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Game Informer have conducted a post release interview with Final Fantasy XIII's producer Yoshinori Kitase. In the interview, Kitase was questioned about about the development of Crystal Tools and when asked what he would change, he said they should have concentrated on improving existing technology rather than creating an entirely new engine.
"Tools and engines improve through a process of trial and error and countless revisions, and that’s what really makes them more efficient."
Kitase was also questioned about the rest of the Fabula Nova Crystallis compilation. When asked whether there are more games in the compilation planning to be announced he answered "Please look forward to future announcements." Even though we've had evidence to believe this before, that pretty much confirms it.
Several of us who have played both the Japanese and International releases of Final Fantasy XIII have noticed some rather irritating changes made to how the game plays. Although the differences are minor, they still have us wondering - Why?
Vibration Many people have claimed that there is no vibration in the English PS3 version of FFXIII. This is untrue. However, how powerful the vibration is has been changed dramatically. You seldom feel it during gameplay and when you do, it's so weak it's barely worth having. This is the first game I've played where the vibration is at such a low frequency I can actually hear the motor inside my controller struggling.
Save Points An extremely minor problem but I assume some of you have come across it. In the Japanese release, when you exit the save menu, you could hold down the analogue stick while the screen quickly switched back to gameplay and you'd immediately start running. Now if you do that you'll stay motionless. You have to release the analogue stick and then try again.
Shroud Menu Known as the Smoke Menu in the Japanese release, you could run around with it open and use it at the most opportune moment. Now when you press L1 to open the shroud menu you can't move. This means you have to make sure you're the perfect distance from your target to use an aerosol or the time limit will run out and you'll end up wasting it. This gets especially annoying later in the game. Several times I've had to get so close to an enemy that I've alerted them and not had enough time to fumble through the menu.
You could say we're making a big deal about nothing but the main reason I'm posting this is because I just don't see the reason for making changes that make the experience slightly less enjoyable. We'll give you our final thoughts on the game over the following days.
Square Enix has revealed that they've shipped 3 million copies of Final Fantasy XIII for the international release of the game yesterday. How many of those copies actually sell is something we'll find out at a later date but you can bet that it's definitely the majority of them. Including the 2 million copies of FFXIII that shipped back in December for the Japanese release, that brings the titles total shipped amount of copies to 5 million worldwide.
It may have taken far longer than we expected but Final Fantasy XIII has finally been released worldwide. I'm sure most of you are too busy furiously racing through the game to read this but we hope you've enjoyed our coverage over the past few years and will continue reading our future coverage of the Fabula Nova Crystallis compilation.
Our Final Fantasy XIII Spot the Difference competition finished earlier today and I can't believe how much I underestimated your want for free stuff. Over the past eight days we've received 631 entries, effectively rendering my inbox useless. I selfishly didn't tell you how to send your images to me and let you figure it out for yourselves. Luckily most of you used an image host but to the rest of you, sorry for not replying to your pleas for help but I simply didn't have time. I also apologise to people who sent in descriptions rather than images of their solutions but I couldn't count them.
I've spent a huge amount of the last 2 days checking through all your entries and out of the total 631 I received, 344 of them were correct. You can see the correct solution below. Don't worry if yours doesn't look identical. I gave you the benefit of the doubt. I'd like to thank Whiplash for actually creating the puzzle and making this possible.
Original/Solution
Now to the winner! I asked my lovely assistant to pick a random email address from the list of winners I compiled. When I searched the email address to double check the winner was correct, I realised who this person was. By an extremely weird coincidence it's someone who's helped us out before.
Shlizar Axis! Well done and thanks to everyone who took part. We'll be sure to do more competitions in the future.
Final Fantasy XIII reviews have begun pouring out of international gaming sites over the past couple of hours after Square's embargo was lifted today. So far, many reputable sites have posted their reviews and unfortunately they all agree the title is hardly the "triple A" effort we expected. See the scores and links to the reviews below.
It looks like Microsoft hasn't bought the exclusive rights to every commercial for Final Fantasy XIII. This new advert being shown in the US advertises Final Fantasy XIII for both the PS3 and Xbox 360. Give it a watch below.
The advertising onslaught for Final Fantasy XIII in the UK has begun with a nationwide bus, poster and TV campaign. Like the US commercial, Microsoft appears to have paid a good amount of money to make sure it's exclusively advertised for Xbox 360. VG247 has the advert available for all to see below.
A week before it's international release, the Xbox 360 version of Final Fantasy XIII has been leaked. Unsurprisingly pirates have gotten their hands on it and it's appearing on torrent sites all over the web. Whether this could cause a substantial hit on sales or not is up for debate but we can assume people at both Square and Microsoft are looking into the source of the leak.
In October last year, Microsoft took action against pirates playing Forza 3 and Borderlands early by permanently banning their accounts. The following month they banned any modified consoles connected to Xbox Live rendering them useless. It's uncertain whether they will take similar action with Final Fantasy XIII.
For those of you wanting to get your hands on the Official Final Fantasy XIII Guide but haven't pre-ordered it yet, you're in luck! We're holding a competition where one of you lucky readers has the chance to get it for free.
All you have to do is spot the 13 differences between the screenshots below. Circle them in any imaged editing software and send your results to us via our Contact form. You must select the "Competition" subject otherwise your entry will be ignored. All entries must be in by noon GMT on the 5th March. A winner will be randomly selected from the group of correct entries and will be contacted for shipping details.
Crystal Tools Was a Mistake - Bring on New FNC Titles
Final Fantasy XIII Japanese Commercial 1 HD
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Japan: December 17th 2009
North America: March 9th 2010
Europe: March 9th 2010
