New York Comic Con final day: Square Enix Central

I arrived at NYCC 2010 this morning to large crowds, though today's crowd put Saturday's to shame by sheer volume. Not that I’m complaining. I dislike feeling like a sardine. I bee-lined it to the Square Enix Booth before the masses were through to door. Square Enix had a huge setup and it took a while to make the rounds.

First, I spoke with Robert Allen Peeler who took me through some of the features of Final Fantasy XIV. This is just an amazing game. It is beautiful. I've seen the ads and the trailers, and I’ve been really wanting to give this game a try. The visuals are just stunning. I don't know what better word there is to describe it. As Robert explained to me, Final Fantasy XIV is an MMORPG which they have worked at to be very story driven. Many of the games in this genre focus around a quest based system where players earn rewards and advance by completing tasks with a varied range of focus. Often times as a result, the story behind this is lost by players who just have their eye on the prize. What is unique about the questing in FFXIV is how the game funnels players through the storyline, incorporated many mini-movies, and encourages the player to talk to the NPCs to learn more about the world and find quests to undertake. The developers have worked hard on the story progression, and want the user to be immersed in the full game experience, rather than just grinding to complete a quest check-list and level up.

Another unique feature of FFXIV is the ability to scale the difficulty of the questing in the game to match the nature of the party you are playing in, be it solo, with a friend, or a full group of players. Many of the MMORPG's out there have predetermined difficulties to the mobs and associated quests, and so certain instances, quests and zones can only be completed by finding a group or raid party.

I was also excited to hear from Robert that the PS3 version of this will be available early next year, and that there will be full integration of the PC and PS3 sides, so all players worldwide will have access to play against and with everyone else, regardless of the platform. So when your friend with a Mac and a PS3 gets this title, you will be able to play together. Certainly something very unique among multi-platform online games.

Next at the Enix booth, I got to speak to Johnny Fournier, who took me through a run of Front Mission Evolved. In Front Mission Evolved, players ride their mechanized weapons platforms around in first-person arena combat. Players can enter and play free-for-all or team-sytle in an effort to get as many kills while taking the fewest. It’s similar from the mech standpoint to Mechwarrior, where players customize a mech with weapons and add-ons to gain an advantage against your opponents. Players can choose from several platforms which vary in size and speed, and unlock weapons and other equipment through experience. It is a fast paced game, was a lot of fun to play against other people there on the floor of the convention center. Front Mission Evolved will be next week for the PS3, Xbox 360 and PC.

I spoke with Andrew Ahn of Enix next and he showed me the newest in a line of Final Fantasy games of the DS/DSi platform, Final Fantasy the 4 Heroes of Light. He walked me through the basics. This is a bit of a throwback to a more traditional RPG type system, with turn-based combat and a 3-dimensional world to explore. Players take on the role of "Brandt", who has just become an adult by turning 14, as tradition states, he must go speak to the King. The King tasks him with defeating a creature in a nearby cave, thus setting in motion the events of the game. For players to progress through the storyline, they must complete missions. If you are familiar with the prior DS-based Final Fantasy games, or even titles from games in the Zelda series, than this will be familiar. This looks like an entertaining title, but check back here in a few days as I will be reviewing this game and will give a full rundown!

I tried another MMORPG called Wakfu (pronounced Waahk-fu), which is in development and is due out sometime in 2011. This was a really neat looking game. Many similarities to other MMORPG type games... players must complete questss to gain experience and levels and can focus their earned experience to improve attributes and actions. There is a trade skill system and players will be able to produce and sell items to their fellow players supporting in-game commerce. There are a couple of very neat and unique concepts that Wakfu's developers are trying to incorporate relate to the governance and social aspect of the game world. The world will be split up into different cities or states (I am not clear on what the official designation will be) that will have resources which may only occur in some of these zones. Some will benefit a certain classes. These resources may benefit certain classes over others. Players can then affect their local hometown by becoming involved in its governance. Players will be able essentially run for office to rule a particular area. A player wanting to full this role might declare to his piers that he will focus on certain resources or other attributes of the region that would benefit himself and similar classed players. Once elected, they can than affect this aspect of the game. This was a fascinating concept to me, and I am looking forward to learning more about how this will work. Wakfu is a turn-based RPG and has a free-to-play model. Expect to see some sort of micro-transaction capability, as well as the ability to pay for premium content.

Last at Enix, I got to play Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded. This is another title for the DSi, and incorporates many characters of Disney lore with characters from Final Fantasy past. In Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded, the fairlytale world of Disney is set as if it existed inside-the-computer. Behind the classic world look of Disney exists an electronic world that has been infected by computer-evil. The objective is to play through various worlds and clean them of the virus-scourge using your key-sword, attack moves and cunning. I played the demo on display and enjoyed this title as well. There is a lot of real-time combat, with the player swinging their weapon, using various moved and combos to defeat the evemy. I'm looking forward to its release, which I'm told by Enix' Alfred Holz is certain as 1/11/11.

Separately, Enix was doing demo-movies of Deus Ex, Final Fantasy XIV and Dungeon Siege 3. We have video from the Dungeon Siege 3 presentation, which you will see shortly here as well.

I spent a good part of the day at the Square Enix booth, and I'm not sad about it one bit. With all there was to see here at NYCC from Square Enix, I can only say that they have one hit after another on their hands. I'm looking forward to diving into all of these different worlds. The only thing I can complain about is that Square Enix is making it hard to decide where to begin.