I started at 7 and looked forwards to every iteration of the series since then, 8 was more of the same with a weird story, 9 was cute and a good throwback, then I went back to 6 which was a masterpiece, 10 was emotional and beautiful, 12 wasn't great but had cool worldbuilding, being a FFT fan.

Here is when it starts to diverge a little. I would call this the start of 'modern' FFs

I actually liked 13's battle system, it worked out many of the kinks of old systems, like healing after each battle and focused on each interaction as a puzzle to be solved. The story was OK and then the sequels kinda tried to do something different. Lightning Returns had terrible reviews, possible due to the time limit, which is why I never tried it

14 had a bad start and did a reboot to become a well loved MMO, but starting in the first world is such a chore with outdated MMO mechanics as someone who started later

15 was ambitious and unfinished. the first time I was truly disappointed in a FF game.

Then, we have the FF7 remakes, which are amazing, it seems that all the effort, the team members who have passion all signed up for this and it shows, but there's a strong nostalgia bias to it.

Now reading the reviews for 16, it seems there's no real reason to give it a try. At this point, I'm not sure what comes after the final FF7 game, is there a way to make 17 something people would care about?

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I understand your sentiment...

I havent played 16 either but i also see almost no appeal. Its clearly an action rpg at heart and that isnt what Final Fantasy was originally about.

The depth of story people expect in the modern era is as high as it was when ff7 ot ff10 released, the only issue is that expectations for production value have gone through the roof.

If anything is holding square enix back from creating the next ff masterpiece, its their commitment to high quality visuals with extremely diverse gameplay, and unfortunately that is what they have groomed their fans to expect. This is why the ff7 remake is being done over 3 games, to get that much story into the visual and gameplay depth people expect, it would probably dilute the experience to cram it into 1 5-year production. That and they make money off 3 games instead of 1 lol

What would salvage ff17 in the eyes of a classic ff fan would be to cut down production value and variations of gameplay. SE just needs to boil in good turn based combat, then focus on creating a beautifully unique setting with deep, engaging lore. That is what was so powerful about ff7 and ff10 imo. A couple minigame distractions would be good, but the amount of effort that went into the minigames in ff7 rebirth is just ridiculous.

It would be nice to see a spinoff series that focused on this at least... We can dream.