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[Koozek]

Lovely Twitter thread that has been going since January about how Rami Ismail (one half of the dev studio Vlambeer that made games like Super Crate Box, Nuclear Throne, Ridiculous Fishing, and LUFTRAUSERS) got his mom to play and beat Final Fantasy XV, her first videogame. Really fun read! Glad she enjoyed the experience and was surprised about how much the medium has to offer emotionally and artistically.

https://twitter.com/tha_rami/status/823347423158345728

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Full thread:

I bought my mom -who doesn't game at all- FFXV.

An hour in she's halfway through chapter 1 & slowly starting to get dual stick controls.

My mom today walked from Hammerhead to Galdin Quay because she forgot about the Regalia. She also met Dino & some "arms dealer".

She also said the right stick felt upside down & I had to sit her down to have The Talk. Turns out unlike me, she plays inverted

Mom finished Chapter 1 of FFXV, but "all the boys but Noctis died and I forgot the buttons so I'll try again tomorrow."

Cindy: "Prince Noctis, could you bring this parcel to the next village?"
Mom: "Absolutely not, I'm a prince, do it yourself."

Mom: "Got to a place named Galdin Quay"
Me: "And?"
Mom: "Met some shady guy."
Me: "Do tell."
Mom: "He tried to sell me weapons."

The past few minutes, I learned that to mom the "Talk" prompt in FFXV doesn't look optional, & repeat lines don't mean "move on".

Prompto: "Chocobos!"
Mom: "We literally all just agreed we need to hurry to Lestallum to figure out this evil empire thing."

Mom defeated Titan, took down Deadeye, and finally got herself a Chocobo. She is already smiling and nodding along with the song.

The Titan battle went rather well, my mom commenting that "Did I beat the really big guy? I have no idea. Where'd he go?"

Deadeye was her 1st hunt of the game, since my mom continues to insist Noctis' royal heritage means she shouldn't do sidequests.

After days, mom figured out her objective marker was pointing at an underground objective, & the cave entrance is somewhere else.

From her texts, it sounds like she went & beat the Naga in Fociaugh Hollow, but couldn't find the rune stone & left confused.

Though she's mentioning that 'she bought a superpower but forgot what it was called or what it does', so maybe she did get it?

For mother's day, I taught my mom to place map markers. Moments later she summoned her first ever FF summon with Ramuh.

Mom's response to the Ramuh summon was a sort of overwhelmed "heavens" which given the summon seems entirely appropriate.

Also: it takes enough of mom's attention to distinguish "bumper" from "trigger" that it sometimes messes up "left" and "right".

I also asked Mom who her favorite character is: Gladiolus, since he has the best face & Tempest saves her when she's in trouble.

Mom has her 1st videogame rival: when Aranea boasted she doesn't do "unpaid work", mom yelled "who do you think you are?" at her.

When Aranea then made her dramatic escape, flying straight up, my mother just nodded "yeah, that's what I thought, run away".

Mom is slowly learning simultaneous dual stick controls, and managed to mentally map "team left bumper", "noctis' right bumper".

Mom also think Iris needs to stop being a try-hard ("oh, her again?" at every post-battle scene), but does think she is adorable.

Got a panicked message that "Load Game" is greyed out in mom's FFXV, turns out it's just background installing the 1.10 update.

Just forwarded mom her first ever fanmail (she says "aww!"), and she also sent me a picture of her clearing Malmalam Thicket?

Update from mom: Gladio left the party for some reason, and now she's looking for Mythril with Aranea. She's unhappy about this.

Mom has learned the Pro Gamer Skills of turning a corner while walking, and complaining about of repeating closing lines.

She couldn't map stairs to a dungeon having multiple floors, so her spatial awareness isn't yet fully functional in the game?

She also 100% *crushed* Quetzalcoatl, but the game crashed & that save corrupted. I redid the fight for her, but barely made it.

Finally, mom always grins at Prompto's whistling after using Piercer, & mentioned Aranea isn't "half bad as a Gladio substitute".

I leave for E3 & now mom messages me this. Guess she finished Chapter 8 and navigated all of Altissia on her own.

Gladio returned to the party, she took the boat, negotiated with Camelia (harsh negotiator, she said), & navigated the city.

The Leviathan fight is a bit too much: "I think Prompto helped on an airplane & I jumped on the dragon but fell in the water".

Anyway, she faced her first game over in the game against Leviathan & is a bit shook up over it, so more play some other day.

