Author Topic: FF10 Tech spechs (Read 14267 times)

halkun · « **on:** 2001-04-09 12:09:00 »

I was able to get the inside skinny on the technology and program flow on the newest Final Fantasy. There are some improvement as well as some setbacks to FF10. This is all hearsay and roumors but I was able to at least talk to the wife of a square devoper to see what was going on. Sneaky me ^_^

First and formost, Square's "even team" is working on this one. they were responsable for FF8 which I wan't a big fan of. You can visually tell it's the same dev team from the character designs to some of the aspects of the battle system, which I will be getting into later.

Let's talk about what's diffent.

The engine uses a extramly modded version of the bouncer engine. Kind of like when FF8 used a modded version of the parasite eve engine. The Anti-alising is done in software using the "fuzzy-blur" method. It's a shame that the hardware AA is sooo slooow. Oh well, every PSX must have a critical hardware bug in it. (The original PSX had a clipping bug in the GPU, that's why clipping looked so bad in many many many games)

The fields are not pre-rendered anymore. I have mixed feelings about this. Will square give up some detail in thier renders for 3d graphics again (I know, the renders were only 320x244, but they looked good on a TV screen) The backgrounds I've seen so far have been less then stellar. The game isn't done yet though.

The battle module and the field module have been merged so the system can go from drama to battle seamlessly. There is no "whooh" with a cool mosic and then a 3d battle stage. I havn't seen if thw world map still enters battle the old way or not. When you run from a battle, the monster is still in the environment The battle menus are gon though.

The battle system has gotten cooler and dumber at the same time. Here's how it works.

The battle uses three characters like in 8, but you can swap in your other party members during battle. In the upper right hand corner there are icons of the three characters in battle with an ATB bar after them. below that you have the monsters icons and thier ATB bar (yes, you can see them now) and then the remaining characters that are "banked out" are placed under that with full ATB. I'm not too clear on how characters can be switched in.

Every character has a job class like in 9. Yuna is a summoner, lulu is a white mage. That is cool. There is also an antho-lion who is a dragoon (has the "jump command") But with sadness I must announce that the "one-shot" magic system from FF8 is back again.

There is no drawing from what I can tell. Also junctions appear to be absent. When you aqire spells from a yet-to-be-determined way. You will only have so much. The menus I saw had "blizard 8 firga 22 stop 12" selectable after the magic command was issued.
The commands are also swappable, you have three slots (as opposed to FF8 which had four) I beleave one of the battle commands can not be switched out (The "intresic" one if you will) but I've seen "item" switched for something else. The menus are semi-trasparent blue. They look pretty.

Mogs are there.

Speech! augh, square better get some good voice actors, Trust me, if we get some sort of Resident Evil voices, square would know.

That's it for my report now... comments ^_^

--------------------------------
YAY! I'm a CRAZY POSTER !!!!!!!

[This message has been edited by halkun (edited April 09, 2001).]

Qhimm · « **Reply #1 on:** 2001-04-09 13:03:00 »

You *are* a sneaky bastard. ^^

eerrrr · « **Reply #2 on:** 2001-04-09 14:41:00 »

wow, nice one halkun. i really didnt like the idea of the one-shot magic system, it was stupid. they shouldve taken more from ff9 than 8 considering they now 8 was a flop. what do u mean theres no whoosh into the battle? is it like you fight the battle on the current scene your in instead of changing to a different environment like the rest?

halkun · « **Reply #3 on:** 2001-04-09 15:13:00 »

You walk out of the inn and into the street. A bad looking soldier is there. You Say "hey wassup" and he gets grumpy. "I'm going to kill you"

The Camera pans to behind the main character, the scene down't change. a little water ripple and the menus come up. No whoosh. oh and after you summon a beast, he is a member of your party. You contol him for the duration of the battle.

Sir Canealot · « **Reply #4 on:** 2001-04-09 15:40:00 »

They have got rid of MP again? WTF is worng with them? MP has worked great in over 8 final fantasys(Includeing ones on game boy ect) and the one where they take mp out is crap!

The Skillster · « **Reply #5 on:** 2001-04-09 17:13:00 »

one-shot magic? is that mean NO mP? i didnt like the idea of getting to SEE when the enemy will attack u, it makes it feel ROBOTIC like, and yes classes is a good thing to "catergorise" players, unlike ff7/8 but if it doesnt have the fantasy feel of ff7/9 and is a serious "love" style or "dark" style like ff8 then it will be another flop. for god's sake we dont want to PLAY a love story (ff8 HAD WAY TOO MUCH DIRECT SPEECH) we would rahter read a book.

