FFVII Episodic + General Squeenix Rant

[TheFeniX]

This is not new news, but I let it slide because I just didn't care and right around that time I was already annoyed at Squeenix for FFXIV lack of content and I wanted to wait for more information about the release schedule. The recent release of Hitman also being Episodic also set me off.

The Final Fantasy remake will be released in episodes: Article posted at the bottom of my rant. So, one of the most popular games of all time is getting a remake and the people remaking it are concerned they'd have to cut content if they didn't do an episode release? That I'm typing that is insane. You could put a kickstarter up for that and you'd have infinty-billion dollars instantly. Imagine valve typed the number 3. Or Blizzard said they are remaking Warcraft 2/3 and/or Starcraft with updated graphics. That's the kind of insanity I'm feeling right now.

I have been understanding Squeenix's mentality less and less each year. They literally just have to deliver content and they can make money, but they keep going into bullshit like this. Asset creation is obviously a time consumer, but it's not like A. they haven't made the entire game once before and B. fans haven't already been waiting almost 20 years for a remake.

Still should be good for some comedy: "Previously on Final Fantasy: a mad scientist tried to get a wolf to rape a woman. A white haired dude (who years later would be the cosplay choice for people who spend way too much money on stainless steel katanas) stabbed a fat guy in the back (or DID HE!?!?!????), and a black man got angry a lot."

Hitman not only has an episodic release, but also online always DRM. The Steam reviews are beating it up pretty bad. This combined with their lackluster handling of FFXIV post-expansion is getting me to totally write them off as a publisher and developer. This is just what happens when you have popular IPs with established fanbases to shit on.

I love how shitty game development has become, we can't even release complete games already released once before without threatening to cut content.

God, can't we just start beating old Enix IPs to death instead? Would love another SoulBlazer or ActRaiser game.

At this year’s E3, Square-Enix finally announced they were remaking Final Fantasy VII, and this past weekend, they unleashed the first full trailer for the game, which was kind of amazing. So, Final Fantasy fans couldn’t possibly have anything to complain about, right? Well, not so fast.

When looking over promotional materials for Final Fantasy VII Remake, fans came across this line…

“Final Fantasy VII Remake will be told across a multi-part series, with each entry providing its own unique experience.”

Wait a minute, so the new Final Fantasy VII is going to be an episodic game? Sure seems like it. Tetsuya Nomura, director of the remake, tried to explain the decision…

“If you did get it into a single release […] we thought there would be stuff we would probably have to pare down and supplemental things we probably couldn’t add, we decided to divide it up, concluding that we have to do a remake that’s fully packed with content. If we took everything that’s in the original game and remade it at [the quality seen in the new trailer], we couldn’t get it all on a single release.”

In other words, remaking a game as story-heavy and complex as Final Fantasy VII with modern top-of-the-line PS4 graphics would simply be too expensive/risky to do all in one go.

I don’t necessarily have a problem with Final Fantasy VII Remake being episodic, as long as A) the wait between episodes isn’t too long and B) this isn’t an excuse to overcharge for the full game. If Square-Enix splits the game into five chapters of 10 – $15, then I have no complaints. I’ll be less pleased if they decide to charge $20 or more per episode.

But hey, if you want to play through a non-episodic version of Final Fantasy VII, the game is now available on the PS4. This is a more-or-less straight port of the original game with trophy support, so get prepared for some old-school blockiness. The Final Fantasy VII PS4 port is 32 percent off until December 12.

[bilateralrope]

There are two Jimquisition episodes about this:
Why Square Enix Is Carving Its Games To Bits.
The 'Problem' With Episodic Games

My opinion is that there are three styles of episodic games:
- Games that are designed to be episodic from the start.
- Games designed as a full game, then sliced up, which fucks up the pacing.
- Games which could fall into either of the above categories, except that later episodes are never released.

My experience with episodic games has been buying all of HL2 in the Orange Box, then never touching another episodic game. Mainly because I don't like buying unfinished games, I view episodic games as unfinished until all the episodes are released and I keep losing interest before the final episode is released.

[TheFeniX]

The thing is, EP1 was not originally going to even be called EP1 and would have had more in common with an expansion pack a la Jedi Academy or Mysteries of the Sith. And HL2 "episodes" at least had major resolutions, THEN introduced new problems. You stop Breen. End. You stop City 17 from blowing up. End. You launch the rocket. Gut punch. End.

Half-life still has a story to tell, but the large plot tokens that the player is tasked with overcoming are wrapped up. You feel that game/episode is beaten. Just like Star Wars could have ended at ANH, but not at ESB. No Half-life game feels like the ending to ESB: a place-holder in of itself. HL2 is easily a stand-alone game and felt as such. It had a clear ending in sync with how HL1 ended: you get screwed by GMan. Wake up and smell the ashes. The Episodes felt the same, but a lot shorter. Makes sense, they were much cheaper than the full game.

Meanwhile, where do we chop FFVII off the first time? Easy: leaving Midgar. But that's merely a stepping off point. It's already been shown Shinra isn't the biggest problem in the game. There's no real resolution, only cool fights and minigames. Even the big reveal at Shinra HQ doesn't mean anything to the player since they were not involved. There's almost no point I can think of in FFVII to cut the game off that wouldn't feel like ending ANH after the Tatooine escape.

Or a "TO BE CONTINUED" line like in Next Generation during the Borg arc or "I'm getting my men back" from Neo-BSG. These had a definate need to keep people waiting for the next installment but also because they had to write and film the show. FFVII's story has already been told. There's already a huge fanbase and hype alone would easily bring new generations into the game.

Damn, could you imagine if they re-released HL2 and it cut off after getting the buggy? "Here's a cool buggy guys. Now wait 6 months (HOPEFULLY) and be ready to cough up more money to drive it to continue the story that's currently in progress." Fucking riots if you give that HL2 even needed a release. But Squeenix fans are ready to just bend over and give them the benefit of the doubt when there's really no reason to considering their track record.