What Shinra News Already Said, as well as What They Didn't Say

Okay, so a lot of Final Fantasy XIII-2 stuff has come out, along with even a Game Informer article (I don't remember if it was a review or a preview; it was most likely a preview) on it. I have been gone from this blog for quite a while now, and I do apologize for that. My life has taken a lot of my concerns since I finished FFVI. As a matter of fact, that FFIII playthrough I am working on is going to be put on hold indefinitely. When I can find the time to play that game again, I'll do it and I'll continue the playthrough. But for now, I've been mostly concerned with my college's orientation next week, my violin practice, my work at my city's performing arts center, and so on. Plus, Skyrim came out, and that game is pretty much the best video game that is out these days (Type-0 isn't going to be counted as anything since it isn't in America yet). A lot of my life has been taken by Skyrim already. I never found the time to take a look at what's going on with the series that I love (except for Type-0. I've kept a close eye on that game since my absence. Unfortunately, there was nothing of importance released within the past month, until now). However, if there are actually any Readers out there reading this (I know there aren't, I can see so on my blog's stats. To be honest, this blog is really more for myself than anything), they should already know that this blog isn't going to get updated that much. It says so in the first post that I wrote here.

Anyway, so Shinra News has been flooded with information on FXIII-2. I was going to take a look at Game Informer's article, and then I ignored it because all it was was a look at the game's first few hours of gameplay. I am not going to read that nonsense. On Shinra News, it seems that the culprit of all the XIII-2 articles is some user by the name of FFGirl. While it's nice to see someone who cares about the sequel of the controversial FFXIII, it would be much nicer to see other people who care about the series in general. Nobody has said anything about Type-0's overseas confirmation, and that news is probably a week old already. It does say that on Type-0's wiki page, but it should say it on the news since that is big and important. All I see on Shinra News is stuff about the DLC for the game and the soundtracks and all that. Who cares? Let me go over the news and show you all which articles are important:

(Oh, by the way, I just went to look and now they say that Type-0 has been confirmed for the West. Nice one.)

• Final Fantasy V and VI to Be Released on North America PSN: This informs of a release. Always important.
• Final Fantasy XIII-2 North American Collector's Edition Announced: As with the other posts of collector's editions, this is somewhat important because this shows what to expect to get when you pay extra money for the game.
• Game Informer Magazine Spoils Beginning of Final Fantasy XIII-2: This is important because if it wasn't there, I would've read the article and the game's beginning would've been spoiled.
• Official ESRB Rating for Final Fantasy XIII-2: Okay, this really isn't all that important. It's still nice to know, I guess.
• Final Fantasy XIII-2 New Artwork and Gameplay: The gameplay demo shown is all that really needs to be seen.
• Final Fantasy XV Could Possibly Be an Action RPG: This is important because this gives readers information from the makers of the game on what to expect from future titles (also, HELLZ YEAH! NO MORE LOADING BARS!)
• New Final Fantasy XIII-2 Special Set to Air in December: This is important for anyone who wants to listen to more information on the game.
• Japanese version of Final Fantasy XIII-2 Now Complete: This post informs of a game's progress in development.

And that's about it. Everything else is about screenshots and whatnot. Sure, they may include some tidbits on the gameplay of the game, but other than that, it's just a bunch of pictures to look at. These should be featured somewhere else, in my opinion. I guess it's not too bad to post them in the news, but there needs to be other stuff there like the articles I listed above. I would become a Shinra News reporter, but Blue says to stay away from that wiki and he seems incredibly scarred by it, so I am not going to do it.

I actually don't have too much to say about XIII-2, though. Actually, I don't really feel like talking about that game right away. I am going to run through the Type-0 internet articles and make sure there is nothing of actual importance to talk about. Then I'll go over the Versus XIII stuff, because I think there is some new information out on that game. Then, I will get back to writing about XIII-2.

