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[Go_Ly_Dow]

Summary vid below, athough doesn't show the 2nd world map much.



Insomnia, originally set to be the games opening locale, before venturing out into the open world. Essentially completely cut and relegated to a barebones dungeon:



Altissia, whilst you get to explore it, they clearly developed a much more sprawling city and areas that you never get to visit, including the giant stadium. The entire experience in the game felt short lived for such a big locale with so much detail.



Then you have the 2nd open world / world map area that was left half finished and completely cut from the game.





Tenebrae, another locale for which they developed a ton of the map, yet you again only stop there for a few mins before moving on.



Not to even mention what seems like hours of cutscenes and CG shown across the Versus XIII and early FFXV trailers that never made it into the game at all. They developed some beautiful environments and then did nothing with them..... the story felt disjointed and unfinished, the combat compared to something like 7R wasn't fun at all. The new team they hired for the project wasn't up for the job.

The game deserved an extra year or two in the oven and all the resources they took out of the game by making the CG movie, anime, marketing and DLC could have been consolidated to make a truly monumental FF game. One that I think fans would have acknowledged as a return to form for the series and likely would have made this the highest selling game in the series by a country mile.

Stellllaaaa!!!!

 

[nikeboy94]

While I did really like FF15 in the end, it is tragic to know what it "could" have been.

 

[Tiago Rodrigues]

Let's not.

It still hurts.

And I say this as someone that played the game after all dlcs were out, plus Royal version, the anime, movie, etc. Loved the experience, characters, lore etc...but it was frustrating because you could feel a much bigger game waiting to happen and it never did ...

 

[Bragr]

They should have cut more of that shit if you ask me.

 

[STARSBarry]

Square where far too busy trying to create some weird cross media franchise like it was going to be next Mobile Suit Gundam.

 

[Go_Ly_Dow]

Let's not.

It still hurts.

And I say this as someone that played the game after all dlcs were out, plus Royal version, the anime, movie, etc. Loved the experience, characters, lore etc...but it was frustrating because you could feel a much bigger game waiting to happen and it never did ...

As good as Tabata was at getting a project done, he wasn't the right person for a mainline FF game. The entire direction and feel of the game was similar to Type-0. Another project that cut corners and felt disappointing.

The project feels like it was so close to being that bigger game fans waited so long for, but they just gave up at the last hurdle. Really disappointing from S-E.

 

[TintoConCasera]

The more I see about this game, the less I want to play it.

Does it have any redeeming qualities?

 

[BennyBlanco]

this game stinks.

 

[Bitmap Frogs]

That last bit at the end, on the train, felt super weird. Like a cut content tour.

 

[Andodalf]

There’s no game I’d rather have than the directors cut of this. Still Ana making game even with the clear compromises

 

[Kiddo Cabbusses]

Oh dagnabbit, not another one of those "cut content from Square games" discussions.
"We cut so much content from Secret of Mana because the SNESCD was canned? Oh, putting that content in the remake? No thank you."

 

[jshackles]

They should have cut more of that shit if you ask me.

In a weird way, this game could have been more interesting if it was more focussed in the first two acts. The third act felt a bit like the first half of Final Fantasy XIII, but it was also a great spectacle that had some really cool set pieces. The open world bloat of the first part had its moments, but it was hours and hours and hours of wandering around a mostly empty and quite large map.

I actually kinda liked the way they did the Pocket Edition of this game, which was exactly like this - a mostly focussed narrative where all the junk open world stuff was cut in favor of smaller vignettes. Kinda wish they would have done that for the game itself, but on a grander scale.

 

[Aion002]

The more I see about this game, the less I want to play it.

Does it have any redeeming qualities?

The world is pretty, the summons are cool and the music is great.



Everything else is a wasted opportunity.

 

[Metnut]

It’s crazy that so much got cut considering the development cycle that lasted 7-8 years.

 

[Nankatsu]

Let's not.

It still hurts.

And I say this as someone that played the game after all dlcs were out, plus Royal version, the anime, movie, etc. Loved the experience, characters, lore etc...but it was frustrating because you could feel a much bigger game waiting to happen and it never did ...

Same boat. I completely got absorved in anything FFXV related. Really enjoy the experience but yeah, the game could have been much bigger than it was.

In the end, the

Spoiler

tragic ending

matches the tragic shaft the game got.

 

[Pagusas]

FF15 is an enigma to me. You can totally see the makings of a good game in it, you can see all the potential, its all within a fingers length... but it somehow shat the bed completely. Seeing what could of been just makes it even worse.

