Nick's Analysis of DKΣ3713 Part 1

I posted last week about some of the news that came out of Square Enix's private party, DKΣ3713 (pronounced D K Sigma 3 7 13) but I have not gotten a chance until now to discuss my feelings regarding each individual title. While trailers were not open to the public and 4 Player Podcast was unable to attend, the team at Gamespot Japan managed to get some hands on time with a few of the titles and provide more details. I will of course discuss my own personal thoughts and opinions regarding the games at the show but you can also stop by Gamespot Japan for the full details.
So I'll start with the obvious one first. Final Fantasy XIII is the next true installment in the Final Fantasy series. The game has been in development for a very long time now and we have still seen little more than a pretty CG trailer with what appears to be brief clips of a battle sequence. While the game certainly looks beautiful, it would be nice to see some actual gameplay. So what exactly did Square reveal about FFXIII at this party? Well not much. It looks like we won't be getting our hands on a playable version of the game until march of 2009 when a demo will be bundled with the Blu-Ray release of Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Keep in mind this has only been confirmed for Japan and no actual date has been set for the United States. Not cool. Brad made a good point on our last podcast when he said that by the time this game is actually released, the game will not look nearly as good as we expect it too because their will already be better looking games by then. But then again, it really is the gameplay that matters in the long run and I have no doubt that this game will look brilliant even if other games look better. I like to think of Gears of War because despite the games age, it still looks amazing even by today's standards. It worries me however that Square-Enix can't even show a little bit of gameplay footage because I can remember seeing footage of FFX more than 2 years prior to its release when the main character (Tidus) didn't have a name and still had black hair! Overall, I am happy to know that I will be posting gameplay impressions in March but it still sucks to know that this game is such a long way out. I hope that it the next couple months, we will start to see some gameplay details including battle system specifics, story details, and maybe a look at some of the environments in the game.
Final Fantasy XIII Agito is another part of Final Fantasy XIII series: Fabula Nova Crystallis which is also made up FFXIII and FFXIII Versus. The game was originally planned as a "mobile" title but fortunately for us, Square realized how bad this decision was and decided to bring the game over to the PSP instead. Now this begs the question of whether or not this game will be a port of what was originally intended for phones (which would suck) or if they will harness to power of the PSP to bring gamers a quality extension of the FFXIII universe. What's stranger is that no one seems to comment on what type of the game it is other than the fact the game will serve as a prequel to FFXIII. Is it a turn based RPG, action RPG, RTS, Shooter, or platformer perhaps? No one knows. The new trailer did suggest the existence of two warring nations and showed a cloaked woman planting a flag in the ground suggesting victory so i'm thinking the game might be a strategy RPG in the same vein as Final Fantasy Tactics. Whatever it is, I am excited to find out because find Final Fantasy XIII series: Fabula Nova Crystallis seems to be one of Squares most ambitious projects to date.

I'll post the next portion of my impressions soon which will include my thoughts on Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep, Kingdom Hearts: 358/2 Days, and Kingdom Hearts: Coded.

-Nick