Tons of new Final Fantasy XIII details pop up

Dengeki Playstation 3 magazine printed a huge interview in their most recent issue with several key team members on the Final Fantasy XIII project, including character designer Tetsuya Nomura, director Motomu Toriyama and producer Kitase Yoshinori. he translation of the full interview can be read here, but I’ll highlight the key points for you so you still have plenty of time to read all the April Fool’s goodness that the net has to offer today.

* The demo that’s coming out shortly was completed in December 2008, and Kitase states “this demo should be played with the understanding that it is “FFXIII” as it was in 2008.”

*with the PS3, expressions that could once only be done with CG movies before, can be done in real-time. Thus, the game will feature incorporated CG movie quality scenes that are drawn in realtime.

*The demo battle system’s ATB is only showing the basic aspects so only about 50% of what will be in the final game is implemented. The story that’s included is also only a very superficial part. But I think it will be a good show of what can be expected of the final product.

*this game does not have a seamless battle system like FFXII, but the change into battle is very rapid and has been designed to play with a similar sensation to a seamless system.

*In the demo, the balance is a bit on the easy side, but in the final release, specifically referring to the battle, the difficulty has been raised slightly, and may be a little more easy to end up with a Game Over than before. But there’s a retry command implemented that will take you to immediately before the battle so don’t worry.

*(in battle) You can move the camera around freely so please find a cool angle for yourself to use. During certain commands, such as lifting an enemy off the ground, the camera angle changes, so there shouldn’t be any instance that makes the action difficult to see. Also, we’ve really worked on the details of magic spell graphics. For example, a fire based spell might leave smoke at where it landed or blizzard spells might leave shards of ice scattered about for a while.

Also mentioned again is yesterday’s news about the game using close to 100 percent of the PS3’s muscle. Lots of exciting stuff to chew on. By the way, have you been to the official site for the game lately? I went there today and heard some music that really left a lasting impression. If the beauty of the score says anything about how good this game could be, I am officially out of my mind with excitement.