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Final Fantasy XV Demo Gameplay (XB1 & PS4 demos), Battle System, Night & Map Shown
- Thread starter zakislam
- Start date
Are you an actual person or an Onion article that somehow managed to sign up on GAF?
Totally agree! But I think there should also be a handful of design adjustments to make it clearer what you're supposed to do. For example, this crawl space is actually kind of hard to notice. Apart from the glowing icon, it could be easy to miss if you weren't directly looking at it.
One idea would be to make the space more visually striking. In linear games, lighting tends to serve this purpose, but this is an exterior area in a mission that could happen at night, in the fog, in the pouring rain etc. So maybe some artificial lights like a flickering flashlight that points at the crawl space could make it a lot clearer. This would possibly hint at someone who failed getting the Behemoth and would add to the tension of the scene.
You could also paint the crawl space a color that makes it stand out more from the environment. The Uncharted series gets a lot of mileage out of using the color yellow for ladders and ledges that are climbable.
I'm definitely in the camp that less is more when it comes to UI, but I don't think only making it optional is enough. Clearly they chose to add these in, because in their playtesting they may have found that their quests were hard to follow because the lack of direction. If that is the problem they should strive to make their levels a lot clearer before leaning on UI elements.
Death Penalty
Member
Are people really that upset about quest markers...? Like, what's the downside? The only thing they prevent you from doing is fumbling around looking for something for longer than you need to. Not to mention these look fairly unobtrusive compared to some of the more gruesome UIs I've seen. I'm glad they're there.
I actually had exactly the opposite experience with these games. Final Fantasy X was laughably easy, and you're bananas if you expect me to believe you just mashed X through optional bosses in KH.
I actually had exactly the opposite experience with these games. Final Fantasy X was laughably easy, and you're bananas if you expect me to believe you just mashed X through optional bosses in KH.
Agreed. Although I suppose I am a casual player. I appreciate modern RPGs providing many ways of finding objectives (currently playing DA:I and love being able to set my own markers). Not that I don't like challenge, but I'd rather my challenge be some sort of tactical situation, not wasting time running around in circles because the game doesn't want to highlight an objective or crawlspace.
Quest markers are a design crutch and clash with the motifs of exploration and immersion.
Not saying this is how this quest works(haven't played it), but if your mission is to track the Behemoth all you have to do is go to the marker to marker finding footprints of the Behemoth. That doesn't evoke the feeling of tracking the Behemoth. Mechanically all you would be doing is going from point a to b to c to d.
The other side of the issue is, well if they're off you would spend hours lost and not able to find them. If that is the case, then the mission is flawed and the UI is a bandaid for a much bigger issue with the quest design.
The UI itself, as annoying an immersion breaking as it is, isn't the issue. The necessity of it is.
Death Penalty
Member
What would you propose as a solution in a big open world like this? I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying there's a lot of room to get lost, especially when you're looking for such a small space in a very large region. I agree with you that specifically when you're tracking a monster, the quest marker does take some of the fun out of the element of hunting the beast. That's a very specific circumstance though and for just about everything else I'd prefer not to fumble around and waste a lot of time lost and bored. The UI is also quite attractive and minimalistic, so that's a plus for me as well.
Seven Force
Banned
Outside of Seymour Flux and Yunalesca, the attack command carried me relatively far throughout the game, optional bosses notwithstanding.
I'm not going to pretend KH combat is really complex (because it isn't), but mashing against optional KH bosses and winning sounds like bullshit.
That's why I wrote Outside of boss battles.... Read again.
I played and finished every FF from FFIV onwards. Let's face it, most battles are repetitive and can be easily button-mashed through. Turn-based doesn't automatically mean it's deep just because you're selecting spells from a menu instead of pressing a corresponding face button.
The last few turn-based JRPGs I played could be finished on auto-battle mode without even looking on the screen.
At that point I'd rather have an action-based system where you at least have direct control and feedback while mashing buttons.
I mean, I don't even understand what some of you want. Do you really want to see SE create a huge, dynamic world with a crazy ambitious scale just to then have your party magically teleported to a separate battle screen where they awkwardly stand in front of the enemies, waiting for their turn to attack and then walk back to the same spot again? How would this not feel absolutely archaic for a modern audience? Would you at least be okay with your party moving around in battles like in FFXIII?
