This is it -- what almost all RPG fans have been waiting for. Square released a PS3 Final Fantasy XIII demo overnight in Japan, and after the dramatic changes set in Final Fantasy XII, players' expectations have been running high. After finishing the demo, I have to say I like where things are going.
Here are a handful of things that the demo does differently from other games in the series:
- There's no MP. That's right, use all the magic you want.
- There are no level-ups or XP.
- There are no random battles, with all enemies seen on-screen.
- Combat moves very quickly, and you can queue up to three actions at a time.
- Party members are completely AI controlled.
The demo starts with Lightning, a female ex-soldier for the holy order, who escapes from a train with a man named Pazu into the middle of a war between the people who live in the "Cocoon" and "Parushi" worlds. Following that, you take control of another character named Snow, who's a fist punchin', blonde haired, blue eyed leader of a small pocket of Cocoon resistance.
This all climaxes -- spoiler alert -- when a large number of Snow's comrades die at the hands of the Parushi army, which strikes me as a bit dark for a Final Fantasy game. From what I can gather, it appears the people (robots?) from the world of Parushi are using the people from Coccoon as slaves, and the people from Coccoon are resisting them. The demo doesn't go into much detail on this front, likely on purpose to save the story for the full game.
The demo's graphics look amazing, though they have a somewhat uneven framerate -- which is nothing unusual for a game that's still a year away (reports say this code is from December 2008), but a bit strange for a publicly released demo. While the graphics are quite beautiful, the music is equally impressive. The battle theme is so good you just have to hear it for yourself. Coupled with the new, more action based combat mechanics, it really gets you into the fight like no other Final Fantasy game before it.
Click the image above to check out all Final Fantasy XIII screens.