Final Fantasy 16 - one of the most boring and uninspired games I have ever played

CompleteGlobalSaturation

CompleteGlobalSaturation

Member
Purchased this game after enjoying the demo. Clearly I've been duped. This game is a cutscene fest full of filler dialogue, a very slow plot, pointless fetch quests and extremely mundane gameplay.

I cannot stand the bullet sponge enemies either.

The only saving grace are the cool boss battles, but they seem to occur once in a blue moon i.e. after 2-3 hours of 'shit' gameplay. 90% of the missions in this game drag unnecessarily.

Who designed this game should never ever make games again.

Easily the worst RPG title I have played. A classic example of why 'more' is not better. This game feels 30 hours too long.

I'm currently on the level 'Onward'. How many hours of shit do I have to endure before I complete this game?
 
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CompleteGlobalSaturation said:
Purchased this game after enjoying the demo. Clearly I've been duped. This game is a cutscene fest full of filler dialogue, a very slow plot, pointless fetch quests and extremely mundane gameplay.

I cannot stand the bullet sponge enemies either.

The only saving grace are the cool boss battles, but they seem to occur once in a blue moon i.e. after 2-3 hours of 'shit' gameplay. 90% of the missions in this game drag unnecessarily.

Who designed this game should never ever make games again.

Easily the worst RPG title I have played. A classic example of why 'more' is not better. This game feels 30 hours too long.

I'm currently on the level 'Onward'. How many hours of shit do I have to endure before I complete this game?
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They didn't even try to make it much of an RPG, it's designed just like their MMO (FFXIV) because it's made by the same devs. The game even has those shitty FFXIV side quests. I really wish the game had more RPG mechanics and rewarded exploration more. It's a shame that the last original new FF (not counting remakes) we had that remotely feels like an RPG was FFXV 9 years ago...
 
I completely agree and dropped it at around 12-15 hours. There were some huge standout moments in the boss fights I encountered but it was all surrounded by boring quests and filler. It's a series that I think I'm just going to stay away from going forward, it's clearly not for me.
 
Gameplay Gods Bless said:
They didn't even try to make it much of an RPG, it's designed just like their MMO (FFXIV) because it's made by the same devs. The game even has those shitty FFXIV side quests. I really wish the game had more RPG mechanics and rewarded exploration more. It's a shame that the last original new FF (not counting remakes) we had that remotely feels like an RPG was FFXV 9 years ago...
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The game certainly has those MMO vibes with pointless filler/fetch quests.

I want to play games for fun factor only but FF16 feels like a chore to play.

Back to Space Marine 2 and Doom Eternal it is....
 
I thought it was ok-ish. Some great moments, some really boring ones. The word I'd use to describe it is disappointing. It could have easily been so much better with some tweaks, but it is what it is.
 
I hated this game. Easily the most bored and apathetic I've ever felt while playing a mainline FF game, and it's the only one I haven't finished.

I'm convinced it started out as some DMC style spinoff game that would've consisted of just those linear story dungeons + boss battles. Then they decided to expand it into a mainline FF so they pumped it full of FF XIV A Realm Reborn drudgery.
 
DonkeyPunchJr said:
I hated this game. Easily the most bored and apathetic I've ever felt while playing a mainline FF game, and it's the only one I haven't finished.

I'm convinced it started out as some DMC style spinoff game that would've consisted of just those linear story dungeons + boss battles. Then they decided to expand it into a mainline FF so they pumped it full of FF XIV A Realm Reborn drudgery.
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The game would have been much better for it.

Cutting 50% of the single player content would instantly improve the game IMO. Most of the missions in this game add nothing of value to the plot.
 
its has some pacing problems and horrible side quests ( they get way way better close to the end ) ? YES

but game plays great, combat is fun, bosses are amazing, graphics are great and a amazing cast, the only thing this game is missing is final fantasy difficult from the start, first playthrough is too easy.

if you are playing it on PC there is some mods that ll help the experience

 
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Cool story bro, one of my favourite games this gen. A buddy of mine who is a huge Nintendo fanboy recently finished it and said it was the best FF since X and overall spectacular entry in the series. Worth noting we are both old-school gamers who started gaming on the Atari 2600, haters keep hating, Final Fantasy for life ⚔️

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I haven't played the game but it sure seems to not be universally liked. I will maybe get round to it one day but it's one of those games I flick past on every sale just due to its bad word of mouth.
 
