FFT Sequel Ideas thread.

[Havermayer]

Not sure where else to put this, since it isn't relating to "hacking".  Instead, it's a thread to imagine and bounce off ideas for a hypothetical "true" FFT sequel.  My ideas:

General Stuff:

1. My idea would be a synthesis of the best ideas from FFT, FFTA 1, 2, as well as the aesthetics of Vagrant Story.  Also taking some of the stuff that works from FFXII, and the Nippon Ichi games.  

2. Rule: MOAR EPIC!  

3. Setting.  Mix of VS and FFT.  Medieval European style setting.  Gritty.  Just human races.  

Specific Stuff:

1. Grids or Spheres?

You could either allow for a more detailed grid system (each FFT square would be cut up into 4 smaller squares), or go with spheres/circles (like Phantom Brave did).  Not sure what is best myself.  

2. Armor and Speed.
I say implement a weight system which affects speed.

3. Items and Chemist.  
Should everyone have the ability to use items, or should it be a "special" skill that only chemists could use?  

An idea that I have is to have everyone have item, but make them not that effective.  Chemists have innate "Throw item" and another skill which doubles the effectiveness of items and potions (since they know how to make and use them properly).  

4. Shields.  
It doesn't seem right that the percent evasion should be based on the equipment itself.  That should be based on character stats.  The shield should have different properties (weak against fire, nullifies fire attacks, etc), and different sizes (and weights).  

5. 3D or 2d?  You could go with more detailed and higher res 2D sprites and 3D backgrounds.  However, it'd be so freaking epic if it had graphics and art style to similar to Vagrant Story and FFXII.  Yes, that means that there WILL be noses.  With much larger maps than FFT.  And everything is properly to scale.  (Notice how buildings are not as big as they should be in FFT so that they could fit into the maps).

6. Character designs.  

A mix of FFT and Vagrant Story.  Similar to FFT, but with proper body proportions.  Most of the VS character designs and equipment are really cool looking.  Not a fan of Ashley's butless pants though.  

7. Money.

No more "win battle, receive Gil".  How to get money though?  Not sure.  Perhaps odd jobs, selling found items, and random chests?  Chemists could have the ability to produce potions, which could be useful for your cash strapped team.

8. Random Battles.

Never liked them.   What to do instead?  Not sure.  

9. World Map

No world map.  The entire world is rendered in 3D.  You travel between places by actually traveling from town to town.  The world would be huge.  

10. Item Management

Either games give characters infinite (or near infinite) space for items, or have limited inventories.  I never liked the first.  The second tends to lead to endless micro-management.  

My solution.  Space is limited.  To increase it, you can buy backpacks (which increases weight for that character).  Want to increase it more?  Buy some chocobos and wagons.  But the trade off is that you have to feed the damn things.  To simplify things, your inventory is considered to be one big "pool".  So you don't have to do the micromanagement of assigning items to each person.  

11. Max Characters per team

I was thinking that the main restraints on how many people you have on your team are practical things like money, food, and such.  So it'd be a trade off between the benefits of more dudes vs. the costs.  A limit would exist, but it'd be really hard to reach it.

12.  Charge Time?

Charge time ftw.

13. Gameplay Options:

- Campaign (Regular Story Mode)
- Multiplayer (Deathmatch, but what else?)
- What else to include?

14. Target specific body parts?

I thought that it was a good idea in VS.  Just poorly executed.  How would you guys handle it?  

I would make it so that you could never kill someone by just attacking their hands, or limbs.  Instead, attacking it enough would eventually make that limb useless.  

15. Character Customization.  

Based off of FFT.  Job System.  Should you be able to equip more than one support ability?  I was thinking that perhaps some would be worth "two" slots if they're powerful enough (like two swords).  Weaker ones would be worth one.  This way, weaker support abilities would still be used instead of ignored.

16. Critical Status

The lower your HP, the worse off you are.  How much I'm not sure.  I like the idea from D&D :

In 3rd Edition you aren't dead until you reach -10 hp. At 0 hp you are disabled, and will lose HP with any action except movement that doesn't heal you. At -1 to -9, you are dying, meaning you fall unconscious and begin bleeding out at a rate of 1 hp per turn (unless you have an ability like Die Hard) unless healed or you reach -10 hp. You recover completely if you are taken out of negative hp via magical or mundane healing--if you aren't dying but you are still in negative hp, you remain unconscious; any healing stabilizes you.