I would love to hear your ideal system, I'm really curious^^
Icyflamez96
Member
The only time I was truly challenged in mandatory battles in an FF game was FFXIII tbh. I have only played FFVII. FFX, and FFVIII though. I liked that FFXIII often kept me on my toes with paradigm shifting for buffs then shifting to raise the stagger bar, then always watching my health so I can switch to a recovery paradigm all while still trying not to lose my stagger process. With all of the others, it was braindead as hell tbh (outside of certain bosses) with no sense of agency unless I just happened to be really underleveled. I still found those fun to play but I never gave them points for having necassary depth. It was just attack, magic, cure. Never use summons because I hated how long the animations were lol.
Seven Force
Banned
To be honest, I don't think there's anything wrong with that. Bravely Default is a good example of a game that does just that and manages to make it far, far more dynamic than just attacking and occasionally using magic.
Edit: Falk beat me to it :V
Icyflamez96
Member
It looks fine for me in that game, but I couldn't imagine that not looking extremely weird/jarring for FFXV considering the really realistic look it has because of the crazy good graphical quality and realistic colors.
Seven Force
Banned
I was speaking about the genre in general. XV's seamless approach is great, and it's nice to see other titles implementing it (Tales of Zestiria comes to mind) as well.
Icyflamez96
Member
Oh well I assumed the guy you responded to was talking about FFXV which led me to assume that you were implying it'd be fine for FFXV :x
Experience points you have and experience points you need to get to the next level.
It bothers me that each character in FFXV, going by the demo anyway, has the exact same experience points and amount to level up again. Maby i'm overthinking this too early.
the only person who consistently beats falk to posts is me
Meccanical
Member
The only person who consistently beats me to posting is wmlk
edit: god damnit
>_____________>
The only person who consistently beats me to posting is wmlk
edit: god damnit
KEK
Seven Force
Banned
The only person who consistently beats me to posting is wmlk
edit: god damnit
okay are you guys fucking with me
The only person who consistently beats me to posting is wmlk
edit: god damnit
Creepy
Icyflamez96
Member
Experience points you have and experience points you need to get to the next level.
It bothers me that each character in FFXV, going by the demo anyway, has the exact same experience points and amount to level up again. Maby i'm overthinking this too early.
Okay? lol. I understand experience points. I guess I don't get your point or why this would be an issue.
I mean, you said "getting their own experience points." That's not what's happening in the pics you've posted. They have different experience levels because you have different people in your part at the same time, so those characters aren't earning experience points when they're not active. This, obviously, will not be a thing in FF15 (story withstanding).
QuiteWhittle
Member
The characters all had different levels in one of the latest scans.
So for the general case of the UI, I actually think most of that UI is just fine to have, but I don't think it should be present all the time. In Bioshock Infinite they had a button that you would press and an arrow would point you where you were supposed to go next. I think similarly you could use a button to toggle that sort of menu ON/OFF as necessary. That way its a simple solution that doesn't require any new system design.
As far as quest specific design. You obviously need an indicator to take you to the right region of the map, and maybe having a general circle on your map of where you should be looking for these Behemoth tracks is better. Realistically speaking if you're going to track an animal that has been causing trouble for people you'd get some information of the general areas the Behemoth hangs out. Then they can use visual clues in that area (fallen trees, footprints, etc.) in combination with character banter ("whoa look at the size of these foot prints" or "gross it stinks here, it must be close").
Other than that for more specific interactions with the world that you don't normally do(like crawling in tunnels) they should make these areas of interest visually striking so that you would naturally go up to them, and make it so it's the only place you can get to. The crawl space shown is actually a good example of this because you(presumably) can't climb the rock walls around you so they act as a funnel to guide you to the opening.
These are issues that come with this specific mission, but I think they have more general application too. When you're designing missions in the game and you know that you can always count on flashing indicators to guide the player, that can act as an enabler for lazier design choices. Like ones that undermine the actions the mechanics you're doing are supposedly a metaphor for.(ie: Going from point A-B does not feel like tracking a Behemoth)
Also just to be clear, what I'm talking about is more of what I would consider idealistic choices. I understand that in the real world you have to get things done and using hefty amounts of UI indicators is a quick fix when your quest just won't work any other way.