She just added: "The story is getting a bit complicated - I don't know who is on what side. I guess I'll follow Noct & find out."

From this point out, contains severe spoilers for FFXV's story. If you want to avoid those, mute the hashtag now.

So the Leviathan fight was pretty much impossible. A lot of fast camera movement, and fast telegraphing. Mom nails QTE's tho'.

Mom seemed to enjoy the back and forth between Leviathan sequences and cutscenes, as it gave her some breathers and context.

Mom's roleplaying is still great. 0 chill in the negotiations, demanded Leviathan give Noctis her powers. "King time!", she said.

She was shocked at Lunafreya's fate during the fight, and of Ignis' injury afterwards. Ardyn is "a bad man".

Mom mumbled "these games have beautiful images" at the most beautiful shot in FFXV.

Anyway, mom's at Chapter 10 now. She agrees with Gladio yelling at Noctis, but added maybe Gladio "shouldn't have said coward".

Oh, she carefully admitted that she bought some healing items before the Leviathan battle "just in case". One proud son right now

Mom got stuck during the Marboro fight because of the Ignis section and she spent a week trying to beat an unbeatable boss.

Mom progressed rapidly today! She beat Marboro, cleared the train section, and died several time on the aircraft section.

Mom was sad to learn dying in a crashing imperial craft full of self-detonating enemies does not trigger the "Ruby Light" revive

Anyway, mom really liked the train, & was quite proud to successfully defend it. "It's a nice train. Very cozy. A bit too long."

Mom totally missed that Noctis threw Prompto off the train, and was confused as to why he was gone. "How do you follow all that?"

Mom didn't really remark on Tenebrae, but easily followed the Shiva reveal, and found it "really surprising". "Good, right?"

Mom finally made a smooth 180 turn with the camera while walking. She was 34 hours into the game. "That was good!", she grinned.

Watching mom try to do the driving segment was the most endearing thing. It took 2 hours to get it, and it's a 2 minute segment.

Mom had several giggle attacks through the segment, most notably when she crashed the car as soon as Gladio said "don't crash".

Mom also had her 1st ragequit, & decided to "whatever" about an hour & a half into her attempt. Went back after 5 minutes.

Finally, she encountered her 1st clipping bug when the car fell off the road. She just exclaimed an "oh" as the car fell forever.

When mom was gonna drive us to the train home, @MsMinotaur said "don't crash" & mom had another giggle attack so we had to wait.

By the end mom started driving using the left thumbstick vice-grip with 2 fingers. Never seen that before but it sure worked.

My mom reviews FFXV Chapter 13 better than anyone I've seen discuss it before: "Well, there's a lot of hallways here."

Chapter 13:
"Ardyn just won't shut up"
"I think Ravus might be hurt"
"I found everyone"
"Noctis put his sword in some cabinet?"

Mom's biggest enemy is timed sequences. She's gotten the hang of QTE's, but putting any timer on the screen is instant despair.

"Enemies & a timer appeared, so I tried fighting them a lot of times, but I think I might've tensed because my neck's stuck now."

I asked why she tried fighting while the 'guys' tell her she should run for the crystal. She said she tried but couldn't do it?

Oh no, she almost completed it on her second try, but seems the tiny cutscene at the end is still on-timer, so she got game over.

So I guess she's been thinking that running away is bad, & instead of trying again, she's been fighting infini-spawns for hours.

"Noctis looked very sad looking back for his friends and then the screen said game over, so I just didn't want to do that again."

Mom just apologized for the times she made me stop playing before a savepoint. "I had no idea thats how it works". Big grin here.

"That was the Crystal? I didn't think it looked like one. It looks more like some sort of amoebe."

"I met Bahamut and he has very big hands."

My mom's response to Bahamut's explanation is that she doesn't believe Noctis will come to any harm in this game and uh oh.

The impact of ruined Galdin Quay is dampened since mom couldn't control the camera when she was there before, & only saw sky.

My mom's surprised "oh!" and relieved smile at "It's me, Talcott!" makes me believe that yeah, this is a resounding success.

Aw, mom's really happy to see the boys!
"10 years & Gladio still hasn't learned to button his jacket", mom grinned. "Thankfully."

Mom super boss-rushed the Behemoth. It didn't stand a chance. She's at the citadel. This is it.

I don't think mom remembers the in-media-res opening of the game, but she's going straight for Ifrit.