Other ideas:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... nceFailure

17. Escape and Surrender.  

You can escape from battle.  You can also surrender, or pay off your attackers.  The enemies can do the same.  For instance, if thieves attack you, you can pay them off, run away or battle it out.  But if the battle gets to thick, you can give up and pay them what they want.  

You can execute a soldier who surrenders if you're evil.  

This can shorten battles a bit, since you won't have to spend the extra five minutes dealing with that one Knight who clearly has no chance of survival.  

Obviously, Mediators can be useful here.  

18. Good/Evil actions

Should you be able to be evil?  Could you kill random people, but face the consequences of being a wanted villain?  

19. Stats

Two units for stats should be double digets.  So, they'd either be 9.6 or 96.  But not 9.  

20.  Brave/Faith and Zodiac

I never liked these that much.  Needless complications in my view.  Should it be carried over?

Jobs and Abilities

1. Mimes.  

They suck in FFT.  How do we fix them?  

Here's some stuff from other FF games, that aren't in FFT.  Which ones should be included in the sequel?

Final Fantasy 5:

spoiler

Black Mage - MP + 30%
Blue Mage: Peep/Scan (shows status, weakpoints, etc of enemy)
Summoner - Call! Random Summon with no MP
Red Mage - X-Magic - Use magic spell twice
Trainer:  !Tame - Paralyse monsters
Chemist - Medicine (doubles potion power), Combine (mix two items), Drink (drink stat boosting drinks)
Geomancer: Pitfalls (spot traps)
Dancer: equip Ribbon

In general, what stuff works in VS, Disgaea, FFTA series, and other games that you'd like to see imported to a FFT sequel?

[Kaijyuu]

3. Items and Chemist.
Should everyone have the ability to use items, or should it be a "special" skill that only chemists could use?

An idea that I have is to have everyone have item, but make them not that effective. Chemists have innate "Throw item" and another skill which doubles the effectiveness of items and potions (since they know how to make and use them properly).

Go the FF5 route. Everyone gets basic items, chemists can use special ones with their skillset.

4. Shields.
It doesn't seem right that the percent evasion should be based on the equipment itself. That should be based on character stats. The shield should have different properties (weak against fire, nullifies fire attacks, etc), and different sizes (and weights).

If you're going to do that, they should probably give hp (or armor, if you're going that route).

However, it'd be so freaking epic if it had graphics and art style to similar to Vagrant Story and FFXII

Disagree. 3d is not inherently better than 2d. It's all the quality of the art.
On that note, I disliked Vagrant story's graphics because I think they were too ambitious for the technology they were using. I have two rules for judging graphics: Can I understand what's going on, and does it make me ill to view them? VS was guilty of the latter, and I think that was entirely the fault of the playstation's limited power.

7. Money.

No more "win battle, receive Gil". How to get money though? Not sure. Perhaps odd jobs, selling found items, and random chests? Chemists could have the ability to produce potions, which could be useful for your cash strapped team.

Sure, whatever, but money should still come automatically through normal play of the game.
Making the player do chores for their income is something from real life that doesn't translate well into gameplay.

8. Random Battles.

Never liked them. What to do instead? Not sure.

Not many options for a strategy game there. Could make the player have a battle every time they visit the map, with a hub world ala disgaea. Or pseudo random battles like crono trigger, if you go with #9.

9. World Map

No world map. The entire world is rendered in 3D. You travel between places by actually traveling from town to town. The world would be huge.

So, go with what FFX used?
Still a glorified world map. Just makes it tedious to get from place to place before you get the airship or whatever.

19. Stats

Two units for stats should be double digets. So, they'd either be 9.6 or 96. But not 9.

Not sure what you mean here.

20. Brave/Faith and Zodiac

I never liked these that much. Needless complications in my view. Should it be carried over?

FFT didn't have random damage, outside of a few weapons. Zodiac compatibility did that. I say keep it.
Br/Fa could be replaced by a less broken system.

[philsov]

20. Brave/Faith and Zodiac

I never liked these that much. Needless complications in my view. Should it be carried over?

Hell yea.

I want a combination Zodiac / elemental system, in fact.  Zodiac is two-way (25% damage modifier by both people), but elemental would be one way (Fire to water is a -20% damage modifier, water to fire is +20%).  Healing is reversed.  

Fire is weak to water is weak to earth is weak to air is weak to fire!

Just think of the composite charts to be made and the amount of min-maxing possible!  *drool*

[FFMaster]

That would be awesome philsov. The elemental affinity system will make battles much more interesting.

