Game:

Final Fantasy XVI (2023)

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Walkthrough

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Final Fantasy XVI is an action role-playing game developed and published by Square Enix. The sixteenth main installment in the Final Fantasy series, it released on June 22, 2023 for the PlayStation 5 as a timed exclusive. The game features segmented open environments and an action-based combat system involving both melee and magic-based attacks. There are also recurring series features including Chocobos, and summoned monsters called Eikons, which are both fought as bosses and used through channelling their power in combat.

Final Fantasy XVI is set in the fictional world of Valisthea, a world divided between six nations who hold power through access to magical Crystals and Dominants, humans who act as hosts for each nation's Eikon. Tensions between the nations escalate as a malady dubbed the Blight begins consuming the land. Clive Rosfield, guardian to his younger brother Joshua, witnesses his kingdom destroyed and goes on a revenge quest in pursuit of the dark Eikon Ifrit.

Beginning concept development in 2015, the staff included Naoki Yoshida as producer, Hiroshi Takai as main director, artists Hiroshi Minagawa and Kazuya Takahashi, Kazutoyo Maehiro as creative director and lead writer, Masayoshi Soken as composer, and Capcom veteran Ryota Suzuki as battle designer. Yoshida's aim was for a dark fantasy storyline that would have broad appeal and reinvigorate the series. Its production and promotion was impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, and later by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The game has been well received by journalists. Praise was given to its story, characters, music and combat system. Criticism focused on its lack of deeper RPG elements, framerate issues and side quest design.

Final Fantasy XVI is set in the fictional world of Valisthea. Scattered throughout the two continents of Ash and Storm are magical crystals, known as the Mothercrystals, which provide aether energy to the various populations and drive civilization, although their overuse causes magic users to petrify. In the history of the world, a technologically advanced and now-legendary sky-based civilization once dominated the world. 1500 years before the events of the game, a great war caused the civilization to collapse, with remnants of it scattering across Valisthea. A powerful force in Valisthea are the Eikons, magical creatures who operate through human hosts called Dominants. Each Eikon represents one element and typically never fight each other. A seemingly impossible second Eikon of fire, Ifrit, drives the main plot by disrupting this balance.

The core nations of Valisthea are the Grand Duchy of Rosaria, the Holy Empire of Sanbreque, and the Dhalmekian Republic on the Storm continent, the Kingdom of Waloed which dominates the Ash continent, and the neutral Crystalline Dominion sitting between Ash and Storm. An outlier is the Iron Kingdom, an isolated nation off the coast of Storm overseen by the Crystalline Orthodox. By the game's events, Valisthea is suffering from a depletion of aether dubbed the Blight, driving the nations into conflict with each other. A key part of the nations' politics and military are Dominants, who can use magic without crystals, though they are more at risk from petrification. Depending on where they are born, Dominants are hailed as political leaders, tolerated due to their power, or suffer abuse and are either killed or used as weapons of war.

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