Final Fantasy XV

Well this game is something...

Game no: 188

Genre: RPG

Platform: PS4
Factory Sealed: 120

What's is it about:

This story can't be explained in a couple of sentences. Since you need to be immerse in the whole Final Fantasy mythos to fully understand the motivations of the characters and why they do the things that they do. I can only summarize this is a story about friendship, family brotherhood and scarifies. This is the core that makes the story what it is. This is the story of how Noctis, Ignis, Prompto and Gladious battle to save the whole world

Gameplay consist of:

Where to start. It's an RPG after all so they threw everything except the kitchen sink

- Exploring: This consists of the world map and you go around following your waypoints or main story waypoints. Which comes to the next item

- Driving: Noctis and crew drives around in the car called the Regalia. This car is longer than the average car. Drivng is not like any other open world sandbox games. You can driver around like crazy and your speed is limited to 60 miles (I don't know, since the car feels very slow). You can drive it manually which is just pressing the R2 button or you can ask Ignis to drive which is better. You only can stop at parking spots and rest stops. Rest stops are one stop shops where you can refuel a car and get some grub. You can also ask the local for some extra work to get more money. They usually give you quests like finding an item or killing a beats.

- Running/Walking: When you are not in the car you spend a lot of time walking around the vast map. Since the car can't go offroad, you spend most of the time running to a certain checkpoint. Pressing the Circle button will make you print but only for a couple seconds. While running in the land you will encounter monsters which will trigger

- Combat: This game offers an active combat system. There are no random encounters. You can choose to engage an enemy or not. You only can control Noctis but you can give basic commands to the rest of the crew. Noctis is the only one that has MP. His MP is mainly used to warp from point A to point B. This will give Noctis the element of surprise when attacking his enemy. Some enemies have higher level than the group so you really need to think if you want to fight them. As far as weapons Noctis has his default weapon the engine blade and 13 royal weapon which he can absorb. We can only assign 4 weapons at a time and map them in the directional keys. Beside weapons, there are also 

- Magic: Noctis has the ability to absorb magic to use magic. There is only 3 types of magic available which is Fire, Lightning and Ice. You need to craft them and add items such as potions or elixir to double the power.

That the base of the gameplay but there is more:

- Cooking: Ignis has the ability to cook. He gets new recipes by killing animals, eating at restaurants or finding ingredients in the world map. the more Ignis cook, the better recipes he can make. I think the best part of the game is 

- Eating: Each rest stop has diners and restaurants. They offer photo realistic food. The food offers ability that will last for a certain time. Abilities like add 600HP or gain 50% exp.

- Photography: Prompto has a camera and he takes pictures of your adventures. There are more candid photos with some places requires you do to a photo op. You are allowed to choose the photo at the end of each chapter which makes a good scrapbook. 

- Camping: Gladious skill is camping. Camping is where you recharge your health and absorb all EXP points you gain during your battles. Ignis will cook something at the campsite. 

- Fishing: Noctis ability is to fish. Is not the deep the gameplay but it does offer a fun distraction. 

- QTE: There are a lot of quick time events and answers you need to decided. Most of the conversation has branches that will determine how to end result is going to be. 

- Leveling Up: As any RPG there is level up and there is also a skill tree that you need to upgrade.

What I liked: 

- The ability to choose the song in the car

- Eating food. The food looks so good.

- Combat is fun and frantic. Its hard to get an A for finesse. You need to change weapons on the fly and get good combos to get a good result. 

- The quest are fun.

- Seeing the sights.

- I didn't get to ride a chocobo but I hear that is great. 

- Easy mode. If you die, you will automatically be revived which makes combat more fun.

What I didn't Liked:

- Running. That sucks. Some places you are not allowed to run. It will be suck on a certain crawl.

- The story. It doesn't make that much sense and some parts you will be lost on what the heck has happen.

- Chapter 13. The most out place chapter in the whole game. The most draggiest 3 hours of my life

- Chapter 1-9 is open world and after that is all linear. You can't return back to the world map and the game did mention it was going to be the last time you will be there. 

- The ending... 

Status: Finish the main quest. Played for 23 hours and beat the final boss at level 36. Which is impossible with the current boss.

Score: With all the flaws this game is still a great game. Worth to be played again after you win the game. Just for the exploration part. The story doesn't leave you wanting more but the gameplay does make up for that.