As I mentioned in a thread I recently created, 1up.com had a weeklong exclusive of Final Fantasy XIII with different “events” each day. For this past Thursday there was a special podcast of Active Time Babble talking about their impressions of Final Fantasy XIII – spoiler free – and Xenoblade/Monolith for a bit. It is a long podcast, two hours six minutes and 9 seconds long, but I highly recommend listening to it as they do a wonderful job at expressing their views and thoughts of the game without getting into a heated debate. When they do disagree they talk very respectfully and there is no bashing. I know some may say it is just their opinion and “I” don’t care about what they say but it is very interesting as it they keep their impressions honest and fair. I’ll be breaking down the podcast that way people can get a general idea of what they are interested in hearing and can jump to that part. However, once they get onto Final Fantasy XIII I found it all to be good so I would advise to listen to the whole conversation in any free time. The podcast is dated 2/25/2010, titled Final Fantasy XIII and just click the download button and “your” media player should load up and start playing it (when I clicked on “download” Windows Media Player started and the podcast began). Active Time Babble Podcast

I’ll also be sharing my thoughts, as can anyone, on some of what they said and there is something that they talked about that I would like to ask/discuss with the TFF community; I won’t be starting another thread since the topic is a part of the podcast.

The first 22 minutes is their discussion about Xenoblade and some of the hosts’ problems with the Xenosaga series and Monolith. There isn’t much to it but if you are interested in listening to what they have to say about those topics go ahead and listen but that could be considered the “boring” part of the podcast.


24:35 – 30:50:

• Sales of Final Fantasy XIII in Japan
• Web speculation of Final Fantasy XV being on a handheld
• Kitase needing a break and Square Enix needing to finish all the games they promised
• Dragon Quest VI and the new mini-game found in the DS version – Slime Curling
• God Eater – a PSP game that is being brought to the U.S


31:43 – 1:00:15:

• Towns of the Final Fantasy series, Final Fantasy XIII, JRPGs, Dragon Quest series, Crisis Core, & BioWare games
• Some of their impressions of Final Fantasy XIII
• Final Fantasy XIII being exhausting to play (explained later on)
• The Final Fantasy experience since Final Fantasy IV
• Final Fantasy XIII’s linearity
• Final Fantasy since the beginning of the series
• Final Fantasy XIII having a linear view but in return it plays up its characters with substance
• What happened during the development of Final Fantasy XIII
• Certain Japanese developers coddling gamers with long tutorials in their game(s)
• How in Final Fantasy XIII the developers have been able to create a legitimately challenging game
• Crystarium Grid
• Progress in Final Fantasy XIII


1:01:05 – 1:24:40:

• Battle system of Final Fantasy XIII
• What they’ve heard online about Final Fantasy XIII
• The linearity design being deliberate or a last minute decision
• Final Fantasy XIII being designed around its narrative – an interactive movie
• The explanation as to why Final Fantasy XIII is exhausting to play
• The story’s relation to its setting
• The visual artistry of Final Fantasy XIII
• Final Fantasy XIII’s camera
• Directorial control versus Free-roaming camera


1:25:30 – 2:03:56:

• Camera design (cont.)
• Some of the characters of Final Fantasy XIII
• The self-awareness and savvy of Final Fantasy XIII
• The quality of the story/writing
• The context of the world being given in flashbacks and a database
• Purpose of townspeople in JRPGs and in Final Fantasy XIII
• Towns (again)
• A Kitase interview about towns in HD
• The style of Square Enix in Final Fantasy (design philosophy)
• The Final Fantasy series’ appeal
• Preconceptions of Final Fantasy
• Fabula Novus Crystallis
• Marketing of Final Fantasy XIII
• The diversity of the RPG genre
• The tradition gameplay of Final Fantasy or the lack of “traditional” throughout the series
• Square Enix
• When would FFXV arrive
• Final Fantasy’s relevance in current times

When Kat brings up the sales of Final Fantasy XIII in Japan, they say that they are disappointing, that there are tons on the shelf that are “new” that haven’t been sold. Yes, Square Enix may have overestimated however Kat does say that the PS3 install base must be taken into consideration. A good point by Kat because there are less than 5 million PS3 owners in Japan and Final Fantasy XIII has sold around 1.89 million which is around 39% of the install base which is very good. It is quite hard to sell to over 50% of the install base for any game so Final Fantasy XIII did well. The hosts also don’t realize the Japanese market – everyone who wants to buy the game do so in the first week and it sharply decreases in sales afterwards, especially highly anticipated games. Final Fantasy XIII had the same sale life as other games in Japan, it is nothing unusual.

During the 33 to 36 minute marks the hosts talked about towns in relation to Final Fantasy XIII, the Final Fantasy series, Bioware games, Dragon Quest, and JRPGs. I found what someone said to be very interesting and here is the discussion as best as I could write it down:

[First Person]Final Fantasy has never done towns very well. Towns in Final Fantasy are boring and stupid. Like, I play Bioware RPGs now so I can appreciate that you can turn a town into something interesting a destination in themselves. Where you do things, where you have quests that you meet interesting people and do things that matter. Balamb Garden was the one town and the main city in Final Fantasy XII, like those are the only cities in Final Fantasy that have ever been worth a crap.

