• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Tabata: "Fans playing FF15 w/o watching the movie might miss crucial story details"

ST2K

Member
He didn't say people would miss crucial story details by not watching the movie. Hell, he doesn't even mention the movie specifically.

He was asked what the extra FFXV universe stuff added. Tabata said it enriches the world further, and then he said some fans might feel like they've missed out on stuff if they missed one part. This is obviously true, as some fans of any franchise will insist on reading the comic books and watching the spinoff webseries and so on. He's saying if you're one of those people that wants every shred of context, you'll want in on the anime/movie.

I know it's cool to hate on everything FFXV, but can people at least try to do it without misconstruing quotes? There's enough in the game to criticize as is.
 

Tyaren

Member
Then: You don't need to watch the movie, it's okay.
Now: Well... about that...

NB24zXK.jpg
 
If you need to watch a terrible movie in order to properly enjoy a game then you messed up.

I kept saying this before release as a big worry and it turned out true. You missed a lot if you didn't watch the anime either.

The best part about FF is that each entry is supposed to be stand alone, how are you supposed to bring in new comers if you're expected to invest so much time into the game before even playing it?
 

Alebelly

Member
I watched the movie before playing the game. What I learned from this is that the story and writing in both game and movie is absolute garbage.

Play the game for the fun combat, everything else is trash.
 

Squire

Banned
Yeah, this is my major beef with Tabata: blatant, easily tracked contradictions.

It's not just that the game is bad and didn't live up to PR speak (most games don't, even when they're very good), it's that he misrepresented it based on whatever was the most convenient message to send at the time and he continues to do so post-launch.

If he's not a liar he's cutting it pretty close.
 

Rymuth

Member
If you need to watch a terrible movie in order to properly enjoy a game then you messed up.

I kept saying this before release as a big worry and it turned out true. You missed a lot if you didn't watch the anime either

Gaah ~ I'd forgotten how much of a sickly ghost Luna looked in the movie...
 

BigEmil

Junior Member
Just read up the plot online under a minute for free, then play the game. Don't bother with the movie
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
That movie is terrible so that says a lot about the plot of the game lol.
 

benzy

Member
HT: If you watch Kingsglaive or Brotherhood, I think you'll get a better view of the world where the game is set. A grander scale, a more fully realized story. That said, some fans who only see one part might be left with a negative impression, or like they've missed crucial parts of the tale.

This just sounds like he's referring to some of the player and fan feedback complaints vs. what he actually thinks.

This is literally one of the fan complaints in an old SE XV blog post about free game updates.

The opening cut scene for Kingsglaive should've been in the actually game to introduce the story properly for people.

Tabata's initial comments about not needing to watch KG actually still holds true. The movie barely added anything to the game's story and did jack shit to explain anything about the lore and world. The only most significant event was the invasion which you find out about in the game.
 
Should have included that shit in the game then instead of wasting it on a CGI movie and 10 million spin off titles.

So much story and context missing from some of the most important beats in the game. It's incredible and not in a good way.
 
I wonder how much money it cost to make the movie since it apparently didn't do too well.
Might have been better to either make more fancy commercials like the Omen trailer (which doesn't happen in the game, right?) or just more cutscenes for the game since it seriously needed them
 

Dynasty8

Member
They should've scrapped the important parts of the movie and integrated into the game. Same with the Brotherhood anime... Scrapped the important parts into CGI and made it apart of the game. This is what the E3 demo was back in 2013 and even the Versus trailer back in 2006.

This game had SO much potential but they just watered the base game down and cut it into unnecessary pieces.

This is how I personally would have loved the game to have been:
You start off as a young Noctis like the Platinum demo and have a proper introduction to the main cast like some of the Brotherhood scenes. As young Noctis, you train with Gladio (tutorial) and go through small kid missions and uncover important aspects of the lore and the history of your kingdom. A proper introduction, not starting the game with 4 dudes pushing a car while being late to a "wedding"..... This entire kid section will be limited to ONLY Insomnia just for the beginning. (Think something like Breath of Fire 3)

After about 5-10 hours, you find yourself as a grown up Noctis and this is where the real FFXV begins. The world is now open to explore and instead of having cut story segments that confuse the player completely, they should show how things unfold through properly paced Kingsglaive scenes (not the entire movie, just important scenes like the invasion and more).

