RPGFan
9.0Final Fantasy XVI is an enjoyable action RPG adventure with a phenomenal plot. Graphics 78 Sound 98 Gameplay 90 Control 88 Story 95 Overall Score 90 For information on our scoring systems, see our scoring systems overview .
Final Fantasy XVI
Creative Business Unit III · Jun 22, 2023
About
An epic dark fantasy world where the fate of the land is decided by the mighty Eikons and the Dominants who wield them.
This is the tale of Clive Rosfield, a warrior granted the title “First Shield of Rosaria” and sworn to protect his younger brother Joshua, the dominant of the Phoenix. Before long, Clive will be caught up in a great tragedy and swear revenge on the Dark Eikon Ifrit, a mysterious entity that brings calamity in its wake.
Trailers & screenshots
Scores by platform
Critic reviews
- 3rd-strike.com8.0Much like our conclusion before, Final Fantasy XVI definitely works as a stand-alone Final Fantasy title and we had a decent amount of fun. But for a game focused on combat, we found the mechanics to be a little too easy to draw us in. While this game’s stunning visuals and simple gameplay make it perfect for newcomers to the franchise, this will probably not be a fan favorite.
- Generación Xbox8.9En conclusión, Final Fantasy XVI es un juego que ha demostrado ser un regreso a la forma para la saga. La calidad de los gráficos y el sonido es impresionante, la jugabilidad es muy entretenida, así como un sistema de combate que engancha así como su suficiente duración. Sin embargo, es importante destacar que el juego requiere una configuración de hardware relativamente alta para funcionar correctamente.
- Impulse Gamer8.8Final Fantasy XVI is a return to form for the long-running franchise. An excellent game that sadly has some performance quirks that need to be addressed to fully realise its potential.
- Merlin'in Kazani8.0Final Fantasy 16, ana seri Final Fantasy olarak beklentilerimin altında kalmış olabilir ama bu kötü bir oyun olduğu anlamına gelmiyor. Sağlam bir aksiyona, sürükleyici bir hikayeye sahip, JRPG severler değil de Hack’n Slash severler için yapılmış iyi bir oyun var elimizde.
- Gaming Trend10A complete package, with all DLC packed in, Final Fantasy XVI Complete Edition lives up to its name. The performance on a wide variety of hardware speaks to a lot of optimization work, and mods make the skies the limit. This is the ultimate way to experience this fantastic entry to the series.
Gamer reviews
pls fix this...
this game is already out rigth? why is it still in the upcoming list. if this the dlc then make sure to update the title at least
Things just didn’t click
The game kicks off on a high note with an epic action sequence, introduces intriguing characters and a captivating world, along with enjoyable combat. However, once the initial excitement wanes and you reach the Hideaway, the game's momentum quickly dissipates, and this lackluster pace persists throughout, from start to finish. Let me elaborate. I'm yearning for something to grip my interest, but both the gameplay and storyline leave me utterly unengaged. I'm finding it exceptionally challenging to complete this game. I don’t even know if I want to. To be honest, there's something about the way the story is structured that fails to captivate me. The storytelling pacing and delivery fall flat. While certain plot points may appear promising on paper, they fail to maintain my interest during actual gameplay. I was so hyped for this when I played the demo, turns out the demo was the best part of the game.
