Square Enix hints at Final Fantasy 15 as an action RPG

By Wesley Yin-Poole Published 16 November, 2011

"That's a trend, and you ignore things like that at your peril."

Square Enix has hinted that the inevitable Final Fantasy 15 may ditch the series' turn-based roots in favour of action role-playing gameplay.

In an interview with Edge, Final Fantasy producer Yoshinori Kitase acknowledged the popularity of action role-playing games such as BioWare's Mass Effect and Dragon Age.

"I think the nature of the franchise is to present something new each time," he said. "In the global market we see many players moving away from games that used turn-based systems toward what you might term an action-RPG.

"That's a trend, and you ignore things like that at your peril."

Final Fantasy 13's linear gameplay proved divisive, but its battle system, which fused turn-based strategy with real-time action, won plaudits.

Direct sequel Final Fantasy 13-2 builds on that battle system, but according to Kitase, future games in the series could see even more drastic changes.

"FFXIII and FFXIII-2's battle systems have those elements of speed and action that are the key words for us, though that doesn't necessarily mean we're going to stick to the same route in our next game," he said. "That's something only time can tell."

Picture of Wesley.

About Wesley Yin-Poole

Wesley is Eurogamer's news editor. He likes news, interviews, and more news. He also likes Street Fighter more than anyone can get him to shut up about it.

Read more articles from Wesley by visiting the Wesley Yin-Poole archive page.

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Comments (43) Latest comment 6 months ago

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  • ruddiger7 #1 6 months ago

    Stop trying to americanise final fantasy. They were great when they were japanese rpgs. If i want an action rpg I will play mass effect or dragon age.

  • TelexStar #2 6 months ago

    This has all the hallmarks of a desperate developer. Sqenix needs to ditch the reliance on over-indulgent cutscenes and go back to what it did best - in the days of the earlier FF series. Providing a great story with a deep and customisable RPG system....imho.

  • landlock #3 6 months ago

    huh? Americanise? Japan has been making Action RPGs for years.

  • King_Edward #4 6 months ago

    Following a trend worked so well for FFXIII...

  • rockavitch #5 6 months ago

    I'd be fine with this is it was the same as Rogue Galaxy... although I'd prefer Rogue Galaxy 2 much more (Level 5 why must you ignore my requests).

  • CygnusReactor #6 6 months ago

    Squarenix should invent a new IP instead of killing a beloved series even more than there already have. I've so fallen out of love this FF, although I still load up ff6 or ff7 from time to time... guilty pleasure...

  • Daddy-Doom-Bar #7 6 months ago

    The term trend doesn't just apply to things that are good. The KKK was a trend. And how do they know that's what the fans want, have they asked us? They haven't asked me, coz I'd tell them to stop being so fackin stupid.

  • Histeria #8 6 months ago

    @ruddiger7 "Stop trying to americanise final fantasy"

    If they're trying to turn them into Dragon Age or Mass Effect, wouldn't that me Canadianising them? ;)

  • hume #9 6 months ago

    After playing Witcher 2, Dark Souls, Skyrim and Xenoblades this year and trying to finish (without success) FF13 I must say that the contrast in quality is so great that if sqeenix will follow their path to appeal to younger generation I will never get back to playing their games on main consoles (FFT Ogre and newest DQ were quite a treat).
    And I used to love FF series (even 12 with it's bland set of characters).
    I suppose with so many good games coming up there's no point in despairing. Just hope that their simplified games will bring them enough audience to stop their demise. Oh no. Actually I hope they will fucking crush and burn.

  • lucky_jim #10 6 months ago

    It'll be an Afghanistan/ Iraq- themed FPS, mark my words.

  • Cjail #11 6 months ago

    A Dark Souls combat system with FF style magic and summoning, and "squad" control interface like Mass Effect could be a killer combo...if done properly.
    Also stop making effeminate male characters!
    Edited by Cjail at 16/11/11 @ 08:41

  • JamesonYu #12 6 months ago

    Kitase-san obviously hasn't played Mass Effect or the Dragon age games, and is out of touch even with Final Fantasy's own past.

    Dragon Age's battle system was inspired BY A FINAL FANTASY GAME; its AI behavior systems were derived from Gambits in Final Fantasy XII.

    Final Fantasy games need to be less indulgent. It needs to look back at its most successful games and respect their legacies. Final Fantasy IV, VI, VII-IX, X and XII were all great because of their simple but affecting stories and battle systems that were simple to grasp but highly customizeable. Its amazing how that no matter how vocal Final Fantasy fans are, the idiots at Square- Enix never listen to them. Instead, they draw inspiration from , gasp- Call of Duty for Final Fantasy XIII.