On Type-0, it is said that there will likely be a sequel to the game. I already knew about this since Square had planned to make a little spinoff series going like Type-1, Type-2 and so on. However, if you didn't know about this, I guess you are now informed on that. Also, there is a second demo out for Type-0, but that's old news as well. I think the second demo might be the same as the first, I am not too sure. As for Versus XIII, there isn't much out other than that the game will have Moogles. Everything else on the interwebs is about XIII-2, so I guess I have no choice but to get back to that game. But first, I need to look at the new articles and videos that have been released on that game.

I'm sorry, I can't find a good video. I keep finding this one where the guy is holding the camera sideways. There was another of a press conference, and the translations were awful. If you want to see it for yourself, here's the two videos. I will admit, the articles that show screenshots of Sunleth Waterscape were impressive. I missed that place; I am going to be so glad to see it again.

Final Fantasy Type-0 Overseas Release Confirmed!

You know what, I don't care if this picture becomes overused. From now
on, this picture will be used every time some good news is released.

So yeah, that's about it really. Here's the link to the article confirming this bit of information. Don't bother going to the Final Fantasy Wiki anymore, they only care about FFXIII-2, which looks great but is nothing compared to this game right here. Did I mention this might be the best Final Fantasy yet?

Since I have some duties to this blog to fulfill, I am going to write about all the buzz going on around XIII-2 shortly.

Type-0 Is on the Rise

What a better way to break the news than Rem's cute face?

Final Fantasy Type-0 sold half a million copies in Japan. If those numbers aren't convincing enough for Square to release the game overseas, then I guess I am going to have to go over there and sit down with them to get them to do it. The game sold 472,253 copies, to be exact, making it the fourteenth best first-week selling game in Japan of all time (I think). Other sites are now putting up the question of how it will do in comparison to sales of other games, but that doesn't seem to matter to much. Famitsu gave it a 39/40; in other words, a near perfect score. I believe that Square is just waiting on fan reception now from the Japanese audience, but what I really think is going on is that Square is just toying with all other audiences. I am sure that they will release this game overseas. There's just too much going on with this game. You have the fact that it's considered almost perfect by Famitsu, you have how it is one of Square's best first-week sellers and ranks up there amongst their top PSP games, you have the fact that the game itself is incredible with the potential of being the best release yet, you have Rem, you have plot spoilers in the game's trailers. Then there are the hundreds of trailers and screenshots that audiences overseas were able to get a hold of. There is even a Game Informer article on the game when nobody even knows if it will ever be released (making it the first game I've ever seen in Game Informer that hasn't been confirmed for a release outside of Japan).

Then again, you have that twitter update from that guy who said he was voicing King. I guess that should give away the whole thing.

Damn it! I hate it when you know that a game like this will be released, yet you still want the developer to certify that certainty. Ugh! SQUARE, FOR CHRIST'S SAKE, CONFIRM THE OVERSEAS RELEASE! This is what happens when you tease a manic!

The Answer to Our Prayers

BAM! Type-0 is going to be released overseas. Nuff said.

This means I get to watch in horror as Rem dies. It's like the time I watched Amadeus and shed tears when Mozart died. Then again, the game is probably going to be so perfect, like the movie Amadues, that I will find Rem's death to strengthen the whole of the game. I'll probably miss her very much, but we'll see when the time comes.

Final Fantasy Type-0: Best Final Fantasy Yet?

Square refuses to allow embedding on their newest video of gameplay footage from Type-0, but that's not going to stop me from putting it here. I have my ways of doing it. I do not take credit for the video as it is a video that Square Enix created.

This
game
looks
amazing.

It has everything I could've ever wanted in a Final Fantasy. A full group of characters, not just four or six. The game has a seemingly intricate storyline, even though I am not so sure since I cannot understand Japanese. It basically has all the basics of an RPG, but there's more.