Review After 100% Completion: Final Fantasy XVI
FF16 feels like a heavier push into the action RPG genre for the Final Fantasy franchise. Gameplay-wise, it does one thing, and it does it very well. Armed with the power of Eikons and limited by your own ability to chain combos and maximize damage, the game's combat system is its core gameplay which everything revolves around. If you've played FFXIV, Creative Business Unit III's bread and butter, you'll find a yourself at home with the lore references and some of the combat mechanics, as they very much look like FFXIV raid mechanics. Couple all this around outstanding visuals and in-game rendered cutscenes (save for a certain few that are prerendered), you will be hooked to play CBU3's Final Fantasy. Achievements: - Missable Achievements: None, all achievements can be acquired, but you need at least 2 runs. - 2nd Playthrough only Achievements: Yes, the Final Fantasy Mode achievement requires you to play the game at least twice. - Multiplayer-Only Achievements: No multiplayer - Time-based Achievements: None - High-Skill Achievements: Yes. Most achievements are execution-based, like landing certain skills without touching the ground, or get through certain bosses without taking damage. Gameplay: - Gameplay Loop: Final Fantasy 16's Core Loop is combat. Multiple systems work together to support the combat loop and it works astonishingly well. To put it simply, the core loop consists of your character, Clive, striking enemies and dodging/parrying/blocking incoming attacks. But it is supported by different systems, like the Eikonic Abilities, Consumable/Torgal System, the Limit Break, Character Progression via Level Ups/Eikon Upgrades/Equipment/Accessories. - Currency Grind: EXP, GIL, and Ability points are the currencies primarily used in the game. All currencies have accessories to make farming a bit faster. Completing all bounties and side quests gives you enough of all of them to not need to specifically grind for any of them. - UI: UI disappears when not in combat. On-screen markers are available. - Microtransactions: None - Minigames: None. Story: - Voice Acting: Voice Acting is present and is available in multiple languages. All cutscenes are voiced, except for certain NPCs giving extra lore or insight for a chapter. - Multiple Endings: Nope. - Narrative: Story is told linearly. Narrative sometimes splits across different characters to show what they were doing at the time. Timeskips are employed, along with visual character changes. The Active Time Lore, a feature that allows the player to gain more information at their fingertips, is always available and allows a smoother experience without forcing awkward exposition during a cutscene. - Tone, Mood, and Atmosphere: The tone, mood, and atmosphere of the game is dark, all throughout. It makes you appreciate the tiny wins and reprieves that the characters experience, but the weight of a dying world always pulls heavily on the player. Lifespan: - Chapter Select/New Game+ : Yes. There is a New Game+, and finishing the game unlocks Final Fantasy Mode, a challenge difficulty that gives you a slightly new experience and opens up new avenues of advancement to better suit this difficulty. The Arete Stone also allows the player to revisit chapters for the Chapter Select feature and get items that they have missed, and the player will also be ranked according to certain criteria during that run. - DLCs: As of this writing, there are no DLCs, but rumors of one is circulating through some media outlets. - Duration: HowLongToBeat lists the Completionist at 76.5 hours. I have 100%-ed the game at 130 hours. Graphics: - Graphic Settings: An update was released to allow Motion Blur to be adjusted. There are also two modes on the PS5, Frame Rate and Graphics mode. I primarily played on Frame Rate to ensure consistent gameplay instead of prioritizing graphic fidelity. - Optimizations: There had been reports of issues on certain cutscenes causing the PS5 to crash repeatedly on Graphics Mode. General reports of the PS5 being really hot during casual gameplay. Non-combat scenes have a lot of frame stutters. Combat scenes triggers high framerate gameplay, possibly applying tradeoff optimizations during combat. I have not encountered any bugs during my playthrough. Accessibility: - Varying Difficulty: Story and Action modes are