So Eurogamer have a big interview with FF XV director Hajime Tabata up on their site now, with him outlining his influences and his vision for the game. He goes on about being influenced by western games, his influences by "core-centric" games, and then:

Tabata's also in pursuit of a Final Fantasy that's not as overwhelming as its predecessors, and one that can be enjoyed by a broader audience. "With Final Fantasy 15, I do want to make it more casual," he says. "Of course the depth of the game is going to be there, but I want to make it so players can easily experience the satisfaction of the depth of the game." There's an option to set that car to drive itself, allowing players to sit back and take in the sights - although there is also an option to drive it manually, should they want to engage more fully with the world.

"Another example is in the combat," explains Tabata. "With the hardware specifications of the newer consoles, it's possible to set it up so you have different enemies and different choices of attacks you can enter in, but I want to simplify that. It'll basically be a one-button action, and the AI intuitively outputs an action that kind of satisfies, gives you that instant gratification, and it connects with the simple touch of a button. I myself am not getting any younger. I don't want to be frantically pushing buttons. I also want to utilise the intelligence of the hardware spec, and not have to go through too much hassle or trouble in order to execute moves."

"A one-button action" can't sound very good for fans of the genre? The trailer had me interested in the game, but he's saying all the wrong things for me here.

Yeah, one-button-action sounds shitty. I mean if there's a timing element to it, sure, in a shorter game. But in a ~50 hr JRPG? Fuck outta here.

Timing-based, context-sensitive input sounds a lot like a QTE. A one button QTE.

double post.

Hah, that sounds ridiculous. Oh, is this the Crisis Core guy? That's awesome. I got around 15 hours into that game without doing anything other than hitting the X button before I realized how bored I was and gave up.

I'll be curious to see how this winds up, but the trailers and details released so far haven't exactly gotten me excited.

Yea. Fancy graphics is all I think this game has going for it and that doesn't include design.

Commence the same pointless argument that has been happening everywhere over and over again about this.

This conversation came up in another thread. People are blowing his comment severely out of context.

"Casual" does not mean "dumbed down" or "Will be Angry Birds". And most Final Fantasy games feature one-button combat, when you come down to it.

I don't even particularly care about Final Fantasy, and this sounds absolutely ridiculous to me. There HAS to be more to it than that, right?

"It'll basically be a one-button action, and the AI intuitively outputs an action that kind of satisfies, gives you that instant gratification, and it connects with the simple touch of a button."

Even in context, that sounds to me like "just tap X to badass".

One-button action sounds like ass.

What?

Also, casual in this context can't mean anything other than dumbed down. Come on now. But sure, shouldn't doom the game because of these comments, but these comments don't look good.

@planetfunksquad: Did you not play Final Fantasy XII. Heavy AI party interaction and frequent use of one button to confirm battle menu options.

But of course people on the internet extrapolate their worst fears and start screeching, because that's what the internet does. Baseless hyperventilation might as well be the official sport of social media.

I hope something got lost in translation.

@amyggen: Press X to select a menu option. That's one-button combat. And it's been around since the original Final Fantasy.

@hailinel: I did play ff12, and choosing attacks from a menu is different to pressing x and having the game select attacks for you. There's a level of strategy which gets lost. I mean yeah, we're extrapolating from his comments, but if you think tapping X for the length of a full JRPG with no autonomy in attack selection sounds good then me and you have different ideas of good.

I think he's saying that one-button action, auto-driving cars etc. will be available for players who want them. It doesn't necessarily mean that everyone will be forced into that experience.

The real concern is whether they can accommodate both levels of gameplay without degrading the quality of either one, which is doubtful. If the easy mode is just "Press X until a cutscene appears", is that fun? On the other hand, if the gameplay complexity/challenge in the normal mode is so easily removable for casual players, does it all feel like padding or busywork?

Spending the resources to make these changes, when both of those outcomes are pretty likely, seems like a crapshoot.

@planetfunksquad: The idea that you think FFXV will offer no autonomy based on Tabata's comments is very, very odd.

I've already seen people blowing up about this comment elsewhere--glad to see GB isn't above this criticism!