    Having started hardcore gaming only in the 32-bit era, I could always rely on Squaresoft games; whatever they touched turned to gold ( yes, even chocobo's mysterious dungeon). But, as soon as they merged with ENIX, they took less creative risks and started to milk Final fantasy for all its worth. When they realized that spin-offs were not even selling THAT well they started to panic and drew inspirations from popular "modern" games. They are too insipid to realize that their best selling games were from times that they marched to the beat of their own drum.

  • Jolly_Armadillo #13 6 months ago

    "That's a trend, and you ignore things like that at your peril."

    That's right, be a sheep, like the rest of them! Good bye variety, hello monotony.
    Edited by Jolly_Armadillo at 16/11/11 @ 08:48

  • jstar #14 6 months ago

    I'm getting a bit bored of this FF devotion. I've been playing these games since FFIV. I even played the gameboy versions. And I mean the crappy old monochrome ones. I've played 5, 6, 7,8,9 and 10. And 12 and 13.

    The fact of the matter is that other than prettier graphics these games have pretty much remained unchanged for the whole series. Do a dungeon, random battle walk down a linear path on the world map, go to a town, buy some gear, do a dungeon blah blah.

    They are filled with grandiose nonsensical stories and other than a few notable examples illustrate most clearly the absolute lack of innovation in the japanese RPG. They are stagnant and old and desperately need to be made relevant again.

  • berelain #15 6 months ago

    NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO*

    Edit: oops, broke the layout with too many OOOOOO's.
    Edited by berelain at 16/11/11 @ 08:51

  • hume #16 6 months ago

    @JamesonYu so true. so sad.

  • Whitster #17 6 months ago

    Maybe if you hadn't taken a step back gameplay wise after FFXII your series would still be progressing rather than stagnating.

  • Schiraman #18 6 months ago

    Wait, the battle system in FFXIII won plaudits? Really?

    Personally I'd say it's the worst system I've ever seen in a FF game - and if they think that system is a strong point to build on, they really do have no idea what they're doing any more. What a shame.

  • MattEdWithCheese #19 6 months ago

    Well, I love Tales of Vesperia, Eternal Sonata and the earlier Star Ocean games. Not to mention Kingdom Hearts and the Upcoming FFVsXIII are Action RPGs!

  • TexMurphy01 #20 6 months ago

    Well, actually I'm not so worried about the mechanics which you use to create your game. After all, I thought the change of pace in FFXII was pretty good.

    But please, let's have a great story with a real sense of adventure, some involving characters and some great music. You get those and you're golden.

  • Deano_98 #21 6 months ago

    Isn't versus XIII supposed to be going more down this route? why don't you finish that first before you think about jumping on the Americanising bandwagon with my favourite series

  • sethsez #22 6 months ago

    Hey, you know what would be great? If, instead of devising a new system for the sole purpose of distinguishing this Final Fantasy from all the others and disappearing up its own ass in the process, Square-Enix would just focus on making a simple, polished JRPG with a high budget and lots of carefully created content. This whole "throw shit at the wall and see what sticks" approach to game creation is getting to be a bit tiresome, and has completely drained Final Fantasy of whatever tenuous identity it ever had.

  • Seoh #23 6 months ago

    Why don't they go back to an actual turn based game like FF10 was. 13's combat was so fast you just selected auto attack every time and changed your stances (cant remember the real word)

  • ShiroBen #24 6 months ago

    It doesn't matter what they do with the next Final Fantasy, the series lost its soul a long time ago.

  • abigsmurf #25 6 months ago

    Please... save this for the spin offs. You already have an excellent action RPG franchise in Kingdom Hearts.

    Blend FFXIII's system a bit more with FFXIIs gambit system, remove the need to break bosses and tougher enemies, boost the interactivity a bit more and you've a pretty good system.

    Xenoblade almost got it perfect, the only thing it struggled on was the AI (no! don't heal me, heal the tank who's about to die! Argh, why's the tank standing in the lava fighting this boss!?).

    Anyhow, I find it hard to believe FFXV isn't in full production by now. If they leave it any longer, by the time it's released the 360 and PS3 will be dead.

  • Triggerhappytel #26 6 months ago

    They should have never scrapped that Grin-developed FFXII spin-off called Fortress. It looked really promising; like Demon's Souls crossed with Monster Hunter.

    Stop pissing around with the FF games and go back to making deep RPG games a la numbers VI, VII and IX. Pandering to trends with a franchise which has already been dragged through the mud won't win you any fans.

