It's kind of tough to really make a turn-based classic-style Final Fantasy game different from the others that came before.
There is a real issue in attempting to do so as well. In the past, some franchises have tried to reinvent the wheel with a new addition of their game only to piss off the already existing fanbase with a confusing new system that doesn't make any sense in relation to past games and at the same time the run the risk of ostracizing potential new fans by making the game "too simple."
Final Fantasy games get put under a great deal more scrutiny than other franchises do but then again, it is one of the most well-known and long-running RPG's so perhaps that is a fair tradeoff.
Resonance didn't get a wide release because it isn't a huge addition to the FF universe. Hell, I barely even heard about it until one day I was kind of over Fallout 4 and just did a search for "new RPG games 2026* and there it was.
once you get past the intro (which thankfully isn't terribly long) and a few matches where you could honestly hit anything and still win, we start to get into the real version of the game where if you don't make some wise decisions during battles, you can and will die.
As you would expect, this game is dungeon-centric and while things do kind of move in a linear fashion, you are given the opportunity to take on tasks that happen in areas that you were at 30 mins to an hour ago or so. Actually, nothing is stopping you from warping back to any of those places anytime you feel like it. This comes in handy because if you ONLY do the main story you are constantly barely at or just below the min recommended level for being there, and things can be a bit too tough and see you tear through ether and potions at a rate that is faster than you can earn Gil to replace them. So these side-quests are actually pretty important to go on and most of them have a really great side story associated with them.
I gotta hand it to Final Fantasy, they do have good writers. It is one of the few franchises out there that while I do still get annoyed if gameplay is interrupted to frequently, at least the story is interesting enough.
at about 2.5 hours you start to get the feeling that you can't just auto-attack your way through battles anymore and this is good, the game would be dreadfully boring otherwise. You need to use a spell called "libre" on enemies in order to find out what it is they are weak to so you can get their stagger down or so you can just do more damage to them. They don't FORCE YOU to do this, but you are going to be using a ton of potions between battles if you choose not to. At this point you start to also see the beginning stages of how important MP management is going to be because especially during boss fights, I was finding myself running out of MP entirely and needing to use a turn dangerously replenishing my MP using expensive ethers.
Despite this, there has only been a single boss fight where I nearly died and had to rez several members of my 4 - person team, and that's fine. I recall FF games in the past where you would just get wiped and there was no indication as to why that would be so yeah, a casual gamer like me prefers this style.
But Final Fantasy games are just about walking in a semi-linear path from castle to dungeon to castle and then doing it again and again, right? Well, sure I guess... but so is every other game as well.
Resonance slowly introduces you to things called "Visions" and at first it might not be so clear what those are because they only talk to you about it in like 2 tutorial windows. I was tired when that part came along so I spent a bit of the next day wondering what the frick was going on.
They are actually really cool. Anyone can equip any vision that you acquire and by doing so you level up in that regard as well. The bonuses that you get after leveling up a vision can be applied to your character anytime you want even if you no longer have that vision equipped. Some of the attribute buffs are permanent no matter what you do. So this encourage a lot of swapping around of visions between characters because you want everyone to get the attribute bonuses and also, if a particular area is filled with mobs that are weak to say "ice stuff" you don't have to be stuck with just your one person that can do ice damage being the only person in your party that is worth a shit. You just go equip a vision that has access to ice-damage things and off you go - make the progression easier and get some stat bonuses along the way.
You can see there on the right that this vision "Cloud" has Libra, which is very important to ID weakenesses in enemies, and also has thunder and water. Later on you are able to acquire the higher tier skills and even though I have already done that with a few of my visions, I'll save that for another time because it is quite involved.
You maybe recognize "Cloud" as well seeing as how he is likely the most famous Final Fantasy character of all time. That is another thing that is fun about the visions. They are all characters from previous Final Fantasy games and while the vision is being acquired you get a bunch of little screens going by in the back that are from the game you first encountered them in all the way back to the 1980's Final Fantasy 1. For me anyway, this was a fun trip down memory lane.
The graphics for the most part are delightfully 2D+ and pixelated on purpose. As I said in my last edition, Squenix didn't have to do this, they chose to. You can tell because in certain animation sequences (which thankfully you can skip if you want) you see modern graphic displayed.
you wouldn't think that this is even from the same game but it is. It's cool to see but after you activate it a couple of times you are probably going to be reaching for the skip button, just like I do.
So while I do not know how long this game actually is, I am thinking I am probably about 20% of the way through it. FF games tend to be around 50 hours if you are doing some of the optional stuff and this works out nicely for me because that is about all I am willing to invest into any game ever since I stopped playing MMO's.
Now as far as whether or not this game is worth that they are charging I'm going to give a solid "no" on this but you have to understand where I am coming from with this opine. Square-Enix is notorious for having high-priced games on release and then not discounting it for a very long time, if they do at all. Normally it will be a year or something and then it will appear on the PS network or something in the hopes that it can promote another something or other they are about to release. Nintendo Switch (which is what I am playing it on) almost NEVER reduces the price of anything.
While this game is good, there is no doubt they are taking advantage of the lore-fans by making this game $50 at launch when the total file size is between 9 and 15 GB.
If you are a fanboi like I am, it maybe is worth it. They have made some innovations that are fun and new while not making the game something so different that you hate it like I did FF15.
It holds my interest for a couple of hours almost every night and honestly, that's perfect for me.