NoctisVsStar
Member
I meant Tai Yasue my apologies got them mixed up right quick.
The only person who consistently beats me to posting is wmlk
edit: god damnit
lol get wrekt
See, this woman/man understands! Exactly my thoughts. LR might even have the best FF battle-system, imo. Try it, if you haven't already! You have to be on your toes all the time watching out for audio-visual cues and timing your blocks and attacks, plus there's a lot of important customizing before every difficult enemy. Even smaller mobs would feel dangerous because of your limited item slots and the fact that you would lose precious time after losing a fight, which could mess up your whole tight time-management.
If you think about it, it's only a small step away from being fully action-based, though.
In general I still like turn-based if it has some real-time or twitch-based mechanics also, like in the Shadow Hearts or Baten Kaitos series. They are the best of both worlds and make otherwise boring and tedious battles in JRPGs more involving and exciting for me.
I played the demo for nearly 10 hours. The battle system was surprisingly addictive, yeah. Still, turn-based feels just too tedious for me nowadays. I don't have the patience I had as a kid anymore^^
Well, and I was only talking about FFXV where it would just feel so out of place, not about small, stylized JRPGs like Bravely Default.
Dark_castle
Junior Member
The only person who consistently beats me to posting is wmlk
edit: god damnit
I personally don't hate them as much as others here, but yeah, it would be great if they could just allow us to turn on/off quest marker and map icons as we wish.
Also, no mini-map on screen? I wonder if it can toggled on.
...why is the Garula still breathing?
Meccanical
Member
Those are it's last painful labored breaths before it dies completely.
And by die completely I mean fade out of the world.
Dark_castle
Junior Member
Damn GuardianSoul, you've got mad skillz. SE should honestly consider paying you to recreate the OST for them in such short time.
but but but 4x battle speed
Not a fan of how hand-holdy the UI is. I understand open world game design can be challenging, but there has to be a better way of guiding your player through the world.
HEYYYYYY GO OVER THERE! 194m UNTIL THE NEXT PART OF THE QUEST!
HEEEEYYYY I UPDATED YOUR QUEST JUST SO YOU KNOW!
YOU CAN CRAWL IN HERE! LOOK LOOK AT ME! I'M A CRAWL SPACE! DO YOU SEE ME?
For those of you who have seen the Megaman sequilitis:
I think all of these things are smart to have in an open world game.
Don't know why it bothers me, it just does. I figured it was because your party will never leave you. Seems like a pointless thing to complain about i know. Whatever. I just like randomness. It looks too samey.
threelights
Member
The first image of the camp menu (in a scan) already showed them all at different levels.
That is just a demo, of course everyone will level up equally, unless someone keeps dying.
Sign
Member
It is not KH, but I do like the weightiness of the attacks. The animations are really nice as well. I think the slower system is probably going to let them get away with putting combat in smaller, denser environments and not have it turn into an absolute cluster. One of Kingdom Heart's big weakness after the first game was that the locales were made sparse to accommodate the combat / camera, imo.
Honestly, I had only ever shipped XII and KH in my dreams... I look forward to giving it a spin in reality!
Honestly, I had only ever shipped XII and KH in my dreams... I look forward to giving it a spin in reality!
Carlos Lima
Member
Not a fan of how hand-holdy the UI is. I understand open world game design can be challenging, but there has to be a better way of guiding your player through the world.
HEYYYYYY GO OVER THERE! 194m UNTIL THE NEXT PART OF THE QUEST!
HEEEEYYYY I UPDATED YOUR QUEST JUST SO YOU KNOW!
YOU CAN CRAWL IN HERE! LOOK LOOK AT ME! I'M A CRAWL SPACE! DO YOU SEE ME?
For those of you who have seen the Megaman sequilitis:
I hope that the game also plays by itself. Now THAT would be modern game design.
Dynasty8
Member
Not a fan of how hand-holdy the UI is. I understand open world game design can be challenging, but there has to be a better way of guiding your player through the world.
HEYYYYYY GO OVER THERE! 194m UNTIL THE NEXT PART OF THE QUEST!
HEEEEYYYY I UPDATED YOUR QUEST JUST SO YOU KNOW!