  • RealoFoxtrot #27 6 months ago

    well, i cant say that this article intrigued me when i read the byline.. but..

    Final Fantasy 13's Paradime system was awful.

    I've been waiting for FFXIII-Versis's combat system, cause it's ment to be based off of Kingdom Hearts.
    Dont know about anyone else, but i really enjoyed kingdom hearts 2.

  • nickthegun #28 6 months ago

    Mass Effect isnt an RPG. Its a third person shooter with a good story.

  • Mr_Brown #29 6 months ago

    The problem they have us that they are trying to turn something into something it's not. Final Fantasy is popular because it's a great JRPG, but it will be average if they attempt to change it to a western RPG.

    The battle system was the one thing that I think they got right in XIII, the series will bomb if they continue down that route. If they want it to be action RPG why don't they follOw the template of Xenoade Chronicles. That I troduces Western things without sacrificing what's good about JRPGs.

  • saku_luk #30 6 months ago

    I think Battle system from FF13 was really cool, best in series :) but that's just me maybe.

  • darkmorgado #31 6 months ago

    There are two types of people in the world - those who set the trend and those who mindlessly follow it.

    We now have confirmation that square enix are in the latter group.

  • FortysixterUK #32 6 months ago

    As long as there are no QTE's ( I desperately want FF13-2 to be good, but it HAS QTE's and I'm a tad concerned ).
    And also as long as it's single player...forget the MMO's.
    But really what I want is a heavy JRPG translated to English.

  • Whatascoop #33 6 months ago

    Is the trend towards having nothing but mediocre J-RPGs this generation?

  • Centrifugal #34 6 months ago

    Type-0 is arguably an action-RPG and it's absolutely amazing, the best Final Fantasy in years. And I've only played it in Japanese.

    Here's hoping Square Enix translate it.

  • alcides #35 6 months ago

    Oh dear, let just put them down. I mean Square games. On shelves.

  • wez_316 #36 6 months ago

    I am maybe one of few that appreciates FF trying to innovate since the lackluster (yet seemingly universally loved) FFX and the sequel to it. XIII and especially the massively underrated and utterly brilliant XII were better than X and X-2 in my opinion. Until Xenoblade, XII was the only game in my opinion that truly modernised the RPG while still keeping the core RPG spirit alive.

    I'm very glad they are trying to mix things up even more. I'll buy anyone FF that isn't an MMO personally and I very rarely get stung.

  • Alestes #37 6 months ago

    Square-Enix really took the FF gameplay in the right direction with FF12, large explorable areas, non-random battles and so on. The only thing that was lacking as the cast (Vaan is a horrible main character) and the story had flaws too.

    But then with FF13 they decided to reuse none of that and instead take the worst things from FF10 and enhance them, sigh.

    Xenoblade Chronicles showed us earlier this year how a modern JRPG is done, and it have many things in common with FF12.
    Edited by Alestes at 16/11/11 @ 18:05

  • silversun #38 6 months ago

    Last few days been reading about history of video games and how some the first games like oxo.
    Makes you realise how much games change over time.
    So in a way i hope if the gameplay changes a bit then the core of final fantasy can stay the same.
    If game stopped having chocobos and turned in to deus ex then it would no longer be what final fantasy is. but not to say they cant do well to take gameplay inspiration from games like that and mass effect.
    I guess i think of the good other action rpg like kingdom hearts, but mass effect is different from that or a star ocean type game.

    Either way after looking back of games of the past, as a final fantasy fan i not to worried.

  • TheBusterMan #39 6 months ago

    @ruddiger7 Exactly,you took the words from my word hole.And let's hope the FF10 HD update isn't borked up with 'action' combat.Leave that to Mass Effect(which I loved,but don't want for FF)

  • metallicorphan #40 6 months ago

    Square Enix is dead


    Long live SquareSoft!!

  • markw85 #41 6 months ago

    I used to be a huge Final Fantasy fan but the series fell apart after XII. Square Enix should just put FF to sleep.

  • Mindstorm #42 6 months ago

    the past is a burden and the future is all guesswork and "trendspotting".... not good signs. My two penny is that the decline of this franchise is now irreversible.

  • IvorB #43 6 months ago

    After XIII they can go hang. This comes from a hardcore FF fan. And to think I was so buzzed after the breath of fresh air that was XII. I played that again recently and felt sad thinking about what might have been. Anyway Dark Souls arriving in the post for me tomorrow. Good bye, Final Fantasy. We'll aways have X, VII and XII.