The characters needed better development, the lore needed better explanation, and we felt nothing about characters like Regis or "Jared" dying because the game did nothing for them. The story didn't succeed in making the player feel any empathy or emotion like many past FF titles.

This is what happens when you intentionally detach the main story segments of a game into a separate movie, separate proper character development into a mini YouTube anime series, cut content of important and necessary scenes into DLC that should have been apart of the main game, and provide "updates" almost one whole year later with added scenes and features that should have been apart of the base game from the start.

It was truly a big let down and I fear FFVII:Remake will suffer the same problems.
 

Tyaren

Member
Is the story even worth paying attention to tho?

Not really...but the infamous newspaper scene will have literally no impact and Regis will stay a complete stranger in FFXV if you have not watched the movie.
Yeah, the story is bad in the movie and game, but at least you will care a bit more for the characters that you are supposed to care for.
 

Ydelnae

Member
He didn't say people would miss crucial story details by not watching the movie. Hell, he doesn't even mention the movie specifically.

He was asked what the extra FFXV universe stuff added. Tabata said it enriches the world further, and then he said some fans might feel like they've missed out on stuff if they missed one part. This is obviously true, as some fans of any franchise will insist on reading the comic books and watching the spinoff webseries and so on. He's saying if you're one of those people that wants every shred of context, you'll want in on the anime/movie.

I know it's cool to hate on everything FFXV, but can people at least try to do it without misconstruing quotes? There's enough in the game to criticize as is.

I had to do gymnastics to make the statement fit into the thread title and I feel like the one I chose does not miscontruct what Tabata said, any mod can easily change it if it feels like it's misleading though. Since I included the quote and a direct link to the source, as well as complementary statements to this thread's information, I directly assume that people will read the entire post (or at least, the quote which leads into the thread title), instead of commenting solely on the thread title. He also mentions the movie my its name, and it is referenced by the interviewer too.

And I'm deemed as part of FFXV's defense force in this forum, I have my past posts related to this game to back me up, so I won't enter on that discussion.
 
Then: You don't need to watch the movie, it's okay.
Now: Well... about that...

Ive nearly grown to hate this game post launch purely from Tabata talking out of his ass.


Yeah, this is my major beef with Tabata: blatant, easily tracked contradictions.

It's not just that the game is bad and didn't live up to PR speak (most games don't, even when they're very good), it's that he misrepresented it based on whatever was the most convenient message to send at the time and he continues to do so post-launch.

If he's not a liar he's cutting it pretty close.

Holy shit Tabata, stop talking already

At this point what can be believed coming from him?
 

Moonlight

Banned
And the content in the movie feels rather irrelevant and even misleading about the story content of the game. The Luna in that movie is barely the same character in the game.
Nearly as useless, though. I still can't believe how unbelievably meanspirited of the movie it was to have Luna attempt to do something, only to get pushed out by Nyx because 'they don't teach flight class in princess school'.
 

Squire

Banned
I wonder how much money it cost to make the movie since it apparently didn't do too well.
Might have been better to either make more fancy commercials like the Omen trailer (which doesn't happen in the game, right?) or just more cutscenes for the game since it seriously needed them

Rumors are it's in the 40m range.

It is pretty good CG, and they did get fairly well-known actors for the major roles.
 
Everyone knows this. Everyone should also agree this is shitty storytelling. You shouldn't need other media to complete a story.

Tabata you fucked FFXV now shut your mouth and keep pushing FFXV Mobile Bullshit.
 
Sorry to hijack the thread but I'm playing the game right now and for some reason I can't drive the car anymore?