Feels like a 5 star game and a 2 star game by different studios smooshed together imo. The highs are very high but there's a huge gulf between that and most of the content, which is trash.
 
IMO, FFIX was a better Final Fantasy than XVI. XVI is what you get when you don't have Sakaguchi or something else to copy. I haven't really enjoyed the franchise since XII and that was at least right after Sakaguchi left. So there was a lot more inspiration from the OG team.

XVI was fun for a while, but that story was just as bad as "destroy Chaos!!" from SoP. Like XV, I'm left with a bad lasting impression. I don't think I'll ever want to play XV or XVI ever again. Yet, I'm compelled to play classic FF games. It's confusing and I don't like it.
 
Some of the highest highs and the lowest lows you can find in an action game.

Still I enjoyed the ride overall, but it's wildly inconsistent. Some of the vistas and cutscenes are really gorgeous though
 
FF cycle is real

FF gets announced with cool trailer —> fans say this will be a return to form, finally a good one —> it's announced there will not be turn based combat —-> media praises game —-> game comes out —-> people say it's good —-> honeymoon phase ends —-> the game stinks —-> restart the cycle
 
Enjoyed the overall package.
The mission design was trash with the fetch quests or talk to A and B - come back. Middle of the game was a huge bore.

That being said, i loved the combat, story for the most part, and the amazing boss battles. Ended on a high note and i think Clive is a cool character. Would play a sequel.
 
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BennyBlanco said:
FF cycle is real

FF gets announced with cool trailer —> fans say this will be a return to form, finally a good one —> it's announced there will not be turn based combat —-> media praises game —-> game comes out —-> people say it's good —-> honeymoon phase ends —-> the game stinks —-> restart the cycle
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You forgot post "the game stinks" -> "the last FF before this one was not so bad all things reconsidered"
 
CBU3 were riding high off of the success of FFXIV, especially Shadowbringers and Endwalker. The trailers looked great, it had a cool protagonist, the music sounded fire, the premise was interesting, it had the gameplay dev of Devil May Cry attached to it, and the 2 hour Prologue Demo was fantastic and very positively received by people. There was a lot of reason to believe FFXVI might actually be the one to pull Final Fantasy out of the hole it's been in.

Final Fantasy hasn't had a universally liked hit since FFX, almost 25 years ago. Rebirth seemed liked it was the most liked single player FF since X, but ironically it underperformed commercially. I don't know. Final Fantasy might actually be fucked.
 
This is one of the shorter Notes I've made after watching Trailers, gameplay footage and playing the Demo:

"Generic cliche story and character interactions, bland art direction, button mashy and easy combat, "Epic Boss fight" consisting of holding one button, 0 destructible objects, very linear locations with tons of invisible walls, PS4 graphics but it's a PS5-only title, significant and constant framerate drops."
 
It's a FF game with only 1 playable character and terrible RPG mechanics. If that's what you like in FF games, more power to you. It's not what I hoped for.
 
Madflavor said:
CBU3 were riding high off of the success of FFXIV, especially Shadowbringers and Endwalker. The trailers looked great, it had a cool protagonist, the music sounded fire, the premise was interesting, it had the gameplay dev of Devil May Cry attached to it, and the 2 hour Prologue Demo was fantastic and very positively received by people. There was a lot of reason to believe FFXVI might actually be the one to pull Final Fantasy out of the hole it's been in.

Final Fantasy hasn't had a universally liked hit since FFX, almost 25 years ago. Rebirth seemed liked it was the most liked single player FF since X, but ironically it underperformed commercially. I don't know. Final Fantasy might actually be fucked.
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You could try and say it's because of this generation change, but older generations like action games and hard action games. It's not like they dropped games completely. I feel like any developer who thinks that way is a bit clueless. When BG3 wins GOTY and some developer claims "turn based isn't what players want". It's all very stupid. Fans like Final Fantasy for specific reasons. It isn't because they had bad gameplay. They made adjustments to the battle system. Square basically copied Capcom or any other action game after the fact with XVI.
 
Flabagast said:
Some of the highest highs and the lowest lows you can find in an action game.

Still I enjoyed the ride overall, but it's wildly inconsistent. Some of the vistas and cutscenes are really gorgeous though
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Is it possible to enjoy it if the last game I finished is the masterpiece of KCD2? I am considering what to play next and FF16 has been on my radar.
For reference, I do not play JRPGs, the only one I ever finished is FF15 (mostly liked it, but hated its sidequests).
 