[Pickle Girl Fanboy]

What are you doing for the story?  FFT: War of the Gods, Esper vs Occuria would be cool.

[Kuraudo Sutoraifu]

5. 3D or 2d?  You could go with more detailed and higher res 2D sprites and 3D backgrounds.  However, it'd be so freaking epic if it had graphics and art style to similar to Vagrant Story and FFXII.  Yes, that means that there WILL be noses.  With much larger maps than FFT.  And everything is properly to scale.  (Notice how buildings are not as big as they should be in FFT so that they could fit into the maps).

While the potential for a more 3d look would be very interesting, it has failed so far in execution whenever I see it.  (i.e. Gladius)

7. Money.

No more "win battle, receive Gil".  How to get money though?  Not sure.  Perhaps odd jobs, selling found items, and random chests?  Chemists could have the ability to produce potions, which could be useful for your cash strapped team.

Perhaps you could win all of your enemies armor/accessories/weapons and just sell off the excess/outdated/unwanted.

8. Random Battles.

Never liked them.   What to do instead?  Not sure.

RPG complaint number one.  FFXII tried to fix it by using a more MMO approach; people complained.  Other games have a sort of infinite colliseum to wherever you go, so you can level up, but I find this too controlled.

9. World Map

No world map.  The entire world is rendered in 3D.  You travel between places by actually traveling from town to town.  The world would be huge.

I love this idea, but technically you still described a world map.

13. Gameplay Options:

- Campaign (Regular Story Mode)
- Multiplayer (Deathmatch, but what else?)
- What else to include?

Gladius had a "territories" game where you had to be the first to control an area while trying to kill/not be killed by other teams before they reach it.

16. Critical Status

The lower your HP, the worse off you are.  How much I'm not sure.  I like the idea from D&D :

In 3rd Edition you aren't dead until you reach -10 hp. At 0 hp you are disabled, and will lose HP with any action except movement that doesn't heal you. At -1 to -9, you are dying, meaning you fall unconscious and begin bleeding out at a rate of 1 hp per turn (unless you have an ability like Die Hard) unless healed or you reach -10 hp. You recover completely if you are taken out of negative hp via magical or mundane healing--if you aren't dying but you are still in negative hp, you remain unconscious; any healing stabilizes you.

You mean like a 3 turn countdown?

18. Good/Evil actions

Should you be able to be evil?  Could you kill random people, but face the consequences of being a wanted villain?

An FFT Choose-Your-Own-Adventure?  Awesome.

]
1. Mimes.  

They suck in FFT.  How do we fix them?

Lies.  Mimes are uber-fun and can be used very effectively.

[Pickle Girl Fanboy]

What are you doing for the story?  FFT: War of the St. Ajora, Esper vs Occuria would be cool.

I said gods, not St. Ajora.  What the heck is going on?

[Zalge]

Haha, dude doesn't know. =D Dude, Zodiac has a word filter.

... Dude

[Havermayer]

What are you doing for the story?  FFT: War of the St. Ajora, Esper vs Occuria would be cool.

I said St. Ajora, not St. Ajora.  What the heck is going on?

Completely original story.  Either it would take place in another fantasy medieval European setting, or it would take place in the same universe but in another country and at a different time.  

The plot would not involve resurrecting an ancient demon.  I think it would be better to focus on political intrigue, plots, and mysteries like that.

[Kaijyuu]

So... a tactics ogre storyline?

Kewl.

[SentinalBlade]

Something going on with the country next to ivalice would be awesome. Two countries waged ware during the 50 year war. id like to see whats happening on the side that was winning(until balbanes whooped ass and forced a treatied-ceasefire). The plot might end up being more political, or maybe even lead to war with ivalice again. All of it would be a cool idea, and its not some farce of a story that has a twist with rofel becoming a god or some odd fanboy fantasy. Maybe it would mention him, but no more "Cameos; Just cause the character is awesome" (that means you guys, cloud and balthier!)

On the brave and faith note, it should be carried over, but more limited. Bravery needs a new cap and new formula for reaction fire chances. Faith is actually a nice touch; The only thing that needs to be altered is the damage magic will do to tanks. the obvious choice is to lower a tanks faith and raise his brave. the amount of damage entailed with faith magic needs to take in if the character is a physical or magical class.

