An abundance of information regarding many upcoming Final Fantasy games.

Starting off with Final Fantasy XIII, the big news released a few days ago involves a bit more insight about a few of the summons in the game as well as a quick peak at the plot-line that is unfolding. Beginning with the summons, Square-Enix is already making it known that once again Final Fantasy tradition will be broken just a tad. Sure the summons are present to jump to aid the main female Lightning when needed, but the skills and abilities they exhibit this time around differ from previous installments in the series.

Shiva is back in action as a usable summon once again, but her ability consists of...transforming into a motorcycle. What? Yes, she has the capability of converting herself into a form of transportation in which Lightning can then ride around in battle while she firing upon her enemies in battle. Since this is a new way of playing out the battle system in a Final Fantasy game, this seems to be one of the development teams most challenging tasks so far. Earlier it was announced that Final Fantasy XIII will be returning to the familiar ATB (Active Time Battle) of past.

As for the game play and storyline, Final Fantasy XIII's emphasis on crystal power is shown by the ability of these to create creatures, machines, and an overall abundance of wealth, success, and prosperity to the game's world. A closed-off community floats above in a protected and shelled society known as "Cocoon". Previously announced was the "Pulse" which is the name of the netherworld located below Cocoon which the residents of the floating shelled in society fear. On Pulse, creatures have awoken and are causing terror in the form of spreading hatred and fear among the inhabitants below.

Cocoon's governing body senses the threat and decides to take immediate action in order to prevent any immense danger from occurring to their thriving community above. As the growing threat continues, suspicions start to arise involving current citizens of the Cocoon which are then forces to become dwellers in the cursed Pulse. To the rescue though is the entrance of Lightning, who is chosen by the crystal (don't ask me how), to attempt to wipe-out all those who are working to destroy the world which also somehow places her in the predicament of opposing the society's own government on Cocoon.

Also mentioned briefly in a previous article was the emergence of a male character riding in on a motor bike. Described by character designer Tetsuya Nomura, the image or personality that this young blond character possesses is that of a "cowboy". So far it is unclear what connects both the new male character and Lightning, but Nomura does state that their relationship is not a very usual one.

Straying slightly away from the main game in the Compilation for a moment, Final Fantasy XIII Versus has been announced to be taking on the battle system that is quite similar to the Kingdom Hearts franchise. The silver-haired protagonist has the ability to instantly teleport to the location of where he throws his main weapon, but a limit is supposedly put on this skill for usage in the game. The developing team wants to create a movie-type atmosphere while working on the field maps giving it a very "dynamic and wide" differences height-wise that are made capable through the Playstation 3's high specs.

Tetsuya Nomura once again spoke up stating the fact that Final Fantasy XIII Versus will not be your run-of-the-mill Good vs. Evil Final Fantasy game. With the setting occurring in an isolated kingdom during modern times, a crystal once again is the focal point of our story. Controlling both the order of swords and magical usage, the crystal present is the very last of its kind. A foreseen battle is to take place for rights of the crystal, which will usher in a new era to the people in the kingdom.

Finally, the last bit of news concerning the Fabula Nova Crystallis Final Fantasy XIII Compilation is that Final Fantasy Agito XIII is currently being developed as a full 3-Dimensional title whereas the main heroes are once again tasked with the duty of protecting..."the crystal".

All in all, Square-Enix has dropped no hints of potential release dates for any of the three games in the Compilation so far.

And for those of you who are still wondering what the news is on Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII; it is currently 65% complete and could possible be seeing a release date of late summer/early fall here in 2007.

Square Enix made it known that they will have a surprise announcement in regards to Final Fantasy later this year, to celebrate the series' 20th anniversary coming up on December 18, 2007. Exactly when the announcement is to be made is not specified yet.

superb info. and Shiva a motorbike....close enough to a boat I guess

>=O @ making shiva turn into a motorcycle!! having a ship named after her was one thing but her morphing into a bike....

remember the whole K_D riding Vespie thing...it has been intergrated into a game

Now...im not really looking forward to 13...but one thing that I hope happens is the ATB...the old systems was the best, and they should have kept it.

Yeah, check out these scans, and Scan 5 has shiva as a bike at the top of the scan:

she looks really weird there..

anyways, the character design for the Fianl Fantasy series has always been a little out there so it must be good

The Japanese trailer was awesome, I was licking my screen XD

But really, this game is so awesome.
The fighting system, the characters, music must be good too this time.
Square-Enix sure did good.

Uhhhh...

But yeah, I'm starting to feel that FFXIII is going to make us wait less than FFXII did. It's imposible for FF13 to take as long as 12 did (5 years) and the great news is, the production of the game is already a good chunk of the way in. We've got character descriptions, story-line revealings, plot set-ups, info on summons and enemies, etc.

I think as long as Square-Enix stops delaying the main series while they work on all these micro-popular games we call "fillers", we will see a consistant release of FF games subsequently like they used to be released.



Now we take a look at the time period between Final Fantasy X-XII.



It took Square-Enix 27 months to release 3 FF games, but it took 3 whole years to go from FFXI to FFXII. Let's hope that Squenix is back on track with their focus on the main series and dedicate most of their time and efforts to the "Heart & Soul" of the franchise.

This is true. Hopefully they'll stay on track. But I dont think we'll be going back to getting a new FF every year anytime soon. Production times are taking longer and its probably going to take longer each time

sorry for the double post, but some decently big news

taken straight from 1up.com

Yea, apparently they're keeping with the White Engine for FFXIII but changing for the Unreal Engine after that. I wonder why. It makes me question the reliability of the White Engine. It could mean that it's not nearly what they wanted it to be... but since they've already programmed half of the game into it, they can't really change it now. I hope there's no major let downs on that game.

Yeah, one thing I wasn't ever really to sure about is the capability of these "Engines" being used. I guess instead of breaking down the details, I just go out and play the game. :p

However, FFXIII looks great with what they've shown so far even on the White Engine. Sooooo...Unreal Engine 3, as it's described to even further advance the graphical feel of the next gen consoles, should hope to be quite a thrilling feature. Let's hope it delivers.

more details, from 1up.com

Faster battle system. I think it'll be more seamless than FFXII and faster than FFXII. Is that even turn based anymore then?

The whole "keeping her real name secret" is kind of interesting as it will most likely reveal that she is related to a very notable person in the story, or else she has played a very important role in past events in history and she is trying to move on from whatever happened.

As for the whole battle system moving faster, you have to wonder how much faster can it really go? FFXII was pretty speedy, and I think it should still be considered Turn-Based, it just depends on how souped-up and advanced your characters can evolve I think.