[06/06] Lightning Returns hits Europe February 2014

[Ohri-Jin]

Thu, Jun 06, 2013 | 11:13 BST

Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy 13 hits Europe February 2014, new trailer inside

Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy 13 will release across Europe in February 2014, and the RPG has also received a new trailer courtesy of Square-Enix to mark the announcement.
Square tweeted that the game will release February 14, 2014 on PS3 and Xbox 360 across Europe.
Here’s the clip:

Source - http://www.vg247.com/2013/06/06/lig...hits-europe-february-2014-new-trailer-inside/



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Thu, Jun 06, 2013 | 13:01 BST

Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy 13 Ultimate Box edition revealed, pack-art inside

Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy 13 will receive a limited Ultimate Box edition in Japan, which contains an action figure, and all three games in the trilogy among other things. The game’s standard box-art has also been revealed by Square-Enix. Check it all out inside.

The box is heading to Japan and is available on the Square-Enix store now for ¥26,000.
Earlier today, Square announced that Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy 13 will launch on PS3 and Xbox 360 across North America on February 11 and across Europe February 14.

We’ve got the official PS3 and Xbox 360 box-art below, courtesy of AGB.

Source - http://www.vg247.com/2013/06/06/lightning-returns-final-fantasy-13-ultimate-box-edition-revealed-pack-art-inside/



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[h=1]Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII’s Battle System Is All About Switching Schema[/h] By Spencer . June 6, 2013 . 4:01am
22 16 0 Share61

Siliconera recently saw a slice of Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII, which took place in Yusnaan, it’s like the Sin City in Lightning’s world. Hope acts as Lightning’s navigator and the two characters continually talk as you walk through the map.

The level designers added obstacles to jump over, a ladder to climb, and a pole to slide down. Since this was a demo I didn’t worry about the clock in the right-hand corner, which reminds players how much time is left until the end of the world. I decided to explore the area hoping to find a secret enemy like in the Final Fantasy XIII-2 E3 demo, but alas I didn’t discover anything of the sort. This demo felt similar to a Kingdom Hearts map where you move through one room of enemies to the next.

As you just saw in the E3 trailer, Snow also returns for Lightning Returns. He appears to be an antagonist since Lightning pursues Snow in this mission. Hope explains that the people in Yusnaan call Snow a "patron" and the two discuss how Snow’s desire to protect others has carried over to an entire city. I spotted Snow twice in the dilapidated castle and tried to catch him, but he always escaped before Lightning could grab him.


That said, the Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII demo was really designed to demonstrate the combat system. Enemies in Lightning Returns appear on the map and will chase Lightning if they see her. You can gain an upper hand in battle by striking first. Hit an enemy and they lose 10% of their HP when the fight starts. If an enemy hits Lightning first you lose 5% of your HP. The trick is to strike an enemy from behind which knocks off 25% of an enemy’s HP right off the bat.

Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII only has one character to play as — Lightning. However, you can change her attacks by switching Schema. You do this by pressing L1 and R1 so it’s kind of like having three command sets. The demo had three Schema to try:

Divinity
Triangle: Thunder
Circle: Attack
Square: Block
X: Galestrike

Dark Muse
Triangle: Electric Blitz
Circle: Heavy Slash
Square: Lesser Guard
X: Light Slash

Sorceress
Triangle: Firaga
Circle: Ruin
Square: Lesser Guard
X: Blizzara

Stronger attacks like Firaga drain more of the ATB gauge than a simple spell like Ruin. Each schema actually has its own ATB bar, so you can spam Thunder in Lightning’s Divinity form, then switch to Dark Muse and do a Light Slash –> Heavy Slash –> Light Slash combo and finally finish an enemy off with Firaga. By the time you cycle through all three Schema, the first one will have recovered about 50% of its ATB bar. Usually, fights against weaker mobs end before you can cycle through all three Schema. If all of the ATB gauges are completely out you have to wait, but you can still walk around by using the left analog stick. Lightning does not recover HP after each fight and she didn’t have any cure spells in the demo either. Fortunately, Square Enix gave demo players a couple of X-Potions, a Bravery Potion, and a Faith Potion.



After running through the castle, I reached the one boss battle in the Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII demo. Lumina appears and steps out of a shroud of chaos (it was like a black mist). She says to Lightning in a slightly curious, slightly taunting tone that Lightning wasn’t one of god’s usual lackeys since Lightning could see her. Lumina then summons the dragon-like Zaltys from the chaos and vanishes.

Zaltys attacked with a lunging bite and a fireball attack. Lightning can block to reduce damage by pressing square right before Zaltys strikes with its jaws. Not all blocks are created equal, though. Block in the Divinity schema reduces more damage than Lesser Block in Sorceress or Dark Muse schemas. The key is to switch schema back to Divinity to maximize the effectiveness of a block so you have to push either L1 and then square or R1 and then square.

The stagger system introduced in the Final Fantasy XIII series is back in Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII with a few tweaks. On top of dishing out more damage, Lightning has a chance to stagger an enemy which will knock it down for a few seconds. Players have to repeatedly and rapidly exploit elemental weaknesses to increase the stagger wave and when it’s full the enemy will be incapacitated. I found the easiest way to stagger Zaltys was to block first (blocking also increases the stagger wave), then spam thunder (it’s elemental weakness), switch to Dark Muse to spam Electric Blitz, and then switch back to Divinity to use Thunder.


