Every time I start to collect my thoughts on “Final Fantasy XVI,” the latest in Square Enix’s legendary series of blockbuster role-playing games, I’m faced with a problem: I like this game, but everything I need to say about it makes it sound terrible.
Compared to other recent entries in the venerable “Final Fantasy” franchise, it’s hard not to feel like “XVI” is missing something. After the unhinged metatext of “Final Fantasy VII Remake,” this one feels a little safe in its construction. Following the endlessly endearing bachelor party at the heart of “Final Fantasy XV,” most of the new characters feel a little emotionally distant. And next to the involved theological and political turmoil of “Final Fantasy XIV,” developed by much of the same team that worked on “XVI,” the worldbuilding here feels downright shallow.
The wider story also feels entirely incomplete, with plot threads mentioned and sometimes followed for hours before completely disappearing without a resolution of any kind. Character relationships are invented seemingly on the fly - at one point an enemy grumbles at protagonist Clive that he’s grown stronger since their last meeting, in the kind of tone that suggests a bitter rivalry; said “last meeting” was also their first meeting, less than an hour earlier, and Clive has not, in fact “grown stronger” at all.
Elsewhere in the game, an NPC ominously muses that the king must be up to something, and having now seen the game to completion, I still couldn’t tell you what the king is up to. These high-fantasy sound bites feel like they’re pulled from a different game, one where they actually mean something. “Final Fantasy XVI” so often feels as though it’s mimicking someone else’s setup or someone else’s payoff, but it’s frustratingly uncommon for the two to feel connected.
And yet, the second I rolled credits on the game - a 50-hour experience that I devoured in under a week - I immediately started a new save file. With my backlog overflowing, why did this underwritten disaster of half-measures hold my attention so fiercely?
Maybe it’s the spectacle of it all. “Final Fantasy XVI” features uncharacteristically flashy combat inspired by the likes of the “Devil May Cry” series. “Devil May Cry” designer Ryota Suzuki actually worked on “FFXVI’s” combat system, and he describes it as his “personal masterpiece.” After playing the game, it’s tough to argue with Suzuki. The game combines a cooldown-based ability system with a stagger system to add really fascinating tension where dealing the most damage in the short term isn’t always the best idea. It lends a slightly tactical feel to an otherwise button-mashy fireworks display. “Final Fantasy” has been experimenting with action-oriented combat for years, and while it still hasn’t dethroned “Final Fantasy VII Remake” for the title of my favorite combat system, this is probably the best an action-oriented “Final Fantasy” has ever felt. The combat may be broken up by comically long “go-to-place-talk-to-person” quest lines, but when it rears its head, it’s pretty undeniable.
There are also the Eikon battles, which place the player in control of one of “Final Fantasy’s” iconic summons. Where summons are generally used in the series as one-off super-powerful attacks, “FFXVI” uses them as an excuse to stage mind-blowing kaiju wars. There are only a few of these, but they’re all so breathtaking in presentation that I don’t know if I can do any of them justice by describing them. Long have I been a proponent of smaller, cheaper games from major studios, but when something is this bombastic and sincerely spectacular, it’s hard to turn it down.
Admittedly, I also have some fondness for the game’s cast. As I said before, for a series that’s often defined by the strength of its characters, this is a pretty weak lineup, but even “Final Fantasy” at its worst still has better character writing than most franchises at their best. Spending more time with these NPCs is a treat, especially when so many of them are brought to life by such incredible voice performances (Ralph Ineson’s Cid is stunning).
So maybe that’s it - high production values obscuring a so-so game. Star combat designers coming in to distract from shoddy writing; stunning setpieces overshadowing bland quest design; fancy performances masking underwritten characters. Maybe I’m just falling for a flashy cover in front of an uninspired game.
But I can’t argue with the results. “Final Fantasy XVI” is a blast. No matter how many cons I can rattle off (and trust me, I’ve got a laundry list, some of which I haven’t even named here), I still like the game a lot. It feels good to play. It’s far from my favorite “Final Fantasy,” but for all its shortcomings, it’s still, in every way that matters, a good game. And I’m probably going to play it one more time. Maybe I’ll figure out what the king is up to.
Sorrel Kerr-Jung is a junior studying virtual reality game development at Ohio University. Please note that the views and opinions of the columnist do not reflect those of The Post. Do you agree? Tell Sorrel by tweeting her at @sorrelquest.
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