First, above all things, are the live action battles. I am talking Kingdom Hearts fighting here. Gone is the little loading bar, because in this game, movement across an open-field environment is now a dynamic feature. In FFXIII, I liked how the characters and enemies moved around on the battle screen since it felt more realistic and quick paced than just standing there waiting to attack. In this game, it seems that concept has been taken to full lengths. The battles seem even quicker and more hectic than the fights in Kingdom Hearts. Basically, every battle in this game looks like one of the really tough boss fights from Kingdom Hearts. However, the director of the game says that it won't be too difficult, so I guess I shouldn't have to worry about that.

Well, damn, I forgot everything I wanted to say. The opening clips were interesting, showing off boss fights, new environments and even sniping! Cool! What I found notably interesting was the scene with the fight against a dragon... the one at some castle looking place. This game really looks like it is going to have a wide variety of settings, so it's like every theme of Final Fantasy history put into one. Or maybe not, but whatever, the world looks great. They then show off what the Suzaku Magic School and how interestingly intricate it is. This game also shows off the summer costumes, which reminds me of this interesting note that the DLC in this game is going to be free. I can only assume that means the DLC won't be amazing or anything, but still, that's cool. That's like getting DLC for Fallout without having to pay a cent.

Seriously, though, that world map is awesome. What a way to bring back the good old days of the Final Fantasy series when it was at its best. There also seems to be other vehicles than chocobos and airships. I doubt that they will be as prominent throughout the game, but that doesn't really matter. I still find it awesome that this game has some knockoff Magitek Armor. That has to be one of the coolest things Square ever designed. Also, the world map is dynamic in the sense that there are actual places that are astoundingly different than just a patch of sand for a desert or a slew of mountains for a snowy area. In this game, you actually see individual landscapes and towns on the map, making it all look very intricate. This is really cool. To top it off, the world map even turns into this massive war battlezone, incorporating elements of an RTS game. It looks good, but I wouldn't know for sure because I've never played a RTS game. I heard that Revenant Wings, the fail FFXII sequel, was a terrible example of an RTS.

Soon after that display, I got to see Rem fighting two of those yeti things I fought in the demo of the game. This time, she is donning that cute summer outfit, and she is throwing her knives around like boomerangs! That is so cool! I think she also gets to poison enemies that way. Rem is just simply a badass. It's too bad she dies. What? Are you complaining about the spoiler? It's not really a spoiler, they show it in the trailer for the game. I know, it's total nonsense. After watching Rem, I got to see some gameplay of Deuce, which was interesting to me because I never got to see what Deuce was like in combat. Although I find the use of a flute as a weapon questionable, it is pretty cool to see the music she plays turn into magic, and the flute even makes little tunes! That kind of reminds me of when I thought of a superpower in which I make soundwaves do anything, from grow trees to destroy buildings. I thought that was really cool to see. The game then shows Cater in combat, whose magic guns seem to be interesting. Even more interesting to me though is the boss she's fighting, which has that dynamic movement I mentioned earlier and it even has strategy to fight given the little part where its eye opened up and revealed itself to be a weak spot. That kind of reminded me of the Metroid bosses that you have to find the right place to shoot them at. Following that is a fight against two behemoths. Simply awesome.

Then I saw the guy who is the monk of this game. Then I saw an interesting boss battle that was taking place in the dark, so I couldn't see the boss very well. That is a pretty awesome effect right there. Then, I saw the most awesome thing ever: airship battles that you actually control an airship and fight it out! Cool! Then the Marlboro makes an appearance, and fulfills the Final Fantasy standard of being massive. Then I saw a cool clip of having to use a turret on an airship to fend off some dragons. Then I saw some fights against giants. Then I saw Machina get killed instantly, making me wonder if that is actually scripted into the battle or if that's really a cheap move the boss can use. I then got to see the Summons in action. I saw Shiva, which I've seen a thousand times already. Then I saw Ifrit, and then I saw Diabolos, which I mistook for Chaos in another post I wrote here. Then I saw Bahamut! Nice! What I found very interesting was that Bahamut dons a similar appearance to his FFX appearance. I then saw Odin, who seemed fun to use. Then Diabolos does a cool thing where he turns into a bunch of bats and kills people by flying around. Then I screamed like a schoolgirl when I saw Rem use Meteor! Simply awesome! Then I saw Deuce do some interesting move that looked a lot like Ultima. Then I was finished off and killed when I saw Bahamut use Mega Flare to do 9999 damage on a boss. AMAZING! Now this is a gameplay trailer! Then, at the end, I saw a woman with no pants on walking around humming something. This game has everything! I wonder what the point of showing that was. Probably just to get more guys to get the game.