Actually, there is an easier way to stagger Zaltys. Lightning can use the Overdrive meter by pressing L2 to slow time. After I activated Overdrive it only took two uses of thunder to stagger the beast. There is a limit to the amount of times you can use Overdrive, so you want to save it for big fights.

After defeating Zaltys, I asked a Square Enix representative where in the game did the demo take place. The rep explained that due to the open ended structure of Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII you can visit Yusnaan in the beginning of the game or in the middle.

Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII was bumped back from fall 2013 to February 11, 2014. The game will be released on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.

Source - http://www.siliconera.com/2013/06/0...tasy-xiiis-battle-system-is-all-about-schema/

 

[Zeroxys]

OMG it looks so awesome DD

 

[Linnaete]

This looks fantastic. By fantastic, I mean, it looks great for a game I may pick out somewhere down the line for £10-£15 if I am in a good mood!

THE GOOD

+ Oh my God, an actual HD big city place!

+ I kind of like this new Snow. Sure, he looks like he belongs in Kingdom Hearts's Organisation XIII, but I love his new outfit, his newfound villainy by the looks of it, and the fact that he's absolutely nothing like the Snow from before! I love this anti-Snow!

+ It's open ended so you can presumably go wherever you want, whenever you want!

THE BAD

- Lightning's voice acting here is TERRIBLE. Ali Hillis sounds even MORE bored than usual. It's like she's also wondering why she's here. She doesn't care if she's phoning it in as long as she gets her pay. Either that or the script is that bad it's not her fault!

- Snow's "yer gonna try an' kill me, HRR?" line and delivery, LOLOLOLOL

- The script sounds laughably awful, compounded by the aforementioned awful delivery from Ali Hillis. But it fits a character like Lightning, I guess.

- The framerate is all over the place. I don't think they're going to fix that, given the size of the world, the content they want to throw in, the short development time, and just simply because this is not an AAA-game in the making. I repeat: the framework is all over the place, an when it is bad, it is atrocious.

- Why the hell is Noel still wearing the same thing? They can give Lightning a hundred stupid new costumes, but they can't afford Noel a new one, when evidently he is going to play some role in the story?

- They haven't sold me on Lumina here. Don't give me a boring line about an Oracle Drive or whatever. Give me a few seconds of Lumina legitimately trolling Lightning.

- Aesthetically, it looks bad. The bullshots have looked nice enough, but I can't help but feel it resembles a standard remastered PS2 game.

- That ice halberd-axe thing that Snow has? It looks really dumb.

- Lightning's new fleet of costumes look awful as usual.

- Where the hell is this all going? Is this simply going to be the story of Lightning's corrupted friends that she will have to "kill", etc. while everyone else sans Hope seems willing to go after her for her blood? This is one massive drug-induced acid trip of a trilogy. At least FFXIII as a standalone has a grounded setting I can just about insert myself into. Here? I don't know the rules at all anymore. So much for the end of FFXIII-2 with Chaos dooming the world, when the worst you can get now is a more decadent-than-usual Blackpool at night run by Snow.

- The front covers of the game in both versions so far look awful.

- This:

This is trying way too hard to be "cool". It's not cool. It's laughable shite.
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[Climhazzard]

February 2014?!

Does this mean those of us who couldn't give a toss about Lightning and her XIII saga now need to wait till at least late 2014/early 2015 for Versus?

This might just be the final nail in the coffin.

 

[.Mosh]

I think it personally is showing more signs of promise than the previous two. Yes I have played and enjoyed FFXIII and FFXIII-2 but I know they aint the greatest by a long shot but they are still good games in my eyes. The delay hasn't been given a reason as well as we do not know what they are showing yet next tuesday.

And another thing that ticks me off is people talking about bad delivery on lines.....yer it sometimes sounded cheesey but who cares I have enjoyed greatly received movies and played games that have great reviews that have their fair share of badly voiced dialogue. It just seems everyone is just nit picking every little detail about the game, no matter what information is shown, its just getting childish now I mean come on stop living in the past and get on with the future...no one is telling you to stick by the franchise but other people are enjoying it just not the 10's of people on this forum that keep nick and dimming it.

I hope S-E does well with this title I want them to also show off some amazing things at their presentation. I will continue to buy whatever they produce because I like JRPG's and RPGS (Don't go down the whole action RPG concept...i know that but whats saying their new titles go back to their old roots)

 

[Tyler Breeze]

#FuckThatBoxart #FuckThisCompany etc etc. First off, that big package thing looks super hella dope. And it sucks that more often than not we out here don't get these things. Second, despite my hashtag, I actually really like the boxart. It looks..... Nice. To put it in a TV PG kind of way. I cannot elaborate any more than I have. Anyway, despite this company pissing me off all the time, I'm really looking forward to playing this game, though it will be later than I wanted it to be. :jeri: CM Punk is not impressed with any of this bullshit though.

 

[Razberry Knight]

the mechanics look fine. i dont doubt this game will be enjoyable if it was a plotless journey from thatgamecompany but as an rpg you can already see the plot suffer. damn you xiii two. sigh...just get this game over with.