Final Fantasy XIII-2 was unveiled at E3 2011 and to those looking for another installment in the franchise, good news indeed. Although I am glad to hear of the new release, I am skeptical. Not in the ability for Square to make a polished game with beautiful cinematics, but with the timing. It wasn’t too long ago that Lightning and company first hit the shelves and with previous talk of new Final Fantasy XIII titles such as Agito and Versus and their respective confusions that followed, I wonder why instead a direct sequel is pushed through development. As released at E3, FFXIII-2 picks up where the story left off, told from the perspective of Lightning’s sister, Serah. For those of you that do not remember, Serah, was the young women close to Snow who was frozen inside a crystal early in the game that set the party up for their long arduous journey towards redemption.
A shocking discovery during the trailer and related material during E3, shows Serah and her friends setting out to discover the whereabouts of her sister Lightning as they believe her to be beyond reach and possibly dead. We do see some cinematics with Lightning fighting in them so if the beloved heroine meets her end, it looks as though it will happen if at all before the story takes place, but after the events of the first game, or sometime during the story as Serah begins to uncover the truth of her elder sister’s whereabouts.
This type of story reminds me of the nightmare of Final Fantasy X-2, which I am sorry to say, should not be spoken of as it is a terrible game, not to mention blasphemous as they tore through and destroyed what may have been the deepest interaction between the male and females characters in any Final Fantasy game to date with a sick spin of bad dance moves and horrendously annoying music and story telling. It also was a direct sequel to Final Fantasy X as the heroine, the summoner Yuna, sets out to discover if her love from another time is really just a fading memory.
Now that my rant is over I leave you with a parting remark of hope, that possibly, somewhere out there in the cosmos of good game design, Square redeems themselves for their past mistake with “X-?” and make an outstanding game with unique experience and most importantly good story elements. For some the world was too linear, I say to you, don’t be so narrow minded and to those that seek closure, pick this game up when it is rumored to be released, Q1 2012.
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