I left it close to a bunch of flans (off road) and now I can't drive it again (manual or auto). What gives?
 
I read this as an admission that they fucked up. He even says that it was an experiment and that next time things gonna be different.
 
Doesn't Nyx have similar powers to Noctis?
I can't imagine it would've been hard to reskin Noctis and have a sequence where you play as Nyx in the beginning especially since
you get Nyx's weapons in game.

Would've been a good opportunity to showcase the combat early on since I don't think you fight anything for like 40 minutes? And even then it's just dogs. Similar to the FF12 opening with Rex instead of Vaan.
The current intro just spoils a lot of the game while having no gameplay to tease the player with what's to come.
Sorry to hijack the thread but I'm playing the game right now and for some reason I can't drive the car anymore?

I left it close to a bunch of flans (off road) and now I can't drive it again (manual or auto). What gives?
You can't drive at night.
Either that or it ran out of gas and it needs to be towed
 

OrionX

Member
"This hd city ain't gonna make the cut. What should we do?"

"I know. Let's take out the dramatic invasion that sets the stage for the entire story and put it in a movie!"

"Works for me! :D"
 

blamite

Member
I haven't played the game myself and I don't really plan to so I don't really have a horse in this race, but he said that about

"fans who only see one part"

which is not at all the same as

"Fans playing FF15 w/o watching the movie"

so it's preeeeeeety misleading to put that in quotes in your title...
 

Gbraga

Member
The older quote says you don't need the movie to enjoy the game. Now he's saying that you may miss important details of the story if you don't watch Kingsglaive. I don't see how that's contradictory. Games are more than their stories. Sure as hell wasn't the plot that made me enjoy FFXV as much as I did. The world's lore is cool, though, but the movie is more focused on the political conflict between Lucis and Niflheim, not all of the astral bullshit. Some of that isn't even in the game or the movies or anywhere else, we know it from a guide, so yeah.

I'd even say that Brotherhood, the anime, is more relevant to the game's actual narrative than Kingsglaive. Throughout the game, the most prevalent theme (and pretty much the only one that's explored) is the bond between the main characters, and Brotherhood is all about that. Getting to know more about their relationships from way back added a lot to those interactions, and the callbacks were really neat.

The two statements are obviously contrasting, but not exactly contradictory. It may be a technicality, but when a technicality is the difference between lying and not lying, it's kind of important.

Type-0 had similar issues with the storytelling, so I don't believe that for a second.

I'm still interested because Tabata seems to have a touch for narrative payoff to recurring game mechanics. Crisis Core had that, and FFXV had that again, and they're some of the most memorable moments in the games. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for when he finally gets to make a game he truly cares about, instead of being tasked with making a game out of Nojima and Nomura's ramblings.
 
I haven't played the game myself and I don't really plan to so I don't really have a horse in this race, but he said that about

"fans who only see one part"

which is not at all the same as

"Fans playing FF15 w/o watching the movie"

so it's preeeeeeety misleading to put that in quotes in your title...

The thing is, without the movie you truly lose context for about 75%+ of the story.

It's inexcusable how terribly the story is told for a Final Fantasy game. You hear of everything happening, you experience 25% of it tops.
 
I just feel like, yea the actual XV was only in development for 3-4 years, they had plenty of time before then to make a outline of a cohesive story. Without needing to do a movie, and anime...

It's so frustrating because the story is there, and it's fantastic. But managed and implemented so piss poor.
 

Gbraga

Member
It's not night time and the tank is full.

You can't drive when there are enemies nearby until you get an upgrade that will allow that. You can try saving and reloading your file to see if you can get into the car before the enemies spawn again.

Or you can go to Hammerhead and have the car towed there.
 

StereoVsn

Member
I thought the movie was completely mediocre and frankly didn't add all that much to FFXV story itself. Yes it gave the backstory but you get the gist in conversations, radio station updates, etc... anyway.

Now, Anime I thought was pretty darn good and gave great background on various characters and Noctis. It was definitely worth watching.
 
Top Bottom