The SaiNt · « **Reply #6 on:** 2001-04-09 18:06:00 »

We'll just have to wait and see....

Aaron · « **Reply #7 on:** 2001-04-09 19:34:00 »

you sure those numbers are limited stocks of magic, and not the MP cost for the magic?

I looked at all these movies from ps2.ign.com about the previews for FFX... Here's what I noticed...

Check out the characters little bars (bottom right of screen i believe). They have an HP bar with numbers above it, AND an MP bar.

The summons cost MP I believe, I saw the summon list, each one had a number like "28" next to it.

When you summon something, it joins your party for the fight (or until it dies, or until you tell it to go away?) - while it is there, all of the characters leave except for your summoner, but you can't tell the summoner to do anything, just the summon. The summon can preform special moves, which I believe also use MP (again, you can see the summon's MP bar in the movies and you can see the MP the moves cost when you select them).

ALSO I saw a monster do an attack that absorbed MP from a character (it said "10 MP" as the damage to the character, and "10 MP" in green on the monster).

eerrrr · « **Reply #8 on:** 2001-04-09 19:59:00 »

thats good then. i dont think square would be stupid enough to make another plain love story. or maybe they r stupid (joey). the idea of controlling a summon sounds good, imagine controlling bahumat! that would be fun.

Aaron · « **Reply #9 on:** 2001-04-10 19:21:00 »

I downloaded some movies of them controlling Ifrit and some bird thing. It looks cool.

Anonymous · « **Reply #10 on:** 2001-04-13 03:57:00 »

I'm personally disapointed that there won't be a PC version of FFX (or no talk of one yet). I can afford the horsepower on a computer but I outgrew consoles long ago. I'm not about to pour out a ton of cash for another one when my TV already has like 5 switchboxes on it. Now if I can get a free PS2 BIOS and emulator, then i'll be just fine. Square, etc. need to get their heads out of their collective backsides and shed their console shells, you can get a million times the firepower off of a computer than a console system. Consoles all have their strongpoints, but PCs have those same strongpoints but often in more than one place.

As far as MP goes, I've played all the FF games except 9 and 10, and found 8 to be the most refreshing and exciting. Not only because Squall fits my persona and looks to the letter, and the same with Rinoa and my girlfriend, but also because the storyline REALLY caught my attention. Romance and time, time and romance. I honestly don't care much about the mechanics of the game, but the one shot magic was a rather good idea, It allowed you more free reign over the magic, shuffling it between people, aligning ANY party to face the monsters they were up against rather than hoping that your magic user is there when you need him/her. It also prevents you from using ultima and other powerful, rare spells dozens of times because you bought a bunch of cheap items.

The SaiNt · « **Reply #11 on:** 2001-04-13 11:43:00 »

About console's, I myself still prefer the PC to a console.
That's why I use emu's 99% of the time.
The PC is an excellent platform despite it's many shortcomings.

Caddberry · « **Reply #12 on:** 2001-04-13 11:44:00 »

WOW a positive comment on ff8 ! you dont see that much around here.. i loved the damn game and i thoughtit wuz smooth.... and u can use spells dozens of times just use an editor and give them to yourself... i have apocalypse on disc 2

Joey · « **Reply #13 on:** 2001-04-13 15:00:00 »

Well.....I'm the same with you, Wing!!!! FF10 USES a lot of movies, so, it will be out on DVDs. Um, it will aslo be out in CD roms as not much people have DVD in the world.

Sir Canealot · « **Reply #14 on:** 2001-04-13 16:05:00 »

I think most people with the PC to run FFX(If a pc port comes along) Will have a DVD. So I dont expect to see a 8 cd version.

eerrrr · « **Reply #15 on:** 2001-04-13 17:09:00 »

well ff9 does make a better use of the magic system, in the fact that everybody has individual powers. so you cant just choose whoever to join your team and win a fight easily, you should try ff9.

Aaron · « **Reply #16 on:** 2001-04-14 06:30:00 »

Joey doesn't know what he's talking about...?

There will NOT be a CD version of FFX. There will be only a DVD version (well actually two I think - one comes on one DVD, and there's a two-DVD version that has extra features like HDTV support(?) and funky surround sound - at least I heard that somewhere). I know for a fact that there will be no CD version though.

