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Game Informer: Hands-On With Final Fantasy XV: Episode Gladiolus (+ off-screen shots)

K

Koozek

Member
http://www.gameinformer.com/b/featu...-with-final-fantasy-xv-episode-gladiolus.aspx

At PAX East 2017, I played around 30 minutes of the upcoming Final Fantasy XV: Episode Gladiolus (The full DLC should take around 2-3 hours to complete). While story spoilers are off the table, I'm eager to share just how Gladiolus plays.

I had a lot more fun with Gladiolus than I ever did with Noctis. Gladiolus features an in-your-face smashy-smashy playstyle that's all about huge offense and precise defense. Through attacking, Gladiolus charges up powerful moves, often area-of-effect attacks, that dish out tremendous damage. But that's not all, Gladiolus is much more than an attack spammer. A block/guard ability allows Gladiolus to prevent incoming damage and negate attacks, and if you time it right, builds up a rage meter that can add a ridiculous multiplier to your outgoing damage.

Your blocks must be precise in order to really get the meter going though, so you must pay careful attention to enemy movements and attack signals. If you can time the block just before an incoming attack lands, you'll build your rage in addition to leaving the enemy vulnerable to devastating attacks.

I took down two bosses in the DLC, and I have to say, it really felt like there was a little bit of Dark Souls inspiration behind some of the enemies and bosses, which I loved. Because you need to play Gladiolus with a completely different playstyle than Noctis, with different tools at your disposal, each fight was quite refreshing.​
More at the link above.

---

UPDATE:
salromano said:
The first 15 minutes posted at GameSpot: http://www.gamespot.com/videos/the-first-15-minutes-of-final-fantasy-15-episode-g/2300-6437609/
Click to expand...

---

Also, off-screen shots from Game Watch [Spoiler warnings for the big DLC boss
Gilgamesh
in the full article]:

Code: 
[IMG]http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/img/gmw/docs/1049/018/03_s.png[/IMG]
[IMG]http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/img/gmw/docs/1049/018/04_s.png[/IMG]
[IMG]http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/img/gmw/docs/1049/018/08_s.png[/IMG]
[IMG]http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/img/gmw/docs/1049/018/06_s.png[/IMG]
[IMG]http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/img/gmw/docs/1049/018/09_s.png[/IMG]
[IMG]http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/img/gmw/docs/1049/018/10_s.png[/IMG]
[IMG]http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/img/gmw/docs/1049/018/12_s.png[/IMG]
 
B

brandonh83

Banned
Sounds pretty good, gonna wait until all the DLC and general updates/revisions are out and have another go with the game.
 
T

True Fire

Member
~9 hours of extra story from the 3 DLCs is fantastic. I hope they're seamlessly integrated into the game.

And the more Cor the better.
 
K

Koozek

Member
Edge_Maverick said:
Really liking the new HUD. What I don't like is having no time to enjoy all these gaemz :(
Click to expand...
Tbh, it's hard to get excited for FFXV again with all these amazing games right now. Gonna be busy with NieR in the next weeks and I think it'll be hard getting back to FFXV's combat after that, lol. Not sure if I'll even get the FFXV DLCs for now. Maybe when the Definitive Edition drops on Steam early next year or so.
Or maybe when the World of Versus expansion is out.
 
E

Edge_Maverick

Member
Koozek said:
Tbh, it's hard to get excited for FFXV again with all these amazing games right now. Gonna be busy with NieR in the next weeks and I think it'll be hard getting back to FFXV's combat after that, lol. Not sure if I'll even get the FFXV DLCs for now. Maybe when the Definitive Edition drops on Steam early next year or so.
Or maybe when the World of Versus expansion is out.
Click to expand...

Already bought the Season Pass so I'll play everything at some point. Not super excited for it, however this hands-on was quite positive and that makes me happy :)

But yeah, too many great stuff is coming out and so quickly. Still need finish Horizon and my copy of NieR just arrived. Then Persona 5 comes early next month...

It's fine since it's the best timeline though!
 
M

MosquitoSmasher

Member
After coming to the conclusion for myself that it still was a pretty disappointing game I really can't get very excited about this. After the glowing reviews I expected a lot more but what I got was a boring ass game world with horrible, horrible side quests. I know plenty of folks love it though, but I can't say the same.
 
T

Toth

Member
I wonder if there is any growth system or gear to enhance Gladio in this. I see enemies have levels but since the DLC is seperate from the game (unless they give you a flat level that chapter 7 was geared around),so I wonder how this is balanced.
 
I

Irishonion

Member
Koozek said:
Tbh, it's hard to get excited for FFXV again with all these amazing games right now. Gonna be busy with NieR in the next weeks and I think it'll be hard getting back to FFXV's combat after that, lol. Not sure if I'll even get the FFXV DLCs for now. Maybe when the Definitive Edition drops on Steam early next year or so.
Or maybe when the World of Versus expansion is out.
Click to expand...

Yea, I love Ffxv, but I spent enough time on first playthrough, once all Dlc has droped and the hopefull expansion are out I can hit up a new game plus mode.
 
dancingphlower

dancingphlower

Member
The author is not a fan of FFXV, so him having positive impressions of the DLC is a good sign right? As someone that enjoyed FFXV I'm pretty excited for this.
 
M

Mario007

Member
dancingphlower said:
The author is not a fan of FFXV, so him having positive impressions of the DLC is a good sign right? As someone that enjoyed FFXV I'm pretty excited for this.
Click to expand...
Not necessarily. For example if this DLC is like Dark Souls then the author might like it as it's different from FFXV but i wouldn't like it because I'm not into Dark Souls.
 
