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New screenshots of Final Fantasy XIII have surfaced!! It was previously revealed yonks ago that our agile new heroine would become part of your typical FF style party, and that it was highly likely that the red haired girl and the Seifer look-a-like in the hat would be part of it. And whilst these screenshots don’t really confirm that, they actually kinda do. The shots above show our little party spending quality time together in much more rural settings as opposed to the high tech cities we’ve seen up until now. The shot on the top right is especially striking; showing a colossal figure amidst tidal waves which appear to have frozen.

Square Enix are still keeping tight lipped about anything concerning this games’ plot and its characters, which is just how I like it! There’s nothing worse than knowing everything about a game way before it’s even released.

As we speak, there’s a bunch of Square Enix employees working their fingers to the bone to get this game completed, along with a bunch of other Final Fantasy related games on the side. Oh yeah, and the forthcoming Xbox 360 port of this game as well.

A playable demo of Final Fantasy XIII will be made available with Final Fantasy VII: Advent children complete when it releases in Japan in March 2009. There’s no word on if this demo will be made available for download on the PSN marketplace.

Watch it: Final Fantasy XIII E3 2008 trailer
Read about it: Fabula nova crystallis: Final Fantasy

[Famitsu]

NZone has stated that a PC version of Final Fantasy XIII is already in the works, utilizing the new Crystal Tools development environment, which makes it possible for game developers to create cross-platform games. It’s still unclear if this port will be for both Japanese AND English versions, or just one or the other. While this might be yet another reason to NOT buy a PS3, this particular news piece should be taken with a grain of salt as they also mentioned that FFXII is an online game and was released for the XBox 360, though I’m inclined to think that it’s just an honest typo error on NZone’s part.

Confirmation on this bit of information will probably be done by Square-Enix sooner, rather than later, and we will be on the lookout for that, so stay tuned folks!

[NZone]

Another game gone multi format and one less reason to buy a PS3. News of the Xbox 360 release either shocked you downright or didn’t surprise you at all given the slew of high profile titles that were once Sony exclusive getting simultaneous releases on the Xbox 360. I fell into the shocked downright camp as I never thought I’d see the day Square Enix would release a new entry into the main Final Fantasy series on a console other than Sony’s.

Not much more information has been disclosed about this game other than it’s release for the Xbox 360 and the inclusion of a new ‘overclock system’ which will allow players to slow down time around them and lay the smackdown on enemies. Rumor has it this will replace the Limit break / Overdrive system. It’s unknown whether this slow down ability will be available to all party members in battle or if it’s exclusive to Lightning and other characters will be given other abilities or forms of attacks.

You can check out a run down of all the information on Final Fantasy XIII revealed up until now here.

Not much is shown that we haven’t seen before, but that said the game looks incredibly slick and I’m digging the funky Uematsu’s composed theme song. As with Versus XIII’s trailer, I’m getting a sense of déjà vu. Final Fantasy XII stunk of Star Wars and it seems XIII will too. And the whole flipping in the air whilst shooting a pistol gives me flashbacks of Yuna in Final Fantasy X-2. The difference being that XIII’s leading lady looks a heck of alot cooler, not so girly and appears to be a heck of alot more capable. It’s good to have a kick arse female in a Final Fantasy game. There hasn’t been one in an FF game since Tifa in VII. Though she lost major cool points after hanging up the mini skirt and getting punk’d like a bitch in Advent children. (How she lost that fight is still a mystery to me…)

Square Enix has said that their aim with Final Fantasy XIII is to have in game battles that rival the pace and intensity of those in Advent children. If anybody can pull that off it’s Square Enix and the PS3 is more than capable of handling it. But the mind boggles as to how the battles system is going to work. My guess is that the battle system will be some offshoot of Final Fantasy XII’s and that those really cool moves shown in the trailer above are triggered set pieces. Kinda like how the triangle command worked in Kingdom Hearts II. But that’s just a complete hunch.

Of the 3 titles that make up Fabula nova crystallis: Final Fantasy, this will release first. There’s no release date, but my guess is that Japan will see it at Christmas of 2008, whilst North America and Europe are made to sit tight until 2009. I doubt very much neither of the Final Fantasy games are close to completion. With the amount of games Square Enix have in development right now it’s a wonder how they get anything completed at all. I bet Square Enix employees haven’t seen their families since the release of Final Fantasy VII.

[JeuxFrance]

Square Enix chose to keep trailers of their forthcoming Final Fantasy XIII and Kingdom Hearts games private at this year’s Tokyo game show. I doubt anybody cared. I sure as hell didn’t. But an extended trailer for Final Fantasy versus XIII has now been released. By released I mean ripped from a DVD. Some bonus DVD got released in Japan and this trailer was on it. So of course it got ripped and uploaded to the Internets. Thank God for the Internet and embeddable videos!

As is always with Square Enix, the quality of the FMV is astounding from a visual standpoint. But I couldn’t help but think “Meh” as I watched this. There’s a resounding sense of deja vu about the whole thing. The main guy looks like a member of Kingdom Hearts II’s Organization XIII and the scene itself easily could’ve been a deleted one from Advent children. It probably was and then Square Enix decided to spin it off into another game.

For those who don’t know, Final Fantasy versus XIII is one of three Final Fantasy XIII games which will collectively form Fabula nova crystallis, which translates roughly as Tale of the new crystal. Final Fantasy XIII is the main game and some mobile phone bullshit is the other. All 3 of these games are set in their own universes, but are unified by their central themes, which I’m assuming will be a crystal and a love interest.

Final Fantasy Versus XIII is being directed by Advent children and Kingdom Hearts director Tetsuya ‘I make men look effeminate and draw kids with huge feet’ Nomura. This of course means Versus XIII will have FMV sequence and cut scenes that look like they were jacked straight out of Advent children and the game will play just like Kingdom Hearts II and probably feature Bahamut and a character named Cid for good measure.

Despite my cynicism, I’m looking forward to this game. I just find it hard to get excited about it when Square Enix’s past few efforts have been so lackluster, there is such little information on this game, the scene above looks so unoriginal and the game probably won’t release in North America or Europe until 2009.

[JeuxFrance]