TL;DR: XVI feels like Heavensward but with a ‘more colours’- DLC, fantastic combat and the exact same mission structure
I love to love Final Fantasy XVI. So much about this hit the spot for me and yet some aspects of it leave me wanting for more. I want to focus on these aspects in this review. By my score it should be obvious how much I like the rest of the game.
My biggest compliment goes to the pacing of the second half of 16. This game moves at a break-neck speed at times and keeps hitting you with one great set-piece after another. Yet later in the game that speed is regularly halted by what feels like filler quests in between. I barely really disliked any of these, but it is the gut reaction when confronted with the fact that you won’t get to the cool thing, you want to do for another 20 minutes, that colours the impression. This for me becomes really apparent in the last zone. A reason for that may be found in how I approached my playthrough. I wanted to get the strongest weapon before fighting the last boss, which meant without googling too much, doing every single Hunt mission as they got available. How these are distributed is a another aspect I don’t like, because for a minority of them you have to complete side quests first. Other than side quests which unlock new gameplay features or gear, they are not marked with the typical + symbol in the quest-icon. So I had to google which of these quests I have to sit through in order to unlock the hunts to unlock the previously mentioned weapon. Add the sort of filler main quests between larger set-pieces and you will see how my progress later in the game basically got halted every 2 main scenario missions. If the hunt-board was unlocked earlier, they could’ve spread these out more throughout the game. That would have improved my enjoyment of the very cool and fun hunt fights for sure.
I'm also not a fan of most of the side quests. Some tell neat stories, others don't and just reward you with money you'll never need and reputation in your camp. All of them are fetchy af. The same could be said about the main scenario ones too. They didn't really get out of the MMO quest design. As someone who loves 14 for many years now I can look past that. I'm used to their approach to story-telling in these quests and felt right at home. Still, they could be a whole lot better and more interesting from a gameplay standpoint.
Now to the spoilery bit:
Why the hell is Jill not more in this game?!?! She is amazing throughout the first half, but basically gets her entire screen-time cut after a certain introduction of another character. Don’t get me wrong, Joshua and Clive have great chemistry and captivating arcs, but Jill could have added to that. She sort of gets side-lined and acts like the love-interest with no agency. I loved the beginning of their love-story just to see it unaddressed for most of the runtime right up to the end. That fact did ruin Jills character for me personally. She has so much potential to add to the themes of Clive’s journey and they should have capitalized on that.
The overall narrative and world are amazing though. I was sceptical at first, because the tone and constant name dropping of kingdom names, places and characters and their history could have easily made for a very confusing and uninspired backdrop to the action-focused gameplay. But it IS interesting. It is really well thought out and understandable just by paying attention to the story and pressing the Active Time Lore Button like twice when you happen to get lost anyway. Hell, the features that keep track of the events in the realm are really cool too! Not needed, yet I still wish more games had that so when I drop them for a couple of months, I can just go to an NPC who has neatly arranged visualizations for every major event, ready for me to browse. This is way more accessible than having to browse the massive entries in 13 for sure.
As I said, I love XVI and while by no means perfect, it scratches that certain itch Final Fantasy has been scratching for most of my life now. It’s a peak comfort game and I’m convinced that I’ll return many many times in the search for solace. Outside of the game I’m already addicted to Soken and his team’s compositions for this one.
My only wish for the future is that 17 will be written by Natsuko Ishikawa and again composed by Soken or the Team that’s working on 7R currently.
I love to love Final Fantasy XVI. So much about this hit the spot for me and yet some aspects of it leave me wanting for more. I want to focus on these aspects in this review. By my score it should be obvious how much I like the rest of the game.
My biggest compliment goes to the pacing of the second half of 16. This game moves at a break-neck speed at times and keeps hitting you with one great set-piece after another. Yet later in the game that speed is regularly halted by what feels like filler quests in between. I barely really disliked any of these, but it is the gut reaction when confronted with the fact that you won’t get to the cool thing, you want to do for another 20 minutes, that colours the impression. This for me becomes really apparent in the last zone. A reason for that may be found in how I approached my playthrough. I wanted to get the strongest weapon before fighting the last boss, which meant without googling too much, doing every single Hunt mission as they got available. How these are distributed is a another aspect I don’t like, because for a minority of them you have to complete side quests first. Other than side quests which unlock new gameplay features or gear, they are not marked with the typical + symbol in the quest-icon. So I had to google which of these quests I have to sit through in order to unlock the hunts to unlock the previously mentioned weapon. Add the sort of filler main quests between larger set-pieces and you will see how my progress later in the game basically got halted every 2 main scenario missions. If the hunt-board was unlocked earlier, they could’ve spread these out more throughout the game. That would have improved my enjoyment of the very cool and fun hunt fights for sure.
I'm also not a fan of most of the side quests. Some tell neat stories, others don't and just reward you with money you'll never need and reputation in your camp. All of them are fetchy af. The same could be said about the main scenario ones too. They didn't really get out of the MMO quest design. As someone who loves 14 for many years now I can look past that. I'm used to their approach to story-telling in these quests and felt right at home. Still, they could be a whole lot better and more interesting from a gameplay standpoint.
Now to the spoilery bit:
Why the hell is Jill not more in this game?!?! She is amazing throughout the first half, but basically gets her entire screen-time cut after a certain introduction of another character. Don’t get me wrong, Joshua and Clive have great chemistry and captivating arcs, but Jill could have added to that. She sort of gets side-lined and acts like the love-interest with no agency. I loved the beginning of their love-story just to see it unaddressed for most of the runtime right up to the end. That fact did ruin Jills character for me personally. She has so much potential to add to the themes of Clive’s journey and they should have capitalized on that.
The overall narrative and world are amazing though. I was sceptical at first, because the tone and constant name dropping of kingdom names, places and characters and their history could have easily made for a very confusing and uninspired backdrop to the action-focused gameplay. But it IS interesting. It is really well thought out and understandable just by paying attention to the story and pressing the Active Time Lore Button like twice when you happen to get lost anyway. Hell, the features that keep track of the events in the realm are really cool too! Not needed, yet I still wish more games had that so when I drop them for a couple of months, I can just go to an NPC who has neatly arranged visualizations for every major event, ready for me to browse. This is way more accessible than having to browse the massive entries in 13 for sure.
As I said, I love XVI and while by no means perfect, it scratches that certain itch Final Fantasy has been scratching for most of my life now. It’s a peak comfort game and I’m convinced that I’ll return many many times in the search for solace. Outside of the game I’m already addicted to Soken and his team’s compositions for this one.
My only wish for the future is that 17 will be written by Natsuko Ishikawa and again composed by Soken or the Team that’s working on 7R currently.