With the release of the Final Fantasy XIII demo in Japan renewed interest has been restored in the franchise and in Square Enix itself. Faith has been restored in loyal followers who have been severely underwhelmed by Square Enix's latest offerings, myself included. Right now Square Enix has created an amazing amount of hype in gamers not only from Japan but around the world too. And this is a great sign for JRPG fans and those curious about JRPGs.
Both of these games look fantastic. The demo of Final Fantasy XIII showed a return to the turn based combat system, of which I am a massive fan of. It adds a certain amount of strategy to fights, especially when you fight harder bosses. Final Fantasy Versus XIII is going in a different direction. Tetsuya Nomura, creator of Versus XIII has told people that the combat system will be reminiscent of the Kingdom Hearts series. He also stated that there will be battle sequences that will mimic the epic fights of the Final Fantasy VII movie Advent Children.
Final Fantasy XIII takes place in a futuristic world. Parts of it seem bright and lively. Whether this theme carries on is unclear. But one thing we can say is that it looks GOOD. Versus XIII uses the same Crystal Tools Engine as Final Fantasy XIII. So the only real difference realistically will be the setting of each game. One will not be superior to the other.
Now Characters, this is where I was a little bedazzled. Final Fantasy XIII's lead Character Lightning seems a little lacking in the Charisma stakes. Not much is known about her but for a lead Character in a Final Fantasy game she seems to lack the presence of other leads. Mind you the lead character in XII, Vaan, also seemed to lack the presence of past heroes. Noctis on the other hand has a certain presence about him. If anyone has watched the trailer for Versus XIII then you will be able to understand what I mean. Noctis has a commanding presence and a ruthless side to him. Yet he also has a human side. He's a fantastic design, but I wouldn't expect less from the creator of Cloud, Sephiroth, Aerith, Squall and Seifer. All fantastic characters.
There is alot to like about each game. They will both be fantastic. But the absolute awesomeness of Noctis Lucis Caelum has me hanging out for Versus XIII more than Final Fantasy XIII. As good as both games will be, I want Versus XIII more.
So what do are you looking forward to more ? Thanks for reading and I appreciate your thoughts.
Microsoft announced its financial results for Q3 of fiscal year 2026, including an update on its gaming Xbox business and more.
Not looking good. Hopefully Asha Sharma is able to turn Phil’s disaster around.
To me it's still quite remarkable how they can cash-in 5.3bn in revenue in a single quarter, since their hardware is basically dead.
The stock mark is what makes Microsoft remarkable, They have convinced every institutional and retail investor to just keep piling money into them. Like many big tech giants they are just a big growing pyramid scheme. As long as people keep dropping money into ETF's that cover the market Microsoft will always be liquid. At the same time it is completely stifling innovation and competition. People need to start being more discreet in how they invest their money as it's killing the system.
Riiiiight because people will just flock back to them for one or two games per year.
15+ years of bad performance is what they call irreparable in business. It is time for them to sell off the assets and get out of entertainment.
These declines are on the back of extra revenue received from releasing games like Forza horizon 5 on PlayStation. So I’m being sarcastic here when I said they should go back to exclusives. Killing off a revenue stream from Ps5 sales will only make things worse
The charity event will be streamed live from Gamescom in August.
Thanks to the slip-up of an artist working on the title, we now have more evidence that a new Injustice game is in the works.
Too soon to start making "vs's" based on speculations.
Why? Well simply the team that is making it and the style of it.
Because of the dev team working on it. Kitase and Toriyama were the main brains behind VII, VIII and X.
On the Versus side you have Nomura directing and Nojima writing (granted he worked on the others games as well), which is the same as KH and AC to which I think FF is better.
Also about the characters???
Lightning is awesome, she has heaps of character, no idea what you are talking about.
I haven't played a Final Fantasy or JRPG before, but later on this year I plan on getting myself deep into some JRPG's and past Final Fantasy games like FFX, Dragon Quest VIII, and Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2 to get myself ready for FFXIII and Versus XIII.
However, based upon what I've seen so far I'm looking forward to Versus XIII more. And NO, I'm not looking forward to Versus XII more because it's a PS3 exclusive, I'm looking forward to it more because:
- it's going to be a more mature FF game and the rumors about this game possibly being the first rated M Final Fantasy game has me a little more intrigued.
-The darker atmosphere of the game.
-The Battle System being similar to Kingdom Hearts (Real Time)
I also think that Versus XIII will be a bigger hit in the West and will sell more in the U.S. and Europe than FFXIII will sell in the same regions just based on the fact that it will be more mature and it's combat system being reminiscent to Kingdom Hearts.
Hmmm wonder whats next. Xbox 1 million vs playstation 5 ?