After so many years of waiting, the game you have all been waiting for is here: Final Fantasy Versus 13. And… wait, wait, I think I’m a little confused.
After so many years of waiting, the game you’ve all been eagerly awaiting is here: Final Fantasy XV. For a moment, this isn’t right either. I’ll try again. After all these years of waiting, the game you’ve all been eagerly awaiting is here: Kingdom Hearts 4…well, I’m definitely getting ahead of myself now. Sorry, I now remember what I actually played, it was Reynatis, but I think if you look at it you’ll forgive me for the confusion.
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Reynatis is a game heavily influenced by it. Director Takumi Isobe didn’t try to pretend that the RPG wasn’t lined up for the later revamp of Final Fantasy Versus 13, and Kingdom Hearts screenwriter Kazushige Nojima and series composer Yoko Shimomura played Reynatis With the same characters, you’ll obviously find some similarities there as well. While this modern fantasy RPG borrows from some familiar favorites, one big question remains: What is Reynatis? Let’s try to answer this question.
First, we’ll take it literally. Reynatis is an action role-playing game developed by Natsume Atari and FuRyu, set in contemporary Shibuya, but with a twist: magic is real and wizards are an oppressed people judged and criminalized by society and the law (although equally The laws are made by wizards too). There are six playable characters in total, but the focus is on two to start with, Marin Kirizumi (whose design is definitely not Sora from Kingdom Hearts), a wandering wizard who wants to be the strongest, and Sai, a wizard. Island Sally seeks revenge against the police.
The plot didn’t feel entirely unique at first, although the way it developed, I’ll be looping back to this. Before we get into that, it’s important to understand how combat works, which can be exciting, new, and frustrating at the same time. No matter which character you play, each character has two modes: repression and liberation.
In Liberation Mode, you can use your magical powers, which means Kingdom Hearts-style melee combat, and NEO Doomsday with You-style abilities, but you have a limited amount of MP, and while you’re in said mode, it will Constantly depleted, when you use an ability most of it is depleted. In suppressed mode, you’re harmless and can’t attack, but when projectiles or close-range attacks are about to hit you, everything slows down, letting you dodge them to recover MP. When your MP is full, you can even slow everything down completely for a short time, allowing you to perform quick attacks without taking damage.
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This is a system I’ve never seen in any other action RPG, and when everything connects just right, it feels (for lack of a better term) magical. The switch between the two modes is instantaneous, so if you move quickly enough, you can enter suppression mode, quickly escape the attack, recover some MP, and then continue attacking in liberation mode. The big problem is that you can do all of this by staying in liberation mode most of the time if you want, since the slow-motion is a little too helpful. With some extra tweaking or some time in the oven, I think this might have been overcome, but it does mean that those who ultimately don’t like fighting might be encouraged to play it safe.
What I find most interesting about both modes is the way they tie into the game’s broader narrative. As I mentioned before, using your magical powers is actually illegal, so when you play as Marin, even if you are forced into combat by the story, NPCs will start reporting you for illegal wizarding activity as soon as you complete the combat. There’s even a pressure gauge that, when high enough, forces you into liberation mode, and the police – who are essentially impossible to defeat – come after you. So, from the get-go, I was wondering, “Wait a minute…is this game trying to make some commentary on real-world law enforcement?”
This question immediately made me nervous because narratives like this often end up going something like this: “No, the cops weren’t bad, it was just a few bad apples that ruined the group.” To complicate matters further, as mentioned earlier , one of the protagonists of the game, Sari, is a policeman, and he seems to be a law-abiding policeman. However, without spoiling too much, there is some serious soul-searching on Surrey’s part as time goes on and Renatis does admit that the police force tends to maintain the status quo and punish marginalized groups.
This stance took me completely by surprise, as it’s rare to see something so radical in this genre, let alone in a game (except for you, my beloved Disco Elysium). I have to admit, the game doesn’t handle this perfectly – a big part of the storyline is that there’s a drug that gives people magical powers, but is addictive, leading to these people being called “damned”. Renatis empathizes with these people and never paints them as bad people because of their struggles with addiction, even though you can only kill them in the game and not help them materially.
Still, “Renadis” overall feels like its core is in the right place, even if it may be misguided, and I feel lucky not to be upset by the story’s ending, even if it strays slightly from its politics meaning etc. But the entire time I was playing the game, even with all of these fun conversations around the police and the demands to fit in, I couldn’t help but think about one thing: Final Fantasy vs. XIII.
This is a game born out of a desire for a pseudo-cancelled Final Fantasy title, and it’s the potential shown in all the trailers for Versus 13 manifested in a theoretical way that’s another A director’s idea of a fantasy based on reality. It’s an exploration of potential, and it’s ironic that this is a game that’s full of stuff, but it never manages to do it all perfectly. There’s one key difference compared to the renamed Final Fantasy game, though: it actually exists.
Yes, it has flaws. Yes, the camera can get incredibly stuttery in tight spaces, and even though Shibuya is beautifully rendered, the level design is mostly rather dull, and at times I couldn’t tell whether the weird pacing of cutscenes was due to localization or not It’s just a normal game. But it’s also a dream come true, hoping to capture the feeling that many people experienced when seeing Versus 13 for the first time. The game doesn’t do that, or Versus 13 ever did. Reynatis is fascinating to me partly because of its flaws.
Anyone who’s seen Kingdom Hearts 3’s secret ending knows that Kingdom Hearts 4 will likely be series director Tetsuya Nomura’s attempt to bring Versus 13’s vision to life, but I’m glad we have Reynatis as Another interpretation of this. Say enough is enough.