Bahamut's summon made my mom exclaim "heavens", to which she grinned and added, "guess that's appropriate."

"Wait, if Bahamut can't defeat Ifrit, what's a bunch of dudes going to do against him?", mom rightfully asks. She looks worried.

"I guess Shiva and Cindy have similar clothing stores"

"I don't know how this game went from some boys making a campfire to the Chosen King purging darkness from the world."

I guess y'all will have to wait for the end of to see what photo she picked.

Mom can't find the point warp to get to Ardyn's fight so she keeps walking back and forth between the throne and the wall.

Mom beat Ardyn.

Mom's expression at Noctis' final moments with Ignis, Prompto, and Gladio is heartbreaking.

"This scene is beautiful & the music is beautiful" is the only thing mom managed to say between the stairs & "It's finally over."

Mom's first credit roll.

I don't think mom has quite realized the campfire credit scene is a flashback and she's happy and confused at it and oh no.

Oh, there is the realisation it's a flashback.

"Oh, it's the sunrise. It's beautiful!"

46 hours and 18 minutes.

That was , and that was my mom's first ever videogame.

Mom says: "I had no clue this was what these games are: the views, music - I started to enjoy playing it and I'm very sad it's over."

 

[Anung]

Been following this myself and it's wonderful. Really cute stuff.

 

[ryushe]

Mom says: "the views, music - I started to enjoy playing it and I'm very sad it's over."

Exactly how I felt after it was all said and done. :'(

 

[DNAbro]

It was nice seeing the progression of this over months. I couldn't imagine my parents playing anything like FFXV.

 

[Shaanyboi]

This is amazing. My parents could never do this. Though my dad did try playing Wind Waker, but I was also really bad at explaining the game to him. I was like 13.

 

[Primethius]

This is really cool to read.

 

[Sheroking]

Jeez.

Props to Mrs. Ismail. An RPG with a sometimes difficult 3D camera is probably the last thing I'd recommend to somebody for their first game and she conquered it.

 

[Koozek]

Been following this myself and it's wonderful. Really cute stuff.

Yeah, I always love seeing how non-gamers/newcomers perceive and experience videogames. It's really interesting how they often instantly notice the silly stuff that we're maybe too used to or just accepted, and at the same time are also impressed by things that we take for granted after decades of gaming.

 

[CircusOfClouds]

My mom would have given up when

Spoiler

they are pushing the car

 

[BTA]

I only just saw it today; it's unfortunate as I would have liked to have followed along over time, since it was fun to read.

 

[Zedark]

Yeah, I always love seeing how non-gamers/newcomers perceive and experience videogames. It's really interesting how they often instantly notice the silly stuff that we're maybe too used to or just accepted, and at the same time are also impressed by things that we take for granted after decades of gaming.

True, and it also gives you a reminder of things that we do instinctively, but are difficult for peopple holding a controller for the first time, like doing precise movement with the left and right stick.

Really interesting read, thanks for compiling all this! Really cool to see how a non-gamer experiences a big budget story-heavy game like FFXV, and how it can be disoriented with the amount of stuff happening.

 

[HStallion]

My mom is not a gaming or tech person at all. She still has an ancient flip phone for example. Still she picked up Until Dawn after seeing me play it and had a similar experience to Rami and his mother.

 

[Koozek]

True, and it also gives you a reminder of things that we do instinctively, but are difficult for peopple holding a controller for the first time, like doing precise movement with the left and right stick.

Really interesting read, thanks for compiling all this! Really cool to see how a non-gamer experiences a big budget story-heavy game like FFXV, and how it can be disoriented with the amount of stuff happening.

Oh yeah!

 

[KojiKnight]

Jeez.

Props to Mrs. Ismail. An RPG with a sometimes difficult 3D camera is probably the last thing I'd recommend to somebody for their first game and she conquered it.

More impressive is 46 hours... I think i did 60 on my first play through and i know how to video game. Though it looks like she avoided all the side quests.

 

[YaBish]

That's awesome. My mom has played a few sidescroller games before, but it had been years since she played one. For some reason she's latched onto the story in Persona 5 and is about 13 hours in. I don't really have the heart to tell her that it's a 85-100 hour game.

 

[Hentailover]

True, and it also gives you a reminder of things that we do instinctively, but are difficult for peopple holding a controller for the first time, like doing precise movement with the left and right stick.

