Supervised and based on a concept by Tetsuya Nomura, the creative leads from the TWEWY team and multiple Kingdom Hearts portable titles have decided to make an iOS game.
What kind of quality do these people wish to create and associate their names with in 2013? Let's find out!
Reviews:
Pocket Gamer UK: 3/10
Modojo: 1.5/5
IGN: 2.5/10
TouchArcade: 1/5
AppSpy: 1/5
Excerpts:
What kind of quality do these people wish to create and associate their names with in 2013? Let's find out!
Reviews:
Pocket Gamer UK: 3/10
Modojo: 1.5/5
IGN: 2.5/10
TouchArcade: 1/5
AppSpy: 1/5
Excerpts:
Pocket Gamer said:But here's the shard of ice at the heart of the game. You will die, repeatedly, and if you don't want to wait until your characters pop back to life you'll have to use a Golden Hourglass to bring them all back. These cost 69p for three.
Let's take a look at that. You couldn't have done anything differently in the fight, because you don't have any control over what happens. All you could have done is tap in a different order, but that wouldn't have made much difference.
The game is weighted such that in some battles your entire team will be wiped out while you look on in impotent dismay.
It's not like an arcade game, where skill and reflexes will get you through, where there's a chance that you'll succeed and move on to the next level. You are going to die no matter what, and when it happens you can either wait or pay up.
Modojo said:A lot of negative words came to mind at the beginning of this review, and one particularly strong one that wasn't mentioned is insulting - this is a game packed with a Who's Who of Final Fantasy history, seemingly in order to extract as much money as possible from the most devoted long-term fans of the series, while offering very little in the way of enjoyable gameplay in return.
In 2013, as publishers finally begin to tread the waters of micro-transactions a little more carefully, and with a sensitive eye on the balance between player experience and profitability, *this* is how Square Enix chooses to reward that devotion, commitment and support of a franchise over all of these years. Depressing is a word too.
IGN said:This is what makes All the Bravest such a bitter pill to swallow. This is a really cool core idea. More than 30 Final Fantasy character classes duking it out side-by-side, all at once, in fast-paced arcade-style turn-based battles? Awesome! All in FF VIIs dirty, grimy Midgar, rendered in stylized pixel-art? Yes, please! But instead we received a grind-heavy experience with no gameplay and an extremely greedy business model.
There is a small amount of stupid nostalgic fun to swiping your screen and seeing 30+ retro characters drawn from the entire Final Fantasy franchise jump into action. But due to its insulting in-game purchases and inexcusably mindless & repetitive gameplay, this is an very disappointing black mark on Square-Enixs long-running franchise.
TouchArcade said:I have no problems with games that are little more than fan service. If a developer releases a game that simply gives its loyal fans "more of what it wants," it's typically a win-win situation for most parties involved. Final Fantasy: All The Bravest, while featuring a lot of bits and pieces of nostalgia, is not fan service.
Such games typically give something back to its community in some form or fashion. FF:ATB instead wants to extort from its fan base, which is easily apparent in its lackluster presentation, non-existent "gameplay," and ridiculous IAP scheme. ATB was disappointing enough in the fact that it's not a real RPG, but it's downright appalling when you think about the fact that it's simply a cash-grab. For everyone but the most stalwart FF fans (and I implore even them): this trip down memory lane isn't worth it.
AppSpy said:Seconds of gameplay, with potentially hours of waiting - this is freemium brought to its horrifying and expensive end point, squandering any potential All The Bravest has.