Anyway, this just sounds kinda like XIII and XIII-2 to me. Those games had the auto-battle button, which would fill the attack queue with the "best" attacks for the job instead of forcing you to do. Of course, if you wanted to do it, you had the option. I bet that XV will be much like this, offering more depth to those who want it and simplicity for those who want to focus on positioning/strategy instead.

That menu provided the options and thus the complexity. There has been no menu seen in any gameplay trailer of FFXV's real-time combat, thus raising concerns of the game's complexity due to the lack of options.

It's becoming increasingly clear that the issue isn't that there is "no context" for "casual means dumbed down;" it's that you're willingly blinding yourself to it to suit your argument. The rest of us choose not to do that, and won't be belittled for looking at things with a critical and open mind rather than a zealous one.

And stop trying to derail discussions with claims of "baseless hyperventilation" and "screeching." A quick scroll up shows none before your own post. You're deflecting and trying to paint anyone with an opposing opinion as idiots to discredit them.

@saturdaynightspecials said:

But then you find that they are designing the game in a way that allows a person to just use Auto-Attack through the whole thing. Sure, you could choose other attack options, but why would you when there is no real motivation?

I'm not condemning FF15 because of what this guy is saying, I'm condemning it because of what died with FF13, dug the hole FF13-2, nailed the coffin with FF13-3, and will likely bury the coffin with FF15 based on all the footage, trailers, and dev comments. The whole thing is just not what it used to be. And people love to argue that every game in the series is different, when in reality, there are certain gameplay types, ascetic styles, hallmark themes while small adjustments were made around character designs, combat, story etc. There was a more common thread throughout the first ten games or so. 12 was pretty different but, in my opinion, was still a great compromise between a more open ended and faster paced experience while still retaining a mostly fantasy ascetic and themes.

I think every game in the series has pros and cons. At least back then though you could expect to like most aspects of an entry into the series while maybe having issues with some of the minor new elements they added that were unique to that game. What changed with FF13 though was that it was radically different and SE seems to be continuing on that track rather than trying to reel it back in to something more traditional.

Also, the comment about previous installments being one-button games because you use a menu is amusing.

Are you serious after all your greatness Tabata you resort to this? One button layout makes it sound like Nomura never left what the f*** is this Kingdom Hearts now?...

@gunslingerpanda: I'm pretty sure I saw a menu in the lower-left corner during the demo. And even if I'm mistaken on that, neither of us have the full picture of how combat works, so why immediately assume your worst fears are absolutely correct?

I'm not being overzealous. I'm optimistic and preferring to let the game speak for itself. Words from one printed interview could be stretched in so many directions that to claim any single interpretation as absolutely correct is absurd. People are reading one comment and jumping to conclusions based on it. He might as well have said the player will want to protect Lara Croft. It's the same class of overreaction.

Hailinel does have a good point here... That said it doesn't "sound" like he meant "you just have one button you press to confirm actions" but more like "You press one button and something contextually appropriate happens and it will look really cool whatever it is."

Seems to me that Square-Enix learned that people like options in difficulty other than selecting Easy, Normal, or Hard.
Bravely Default got tons of praise for the options available to players to adjust difficulty.

Every FF is effectively a one button game.

I've stopped caring about Final Fantasy combat a long time ago.

I think I'll wait and see what the actual game is before having a negative reaction.

You know, when you start comparing turn based combat with real time and equaling both in the current context is when you start sounding delusional. Hopefully i don't need to explain why. Others no doubt will if they haven't already.

Seriously you need to take a step back from every FFXV threads because you are utterly incapable of accepting any criticisms people have.

'With the hardware specifications of the newer consoles, it's possible to set it up so you have different enemies and different choices of attacks you can enter in..."

Pretty sure this has been possible for a long time on ancient hardware too. Maybe this isn't the best guy to have designing your game.

So he wants to make another Final Fantasy 13?

@pr1mus: All I stated there is a basic fact of the series. Whether the game is purely turn-based, ATB, or real-time, the core games of the franchise have always had simple combat that mostly revolves around one button. It's about how all if the systems and mechanics at play interact and respond to those button presses. FFXV doing the same isn't some new and dangerous concept.