Knowing the development hell the game was in, they really should have just made it a smaller hub world game with a more linear focus. I'd rather have had that, with a tight narrative experience, than the half bakes experience we got.

 

[Mister Wolf]

Neck and neck with Phantom Pain for worst AAA game of last gen.

 

[Go_Ly_Dow]

It’s crazy that so much got cut considering the development cycle that lasted 7-8 years.

Supposedly only 3 years of full development, which also coincided the development of the Luminous Engine, which for an AAA project is nothing at all.

Tabata had no issues rushing the game out to appease the higher ups and tearing out chunks of the original vision, placing them into the other media we got and releasing a clearly unfinished project. Wrong man for the job and back when the director change occurred and Nomura was moved on to 7R/KH3, the backlash was justified it seems.

 

[Synless]

Thought it was a great game. I enjoyed every second of it and it’s DLC’s (except Gladious, his sucked).

 

[rofif]

I finished the game last year for first time and absolutely loved it.
I hope there is a way to explore insomnia. Is it a noclip mod or something ?
edit: oh it's actually a mod. Doesn't look like that if you just noclip out

 

[Bitmap Frogs]

The more I see about this game, the less I want to play it.

Does it have any redeeming qualities?

It's the only modern FF (besides FF7r) I cared for the characters., specially the trio of protagonists.

It really feels like some tight friends going for an adventure and the camps are cool in that regard, lots of bro to bro bonding under the stars (it's played straight, no hints at anything beyond friendship).

Other than that it's weirdly disjointed and things fundamentally don't make sense like... oh hey there's this dragon boss at the end of this technodungeon inside a lab. Why? no idea. But it looks cool doesn' it it? We bought the 3d model from a TW company. Oh hey the iconic Tonberrys are guarding this place you need to go, aren't they iconic? Ok, but why? Don't know.

And then there's this weird disconnect between the world and the people who inhabit it. Like dude, dude, as soon as you leave town it's fucking full of monster and at night not even roads are safe... why aren't you barricading the town? "excuse me? sorry I'm enjoying a coffe in delightful corner place that is oh, so cute".

That being said, I enjoyed it. The three protagonists pull you through it.

 

[Go_Ly_Dow]

Neck and neck with Phantom Pain for worst AAA game of last gen.

Another that deserved more time.

 

[rofif]

Neck and neck with Phantom Pain for worst AAA game of last gen.

both some o best games from last gen.
I just ignore everything in Phantom Pain past act 1...

 

[Damigos]

It should've been delayed another 2 years

 

[Sleepwalker]

The more I see about this game, the less I want to play it.

Does it have any redeeming qualities?

no

 

[mortal]

This was the game I waited for years since Versus XIII days. Was never a fan of the Tabata-directed revisions.




Although I'm not going to open up these wounds again. I've made peace with this loss ages ago.

 

[Bragr]

In a weird way, this game could have been more interesting if it was more focussed in the first two acts. The third act felt a bit like the first half of Final Fantasy XIII, but it was also a great spectacle that had some really cool set pieces. The open world bloat of the first part had its moments, but it was hours and hours and hours of wandering around a mostly empty and quite large map.

I actually kinda liked the way they did the Pocket Edition of this game, which was exactly like this - a mostly focussed narrative where all the junk open world stuff was cut in favor of smaller vignettes. Kinda wish they would have done that for the game itself, but on a grander scale.

I'm one of the few wackos who enjoyed driving around and listening to old Final Fantasy music. I wanted the game to stay away from all the linear areas, especially since the combat was so ridiculous, it was annoying to get stuck fighting over and over.

I liked driving around, fishing, and exploring, but there are so many issues with this story that they frankly needed to rebuild the entire game to save it.

 

[YukiOnna]

Still want Lord Nomura's magnum opus of Versus XIII/2013 XV.

I understand the game was having development issues, but there was a meat of a story there and I ain't letting it go. I remember Tabata in the earliest interviews when Nomura was kicked off said he would retain the story and everything Nomura had for it and that answer changed overtime and it wasn't that at all. I'll never forgive it.

 

[SlimeGooGoo]

.

 

[jimmypython]

the director's sole goal was to release something at a fixed date ordered by the higher ups...the project was leftover from Wada so the new CEO probably just wanted to clear the slate

the problem is, Tabata was not a good director...his talent was more in the admin/management side of things.

 

[SCB3]

Let's not.

It still hurts.

And I say this as someone that played the game after all dlcs were out, plus Royal version, the anime, movie, etc. Loved the experience, characters, lore etc...but it was frustrating because you could feel a much bigger game waiting to happen and it never did ...