CompleteGlobalSaturation said:
This game is a cutscene fest full of filler dialogue, a very slow plot, pointless fetch quests and extremely mundane gameplay.
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First time my monitor went into power saving mode while playing a game and it has happened multiple times during this.
CompleteGlobalSaturation said:
Who designed this game should never ever make games again.

Easily the worst RPG title I have played. A classic example of why 'more' is not better. This game feels 30 hours too long.

I'm currently on the level 'Onward'. How many hours of shit do I have to endure before I complete this game?
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I feel like whoever designed it (i mean the concept, not the low-level details) did an amazing job, theres clearly lot of amazing lore and ideas, the whole team executing on those ideas failed to do it justice and just did a bad job.

Little bit weird calling it a worst RPG since it it doesnt have any role playing at all, everything is 100% predetermined, might aswell call it the worst first person shooter, its pretty good at what it is, an adventure game, you can try to hate it for what it isnt, or try to enjoy it for what it is

Anyway, i suggest turning it to story mode (which fixes your bullet sponge complaint) and blast through the main story, enjoy the spectacle without doing any low quality side quests, playing that way allows you to ignore all the bad stuff and just enjoy the good stuff.
 
The absolute lack of challenge, shitty sidequest and a definitely vastly inferior second half killed the game for me.

Combat was quite fun mechanically tho, just too easy because they had to lock hard mode behind bullshit requisites once again.
 
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It's the biggest mixed bag of a game I've ever seen. On paper it seems like it'd be a surefire hit. Medieval setting, dark GoT-like darker story with English-first script, and DMC-like combat. Too bad the execution was subpar. The combat in particular was a huge letdown for me. Felt like a solid 6/10 mediocre action game that didn't have any of the fundamentals of a good action game (mandatory dodging, blocking, parrying, breaking poise, stamina use, etc.) All the basic enemies could just be button-mashed and staggerlocked to death. The game felt very watered down.
 
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Agreed. It may not be an objectively bad game but it did everything in its power to make me hate it. So hate it I did, despite actually enjoying most of the demo. In the full game though? Bland characters, bland plot (after starting out at least somewhat interesting), mostly tedious side quests, mediocre combat, empty and lifeless world, barely any character progression, no meaningful gear and build customization, pretty much no exploration. Even the hyped-up eikon battles felt more like shallow semi-interactive cutscenes directed by some long-forgotten Japanese cousin of Michael Bay's than actually engaging boss fights.

Most importantly though, fuck this game for catfishing me with that demo.
 
T4keD0wN said:
First time my monitor went into power saving mode while playing a game and it has happened multiple times during this.

I feel like whoever designed it (i mean the concept, not the low-level details) did an amazing job, theres clearly lot of amazing lore and ideas, the whole team executing on those ideas failed to do it justice and just did a bad job.

Little bit weird calling it a worst RPG since it it doesnt have any role playing at all, everything is 100% predetermined, might aswell call it the worst first person shooter, its pretty good at what it is, an adventure game, you can try to hate it for what it isnt, or try to enjoy it for what it is

Anyway, i suggest turning it to story mode (which fixes your bullet sponge complaint) and blast through the main story, enjoy the spectacle without doing any low quality side quests, playing that way allows you to ignore all the bad stuff and just enjoy the good stuff.
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That helps with the bullet sponge enemies but does not fix the tedious mission structure.

Does the game get better (I'm on this mission https://www.ign.com/wikis/final-fantasy-16/Onward)?
 
I've never really liked Kinds Funny but this was the last suggestion I ever took from them. Absolutely ridiculous game to recommend to people.
 
CompleteGlobalSaturation said:
That helps with the bullet sponge enemies but does not fix the tedious mission structure.

Does the game get better (I'm on this mission https://www.ign.com/wikis/final-fantasy-16/Onward)?
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Youre pretty far, it doesnt get better gameplay-wise, just more of the same.

Story-wise youre right in front of the 2 or 3 most interesting bits imo, but i think after that (you getting the next 2 eikons/beach part) it gets worse, the last unexplored part of the map is a slog to get through, even though the presence of the next boss is awesome, it feels there was a lot of unrealized potential, and the final chapter after that is by far the weakest.

Id say drop it if youre not interested where the story goes after the next big fight which is right after this mission. Btw, try using single target abilities instead of the ultimate ones, normal enemies go down very quick anyway and this way you can deal with the elites and progress much faster, ive made that mistake and the game was more of a slog than it couldve been for me.
 
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