Gaming Thoughts - Final Fantasy VII Chapter 1
1I woke up this morning with FFVII music in my head.
That battle music that was featured in the trailer.
Different game
This is not the Final Fantasy VII that I played back in the 90s, and that’s a good thing. If I want to play that I can just play that. The graphics don’t really hold up, but the gameplay does. And I’ve never been one to shun a game for sub-par graphics.
The idea that this is more of an action JRPG is very intriguing to me. I’m very interested to see how they can change the game systems while still giving you the same strategic feel. I hope it feels strategic and not too button mashy.
Episodic?
They announced today that FFVII remake is going to be released in chapters, to me this says only one thing. Square needs more time to finish it. I think that Square has finally realized one of their biggest shortfalls. That Final Fantasy games take way too long to come to market.
Final Fantasy games are known for being these massive worlds with 100s of hours of gameplay awaiting the protagonists. They are also known for being some of the best looking games at the time of their release. These two things make putting out a Final Fantasy game a massive undertaking, and the amount of time that elapses between one game and the next is far too long.
Or at least that is the public perception.
Three things that could fix this.
Don’t announce your game so early.
As soon as you put a sign that says Final Fantasy with a number after the gaming public wants news, they want it bad. By announcing games way to early, it does bouey your stock a bit, but it also works against Square as it builds hype too far out. It’s much better to announce when you have something substantial to show. Not just a name in fancy font.
Have another team working on the next one.
I’m not a developer, I don’t know if square is already doing this, but if they aren’t then they should. The games are very far apart, which isn’t really a bad thing. I’m against annualizing games, but I think they are too far apart.
Put the game out one chapter at a time.
This is clearly what square has chosen to do. I think it is potentially a good move. However it all comes down to pricing. No for me when I think about a game from Square, I think about Final Fantasy, and the fact that I bought it on my iPhone, then again on my iPad because they didn’t make a universal app. That would have been fine, but the game was $17, in a sea of $0.99 games. It makes the customer feel like they were ripped off.
Yes, the game is worth that money, but to charge me for it twice just feels slimy.
It’s like selling me a game, and if I hook my system up to a different size TV charging me again.
How is square going to charge for this? That is the BIG question. There are a couple ways that I think they can go.
$60 gets you the whole thing. You can pay for it up front, and as the chapters are released you get them for free.
With this model you can get the entire revenue from the player right up front to offset the costs of making the game.
They had better finish the game though. If they don’t you’re going to have a lot of very very angry fans
I think this is the best model for Square to follow.
Put out the game in chapters, and charge a fee for each chapter.
This would also be fine with me as long as they communicate how much each chapter is, as well as how many chapters are going to be in the game.
If they split the game into 50 chapters at $5 each, I don't want to pay that much for FFVII.
What I worry about is, that Square is going to charge a lot more than they should for this game. Which for any other game wouldn’t be a big deal, but people BUY Final Fantasy games, and Square could set a new pricing precedent with this one.
Square has said that each chapter will be very different that the last.
This sounds very very cool. I really like the idea that each chapter could have a different battle system in it. They didn’t expressly come out and say that, but it is the first thing that comes to my mind.
This could be amazing, or backfire.
By releasing the game in chunks Square can get feedback from the community about what they do and don’t like about the game. I can see them making changes to the battle system from chapter to chapter, which sounds good, but I also think that the design by committee paradigm isn’t really the best way to go when it comes to a video game. Too often people say that they want a certain thing only to find out that when they get what they want, it just doesn't work how they imagined it.
This could lead to a lot of people paying for the first few chapters only to dump the series later as the changes to the battle system move farther and farther away from concise design goals.
I’d really like to know what you think about Square’s Final Fantasy VII announcements? Let me know if the comments.