For years and years I’ve heard gamers always complain about cutscenes in games. Metal Gear Solid 4 is pointed out for having too many cutscenes. I have always pushed back on that. But today I have to admit games do have cutscene issues.

I was playing Final Fantasy 16 last night and it had this issue. The game starts with cutscenes then has the player walk ten steps then goes into another one. I’ve had this issue increasingly with games today. Just make it one big cutscene. Walking from one to another is annoying and makes me care less about a story or the game. I just want it to end.

MGS4s cutscenes were 30 mins to an hour long and they worked well. They gave great info and entertained you. Once it was over it was back to a good stretch of gameplay.

Adversely, The Order 1886 cutscenes were well done but had the opposite effect. People complained about the game length was the problem, no. Going one cutscene into another was my only gripe, it broke immersion.

Devs could also take the other option. Where the conversations are happening in gameplay while you’re doing something. Do not force me to walk while this is happening either. Everytime I walked into another cutscene I’d keep pressing the touchpad on my controller because it would vibrate. For a sec I thought this was made to ease the annoyance of constant cutscenes. But no, when you hold it it brings up lore you can read.

Another issue I have is constantly stopping gameplay to show how to do the obvious in tutorials. Many controller functions at this point should be obvious. Some you’ll have to tell us, but don’t stop the game to give us a button prompt, just tell us.

Those two issues were my biggest issues with it. The Final Fantasy XVI demo is a rare thing of an rpg for me, I like it. I don’t like them usually or the other JRPGs. My issues stem from turn-based combat, no all characters are voiced and meh looking environment.

Final Fantasy does have this issue where the environments do look a bit bland. When you look at stuff like in other JRPGs there’s this blandness and visual noise. Then I realized in FF it’s the filter they’re using, I think it’s film grain, that makes that noise. Then those magic and fire effects caught me off guard with how good they looked.

UPDATE, after playing the full game I was right. The game is way more boring and drawn out than the demo showed. I like the characters and ideas but there’s issues. I thought this would be a turning point for the series but no. The combat is basic and just easy, some compared it to Devil May Cry. It can be pretty flashy but DMC is better. It has the same issue as DMC5, where enemies have way too much health. In particular the small enemies take a lot of hits.

In FF, what annoys me is the constant fighting of random wild animals. I know that’s usually a thing, but it screams filler to me. FF did something better than DMC5, and that’s making the environments diverse. But I just stopped after a while, people are meeting, talking and going on quests, but nothing is happening.