available. Additionally, there are accessories allowing a different experience with combat, generally called the Timely Accessories, mainly meant to provide assistance for those who struggle with this kind of gameplay. - Controller Support: Played on PS5. So yes. - In-game Button Remapping: None, but there are 6 controller layouts to choose from. - Subtitles: Yes, with options to edit size, text background, and to include closed captions. - Pause in Cutscenes: Yes. - Skip in Cutscenes: Yes. - Sound Cue has Visual Cue: Yes. There is an option to include Visual Alerts for Sound cues. - Requires Button Mashing: Yes. - Tutorials: Yes. Final Thoughts: Overall, I'm giving this game an 8, because it does one thing and it does it well, which in my opinion is amazing. It's very easy to muddle up the game with lots of immersion breaking mini-games but they chose not to include any of it. But I feel the downside of the lack of other core gameplay loops is the lack of variety in the sidequests. All of them are basically fetch quests that may or may not include a fight, and all fights are straightforward, which is to say you just kill the enemy and move on. The lack of gameplay loop means sidequests could only take advantage of the combat loop. What I would suggest is to spice up the combat loop with additional objectives, like for example, an enemy with MAX defense, and can only be beaten by interacting with the environment, which would have been amazing during the Liquid Flame fight. Imagine staggering the boss and having Shiva cast Diamond Dust to chip off some HP instead of simply killing it with our own power. While the raid mechanics in the combat is nice nod to FFXIV, it pales in comparison with how magnificent the raid mechanics are in FFXIV. FFXIV expects a level of metaknowledge in the higher tier boss fights; you need to know in advance what you're supposed to do, not just "evade the colorful shapes on the ground". I expected something of the sort in Final Fantasy Mode, not just "here's more colorful shapes on the ground you need to avoid". I feel like the dodge/parry mechanic along with the raid mechanics don't particularly mix well, since all attacks are "dodgeable" as long as you get timing right, which is particularly generous. That idea basically nullifies the raid mechanics, "Why do I need to step out of the colorful shapes when I can just dodge/block the hit and continue?". This is not to say its not fun, only that the raid mechanics stuff should have been implemented better. Like remove Clive's ability to dodge (or make it undodgeable) if you want us to start respect the boss's mechanics. Because most of the time, we just need to remember to dodge on this certain frame, and we can continue dealing damage. Anyway, this is a short rant in this review, but I love FFXVI, I promise. I just feel like it could have been better. I wanted to give it a 10, but it fell short.
Final Fantasy May Cry
The hype surrounding FFXVI is massive. I admit, it got me pumped to play it. It was satisfying to see a Final Fantasy game embracing real-time combat like the Devil May Cry or God Of War games. Leave turn-based RPGs to another franchise please. Let Final Fantasy grow. Apart from its combat, I'm sure everyone's all crazy with its impressive selection of boss fights. I admit, my reaction to the first big boss fight got me grinning and I wanted more of it. Final Fantasy XVI delivered that. As I enjoyed my 80 or so hours of playing, I've noticed a few things that took me out of my enjoyment. Namely with its oddly paced story, weak side-quests (early in the game) and easy combat. I enjoyed my time with its cast of characters, yet the story needed more work. The writing was all over the place and I felt like they cut a huge chunk of story somewhere. Side-quests were also a glaring issue. It was all fetch-quests that provide no benefit to your character, but I love how they add bits and pieces of lore to the story. And lastly combat. Don't get me wrong, I love hacking and slashing my way through enemies, but there's no substance to my movements. As I dodged and shifted from one enemy to another, I noticed that it's combat is more on style. Overall, I still enjoy my time FFXVI. It's a much needed evolution for the franchise and I can't wait for more of this in the future.
Final Fantasy XVI: A beautifully flawed masterpiece that blessed us with Torgal.
