Old-school Final Fantasy fanboys (I include myself in that term) can get ready to have their hearts sunk by this one.

In an interview with Edge Magazine, Final Fantasy 13-2’s producer, Yoshinori Kitase, basically alluded that Square-Enix would possibly head into a new direction with Final Fantasy 15 – following the trends of action-orientated RPGs.

“In the global market we see many players moving away from games that used turn-based systems toward what you might term an action-RPG,” he said, “That’s a trend, and you ignore things like that at your peril.”

He notes things like how Final Fantasy 13’s revamped battle system was built around action and speed – which he describes as “keywords for [the team]” – but it’s not something that will necessarily stick.

Final Fantasy 13 was an entirely new direction for Square-Enix – and despite the linear story and closed-world, it did well enough as a stand-alone RPG – but a lot of fans felt it didn’t feel like a Final Fantasy game.

On one hand, new developments and new directions means that the brand is growing and not stagnating – but will that come at the cost of things that made the franchise so popular to begin with?

According to Kitase, the future direction of the franchise is “ something only time can tell.”

Perhaps Final Fantasy versus 13 will shed some light on what Squenix can do with the franchise – provided that game ever sees the light of day.

Source: Edge Magazine