@hailinel: You are doing this to dismiss concerns about the game becoming overly simplistic. You are essentially saying previous games are equally simplistic. Final Fantasy XII can play itself and yet has at its core one of the most complex combat system in the franchise. An idiot will not be able to play FFXII past the first couple hours when 2-3 simple gambit aren't enough anymore, let alone the 12 you can have at once eventually.

You know full well that there is a world of difference between the combat in FFXII, FFVI, FFX-2 etc. Yet you choose to equal all those things as "hey you press X for everything in those games too!" to dismiss any possible criticisms people may have. THAT is delusion.

Sounds like... maybe Kingdom Hearts combat? Especially given how reminiscent those partnered attacks seemed of the Triangle-button function in KH2. I'm not going to put oversimplification past their creative teams in this day and age (look at the opening third of FF13), but they would have to be profoundly blind to reduce their flagship epic to a single-button grind. It's doubtful that that's what being expressed here.

@hailinel: That menu you saw was the health bars of the team members.

From what I've seen in the trailer and from what they've said, it seems very much like "Press X and something will happen contextually" it really seems that it will do nothing more than give the player the only option is to press one button and see pretty things.

@hailinel: I'll quote it again:"It'll basically be a one-button action, and the AI intuitively outputs an action". That makes it sound like you press X, game does cool thing. I find it odd that you dont get that from that comment.

And nobody is "screeching" or saying that the game is somehow irredeemable because of this comment. They're just saying it sounds shitty. When all we have to go off to gauge how excited we are for a game is some trailers and comments from the developer then we respond accordingly, which is to say "hey, that sounds bad".

wait 1 hour to upgrade your sword gem or pay now!

@pr1mus: An idiot will not necessarily be able to play FFXV effectively after the same length of time. Or maybe that will be possible! Either way, I find the conclusions being jumped to comical, at best.

Maybe the combat will be rote and simplistic to a fault. But I highly doubt that's what Tabata's actually saying. I just think more people ought to wait for more information before leaping on one quote like wolves looking for blood.

@hailinel: And you should also wait for more information yourself. Your general approach to the game isn't exactly neutral either. Maybe you think people are too dismissive too quickly but many probably find your defense of what the game could be equally comical.

Let people think what they want based on what info they have. There's hardly any outrage going on these boards. At most people don't like the sound of things based on a few interviews. No one's calling for Tabata's head.

I really hope that there's some sort of misinformation going on with this interview. From what Tabata said in this interview, I can only infer that they don't want FFXV to be a game anymore; they want to make a movie. Seriously. He even admits their streamlined design direction is because the majority of japan buys casual games. Did they forget they're making an RPG? No no, I get it. You're just following the money, Square Enix. No need to hide it.

I'm really trying to suppress a knee-jerk reaction here, but that quote is the wrong thing to say to get me interested in FFXV.

Wuhhh? If every FF game prior to this has also featured one-button combat and FFXV isn't making any changes in that regard then why would this dude go out of his way to state that this game has one-button combat? He clearly, clearly does not mean one-button combat in the same sense that you do.

You only like jumping to positive conclusions I noticed, unless the game is American like Destiny and you can't stop shitting on it even though you clearly weren't playing it. As for here, people are jumping to the conclusion this game will be casual after the director said so. Yes let's wait on this, that could mean anything, unless you read the article and its pretty clear what he means and its not a great thing. But whatever do your thing

@euandewar: Probably to clear up some conceptions regarding how the game plays without going into a deep dive on it.

@pr1mus: Of course I'm not being neutral. But I'm also not being reactionary with negativity. And if you don't think people aren't calling for Tabata's head, you should see the tone of discourse on other sites. Giant Bomb is being relatively civil about this to be sure, but threads like this that focus on singular, most likely out of context quotes do the overarching conversation no favors.

@bargainben: The only thing I've gone out of my way to criticize about Destiny is the implementation of its lore and story through an external website. I'm not the only one to criticize the game for that point; a solid one, given that the game has actually been released.

And how long have you and I interacted, again? How well do you think you know me?

Eh we'll see what this actually means or if they actually follow through with it at all.