The narrative, characters, combat, graphics, side quests, HUNTS, the ability tree. No matter what I was doing, it was almost always extremely beautiful, exciting, & fun. Most importantly, it all felt extremely well-polished & bug-free aside from some minor performance issues here & there. I rolled credits twice: my 1st playthrough was on 'Action-Focused' & my 2nd (\*New Game+) was on 'Final Fantasy Mode', which made the game feel incredibly fresh, despite having already played through it all once before, due to Final Fantasy Mode making adjustments to the quantity, difficulty & type of enemies you fight throughout it. I hit 100% in-game completion & finally popped my platinum trophy at 126 hours of playtime total. For those who don't want the details & just want to know whether or not you should get it - there you go. Yes. You should absolutely get it. For those who want a little more details, the game was definitely amazing & well-worth the money imo. I genuinely loved it & had more fun during my time with it the last month than I had in awhile. But that also isn't to say that it didn't/doesn't have SOME issues. In the end, the issues were just so miniscule compared to the amount of enjoyment & fun I had from start to finish that anything that was a minor issue or frustration to me at first, quickly faded out of existence, never to be seen again & I completely forgot all about it until writing this review. The first small issue I had was that the a decent amount of the side quests through out the beginning of the game were pretty lackluster & even boring at times. HOWEVER, like I said, after you progress enough through the story to start meeting more prominent side characters, you'll be able to start doing side quest chains for them which end up becoming full fledged story arcs that I would have thought were in the main story if I didn't KNOW they were merely side quests. So, after awhile, my biggest issue that I seemed to have with the game literally just fixed itself & I went from procrastinating & putting off the side quests, to actively completing every side quest that I could before progressing the main story quests even. There was also a potential for your PS5 to give overheating warning messages while in Quality mode, during intense & demanding cutscenes or fights. However, if you're playing on performance mode, I don't think you should have much to worry about, if it isn't already fixed for Quality by now too anyways. I did get the warning a few times while in Quality mode, but if I switched to performance, I wouldn't get it anymore & it would continue to run fine. Lastly, the controversy regarding the change to action focused combat is just absurd to me. Stop it. All of you. This is Final Fantasy as usual. Every single iteration of final fantasy innovates & changes it's core mechanics & even the combat systems. That's what makes a sequel, a good one. Innovation. Whether it's the hybrid combat of FFVII Remake, Action Focused FFXVI, or Old-School Turn Based doesn't matter. What matters is whether or not systems have been innovated on & improved upon from their previous version - & that it FEELS like so. Final Fantasy XVI is a beautifully flawed masterpiece & Torgal has no equal.
A song of Ice and Fire!
PS: My thoughts may be all over the place, so please bear with me! LOL. When I first heard about FFXVI in 2020 and watched its trailer, my initial reaction was pure excitement. Final Fantasy never disappoints when it comes to its soundtracks, and this time they took a more mature and bloody approach that really caught my attention. It was the perfect timing, as I was in a gaming spree and deeply immersed in Game of Thrones. From that moment, FFXVI became a game I eagerly followed, constantly searching for the latest news and updates. The introduction of "Eikons" and the presence of iconic Final Fantasy creatures like Ifrit and Shiva further fueled my excitement. Let me start by saying that Final Fantasy XVI is not only one of the best games released this year, but it's also an all-time masterpiece. As a proud owner of a PS5, I can confidently say that this game is a must-play for anyone with the console. From the moment I started playing the demo to the final hours of the game, I couldn't tear myself away from it. I've already invested 60 hours on my first playthrough, and I'm still completely captivated. Now, let's delve into the review itself. Like any game, Final Fantasy XVI has its strengths and weaknesses, but the beauty is that it offers a complete experience without the need for additional purchases to enhance your progress. The graphics are simply breathtaking, thanks to the processing and graphical power of the PS5. I personally chose to play the game in Graphic Mode, as it provided a more stable experience for me, even if it meant sacrificing a bit of performance. The implementation of ray tracing and other graphical features truly shines, although it may not reach the same level as games like Red Dead Redemption 2 or Horizon Forbidden West. If I were to mention my biggest complaint about the game, it would be the excessive motion blur. It can be so extreme that it may cause discomfort for some players. Fortunately, I managed to find solutions to overcome this issue, perhaps because I'm accustomed to playing games in VR as well. By watching gameplay samples on YouTube, one can