coming out as spankingly excellent games. As good as 13 was, it was definitely a little underwhelming. There could both be awesome if they spend the time polishing them.
Kamokazi-UK
How were you underwhelmed? I found nothing lacking…
tonycawley
I found it frustrating how the game didn’t open up until right near the end. You’re just forced down corridors for 30 hours. Also the character progression didn’t fully open up until near the end.
sesameseed
I thought it was a shocker! Was totally underwhelmed by it and am more than happy to defect my RPG loyalties to Level 5.
Roynaldo
For an FF it was very out of the ordinary, they tried something totally new and while it suceeded in some areas it failed in others.
FF fanboys (like myself) still love it, as it is a cracking story which they never fail on.
For newbies, it can seem to be a very linear RPG. RPGs usually are wide open games with side quests galore but XIII was far from that. It is still a great game in its own right but it has its out of the ordinary problems which makes you feel underwhelmed by it.
Squalje
I think FF games normally have a lot of polish on them and I have high expectations for Versus.
The PSP and I are also looking forward to Agito. Not heard many details on the game to date.
newsky87
Any issues with FF13 certainly were nothing to do with lack of polish, that thing was polished to within an inch of it’s very shiny existence. I think what most people didn’t like was the loss of the open world aspect and not being able to explore towns and talk to all the random NPCs. It was a strictly linear affair, which I didn’t mind. But I’m enjoying Star Ocean very much right now, it has a really old school Final Fantasy feel, very reminiscent of FF7, 8, and 9.
tonycawley
Sorry, i wasn’t saying 13 wasn’t polished, i was saying the delay on versus 13 and 14 would give them time to polish further. I played through 13 and enjoyed it, but was definitely disappointed by it’s linearity
Kamokazi-UK
@tonycawley Polish whouldn’t help, they were telling a story, just like any other FF
shakengandulf
What does “polish” have to do with the story? polish is described as (how bug free the game is, constant fps, no system freeze up’s, if a texture looks wrong its fixed, if a player gets stuck its fixed, its the overall look at the game to make sure its 100% and i’l say rite now its never had any issues running on my console. not ranting btw just making sure you understand its definition game wise.
Charmed_Fanatic
oooooh :(
Jordaaaan
I wonder if that means that we will be large compared to the world map or if we’ll have to explore the world map with it being much bigger and taking much longer to explore.
Also this can pretty much confirm that there’s gonna be secret bosses, something XIII was definately lacking in.
shakengandulf
That sounds rite Jordaaaan. sounds like it will be in its true original FF style form just on a higher spec system.
solidsteven
please don’t be like 13 be like the older one. it better not have the same system as 13
Quinlank
This certainly SOUNDS much better than 13, but might be a tad too ambitious for it’s own good in a way. FFXIII took forever to come out, and it basically only needed one line of text for it’s instruction manual(“Hold up, tap X, you win!”), so a game with a gameworld comparable in scope to FFXIII utilising the far more technically demanding and faster paced combat system of Kingdom Hearts sounds like it could also be in limbo for an age. Saying that, don’t JRPGs usually get their voice work done first so all the animations can be designed around the voices? That was always my impression… unless they’re starting the whole damn game over from scratch… lol