It seems like a lifetime ago that a Final Fantasy game’s development has gone smoothly from start to finish. Even the most recent mainline title, Final Fantasy XV, got delayed after it held an extravagant event to announce the first release date. But at the helm of Final Fantasy XVI is Naoki Yoshida, the same person who managed to summon Phoenix to bring Final Fantasy XIV back to life after its absolutely disastrous launch. Although the release of Endwalker was slightly delayed so Yoshida could put finishing touches on the expansion that wrapped up the Hydaelyn vs. Zodiark storyline, he has earned the reputation of delivering things on time and in a very polished state.
I attended the Uncovered Final Fantasy XV event in March 2016, where Square Enix announced a release date that eventually got delayed.
Recently at PAX East, Yoshida showed off quite a bit of new gameplay for Final Fantasy XVI, in attempts to address some of the concerns the internet had after previews were posted from select media. At the end of that presentation, Yoshida was adamant that the game would not experience any delays and it looks it will be released on June 22 since the game has gone gold. If you’re unfamiliar with the term “gone gold,” it means the game has gotten approval from Sony to be published on PlayStation consoles. That means main development of the game is complete, it’s working, and ready to enter the manufacturing stage.
Going gold nearly three months before the game’s official release date is a bit sooner than most games, but Final Fantasy XVI is likely going to have a huge marketing push behind it. It also doesn’t mean the development team won’t continue polishing the game and release a day one patch — which is typical these days. Besides, Yoshida has a busy schedule in front of him considering Final Fantasy XIV is hosting an in-person Fan Festival in July.
Final Fantasy XVI’s main story is expected to take around 35 hours to complete. The RPG will have around 70 hours of total content thanks to side quests, but there will be a leaderboard for competitive gamers that should offer some replayability.
