Final Fantasy XV: Pocket Edition HD has an interesting story. Since Final Fantasy XV was originally released for consoles and was too powerful for mobile, Square Enix created a mobile version of the game with an abridged story and simplified controls. It was then ported to consoles since Square Enix wanted more sales of the game and here we are. It’s a chibi version of Final Fantasy XV.
The mobile roots of the game is obvious. While the graphics are decent enough thanks to the chibi cartoony look, the biggest distraction is how the characters’ mouths don’t move when they’re speaking. You’ll get used to it and the developers have managed to somehow pack enough emotion in their animations (and voice-acting) to help make up for it. However, this lack of emotions because their faces can’t change means that the game cannot pull off dramatic scenes. There are enough emotions in the voice-acting as it seems to use the exact same lines as the original game, but when the characters look a the same and doesn’t match what they are supposed to be feeling at the time, you can’t take the scene seriously at all.
The game tells a distilled version of the story but cutting out all of the pointless filler such as the long travel times and the empty open world. As a result, there are linear maps and progression. The story follows Noctis, crown prince of Lucis, who is betrothed to Lunafreya in order to help bring peace between Lucis and the Niflheim empire. He sets out with his three friends to meet up with her, but events happen during the trip that tears his whole world apart. The first half of the game involves travelling across Lucis, while the second half rushes through the other areas of the world, ultimately fighting and overcoming the villain to save the world.
The game supposedly has a simplified battle system but manages to carry over most of the elements from the full console game. It uses Square to attack, Triangle to warp strike, and X to dodge or parry. You control only Noctis while the AI controls the other three. Noctis can change weapons on the fly, with different movesets and damage for each different weapon. Prompts will pop up from time to time so that you can execute a special attack with one of the other team members. While Noctis has access to his super moves, this battle system carries over the feel of the console game surprisingly well.
Dungeons are linear but there are some simple split paths. They aren’t too big but for some reason, there is no mini-map, so you have to constantly pause the game to pull up the full map. At least the dungeons don’t outstay their welcome and enemy encounters are placed so that they’re not too frequent either. As they do not respawn, this means you don’t have to grind for the bosses. There is a fixed overhead camera though, so it’s somewhat annoying when you can’t see too far ahead.
There is a handy navigation arrow below Noctis to show where you need to go next. The map has important events such as objectives and sidequests highlighted. However, this is probably a relic from its mobile roots but only the analogue stick works. You cannot use the D-pad at all, not even in menus. You definitely should have played the original game first as half the fun is recognising the places in chibi form, and finding out which of the events and sidequests managed to make it over to this game. There is a lot of asset result in terms of the recorded lines and the epic music.
There are a limited amount of sidequests but they’re quick to finish. Yes, they are still fetch or hunt quests but since there aren’t too much of them, and usually they’re able to be completed immediately in your current area, they aren’t the complete borefest like the ones in the original game. Furthermore, due to all the boring fluff having been taken out, the story is a lot more focused, bringing to light all of its positives and negatives. The positives are that it is better paced and easier to understand. While the negatives are that it's still a badly structured story that had a lot of potential but squandered it completely and absolutely.
Just like the console game, this game starts to unravel towards the end. The second half was always the weakest part of the story and gameplay. With this adaptation, it carries all of the flaws over. The later chapters will have gimmicky events like timed battles, gimped abilities, and solo battles. Everything the game throws at you to spice things up are a hindrance and liability. When you have to fight monsters in an extremely confined space, solo, and the enemies are HP sponges, then it is absolutely no fun at all. A lot of enemy encounters start to become HP sponges and since you cannot run away from battle, it’ll take minutes while you wail away at them for so long before they finally die.
It wouldn’t be so bad if the unfun parts were quickly passed but unfortunately, they are dragged out for too long. Frankly, the final chapters were a waste of time and are the poorest parts of the game. They feel completely different to the rest of the game before it, which were at least enjoyable. There are ten chapters to the game, taking around fifteen to twenty hours to finish. There’s not much to do afterwards unless you want to replay chapters to do some sidequests you may have missed.
Overall, Final Fantasy XV: Pocket Edition HD is a good game and actually does many things better than the original. The abridged story allows for much tighter pacing but doesn’t fix the flaw of the story itself being bad, especially the second half and the ending. It pretty much keeps all of the combat mechanics and while it does simplify some things, the original wasn’t that complex either so this may actually be very faithful and more fun. The chibi graphics are only let down by the lack of expressions of the characters’ faces. While it is designed for players who have already played Final fantasy XV and presents a bite-sized version of the game, this could actually be a decent replacement if you only wanted the core experience without the open world trash filler.
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