1920×1080
The latest issue of Famitsu included an interview with LIGHTNING RETURNS developers and they were nice enough to share new information! Thanks for translating the article, Andriasang.
- The game is currently 30% complete
- This will be Lightning’s last game and will end with a happy ending. The game has just one ending.
- The first FFXIII was story driven, meaning that the story pulled the player along. FFXIII-2 was player driven, meaning players selected the story. Lightning Returns is World Driven, meaning players have to consider how they interact with the changing world.
- The game’s in-game time works out to one day being the equivalent of one to two hours of real time. There will be increases and decreases in time.
- The game is meant to be played and cleared multiple times. The volume is not such that it will take many tens of hours to clear once.
- People from XIII-2 haven’t died. Because of the effects of the chaos (I’m not sure if this is the proper English word), people have stopped aging and don’t get old.
- The Novus world has four continents, two natural and two city-type.
- Depending on your actions, the remaining life of the world could decrease, and the game could end before the 13 day limit.
- There are some times when helping someone will decrease the life of the world.
- Defeating some enemies and clearing some quests will increase the life of the world.
- Lightning is all by herself in battle, allowing you to concentrate more than when you had to control a party.
- Lightning has become a considerably more refined person.
- You can freely move around during battle. Some elements of the battle system are timing-based.
- The battle system is close to action. There’s an ATB gauge.
- During battle, you don’t select menu commands. Instead, you select abilities which have been assigned to buttons.
- Hope will give guidance to Lightning via wireless com.
- The city has clocks everywhere showing the constant progression of time.
Categories: Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII
SQUARE PORTAL 
What about SERAH?!
Thats wat id like to know
Even though I was a bit disappointed in the last game, this is one my most anticipated games of 2013! (Alongside Gears of War: Judgement and BioShock Infinite for the record)
I like that there’s a definitive ending; one way or another as mentioned alot now, Lightning’s journey will be finished; I just hope everything will come full circle by the time the game’s over
I really like how in this game, you’ll continue to pretty much travel at your own pace instead of going through POINT A to Z, though I had no problem with linearity in FF13. Still, a bit iffy about a countdown to doomsday sort of thing. I know completing side quests will give you more time, but some of them would actually speed up the clock doesn’t bold well for me. I was kinda hoping for a Majora’s Mask approach where on the final day, you can reset all the way to the beginning.
Another thing that sounds a bit iffy is that Lightning is the only character you’ll be using this time. One of the things I didn’t like is that the playable characters from FF13 I got to know and care about (except Hope), was hardly ever seen in FF13-2, excluding DLCs and just using Sereh and Noel alongside monsters, I just couldn’t connect to them like I did with the cast of the first game. Even though Hope has started to grow on me, it just gonna suck hearing Lightning and Hope talking. Still, glad we’ll get to see how Snow and the others are handling the situation.
If there’s one thing for sure I know it will be for this upcoming title, is that the gameplay will hold up, even if you’re an army of one. I’ve played games like Xenoblade Chronicles where you can freely move and select your targets, so if they could pull it off, so can this.
Kinda wish there were a clear New Game + feature here though…
I figure there’ll be a new game plus of some kind. And when time expires you either have the choice to go to the final battle (this probably requires making progress in the main quest) or go back to the beginning which still carries over your development.
Right now my only concerns are the saving style (hope it’s not auto-save again, I’d like to create multiple files per playthrough just in case I screw up or miss a quest) and if weapons will be carried over when you start again. I don’t want to have to work to get her ultimate weapon only to be able to own with it for 4 or 5 hours. A new game plus that carries over development and weapons would solve that though!
Anybody else feel for Dajh? dude’s lived for over 100 years and is still stuck in the body of a child…
Yay Hope! He better be in there a lot. And I’m nervous about not playing in a party anymore. That was one of my favorite things about FFXIII. I’m gonna die…a lot. Hahah. Other than that, it sounds really interesting! Especially the world-driven/time concept.
f******k I KNEW IT!!!!
my theory at the end of xiii-2 was that caius created a world where time is in some kind of limbo so the people will stop from aging.
so thought in ffxiii-3 hundreds of years has passed, hope snow noel and the others are still alive.
and people thought they were dead xD
They must be too weak to fight the Chaos monsters.
yeah i’m sad because they won’t be playable but lightning is actually the strongest of the team and the only one that has a chance against the new monsters. :D
That’s very true, but in reality she’s only as strong as Square lets her be xD With just Light you can’t depend on other party members to have your back. As much as I love Lightning, I would love to play all the characters from the last two games (mostly Hope, Snow, Serah & Noel…but most of all Hope lol) I scared I’ll get bored with just Lightning…I nearly got bored in XIII-2 with just Serah and Noel! Idk…maybe it’s just me hahah.
I prefer it this way. I wanted a Lightning-only game but at the same time I didn’t want the other characters to just disappear. It’d be awesome to visit them as NPCs. I wonder if they’ll have their own houses and jobs, etc.
i’m sure they will, and maybe they will have a new appareance.
i can just imagine.
Hope: hey lightning i found a map, looks like there is a door down there
Lightning: thanks hope ~kiss~
Hope:…wa…what was that?
Lightning: ehhhhmmm nothing
Hope: i heard like a kiss
Lightning: YOURE WRONG seems like i have some interference bzzzzz