People freaked out when From made similar comments about Dark Souls II as well.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2012/12/17/on-the-edge-dark-souls-2-article-and-its-foreboding-forecast/

And conversely got way too excited by visuals that ultimately Watch Dogs and DS II didn't fully deliver.

Personally I think it's a little silly to get emotionally invested in games (for or against) this far out from release, there's a whole lot that can change between now and release. Maybe the battle system will be the new Kirby's Air Ride, Maybe some critical nuance didn't survive trying to explain it in English or maybe it's exactly what it sounds like, maybe they will decide to go another direction with battle system yet.

At best, info at this point, is just interesting. Nothing more or less.

Speculation is part of a games pre-release and that speculation can only be built on what we know.

Things we know:

• The game is pretty
• The director is Tabata now
• Tabata said some things

That quote is one of the only things to discuss and people don't like the sound of it. Knowing that, how would you like this discussion to go?

@hailinel: Why do you insist on bringing the discussion to the level of other communities then if you recognize that things are relatively civil around here? Because this is what will happen. You can't go around constantly telling people they're wrong to assume anything and expect no one to take issue with that when yourself you have no more informations than anyone else to base your opinion on.

Underlined the parts that specifically say it's going to be simpler than previous games, designed to be accessible to a larger audience, where the press of one button with the AI filling in the rest is enough to progress and where there is no need to burden yourself with having too much to do in a fight.

It cannot possibly be clearer that the game is designed to be easy, simple and accessible. This sounds like a bad thing to some.

This is not taking one quote out of context and twisting it to fit a narrative.

It sounds like you are hoping that this is taken out of context but the reality is that there's no need to do so for all of this to sound truly terrible for anyone who was hoping for a return to more complex gameplay.

@planetfunksquad: We know much more than that. We know it started as a Kingdom Hearts-like action RPG and then transitioned to something else mechanically. Kingdom Hearts is very heavy on one-button combat and contextual actions.

We know that the player can swap between direct control of each party member. We also know that in some way, party members can link up for team attacks. The lead, Noctis, can summon different weapons out of thin air and transition between them. Maybe the transition is contextual?

We know that the player will have access to a car. It's the primary method of travel, and the player can either drive it or let the game do it automatically.

We know Noctis has a teleportation power. He can use this power to warp around the environment. Perhaps it will serve a tactical use in battle?

These are all things that should be taken into consideration. Not just the basic notion of single-button combat.

@hailinel: Ok. Point made. There are things that people aren't exactly taking into account here. But to put it in the context of this thread, what if the (lots of) people assuming one button, automated combat because of Tabata's comments are right and all of that cool sounding shit is reduced to mashing X? Is that not a concern that should be raised?

Yeah, I get that there are probably a ton of dicks out there on other forums, screaming bloody murder over it, but here there were some apprehensive comments and a few jokes about QTEs. And I'm sure you'll say otherwise, but I have to believe you can see where people are coming from. For a lot of people who were pleasantly surprised by that TGS trailer after being burned by FF13 this is kind of a bad omen. Know what I mean?

Most Final Fantasy games feature hitting the A button to confirm a strategic choice in a menu. A single button action game is an entirely different affair.

I'd agree with you if he said something along the lines of "I want to make it easier to understand the complexities of the game". Instead, we have this piece of wonderful clarification on what he means by "more casual":

With the hardware specifications of the newer consoles, it's possible to set it up so you have different enemies and different choices of attacks you can enter in, but I want to simplify that. It'll basically be a one-button action, and the AI intuitively outputs an action that kind of satisfies, gives you that instant gratification, and it connects with the simple touch of a button. I myself am not getting any younger. I don't want to be frantically pushing buttons. I also want to utilise the intelligence of the hardware spec, and not have to go through too much hassle or trouble in order to execute moves.

What does this say to you other than "I would like to simplify the game down to a single button press?" Right there at the end, he says "...not have to go through too much hassle or trouble in order to execute moves".

You're right that it could still turn out to be a game with plenty of depth and we could be completely misunderstanding him. But reacting to a quote like this with worry about the game's depth and complexity is not an overreaction.

Hailinel, sometimes you're way too over-defensive of this franchise.