Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin

[Moonface]

FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE veterans Tetsuya Nomura and Kazushige Nojima join forces with Team NINJA from KOEI TECMO GAMES to deliver a bold new vision for FINAL FANTASY. Get your first look at STRANGER OF PARADISE FINAL FANTASY ORIGIN. Coming to PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and PC in 2022.

With the memory of their struggle buried deep in their hearts...

Jack and his allies, Ash and Jed, burn with resolve to defeat Chaos as they throw open the gates to the Chaos Shrine. Yet doubts remain—are they truly the Warriors of Light the prophecy foretold? 

Step into a world of dark fantasy and revel in the exhilarating, action-packed battles!

Trial version available on PlayStation 5 until June 24th, 2021.

---

Intrigued by this one. Not overly feeling the design of the main character, but that's the only criticism I have for the game from what we saw. The yelling was a bit much but I don't expect that in the actual game so I'm not worrying about that for now.

[Dragon Lord]

Gameplay looks like it's going to be awesome. Definitely hoping for a similar experience to Nioh in that regard.

Not really liking the party. No female characters, would have preferred a solo experience with character creation. Nice to see different weapon types/builds at least, but yeah, gonna be hard to enjoy this cast of characters.

Love the darker setting of the game. Some of those special kills the player character was doing looked brutal, and it's nice to see a Final Fantasy game with a darker vibe to it.

I'm a tad worried with Nomura being involved in the game. Hopefully the bulk of it is in the hands of Team Ninja so that Nomura doesn't have a chance to work his magic of ruining everything he touches.

[Moonface]

I did try visiting the official site to see if anymore information was on there, but it just leads to an error page.

Yeah, a character creator would've been nice for this, with either male or female voicing depending on what you want to make. I wonder if the footage was in-game for cutscenes and maybe the main character was very plain because you either can make your own, or because there's different clothing and armour options to equip and what we see is just the "naked" version of the model.

[Dragon Lord]

I don't think there's any hope for making your own character due to this:

Jack and his allies, Ash and Jed, burn with resolve to defeat Chaos as they throw open the gates to the Chaos Shrine. Yet doubts remain—are they truly the Warriors of Light the prophecy foretold? 

This confirms the party is set, and unfortunately that likely means their appearances are set. I think the only thing we can hope for is different looking armor like you'd see in the Souls games or Nioh.

[Moonface]

Yeah, because even if there was model customization it being tied to just a male character wouldn't go over well, especially with there being no real reason to have such a restriction. Still, a small thing in the grand scheme of how the game actually is to play. The main character could be a walking paper bag so long as it's great to play.

[Dragon Lord]

I do agree with some people around the internet that the main character is far too western macho man marine dude looking for a game set in a high fantasy setting such as FF. He looks way out of place and it just looks... terrible.

I wonder if he'll push a boulder out of his way by punching it repeatedly.

[Karo]

Honestly I just hope there will be an interesting story in the background and some weird things one of the appeal of the Souls type games is just the mystery and strange lore you can find throughout the games. I have yet to learn too much about Nioh, but I think it would have an interesting story to go through as you enjoy the combat.

As for characters Garlond seem interesting but the main characters I feel like its a rehash of Noctis' crew without the charm.

[Moonface]

I found out why the demo doesn't work.

Also, looks like there is going to be stuff to wear, going by this promotional image: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E3yjctOXEAog...=4096x4096

[Dragon Lord]

So as a positive, Square Enix gave some more information on the game and confirmed that the game will have a Job Class system, and the job you have selected will determine what weapons you can equip and will also change your attack style. So that's good to get confirmed. Was worried they might scrap the job system and just go with being able to change to different weapons.

The little bit of spear gameplay we saw in the trailer looked really nice, and if spears are as good in this game as they are in Nioh, I think I'll be going with a speawr-wielding job (assuming it'll be Dragoon).

[Moonface]

I've not managed to watch anyone playing the demo yet (currently watching someone but literally just started watching) but I heard some impressions that said they felt this game was like Nioh with a different skin on top of it, even down to what certain enemies do. Having not seen the demo or knowing enough about Nioh I can't really comment on how accurate such claims are, but maybe you or someone else will have a better idea DL. XD

[ShiraNoMai]

It definitely looks Souls-like. The job classes seem to differentiate it from the "builds" you'd find in Souls or Nioh, which is neat (I enjoy the XP system it entails with each one). I also haven't been watching for long but from what I see so far it looks fairly okay. It does come off rather dark in some areas (like, can't see levels of dark), but it overall is pretty cool to look at.

[Dragon Lord]

 Having not seen the demo or knowing enough about Nioh I can't really comment on how accurate such claims are, but maybe you or someone else will have a better idea DL. XD

Nioh, especially Nioh 2, has some of the absolute best combat I've ever experienced in gaming, so the more like Nioh this game is in terms of combat, the better. It just needs that ball-busting layer of difficulty that Nioh brings as well. Part of why Nioh's combat is so amazing is because of how hard the games are. It makes the combat, and overcoming enemies/bosses, extremely satisfying. 

So yeah, if this game is just Nioh with a Final Fantasy skin, then it's an absolute win. I said from the start when the game was originally leaked, I want it to be as much as like Nioh as possible, not Dark Souls.

[Moonface]

There's a new demo out for this game that lets you venture into the Refrin Wetlands:

[Dragon Lord]

Sweet. Definitely not going to miss this one.

[Moonface]

I presume you didn't get to play the first demo @Dragon Lord?