As a possible statement against murmurings that Final Fantasy XV’s bro-tastic TGS 2014 trailer was pre-rendered footage, game director Hajime Tabata gave panel attendees a live demonstration of the game engine and some combat on a NicoNico stream earlier today.
Check out the stream below! (archived here) The Final Fantasy XV gameplay footage starts at about 22:35 (with Overture, no less!). The demonstrator treats us to a live, close-up look at the four main character–Noctis, Gladio, Prompto, and Ignis–under different weather and lighting conditions. Later, he begins moving around as Noctis, teleporting to a few different spots. Finally, a fight with several Goblins and a Behemoth is triggered.
My impressions of the fight are more positive than with our glimpses of combat in the recent trailer. There, only sluggish melee attacks were seen. Here, Noctis switches between swift and heavy weapons on the fly. It gives the impression of a more impacting, dramatic Kingdom Hearts, where you’re really in the thick of things with your foes and party members. Noctis also whips out a Fire spell a couple times, which does heavy area-of-effect damage and seems to decimate the Behemoth. Killing one probably won’t be as easy in the final game.
You won’t have to wait too long to try Final Fantasy XV for yourself; a demo of the content seen in this week’s trailer will be shipped with early copies of Final Fantasy Type-0 HD next March. Kotaku says players who explore, taking on optional enemies and a dungeon, will get three or four hours out of the demo, but using the car to drive straight through will only take an hour. The team is also working to get a Chocobo in the demo, but time is a factor there.
Final Fantasy XV has been a long, long time coming, but it’s beginning to materialize in a very real way. Are you still excited for this development-hell phoenix?