Um, I dunno if there'll be PC... I really hope so, because I'm gonna buy a freakin' AWESOME PC in the near future and I don't wanna have to shell out more money for a PS2... If there's no PC version, I guess I'll just wait for the emulators to get good enough to play it. Its very convienient that around the time FF9 came out, emulators were supporting it, I got to keep my streak of playing every one (all 9) of the FF games on my computer and not a console.

1-shot magic system is annoying. I think FFX has MP but I'm not positive. I also like the characters to have different classes - if they all can do exactly the same stuff (i.e. FF3, 5, 6 kinda 7, then it gets kind of boring. FF9 was awesome.

Joey · « **Reply #17 on:** 2001-04-15 15:21:00 »

Ok. So, you think that it will not be out on CD rom, just wait.

Sir Canealot · « **Reply #18 on:** 2001-04-15 15:41:00 »

Well joey give reasons that it will be out on 8cds! Please I would like to hear them!

ficedula · « **Reply #19 on:** 2001-04-15 15:50:00 »

Oh, we will wait. Just like we're still waiting for FF9 PC, or even for that FF9 PC demo you claimed was out.

See, Joey, you don't have a very good track record of being able to show your claims are correct. Ever heard the story about the kid who cried wolf? Now, if you were able to give us a link to an article by Square where they said "we won't abandon CD's for a while", maybe we'd believe you.

Aaron · « **Reply #20 on:** 2001-04-16 05:34:00 »

The game is probably only gonna be for PS2 anyway (although I'd really love to see a PC version). *Why* would there be a CD version? PS2 has the ability to read DVDs... ALL PS2s can read DVDs, its not like you need to update it like you would have to some older computers or something. I bet 8 CDs is more expensive than a DVD, plus it has to have a bigger case, and there's more of them to keep track of and it would be an annoyance.

Why would the game come out on CD?

halkun · « **Reply #21 on:** 2001-04-18 10:00:00 »

Upon closer inspection I stand corrected, the magic is not one-shot, the numbers to the right is how many MP is consumed. Also, it seems that there are the same old-fasoned *woosh* field battles. when the scene goes from field to battle the curent frame cracks up and shatters like glass. Boss fights however move from field to battle seamlessly.

More on the new ATB and switching out characters. Switchouts are not on the menu, most likely you push the R1 or L1 button to pull up the switch menu. The switch menu appears in the upper left corner. You highlight the reserve character to switch in. and then stitch happens. you can switch back and forth until the character you want is selected, but that once that character is "set" the ATB goes back to 0 again.

more later

halkun · « **Reply #22 on:** 2001-04-18 11:20:00 »

It's later.

ATB

The ATB is on the upper right hand corner. I will call this the ATB list. It shows when everyone will be having thier turn. For example, Yuna, Lulu, and Tida are fighting a monster The list on the right hand side shows Yuna with her ATB bar, then lulu under her with her ATB, and Tida with his ATB. Then there is a monster icon (a B) and his ATB. There is a white line along the left side of the ATB list that shows who in line is in the cuurent rounbd. The order for the next round is also shown under that with a black line to the left. Pressing the R2 button will show the turn order beyond the next two rounds. Pretty cool. If there is a character below the one who is "up" who also has ATB you can press the triangle key to use them, but you can't do as much. (longer spells are disabled, you don't have the time to cast them). After that character's attack is done, the next in line pops up and the ATB list ir re-ordered.

During summons, the characters no longer battle. All of them leave and you just control the summoned monster. The ATB list is now not used and is gone. No idea how long the summon battles last.

Along the top there is a semi-trasperent "help" bar that tells you what does what. You can turn it off using "select"

I feel better about the battle system now.

-halkun

eerrrr · « **Reply #23 on:** 2001-04-18 20:19:00 »

wow, thanks halkun. you wouldnt happen to have a screen-shot of a battle would you? the idea of the menu's and stuff being semi-transparent sounds cool.

Aaron · « **Reply #24 on:** 2001-04-19 05:54:00 »

You're right... boss battles and some normal battles flow seamlessly into the fight without a transition. Random encounters have a wierd "shatter" effect.

The summon lasts
- until it dies?
- until you tell it to go away?
- until some time limit runs out?
I dunno, any of those seem like possibilities.

I'll investigate too. Screenshots / movies at ps2.ign.com.

Author Topic: FF10 Tech spechs (Read 14267 times)

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