YOU CAN CRAWL IN HERE! LOOK LOOK AT ME! I'M A CRAWL SPACE! DO YOU SEE ME?
For those of you who have seen the Megaman sequilitis:
I agree...but I don't think they can get away with releasing an Open World game without these things...specifically a huge open world game like this.
The only solution I can think of is having options to turn them off for more hardcore players.
in before 'definite proof tabata reads neogaf everyday, sees your post and rushes to the center of Squeenix HQ to ring the bell that signifies new feedback, at which point all staff have to immediately drop whatever they're doing to clamber all over each other to respond to said feedback'
There's... uh... a Crysis-style minimap in the bottom screenshot D:
EDIT: For clarity I'm referring to the cool floaty "holo screens" that follow Noctis around.
It would be a bit more palatable if they were using a UI similar to the the mock up they showed at E3 2013. That one was sort of an in-world system it had a really grounded feel to it. The current one is slick and minimal, but it's integration feels too video gamey(in the sense that it clashes with the aesthetic of the world).
I know a lot of people are used to these conventions because AAA games get away with it, but that doesn't make it the only way to design your UI.
It would be a bit more palatable if they were using a UI similar to the the mock up they showed at E3 2013. That one was sort of an in-world system it had a really grounded feel to it. The current one is slick and minimal, but it's integration feels too video gamey(in the sense that it clashes with the aesthetic of the world).
I know a lot of people are used to these conventions because AAA games get away with it, but that doesn't make it the only way to design your UI.
MultiJhonny
Banned
It would be a bit more palatable if they were using a UI similar to the the mock up they showed at E3 2013. That one was sort of an in-world system it had a really grounded feel to it. The current one is slick and minimal, but it's integration feels too video gamey(in the sense that it clashes with the aesthetic of the world).
I know a lot of people are used to these conventions because AAA games get away with it, but that doesn't make it the only way to design your UI.
Well a few other gaffers have stated that it all looks pretty placeholder and I tend to agree. The UI could easily change.
threelights
Member
I can't believe this, this is the worst. I hope Neogaf stays offline for the rest of the dev time of this game (and every other website too for that matter). Even though these screens actually came out before the video... Now Tabata is TIME TRAVELING to ruin this game. fml.
Yeah that's what I was referring to. It floats next to Noctis in 3D space like some sort of future smartphone. That has a different aesthetic to some icons on the UI layer existing in the "because videogames" space.
With this particular style there is at least some in world rationalization to it existing. That said the E3 UI could just as easily be used as a design crutch. I just think it fits better into the world as it actually is in the world.
threelights
Member
Wait, you don't want quest markers but you want a giant mini map on the corner of the screen? That's worse.
Not a fan of how hand-holdy the UI is. I understand open world game design can be challenging, but there has to be a better way of guiding your player through the world.
HEYYYYYY GO OVER THERE! 194m UNTIL THE NEXT PART OF THE QUEST!
]
In a map as big as this one you're damn right I want a waypoint
I didn't say there wasn't a place for UI. I was commenting on how it was executed in the quest and how it fits into the world.
In the real world I carry a phone that has a GPS and a map. Having such a thing in a game based on reality is not a video game design crutch. Also that minimap was toggleable. It was toggled on as Noctis climbed on to the ship and was then toggled off. Just like you can pull out your phone, check the map, and put it back in your pocket.
Again my problem with the current quest UI is how it holds your hand, and conflicts with the nature of the quest. You're supposed to search for the behemoth. Following quest markers does not replicate that experience.
That's not to say they couldn't do the same nonsense with the E3 UI. That UI was just a more palatable implementation as it fits in the world, because it actually was in the world.
Having a waypoint is fine, but you should at least be able to toggle it on and off. It also shouldn't interfere with the point of the quest. I can't say for certain that it does till I actually get to play it. I'm just saying that from what we know about the quest, it's primarily based around hunting a monster. I'm more concerned that they ruined the experience of tracking and hunting and turned it into following quest markers until they lead you to the Behemoth.
I honestly can't see eye to eye with you on this. I'm trying to wrap my head how a (presumably) waist-high 2D panel trailing off to your right is in any shape or form believably 'in the world'.
I mean, yeah I totally agree on waypoints and HUD elements and all that (and personally I really prefer the more translucent mockup they had around TGS which refracted the image below it)
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