Fuck that describes it perfectly

 

[night13x]

When they replaced Stella...I knew the game was doomed.

In a perfect world we get the real verus XIII with the real characters, locations, and world, but unfortunately that dream can only be found in old trailers, lost like tears in the rain.

 

[Fbh]

It's a shame the game turned out the way it did. You can definitely see the hints of what was supposed to be a much more ambitious and grander game.
As disappointing as XIII was, at least it felt like a coherent finished product. XV felt like the leftover pieces of a failed project that they just haphazardly tried to stitch together

This was the game I waited for years since Versus XIII days.




Although I'm not going to open up these wounds again. I've made peace with this loss ages ago.

Was going to post this.
Literally nothing from that trailer (aside from the music) was in the game lol.

 

[TexMex]

no it isn’t

 

[Larxia]

Hey I know these videos Glad you liked them.

Final Fantasy XV is indeed a very special subject, it's a love / hate relationship. So promising yet so disappointing.
I can't hate it completely because at this point really Final Fantasy VS XIII / XV has been there for a big part of my life. It's the single project I followed the most, I was so excited by it, full of dreams, so I'm still attached to the few remains of that in XV, which is enough for me to enjoy the game, but it really hurts at the same time

Related to Insomnia, their biggest mistake was making the invasion taking place in the movie. We didn't need the movie. Insomnia and its invasion was what we had been teased with for a decade, everyone wanted to play THAT, it was supposed to be a core part of the game. Instead, they decide to make a movie about it (while removing the main characters from that story arc at the same time) and start the game directly with a later chapter that could be a spin off.

The game should have started in Insomnia. We should have been able to play there for a decent amount of hours, getting attached to it and the characters, and finally playing through the invasion, living it, having actual feelings about it, and then discover the rest of the world.

There are so many missed opportunities in this game, it's crazy. It had so much potential and they wasted so much, I'll never understand some of these decisions, since they clearly weren't budget decisions given that they made a whole movie with famous actors etc. It's just an ultra bad management.

To this day I still can't really say what I think about FF XV, yeah it's broken and far from perfect, but at the same time I still really like parts of it because of its origins. I'm passionate and frustated about it.

 

[Revolutionary]

Despite all the shortcomings of FFXV, I still think it has one of the best villains in the series.

 

[Captain Toad]

I hope Final Fantasy never does the generic open-world thing again. And I would be happy to never see another car in a mainline Final Fantasy game.

 

[thebigmanjosh]

Sucks that we'll never get the game many were expecting, but it's hard to justify if there was really anything there to begin with.

Reality is the game never would've come out had Tabata not taken the reins. I'm assuming what we saw from FFXV is what Nomura had finished enough to build on and polish in the 3ish years between 2013-2016. Media was likely planned along with the rebranding as a way to capture sunk cost from the 6+ years FFV13 was in development.

Tabata also sucked as a director, so we got what we got.

 

[Belthazar]

Even after everything they added post-launch it was still so lacking. Definitely the worst mainline title yet, it's astonishing how unfulfilling the whole thing was... And it hurts even more, considering the last offline entry was so long ago and also very disappointing (even though it was a better game). I mean, we're what? 15 years from the last good FF?

 

[Larxia]

Here's some out of bounds screenshots I took.
This one has so much VS XIII vibe in it, reminds me of the early builds trailer / scans of VS XIII. Really feels like a left out area from that project:

And here's some more FF XV 2013 / Insomnia sadness :

 

[Belthazar]

Also... If Versus was never supposed to be XV until Tabata took the reins, what did they plan on doing for XV? Were they developing nothing as a mainline title? This whole thing is so weird.

 

[YukiOnna]

Here's some out of bounds screenshots I took.
This one has so much VS XIII vibe in it, reminds me of the early builds trailer / scans of VS XIII. Really feels like a left out area from that project:

And here's some more FF XV 2013 / Insomnia sadness :

Reminds me of the early 2010 TGS Trailer

 

[Larxia]

Reminds me of the early 2010 TGS Trailer

Yes exactly that.
Walking around this area in FF XV was a strange experience, really felt like exploring a cut VS XIII area.

 

[xellos2099alpha]

Despite all the shortcomings of FFXV, I still think it has one of the best villains in the series.

People STILL call him that. He is a super weak version of Emet.

 

[Revolutionary]

People STILL call him that. He is a super weak version of Emet.

Lmao Emet is directly based off of Ardyn dude. Except he's depressed and sad so that's why more people feel for him. Past Emet is WAY better.