[Second Person]But the issue with that is, and I can understand by saying you know what we don’t do this very well let’s get rid of it versus we don’t do this very well let’s do it better.
[First Person]But the thing is Final Fantasy XIII doesn’t get rid of towns. You still go through towns there are several towns in the game. There are several destinations and it strips down the experience so that you get the essence of it which is talking to people to flesh out the world a little bit but you don’t have to do all the random running around and wasting time and it’s not boring.

[Second Person] Wait, I like all the random running around and wasting time. It basically gives you a different feelings as you go through the game. Because in like in other Final Fantasy games you are battling, you’re going through a dungeon and then you kinda come out of the dungeon and it’s like tension in release. I get out of the dungeon and my reward is I get to go to this town, I get to screw around, I get to find out what side missions there are, I get to talk to people, I maybe find some treasure chests and do some puzzle type things. And there is this pattern of fast action, slow action, fast action slow action that’s kinda fun. In Final Fantasy XIII you get none of that. There are not towns in Final Fantasy XIII; there are segments in the game in which there are no enemies but there is people hanging out. And maybe some of those people live in little houses over there.

[First Person] Which is kinda a town.

[Second Person] Yeah, but, the thing is when you say towns have been removed and then you say, “no they’re really there”. There’s this sorta little vestige of town but you really don’t do anything there. You just run through it and there’s no enemies just people (jabbering[?]).


After hearing what the first person said initially he may have a point that Final Fantasy and most JRPGs overall (he says the latter later) have never done towns very well. As he says in Final Fantasy XIII they streamline towns so you get the essence but the player doesn’t have to do the random running around. My first question is: do you think Final Fantasy has done towns well or poorly? If not, why would people whine about them being streamlined?


The second guy does bring a good point in return saying “that it [a town] is a reward for surviving the dungeon and it changes the pace”, however, if there isn’t anything wonderful about the towns in Final Fantasy, then what Final Fantasy XIII did is ok. These hosts do sometimes forget to put the topic at hand in context: in Final Fantasy XIII the characters are fugitives they are on the run and not liked by the people of Cocoon (though it may change later) so it is perfectly logical for them not to hang around town to get caught – that would be stupid. In today’s world people can purchase stuff online, they don’t need to go to the physical location to get whatever they want which is what Final Fantasy XIII emulated by the player purchasing their items via the save point – what’s the problem? Is it because it is supposed to be in a “fantasy” world that, that way of purchasing items can’t be done? Final Fantasy XIII is in a fantasy world, a sci-fi world is still a fantasy world, it is not high fantasy (a different genre which some of the most popular games in the Final Fantasy series are not) but it is still a fantasy setting.


When thinking compared to the Dragon Quest series most JRPGs, including Final Fantasy, do not create interesting towns – they have the basic functions and that is it. Therefore why can’t “towns” be implemented in a different way that is still basic? I have not played BioWare RPGs but would those who have say that their towns are a better experience than most JRPGs , worst, or on the same level?


During the 1:07:00 to 1:09:20 they talk about something that I believe a lot of fans of Final Fantasy don’t realize or don’t want to realize:

[First Person]A lot of people are writing it off because this game is different from previous Final Fantasies and therefore I’m not going to like it without stopping to think about the history of the series. And that there is a broad perception that the Final Fantasy series has been ruined forever and this is what every future Final Fantasy will be like and there’s no reason to think that. Every Final Fantasy has its own tone, its own tenure. This [FFXIII] is an attempt to take the Final Fantasy series in one extreme direction. This is what the series has been flirting with since FFIV and especially since FFVII.

[Second Person]I agree in the abstract that I’d rather see this [Final Fantasy XIII] than cling to outmoded design ideas and just churning out Final Fantasies because that is how the series would die. I like to hear that they are trying to be experimental and try new things.

What the first person initially said is why I said that “some fans don’t want to realize” – that the history of the series is about changing up the formula and that the series is not ruined because the next game and the game after that and so on won’t be like Final Fantasy XIII (in this instance). However if they accepted that truth it would destroy their view that the series must repeat itself over and over or that it must repeat from the most current iteration. Though if they realize that each game is different there is no reason to fret that the series is ruined but their conservative views of the series makes them think so. They are caught in a pickle accept the true history of the series or act stupid by saying the series is ruined, when in reality each game is different from the last and from the rest of the series.

Final Fantasy is a unique series in that it always stays relevant by re-inventing itself otherwise it would not have enjoyed the success it has because of the changes it has made. Taking a look back at Final Fantasy II it is clearly different than the original; Final Fantasy III is different from Final Fantasy II and the original as well – this process occurs continuously throughout the series. This process of re-inventing and experimentation is what keeps the series fresh and not stale.


Listen to it, share your thoughts, and/or discuss what I've brought up. Once again, I highly recommend listening to the podcast.