The latest issue of Famitsu has tons of Final Fantasy XIII-related information and screens revealed to the public. Thanks to duckroll from NeoGAF for posting the information in detail. Below is the information revealed in the leaked magazine (the magazine itself is supposed to be released on Tuesday.. oh well).
General Information
The demo included with Advent Children Complete will be on a PS3 disc, not on standard blue-ray movie disc. So pretty much everyone will be able to play the demo.
There are 3 real-time screens of Final Fantasy Agito XIII from the trailer, including a screen of Odin.
3 pages worth of Final Fantasy XIII information and media, about 20 screenshots, which are apparently real-time.
The Final Fantasy XIII demo will be from the opening part of the game, and will be longer than Advent Children Complete (Read the previous article).
4 pages on Final Fantasy Versus XIII, about 10 screenshots which are all real-time.
Shinigami (designed by Amano) is worshiped in the world of Versus XIII.
The cars and clothing seen in the trailers so far may probably change in design for the final game.
The morale of the team is really high! (duh!)
There is this really hot chick featured in one of the magazine scans who I think is the heroine of Versus XIII, just take a look at the scans below. :P
Final Fantasy XIII will have a party battle system (say good bye to Rambo-like Lightning seen in the trailer), where you control each character as they switch turns, like in previous Final Fantasy games. The system, however, will be totally different from Final Fantasy XII.
Final Fantasy XIII’s story is being written such that every single of the main characters will feel like protagonists, instead of just supporting characters (say good bye to meaningless character such as Penelo :D).
At the top of the building where the prince and the heroine of Versus meet, there is a painting. That painting is the Shinigami that is worshiped in the world, and the painting of it in the game itself, is drawn by Amano.
The name of the prince and the heroine in Versus will be revealed at TGS.
Final Fantasy Agito XIII
The game is moved to the PSP because the developers couldn’t wait for cellphones to get more advanced (Making a big Final Fantasy game for a cellphone is a mistake to begin with IMHO).
The battle will be heavy on action but still sort of turn based. It will use an advanced version of Crisis Core’s high speed ATB system (Crisis Core battle system is a button-mashing crap, so let’s hope the “advanced” version is going to be better).
Crisis Core was a 1 character game, but there will be multiple characters in the party this time.
Right now, the game supports Infrastructure multiplayer for up to 3 players.
Summons are part of the character growth system, and can also be controlled by players after summoning.
The game will support both Ad-hoc and Infrastructure.
Famitsu reports that the upcoming Final Fantasy XIII demo will have length of more than 2 hours. Please note that this number is longer than the bundled Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children Complete movie (101 minutes+). The bundle will be released in March 2009.
Here are some other information revealed in Famitsu (Thanks to Playstation Universe):
Final Fantasy XIII demo will be based from the opening part of the game.
The demo will come on a separate disc rather than on the Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children Complete Blu-ray.
Mr. 33CM’s (The guy who rides the motorbike) real name is based off of weather as well.
One of the female characters, referred to as ‘Pigtails Girl’ (The cute looking girl in the trailer, you know?), has been through some tough times.
Here are new magazine scans for all 3 Final Fantasy XIII (Agito and Versus XIII included) titles taken from the latest Shonen Jump. Not many information is revealed, by the way, so just enjoy them as they are. :P
For those of you who still care about the game (I still do… kinda) after the multi-platform announcement, here’s the E3 trailer for your viewing pleasure. Not much is new here, it is basically the extended version of various trailers that you have seen before.
This just made me died inside. Square Enix has been screwing around with me by releasing not-so-quality games. Then they dropped the bomb during E3 press conference by announcing that the most-awaited Final Fantasy XIII is now a multi-platform game (thank you Yoichi Wada for announcing this “awesome” news). I am not joking, it is the truth, Xbox 360 will also have Final Fantasy XIII in its arsenal of games now.
So, what does that mean for me, a Playstation brand fan boy? I am extremely pissed of course, but I will still end up getting the game anyhow. Luckily for me, Final Fantasy Versus XIII is still “planned” to be a PS3 exclusive (hope it stays that way now…).
It is now looking more likely that a worldwide simultaneous release might just happen for Final Fantasy 13 and Final Fantasy Versus 13. The Square Enix president, Yoichi Wada, has said that he wishes simultaneous releases of Square Enix games to become the standard.
He added to this by saying the western market is much more interested in the Japanese style games Square Enix is famous for and now provides them more business than Japan alone.
Wada now wishes to join together the two stages of creating the Japanese release and then translating it.
The Japanese Square Enix Music website now has the full track list of the “drammatica -The Very Best of Yoko Shimomura-” album. The last track on the album is the song from Final Fantasy Versus 13 and is called “Somnus”.
Square Enix has held a presentation at the Game Developers Conference 2008 in San Francisco, titled “The Technology of Final Fantasy”. The presentation was held by Taku Murata, the General Manager of Square Enix’s Research & Development division.
At the presentation it was revealed that the “White Engine” has now been renamed to “Crystal Tools”. The companywide technology platform is designed for use with the PS3, XBox 360 and PC. This technology is going to be used for both Final Fantasy 13 and Final Fantasy Versus 13. Murata also said that a scaled down version of “Crystal Tools” will be implemented for the Wii.
Square then showed a previously seen trailer for Final Fantasy 13.
Even though “Crystal Tools” has been designed for use with more than one platform, at the end of the Final Fantasy 13 trailer the words “For PlayStation 3″ were displayed. This still confirming that Final Fantasy 13 is exclusive for the PlayStation 3 console.
To finish off the presentation, Murata said that “Crystal Tools” will be used with the development of a new MMO that they are currently working on. Square Enix have previously announced a new MMO a while ago. It is uncertain if this new MMO is the same as the previously announced one.
Nikkei Torendinetto has held an interview with the Square Enix president, Yoichi Wada. In the interview he vaguely talks about the release date of Final Fantasy 13, saying that he is unsure whether to release it in the same year as Dragon Quest IX.
Wada says that since both games are high profile games, he is not sure whether it would be good business to release them so close together. So, he says at this point he is undecided.
