Square Enix announced Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII less than a week ago and already some of the first details regarding the game have trickled out. Andriasang has broken the details down for us from the pages of Famitsu.
The game is only 30% complete right now, but already some of the main game mechanics are in place. Similar to Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, Lightning Returns will feature an in-game time system that is related to how much time passes in the real world. Specifically, one day in the game will pass for every hour or two spent playing in real time. The game is set to take about 13 game days, which would translate to roughly 13-26 hours of gameplay.
However, the “life” of the world can be shortened or extended depending on the actions you take. And don’t think that that means you should run around helping people as much as possible, as helping people can sometimes shorten the world’s life, too. Square Enix intends for the game to played through multiple times with the idea that things will be different each time. That said, the game only has one ending and it’s meant to be a happy ending for Lightning.
People from XIII-2 haven’t died; in fact, they have stopped aging. Hope will communicate with Lightning via a wireless com. However, combat will not be party-based. Instead, players will only control Lightning and will be able to move freely about the battlefield in a more action-oriented system. There is still an ATB gauge like the other XIII games and some elements of combat will be timing-based. Instead of being menu-based, abilities will be tied to specific buttons.
Sounds like a pretty big set of changes for Final Fantasy. What do you think?
Bad news for me. I’d probably skip a lot of stuff out of fear for the world’s life.
But some quests DO prolong the world’s life.
Knowing my luck, those would be the ones I skipped over. ):