So from all that, we have blood, we have sniping, we have Kingdom Hearts combat, we have stylish moves, we have a flute that plays music and kills people that way, we have a dynamic world map, which also has an interesting RTS mode. We have a cool little hub/Hogwarts ripoff where the characters accept missions and stuff. I think there are towns, too. We have chocobos, we have Magitek Armor, we have actual airship battles. We have free DLC. We have alternate costumes for characters, so that way Rem can look even cuter than ever. We can restore magic by blowing up the corpses of enemies. We can hopefully still pan the camera so that way we can look up some school uniform skirts. We have classic summons, and we even have limit breaks! Plus, we seemingly have some form of nudity, bringing me back to the not so long ago days of when I played FFVI and found so much more sexual innuendo in that game than I could possibly count. So from what I've gathered from this trailer, this looks like Crisis Core and Revenant Wings done right.

And there's still more! There's much, much more than what that little trailer had to offer. This game apparently has a mode where you put your PSP on Sleep Mode and your characters will "study," or in other words, AUTO LEVELGRIND!!!!!!  Finally! Square found the way to make the game do the level grinding for the player! YESSSSS!!!!!! I remember when I read in one of Blue Highwind's walkthroughs and he said something about how great it'd be if Square created an auto levelgrinding system, and I figured it'd never happen, but lo and behold, this game delivers that system! I know a thousand fans are probably going to complain about how "cheap" that would be, but they're a bunch of idiots. I hate it when people get pissed off over something being cheap. If it was allowed to be in the game, it is certainly not being cheap. Being cheap would be taking a glitch and using it to exploit the game, like that petrification glitch in FFXII that renders bosses completely useless in a fight.

Besides, if you don't want to be "cheap" and have your characters study (I like how that's the term for auto levegrinding), you can always go to the arena. Yep, Hogwarts I mean Suzaku has an arena in it where you can fight battle simulations and gain experience. What makes it even more awesome is that if you die in the arena, you won't die in reality and you get to keep whatever experience you made in the arena! Getting back to the airships, if you can't finish off the dragons with the turrets, you'll have to fight them in combat, which should be pretty cool. Last, each character has their own personal moogle sidekick! CAN THIS GAME NOT GET ANY BETTER!

With all that awesomeness, I seriously, seriously think that this will probably be the greatest Final Fantasy ever. I know, I know, I am really going crazy here. Chances are, this game might not even be released outside of Japan, which will ultimately suck hard. But come on, how long can FFVII really be the greatest Final Fantasy ever made? It's great, but until a remake is made, I just don't see it beating out the next ten Final Fantasies, if A) the series even continues to run that far, and B) if Square Enix doesn't keep screwing up. Thirteen wasn't too bad, to be honest, but Fourteen seems horrible. I just can't wait for this one. I feel kind of weird saying that Type-0 will be the best Final Fantasy when it's A) just a PSP game and B) not even a numbered title, but I have to take all of what I see about its gameplay into consideration. If the storyline is actually good (and it should because Rem dies), then that will pretty much put Type-0 up there as the best. Oh yeah, and that reminds me: when you beat the game, there's apparently a second storyline to fulfill if you start it over. Da hell? So I guess that means I can expect a very intricate story or something. This game has to be good. I don't understand why Square is so nervous about releasing it overseas. How could you be nervous about releasing a game that could be your best work yet? What I really don't get is how Square wasn't or didn't seem too nervous about dishing out FFXIII when they know it had all these things that screamed for a do-over, and now they are completely nervous about a game that is probably perfect the way it is. THEY NEED TO RELEASE TYPE-0 OVERSEAS. FORGET THE JAPANESE MARKET; THE GAME IS GOING TO MAKE MILLIONS REGARDLESS! JUST RELEASE IT OVERSEAS, THERE IS HIGH DEMAND FOR IT IN EUROPE AND NORTH AMERICA, I JUST KNOW IT.