Either way, I said he's ONE of the best. No need to get weird and defense about it.

 

[Doom85]

It's the only modern FF (besides FF7r) I cared for the characters., specially the trio of protagonists.

It really feels like some tight friends going for an adventure and the camps are cool in that regard, lots of bro to bro bonding under the stars (it's played straight, no hints at anything beyond friendship).

Other than that it's weirdly disjointed and things fundamentally don't make sense like... oh hey there's this dragon boss at the end of this technodungeon inside a lab. Why? no idea. But it looks cool doesn' it it? We bought the 3d model from a TW company. Oh hey the iconic Tonberrys are guarding this place you need to go, aren't they iconic? Ok, but why? Don't know.

And then there's this weird disconnect between the world and the people who inhabit it. Like dude, dude, as soon as you leave town it's fucking full of monster and at night not even roads are safe... why aren't you barricading the town? "excuse me? sorry I'm enjoying a coffe in delightful corner place that is oh, so cute".

That being said, I enjoyed it. The three protagonists pull you through it.

“trio/three protagonists”

(sorry, couldn’t resist)

I wish I had gotten attached to the main cast, but only Prompto mildly interested me. Honestly when that mercenary lady replaced Gladious, I wish that had been permanent (or at least offer more party members and let the player decide which 4 to use, you know like most RPGs) as almost the entire supporting cast interested me more than the main four.

Yeah, the disconnect was annoying, honestly the world design was so lacking. Final Fantasy sometimes mixes sci-fi and fantasy and even a bit of our modern reality, but it usually seems to work. Here, four K-pop dudes in leather casually stroll up to one of their Game of Thrones cosplaying dad, then take off in their car where they have to get help from a mechanic who apparently works on vehicles with lots of skin exposed which is TOTALLY a smart move (not against fanservice, but don’t be stupid about it). Like, what?

Also, I generally prefer at least some of the characters in JRPGs to not really know each other when the game starts as it makes growing their bond and getting to know each other easier to pull off. You can do a cast that already is well familiar with one another but it takes top notch writing and for me XV didn’t deliver on that.

 

[Platinumstorm]

The more I see about this game, the less I want to play it.

Does it have any redeeming qualities?

When you get towards the end of the game, you get incredibly confused why you feel gutwrenched over a half finished game with an incredible fishing and cooking system.

 

[01011001]

The more I see about this game, the less I want to play it.

Does it have any redeeming qualities?

it looks decent... I stopped playing due to how awful the fighting system was. there was 1 instance where an automated animation of a special attack threw my character down 2 floors, which would have meant I would need to traverse a big chunk of a dungeon all over again... at that point I just uninstalled the game, and never returned.

I was about to stop multiple times before that, but that was the final straw

the game is pretty braindead over all, if you don't do optional side-missions all you do in the main quest line is quite literally braindead and super easy fights, followed by "spectacle" boss fights that are 90% show and 10% pressing random buttons... no brain required

 

[Notabueno]

Who care, it sold and was overrated by corrupted medias and mediocre gamers despite being the worst solo entry. Probably one of the most boring and tedious open-world game I've played despite having a promising a premise and lots of side content which should've been integrated in the Royal edition (like Monster from the Deep, Episode Platinum, King's Glaive...)

FFXVI is going to be worse I feel.

Also I'm curious: is there a complete list of FFXV cut content?

 

[Three]

Insomnia, originally set to be the games opening locale, before venturing out into the open world. Essentially completely cut and relegated to a barebones dungeon:



Altissia, whilst you get to explore it, they clearly developed a much more sprawling city and areas that you never get to visit, including the giant stadium. The entire experience in the game felt short lived for such a big locale with so much detail.



Then you have the 2nd open world / world map area that was left half finished and completely cut from the game.





Tenebrae, another locale for which they developed a ton of the map, yet you again only stop there for a few mins before moving on.



Not to even mention what seems like hours of cutscenes and CG shown across the Versus XIII and early FFXV trailers that never made it into the game at all. They developed some beautiful environments and then did nothing with them..... the story felt disjointed and unfinished, the combat compared to something like 7R wasn't fun at all. The new team they hired for the project wasn't up for the job.

The game deserved an extra year or two in the oven and all the resources they took out of the game by making the CG movie, anime, marketing and DLC could have been consolidated to make a truly monumental FF game. One that I think fans would have acknowledged as a return to form for the series and likely would have made this the highest selling game in the series by a country mile.

Stellllaaaa!!!!

Wasn't the whole city part of the Ardyn dlc?