Yeah, seen quite a few instances of people that don't do video games straight up calling this really difficult for them.
Just like a year ago, there was an article by some woman, who was like called it "soccer mom tries video games' or whatever. Was so weird somebody give a complicated explanation about how "one stick controls your movement, other controls your view".

 

[Glass Rebel]

Turns out unlike me, she plays inverted

Rami's mother must be embarrassed to have such a worthless son.

 

[Man Called Aerodynamics]

Rami's mother must be embarrassed to have such a worthless son.

Lol.

FF15 is... quite a game to pick for someone's first experience.

 

[Royce McCutcheon]

Mom just apologized for the times she made me stop playing before a savepoint. "I had no idea thats how it works". Big grin here.

I'm positive my mom knows how it worked, she just didn't give a rats ass.

 

[Jintor]

that's really cool.

it kinda reminds me that one of the idle thumbs' mum played... fallout? skyrim? and twittered it? I can't remember which of them though lol

 

[ULTROS!]

Interesting... seems like this FF is really for the first timers. I mean I see there are a lot of people who never play FF games enjoying this one.

 

[Koozek]

More impressive is 46 hours... I think i did 60 on my first play through and i know how to video game. Though it looks like she avoided all the side quests.

Remember when people joked about why Noctis as a prince should have to bring someone tomatoes and stuff?

Cindy: "Prince Noctis, could you bring this parcel to the next village?"
Mom: "Absolutely not, I'm a prince, do it yourself."

Deadeye was her 1st hunt of the game, since my mom continues to insist Noctis' royal heritage means she shouldn't do sidequests.

 

[Klappdrachen]

I'm positive my mom knows how it worked, she just didn't give a rats ass.

My thoughts exactly, haha

 

[DNAbro]

Interesting... seems like this FF is really for the first timers. I mean I see there are a lot of people who never play FF games enjoying this one.

I had a friend who tried other FF before but XV was the only one he liked. Another got it as his first and he enjoyed but hasn't finished it. It's almost like action rpgs and open worlds are more popular than what FF was before.

 

[Falk]

"I don't know how this game went from some boys making a campfire to the Chosen King purging darkness from the world."

This was me with FF7. I'm glad FF15 is conveying this to new audiences.

 

[KojiKnight]

Lol.

FF15 is... quite a game to pick for someone's first experience.

It's not so bad. The voice acting is pretty good, the scenery is beautiful, and easy mode essentially makes you immortal.

 

[blakep267]

Wouldn't the game be much harder if you didn't do the hunts. I know I did a ton of hints early on so I was pretty overleveled early on, but I could see it being more difficult not doing them and experimenting with weapons

Edit nvm. It's probably easy mode

 

[KojiKnight]

Wouldn't the game be much harder if you didn't do the hunts. I know I did a ton of hints early on so I was pretty overleveled early on, but I could see it being more difficult not doing them and experimenting with weapons

Easy mode and Ruby light means that's being incapped is only a minor inconvenience.

 

[MilkBeard]

This was fun, chuckled at some of those comments. Glad she enjoyed the game.

Also, I agree with her about Noctis not doing sidequests. He should make his party do it while he sits at the hotel playing games. That would have been funny, I think.

 

[xuchu]

That's really cool. Was following this when she first started. Really puts into perspective how strange and difficult 3D camera control with dual analogue sticks are for those unaccustomed to controllers.

 

[MilkBeard]

That's really cool. Was following this when she first started. Really puts into perspective how strange and difficult 3D camera control with dual analogue sticks are for those unaccustomed to controllers.

Yeah, it's interesting. I've done it since young so it's like breathing to me. However, this is like watching your grandpa navigate the computer slowly, asking how to open the email. The tech came after their time.

 

[Ruff]

Jeez, I had enough trouble controlling the camera and movement in this game and I've had decades of gaming experience to guide me. I can't imagine playing this one as someone who hasn't even mastered using 2 anolog sticks at once

 

[WordsintheWater]

That was awesome to read

 

[grizzelye]

That was excellent!

 

[Koozek]

This was me with FF7. I'm glad FF15 is conveying this to new audiences.

Though I'd say the jump from doing a eco-terrorist attack on a reactor probably killing dozens of innocents in the slums to saving the world from [FFVII spoilers]

Spoiler

a meteor summoned by an alien-cells-infused madman

is still a bit less innocent than the one in FFXV^^

 

[LordOfLore]

Reminds me of my first videogame in english: FFX-2. I had my mother with me who translated/paraphrased for me. I was 10. We used to play 1-2 hours every other day until post-concert where I did everything due to her going on vacation with my little sister while me and dad stayed in Sweden.