PLEEEEEAAAAAASSSSSEEEEEE, SQUARE, I AM BEGGING YOU!

To top everything off, Siliconera confirmed that there is a secret unrevealed Thirteenth Member of the original Class Zero. That means No. 10 is in the game somewhere! Dammit, I need that game nao!

Type-0 Extended Trailer

UNFORTUNATELY I do not have the trailer here... yet. As soon as it finally gets on Youtube, though, I will snatch it and place it here. You see, I found it at this website here. The problem with it is that it takes forever to load, and I'd rather not have my Readers watch something that literally took thirty minutes to finish loading. Anyway, get ready for a very rushed commentary on the trailer, because I wrote it as I watched the trailer. That involved some serious lightning speed finger reflexes, it was insane.

The trailer starts off with these two weird chicks called Diva, which happen to be the same creatures from the game's logo. The scene then cuts to some clip of an Imperial invasion, with a character named Narrator. Look at that, the Narrator is now a character in the Final Fantasy Series! Well, you do have Vanille, Tidus, and Marquis Ondore, but now for the first time the narrator is actually named Narrator!

The trailer then shows off all the characters in the game. Actually, these are probably the main characters that I'll be seeing throughout the game. I'm sure there are more, which will be completely insane. I've never seen this many characters in a freaking game. This is even more than FFVI for hell's sake. As the game showed off the thousands of characters, I noticed that Seven looks a little too much like Lightning. When Rem came up, I let out a cheer. Then, I saw an interesting fellow named Naghi. What make's him so interesting, you ask? HE WEARS THE SAME UNIFORM AS CLASS ZERO! Could this be the missing No. 10 culprit here? I bet he is! Awesome! I finally found No. 10! After him are some other interesting and not so interesting looking characters. You have GILGAMESH! There are these two people who I assume are the keepers of the red crystal? I've also noticed a couple of people in those Green Goblin uniforms I saw in the demo for the game.

The trailer then cuts to a bunch of gameplay clips. Most of this is stuff I've seen before. I also see some interesting moves that look like limit breaks. There's a fight with GILGAMESH! I also see Bahamut and Chaos as summons. Then I see some cutscene clips, and the first seems to be a battle at Concordia (is this what happens after that ambiguous custscene from the demo with that giant dragon thing flying out?). The ones following this appear to be clips of Class Zero getting whooped. Then that chick in the sailor uniform runs in to inform Class Zero of something. Then there was a scene with some Concordian girl sending in a dragon to fight Class Zero, which leads me to wonder why they aren't allying themselves against the Empire of this game, but I'll never know. Then came that scene where it seems like Machina is talking to a glowing blue figure, and I figured it was Rem dying. I assumed it was Rem, but that looked like it could've been anyone's hand. I got kind of nervous, and after desperately wanting the other cutscenes I didn't care about to go away, I saw that Rem was still around, so I figured that she doesn't die.

Before I see her again, though, are some other crazy cutscenes. One of those people who were guarding that crystal spoke to everyone from that place Class Zero is from, and then I see that lady with the really long cigarette talking to a crystal statue of what I believe to be Diva. That's cool that the crystal statues from FFXIII carried over to this game. We go back to the people from the school Class Zero attends, who appear to be fading away. Yawn. I really don't care about them.

