However, such a bright and lifting description is more fitting for the most early entries in the Final Fantasy series, in which you fight as characters wearing humorous onions as armor and are assisted by old man and five-year-olds as magicians. Let's also be sure not to forget cheese, biscuits, AND mashed potatoes! In contrast, more recent entries in the Final Fantasy series have been far from so whimsical and for some gamers, pleasant. Starting in Final Fantasy VII, the plots became more Gothic, the characters became darker and more negative, and so forth. Hopeless and failure became more common in the stories. Thankfully, we still had our cute, cozy, fluffy Chocobos and Moogles to make us feel some sense of familiarity.
But not anymore.
Way back in 2006, Square-Enix revealed small tidbits of information and previews regarding a game called Final Fantasy Agito XIII. Since speed and enticing updates (and as of Final Fantasy Versus XIII, actually making the game) are not exactly Square-Enix's top priority, the game was unheard for a long time. Finally, the title's... title was inexplicably changed in early 2011 to Final Fantasy Type-0. Finally, just a few months ago, the following trailer for the game dropped, and was released to the public for viewing:
All I can see is one word: what.
What. What is this game? What makes it even in the vein of Final Fantasy? What overtook the developers to overcompensate with an overbearing amount of darkness and maturity? What is this stylish new garb worn by the protagonists? The list of questions goes on, but the best explanation I can offer comes in the form to you, reader, as a summary.
The trailer opens in a manner that seems definite of a fantasy genre title like a typical Final Fantasy game: images are shown of a phoenix, airships, dragons, floating castles, simple battles, and castle-like civilizations. Graphically, the trailer has so far been beautiful. Then, suddenly, the mood of the trailer transforms entirely. Our next shot is a scarily organized army, all the soldiers bearing lifeless, deadpan expressions behind translucent masks. The camera showing all of the gunblade-wielding warriors seems to have not only gone into a soft sepia filter, but also reduces in quality. A leader is speaking over the entire army, as though rallying them to battle. The whole thing reminds me very much of none other than Adolf Hitler and the German Nazi army.
I already began to think somewhat surely was up with this. But I continued to watch, I had to after all. The next scene showed a couple of highly technological airships and war machines invading a city, decimating it immediately. As part of this scene, we see a battle amidst some steps, in which a native blasts one of the invaders with some kind of magical fire blast. But wait... what was that red flash after the spell? Was it fire... or blood? We have references to blood in the Final Fantasy series, such as the iconic Blood Sword, but never has it escalated to this level. Subsequently, the great dragon king, Bahamut, is summoned by the natives, though its Mega Flare seems to have little effect on the invading airships. Then, we see a crystal somewear shatter, and the magical defensive shields of the natives are down immediately. Their blood flies across the scene as they are brutally shot several times by the invaders. Even Bahamut, the DRAGON KING, is shot down with ease. His dark red blood splatters across the camera.
Our next scene, in a lower quality more like that of a cutscene, shows us two of the protagonists pictured above, both of which seem to be severely wounded from events involved in the siege. Then, a giant inferno of flames seems to incinerate them; while it's quite possible they survived, that's a brutal blow to make against suffering, fighting heroes. We then see a few shots of the invading army that was rallied by the Hitler-esque voice shooting down the poor, pleading natives, and their blood too flies across the sky of the scene, in front of the cold, emotionless looks of the soldiers. After that we see a use of magic, though it seems to come from a floating warship. The spell is Thundaga, though its powers seem to have grown past any previous incarnation, easily eradicating all natives in its reach across multiple platforms. Tufts of red, powder-like blood can be scene among some of the electrical blasts.
Finally, the intense story-based FMV is over for a bit; for now, we cut to gameplay videos. Most notable in the gameplay is, again, the incredible presence of blood. In the second battle video, when the fighting character slashes into a human enemy, blood flies everywhere, gushing out of the target's mutilated body. Sword attacks are no longer seemingly painless strikes that just make a three-digit number appear, but rather actually cut into your enemy and makes them bleed. Even inhumane animals, like the snow beast creature seen later, release bloody flares upon being struck.
Then things get bad. Very, very bad. Worse than ever before. We return to the story's FMV, and the first thing we see is a friendly icon of the Final Fantasy series as we have never seen it before: a blood-soaked, helpless, forsaken, dying Chocobo. One of our protagonist makes an effort to heal it, easily failing as soldiers armed with guns approach him and the bird. Just as all hope seems lost, our protagonists, whose face is covered with a deep, think, and wide line of blood, yells out, and the main protagonist, Ace, appears, killing all three soldiers with a great ball of fire. No pun intended. Actually it kind of was intended, but it's really irrelevant to the game and trailer. We are then "treated" to seeing some battle gameplay as Ace, a highlight of which is Ace slaughtering a human enemy in a field with a katana, his quick strikes releasing disturbingly realistic blood shots on to the terrain.
For the trailer's ending scenes, the man that Ace saved seems to be dying from his wound. A girl who appears to be allied with Ace appears, seemingly telling him to stop worrying for the dying man and to move along with her. The two then leave the bloody man and continue along, meeting up with the rest of their large group. Amidst a field of fire, ashes, and a dark, haunting sky, the several red cloaked warriors raise their weapons in an ominous silence. We see weapons that are constant in the Final Fantasy series: katana, rapier, knuckes, rod, and flute, to name a few. Sadly, this is one of not even a handful of elements that the series retains in this title.
While previous games in the Final Fantasy series have exhibited destruction and seizing of towns, never have they been this graphic or destructive. Never has the player been exposed to such realistic, violent death. Never has gameplay involved massive amounts of blood gushing out off dying enemies as they writhe out in pain. Never have our battling protagonists been bathed in blood as they have been now. The Chocobo, a constant creature of happiness, even dies, and the Dragon King is destroyed. It almost seems symbolic that this game is nothing like previous entries in the series, have forgone usual symbols and cliches with their constant icons of the series. Quite honestly, though, I'm wondering if Square-Enix is going to be able to hold onto the T rating from the ESRB that they so desperately will be seeking.
The way I see it, Final Fantasy Type-0 can go one of two ways. The first is that the game will sell poorly and be negatively received by the fans, due to it being such a huge diversion from the rest of the series. Critics may still like it, though critics can often be ignored by the fans; such was the case with the almost polar views between critic and fan regarding Final Fantasy XIII. Alternatively, the game could still be awesome, if Square-Enix realizes that the game needs more elements than just destruction, darkness, and bloody mutilation of enemies in order to produce something new and cutting edge. I await further updates of the game; surely there will be some high and hopefully less dark moments of the game and cast, though from what this trailer depicts, we're all in for a whole new Final Fantasy this time around.
So this is Square Enix's take at Monster Hunter?
ReplyDeleteBasically, yeah.
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