I also agree with it being 2D. Many games are 3-D, but alot of them dont work well. look at alot of tactics games. the new Valkyrie profile, Fire Emblem, even Spectral Souls(the sprites and spell effects at least. the maps in this are 3D, as they are in FFT) are in 2D.

2D works real well for SRPG, If you look at hero's of might and magic; its the only 3d tactical game i can think of that relates to FFT. but its so differently executed...they had to adapt the engine to the fact its 3D. if we did that with FFT, it wouldnt feel like an FFT game anymore. Plus, even with HOMAM's adaption to its new graphical types...it still wasnt great

[ArkDelgato]

I like the overseas Idea for the plot, and after looking at the ivalice maps
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a138/ ... 1240032398
http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/final ... ld_Map.png
http://ffta2.ffsky.cn/image%2Fffta2map.JPG

Ivalice is across the desert from the ff12 kingdoms (and in the future)
And has Loar not too far to the west, and Ordalia to the east, which it has rebeled against. (FFTA2, which is the past; the days of airships has the ivalice continent called Ordalia,  and in the future [fft] it is called ivalice)

[Kaijyuu]

I'd like a story about the rise of St. Ajora. Main character could be the ancestor of Ramza that Altima mentions at the end of FFT.

[KazeKasano]

@Ark
    That first map is debunked by the map in the cutscene where Ondore explains the war, which shows that Rozzaria extends out in a way that would not allow it to connect to the FFT continent in that way.
Here's the screen: http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/final ... ce_map.jpg

However, I like the way this thread is going. Anybody have the ability to actually make this happen?

[ArkDelgato]

Wow, the coastlines matched so well, surprised that it was a fake.
Unless the big disaster that ended the age of airships ended up blowing all of Rozarria.

[KazeKasano]

Yeah. I like that map too. It fit really well.

[Havermayer]

I'd like a story about the rise of St. Ajora. Main character could be the ancestor of Ramza that Altima mentions at the end of FFT.

I never liked those kinds of prequel stories.  We already know what's going to happen.  The Ajora story has been sort of played out.  Instead, a true or spiritual sequel would be a new story, in either a similar universe or just very far away.

I also agree with it being 2D. Many games are 3-D, but alot of them dont work well. look at alot of tactics games. the new Valkyrie profile, Fire Emblem, even Spectral Souls(the sprites and spell effects at least. the maps in this are 3D, as they are in FFT) are in 2D.

I think it's entirely do-able, if done right, and with the right art design.  Think of Vagrant Story, but each unit takes turns like in FFT, and the graphics are ps2 or ps3 level.  The Camera angle really matters.  It wouldn't have the same top-down camera, which I think makes a difference.  



I think the Knights look fine for instance.  

So, go with what FFX used?
Still a glorified world map. Just makes it tedious to get from place to place before you get the airship or whatever.

Oh god, not that.  The entire world was just one long path.  

I looove games like Fallout 3, Oblivion, etc.  So I was thinking of a world similar to that.  Large, super awesome worlds with lots to explore.  Quests to take, and so forth.  Except that battles are SRPG and turn based.  

Imagine this as a story battle.  You travel

However, I like the way this thread is going. Anybody have the ability to actually make this happen?

Well, it's theoretically possible to make a spiritual successor for the PC that doesn't include any characters or settings owned by Square-Enix.  You'd need a large team of well motivated and skilled people who would somehow donate their time to this.  

There have been some fantastic fan-made projects in the past.  One of my favorites is Rosenkeuzstilette.  It's basically Mega Man but with moe anime girls.  

http://hg101.classicgaming.gamespy.com/ ... ilette.htm

Technically do-able, but hard.  Actually, one option would be to heavily modify VS into a turn based srpg to test some of my ideas.  That's probably do-able.

[KazeKasano]

I guess someone should start editing Ashley's textures into Ramza...

[ArkDelgato]

I severely doubt that a sandbox worldmap would mesh at all with an srpg battle system.
The transition would be so jarring if you found an enemy, or the world would be pointless if it was just a blank slate.
It would be a waste of in game memory if it was pointless.

[Havermayer]

More gameplay ideas please.  :O

Ranged Attacks

My idea is that bows, crossbows, etc, can have a a range that is much larger than what they have in FFT.  Instead, bow range would either be static, or determined through a stat (strength?).

The accuracy of the attacks would be proportional on the distance though.  Farther = less accurate.  The size of the target would also matter.  

Guns would also work on the same system.  They're crappy inaccurate guns from like 1450.