S

Strings

Member
Just watched the first 15 minutes, and the boss footage is janky as hell. Definitely not something I'd compare to Dark Souls.
 
1

13ruce

Banned
Looks good, will buy season pass when this launches 25$€ ain't to bad.

Really wanna know what happens with the chocobro's when they were gone during some story parts.
 
I

Isotropy

Member
Nice cutscenes! And so many.

...did they only hire a cutscene director in the last month of the main game's development or something? >_>
 
T

Toth

Member
Isotropy said:
Nice cutscenes! And so many.

...did they only hire a cutscene director in the last month of the main game's development or something? >_>
Click to expand...

If they did and hr or she are working on the new cut scenes in the game, I am very excited to see what they cook up.

edit: PS Total guess but Gilgamesh sounds like Cor. And Cor does vanish when he appears. Hmmm....maybe they are linked?
 
B

Byvar

Member
Wow, did they get Jun Akiyama back on board as event director? Those cutscenes all end a bit too soon but they're still such a huge improvement over the base game.
 
Y

YankeeDonB

Member
Looks good, definitely in. More Cor is good. If they can tell well paced small stories with these character dlcs I'll be happy.
 
S

Socivol

Member
Cutscenes look better but the combat looks button mashy as hell to me. I do appreciate how this makes sense in the context of the game as to why it wasn't in the game. I am hoping that they can infuse additional cutscenes and information in the main game. Even the loading screen had information that the game didn't even bring up.

I will say it's super hard going back to FFXV after playing Horizon though. I did the timed quest this week and the frame pacing is so horrible after going from everything being so smooth in Horizon.
 
B

benzy

Member
Isotropy said:
Nice cutscenes! And so many.

...did they only hire a cutscene director in the last month of the main game's development or something? >_>
Click to expand...

Takeshi Nozue was the cutscene director for XV but he probably spent the majority of his time on Kingsglaive.
 
K

Koozek

Member
Okay, watched the 15min video. Doesn't look like they improved anything about the combat. I don't know what the Game Informer writer meant when he mentioned the Dark Souls influence (maybe just aesthetically?). They still just throw dozens of cannon fodder mobs at you with absolutely no encounter design that encourages using the "precise defense" that was mentioned in the hands-on and the enemies still don't telegraph their attacks well enough (not like you could guard with 15 enemies attacking from all directions at once, anyway).

Eh, I don't think I need to play this myself if these 15 minutes are representative of the whole episode. Might just watch a LP.
 
T

Toth

Member
Looks like they are a few options other than the main quest:

C6lchF2WwAY2bkj.jpg:large


Source
 
T

Toth

Member
minameissteve said:
Cor does mention being punished, and Gilgamesh is missing an arm.
Click to expand...

Total speculation:
When you complete the trial, you merge with Gilgamesh's spirit and become very powerful and 'immortal'. Cor the Immortal indeed. However, the next one that passes the test takes up that mantle only by killing the previous victor. The cycle then continues until the King of Kings appears. Gladio will decline it in the end though for some reason.
 
Demoskinos

Demoskinos

Member
brandonh83 said:
Sounds pretty good, gonna wait until all the DLC and general updates/revisions are out and have another go with the game.
Click to expand...

You know I think that's about where I am. Got through like....the first third to close to half of the game and just quit. Might come back later once they finish making the game.
 
J

JayEH

Junior Member
Koozek said:
Okay, watched the 15min video. Doesn't look like they improved anything about the combat. I don't know what the Game Informer writer meant when he mentioned the Dark Souls influence (maybe just aesthetically?). They still just throw dozens of cannon fodder mobs at you with absolutely no encounter design that encourages using the "precise defense" that was mentioned in the hands-on and the enemies still don't telegraph their attacks well enough (not like you could guard with 15 enemies attacking from all directions at once, anyway).

Eh, I don't think I need to play this myself if these 15 minutes are representative of the whole episode. Might just watch a LP.
Click to expand...

I remember before the game out some people saw the dlc and were making bloodborne comparisons there as well so maybe there's something later on.
 
SolVanderlyn

SolVanderlyn

Thanos acquires the fully powered Infinity Gauntlet in The Avengers: Infinity War, but loses when all the superheroes team up together to stop him.
E

evolve9

Member
I might be wrong, but the combat looks more responsive? It seems too easy though, I hope they ramp up the difficulty later on in the dlc. And yeah, the presentation looks much less amateurish than in the base game. I'm cautiously optimistic for this and the other episodes, I'll probably buy them when they're all released if they're any good.

Liking that battle theme, sounds like something from Crisis Core, fits Gladio pretty well.
 
M

minameissteve

Banned
Toth said:
Total speculation:
When you complete the trial, you merge with Gilgamesh's spirit and become very powerful and 'immortal'. Cor the Immortal indeed. However, the next one that passes the test takes up that mantle only by killing the previous victor. The cycle then continues until the King of Kings appears. Gladio will decline it in the end though for some reason.
Click to expand...

Are you saying Gladio will have to defeat Cor? Cor feels guilt for failing to protect Regis, so maybe this is his way of making up for that?

This theory might explain why Gilgamesh doesn't look, sound or act like any of his previous incarnations. Previous games have taken creative liberties with him, but not to the degree that XV does.
 
K

Koozek

Member
JayEH said:
I remember before the game out some people saw the dlc and were making bloodborne comparisons there as well so maybe there's something later on.
Click to expand...
That was because the DLC director Haruyoshi Sawatari mentioned in an interview that he worked on Bloodborne before joining SE when the interviewer noted a certain similarity from the footage they saw last year. But that obviously doesn't mean they had the actual intention of making this DLC similar to BB/DS gameplay-wise. Doesn't seem like it at all from this gameplay we're seeing.
 
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