easily see that the motion blur is not an ideal aspect of the game. I truly hope that the developers address this in future patches. Moving on to the story itself, I couldn't help but notice some similarities to Game of Thrones. While some may see this as a negative, I appreciate the direction the developers took in making fans draw connections between FFXVI and the beloved TV series. Even if you're not a Game of Thrones fan or haven't watched it, you can still enjoy the overall story of FFXVI. It has crafted a rich lore that will undoubtedly captivate players (I won't spoil any major plot points here). One of the standout features in FFXVI's storytelling is the Active Time Lore system. It's the first time I've seen a game constantly update its lore even during cutscenes, eliminating the need to read through lengthy texts. This mechanic was further expanded through the characters Vivian and Harpocrates, enhancing the immersion and depth of the game world. While the story is compelling, I must admit that it does have its fair share of confusing plot holes. I would be happy to discuss these in the comments section below. However, I can confidently say that Square Enix has redeemed themselves from the storytelling shortcomings of FFXV. They have put immense effort into crafting a narrative that keeps players engaged and invested. Now, let's talk about the characters. The emphasis on Eikons and Dominants in the game truly elevates the entire journey. Clive, the main protagonist, along with Jill and Joshua, are a joy to watch as they progress through the story. It's been a while since a game has evoked such strong emotions from me. The sibling relationship between Joshua and Clive is a masterpiece in itself. I haven't felt this level of emotional connection between characters since Rinoa and Squall in FFVII. Jill, in particular, is a wonderful companion, offering unwavering support to Clive and profoundly impacting his journey. Their love story is beautifully written, devoid of cringe or cheesy dialogues, and instead filled with genuine moments of "I am always there for you." I must admit, I am utterly captivated by Jill's beauty! I find myself constantly taking snapshots whenever she appears on screen. Hahaha! I would love to delve further into each character's development in future discussions. For now, let's briefly mention Torgal, a sweet and reliable Hound whose character progression shines, especially during his final quest with Clive. And then there's Cid, a Dominant and a leader who deserves a separate DLC dedicated to his story. He is a remarkable character, and I can confidently say he's my favorite in the entire game. Experience the game to truly appreciate his depth. When it comes to the side quests in FFXVI, I have mixed feelings. While some are enjoyable, others fall short of my expectations. There are moments where I find myself skipping dialogues, as they don't always live up to the standards set by games like The Witcher 3. However, the hunt board provides a great experience for Final Fantasy fans, allowing us to hunt down monsters for extra AP and experience points. Now, let's discuss the combat mechanics. While it may initially resemble Devil May Cry, upon playing the entire game, you'll discover its unique identity. The combat mechanics are simple and intuitive, and executing Eikon skills is a great and enjoyable experience. However, I do have one minor gripe. I feel that having three Eikons equipped simultaneously somewhat diminishes the sense of progression throughout the story. It begs the question of why we should invest in all the Eikons if we can't fully utilize them. Furthermore, leveling them up can be quite grindy. In comparison to Square Enix's Forspoken, FFXVI lacks a bit in terms of skills and overall magical abilities. However, it's worth noting that Forspoken allows full control over all of Tanta's powers, as mentioned in my review of that game. It's important to note that FFXVI is a linear action RPG and not an open-world game. While there is a degree of freedom in exploring certain areas, it's not as vast as other titles. However, what sets this game apart is its RPG essence, reminiscent of classic titles like God of War or Devil May Cry. Major RPG elements, such as clothing customization and the ability to switch between characters, are missing, which may disappoint some players. Personally, I hope that Square Enix considers adding these features as DLC in the future, following the examples set by FFVII Remake, FFX, FFXII, and FFXV. Lastly, I can't stress enough how much the music in FFXVI has left me in awe. It evokes intense emotions and is truly a standout soundtrack. This is what we've come to expect from Square Enix, and I can already envision it being recognized at the Game of the Year awards this year. The inspiration it provides is simply extraordinary! In conclusion, Final Fantasy XVI is an exceptional game that has truly raised the bar for the current generation of gaming. Despite any flaws, issues, or criticisms you may come across in reviews, you cannot deny the fact that this game is a masterpiece in all its glory. The amount of love and dedication poured into it is evident. 2023 is truly a remarkable year for gaming, and as of now, FFXVI has secured the top spot on my radar. Thank you Square Enix! 
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