 

[Koozek]

Reminds me of my first videogame in english: FFX-2. I had my mother with me who translated/paraphrased for me. I was 10. We used to play 1-2 hours every other day until post-concert where I did everything due to her going on vacation with my little sister while me and dad stayed in Sweden.

Hehe. I hope FFX-2 wasn't your first FF too

 

[KojiKnight]

That's really cool. Was following this when she first started. Really puts into perspective how strange and difficult 3D camera control with dual analogue sticks are for those unaccustomed to controllers.

You notice this when you have kids too. It took awhile, but my 7 year old daughter plays BotW like a champ now.

 

[Arkeband]

This was a nice read - I'm surprised some of the more obtuse story beats didn't deter her but I guess having someone to explain probably helps. Easy Mode also seems like a godsend here if only because the gameplay is so clunky.

Interesting choice of picture.

 

[Keym]

Thank you for taking the time to post the whole thing, worth a read.

 

[Mr. Luchador]

Inverted. *nods*

 

[LordKasual]

So I guess she's been thinking that running away is bad, & instead of trying again, she's been fighting infini-spawns for hours.

God dammit.

I'd give anything to have this sort of meta awareness erased from my RPG playing experience again. After playing RPGs for years, situations like these are just obvious, but before you knew how to spot the developers intentions, stuff like this would happen.


The best part about this is that this sort of experience probably mirrors one of ours the first time we played an RPG, even if you don't particularly remember it. It's so fun to read.

 

[mattp]

been keeping up with this since he started tweeting about it. it's so great

 

[Zeouterlimits]

Really been fun to see the occasional tweets roll in.

 

[LordOfLore]

Hehe. I hope FFX-2 wasn't your first FF too

Oh it was. My order was weird. My pre-PS4 order not counting Dissidia etc was X-2>X>IX>VIII>a fourth of XII>PS2 broke and I got a PS3>VII>VI>V>IV>XIII>II>III>XIII-2>I>LR.

 

[Koozek]

Oh it was. My order was weird. My pre-PS4 order not counting Dissidia etc was X-2>X>IX>VIII>a fourth of XII>PS2 broke and I got a PS3>VII>VI>V>IV>XIII>II>III>XIII-2>I>LR.

Lol, going from X-2 to X must've been weird. What's your fave?

 

[Chronospherics]

My Mum has been playing Crash Bandicoot recently and I sent her a quote I liked from an old interview about adaptive difficulty to help encourage her to push on.

Hope she doesn't give up. I told her to play Warped first since Crash 1 is definitely too tricky.

 

[Koozek]

My Mum has been playing Crash Bandicoot recently and I sent her a quote I liked from an old interview about adaptive difficulty to help encourage her to push on.

Hope she doesn't give up. I told her to play Warped first since Crash 1 is definitely too tricky.

Crash is harder than Dark Souls, tbh.

 

[Tyaren]

I know a couple of elderly who would probably fall in love with video games if they only gave them a chance and weren't literally afraid of the modern tech.
There's for example my neighbour, 80 years old, he's mentally completely fit, but his physical health started to deteriorate.
He is a huge car enthusiast. It is literally all he ever cared for. He owns like a dozen cars, many vintage ones and as far as I can remember he always proudly drove them around the block, so that they remained in good shape and occasionally he drove over to Hockenheimring (which is not far away) to watch races.
A few months ago he got in fortunately just a minor car accident. It was his fault and the state of his physical health was involved, so he got his driver's licence revoked. There's not a chance he will ever get it back.
This was a terrible loss for him. He now watches races on TV if they are on, reads car magazines, but that is not nearly a replacement.
I bet, if he could get into video games, he would absolutely love games like Gran Turismo or Forza. Games were you can customize your car, where you can virtually examine the newest and most expensive cars from outside to inside and where you can at least virtually drive them on all the famous racing tracks of the world.

 

[Chronospherics]

Crash is harder than Dark Souls, tbh.

She bought it. I didn't tell her to do that, heh.

Edit: My mum does play games though. She owns her own PS4, just not very good at them. But she beat Uncharted 4 (on explorer) and a few others like Tearaway, so I think she stands a good chance with Crash 3.