Then, my heart was split in twain. You can tell the exact seriousness of the situation by the fact that I used an archaic word, twain. Seriously, I started sobbing over this. I thought I was going to suffocate. Square apparently thought it would be funny to take my worst fear from the last trailer and bring it to life to screw with me. Just after the scene with the people fading away, I saw Machina kneeling before somebody raising out her hand. Upon hearing her voice, I found it was Rem! She sounded like she was in pain! What's going on? The camera then zooms out and I see her on the floor, with the building all destroyed, and everything is raining and all. And there is blood all over her pretty face! NO! WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?! REM, WHY ARE YOU DYING REM? WHY????? SQUARE, HOW COULD YOU KILL A BELOVED CHARACTER BEFORE EVER GIVING ME A CHANCE TO MEET HER? WHAT KIND OF EVIL IS THIS!!!!! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sorry, *sniff sniff,* I couldn't contain myself. Also, the background music was kind of annoying. Well, I guess I'd better move on with my life, because I am probably never going to see this game in America. Square is getting on my nerves with all these games they make a huge display off of and never release them. It's like they want to tease their non-Japanese fans. What would really be something is if Square developed a Final Fantasy game that was only released in Australia, Europe, and North America but not Japan. That will probably never happen, though, so I should forget about it. Still, that would be very funny.

XIII-2 Trailer: "New Adventures"

For some reason this trailer isn't blocked, but the trailer for Type-0 is. I don't understand why companies block trailers over copyright when the purpose of a trailer is to get as much people as possible excited for whatever they are releasing trailers for. I can understand Versus XIII since that is a game that is still in heavy incognito development for some reason, but Type-0 is on the verge of being released, and so is this game, so I don't see why those trailers need to be blocked.

Anyway, this has to be the first XIII-2 trailer I am completely satisfied with. The E3 trailer was cool, but it wasn't enough. The PAX trailer was filled with cutscenes and made the game feel really dramatic. The TGS trailers were cool, and they actually showed new things, but that was also a problem since I barely understood what the hell was going on. I like this trailer because it finally gives a clear depiction of what's in the game. There is actually a good proportion of gameplay footage to cutscenes, for once, so I got to see some interesting gameplay elements. I got to see some of the environments I will get to explore, and I also got to see minigames. Oh god, after FFVII, the thought of playing minigames in a Final Fantasy has left some dread in me, but I like it too because it brings back the good old feel of the previous Final Fantasies. There's even chocobo racing!

As far as the cutscenes go, they seem to actually give a good depiction of the story and what's going on. However, my only gripe is with the first scenes where Lighting falls into another dimension right at the end of the original game. As far as I remember, Lightning wasn't just standing back away from the entire group, contrary to Snow's suggestion that implies he never saw her come out of crystal stasis with the rest of the party. This is a huge plothole as far as the trailers show. Maybe the game will start off with a different version of the original game's ending that will fix that plothole. I also find some other cutscenes to be interesting. I don't get why Square decided to show Noel getting killed, though. I am guessing Square has developed a habit of giving away spoilers in their trailers now. First Noel, then Rem. Next thing I know, I'll see a trailer of Noctis getting killed. Then the same thing will happen in the trailers for FFXV. Then in FFXVI, the trailer will show the entire plot. Well, then again, FFXIII-2 is actually supposed to have multiple endings, so I guess it is kind of hard to spoil the whole game given that.

Also, on a completely unrelated note, or mostly unrelated, I love how everywhere on the Internet that has a Type-0 trailer or a XIII-2 trailer has more people who actually like what they see than people complaining about how Square is going downhill and that, ever since they merged with Enix, they (the fans that whine about everything) got a skyscraper shoved up their bums. Some would probably argue with me that those people who like what they see from XIII-2 and Type-0 are just a bunch of noobs to the series, but I don't get how they can outnumber a fanbase that grew since before these games were even conceived. In any case, I don't really give a damn, I am just stating what I see. If you don't like these games, then good for you, I don't care. When you start complaining to me for saying these games are great, I can honestly say go to hell because I am saying that they are what's best for ME. I don't see what's so bad about calling a game good just because I enjoy them, but whatever. Fans who complain about the merging of Square and Enix and then take it out on fans who don't mind the merging are a bunch of butthurt morons.