[E3 2016] Final Fantasy XV’s VR Experience is terrible

I am so completely excited about Final Fantasy XV. It looks incredible, keeping me thus far beyond impressed with everything I’ve seen. When Square Enix took the stage at Sony’s E3 2016 press conference to announce that a VR Experience of the game was coming, I almost lost it.

Oof, was I getting ahead of myself, because what I played on the show floor was a bag of half-eaten sausages left to rot in the hot Los Angeles sun.

With the world of Final Fantasy XV being a huge, lush environment, one would expect that it’s made to be explored and examined. It has rainforests, cities, fields, mountains, caves — you’d be hard pressed not to want to see it. Virtual Reality should be perfect for this.

Oho, but it’s not. The Final Fantasy XV VR Experience drops players into what amounts to a tiny construction site with a big Behemoth in the middle. As Noctis and his crew battle the beast, we (the player) are tasked with pointing the PS Move controller and shooting. And shooting. And shooting some more. We can tap the fire button for single shots, but why would we when we can hold it down and unload on the monster? It has a bajillion hit points and we barely make a dent as we autoshoot at it anyways, so a single bullet would do nothing.

We can’t move, either. Without an analog stick, our only method to get around is to point the Move controller at a very specific point of light on the screen and teleport to that spot to help us change vantage points. We never even need to turn our heads for a true VR feel, either, as we can quite literally just aim forward with our weapon and shoot.

The “experience” is essentially just an on-rails shooter, minus any form of enjoyment. The beast can’t kill us (I felt impervious), and my Move controller lost calibration almost instantly, so pointing really meant “hold the Move over my head and to the side”.

The entire idea is basically a bad FPS arena with tacked-on gimmick.

Oh, and the demo ends with a ride around in Cid’s car as we stare at her cleavage.

I looked like a dork playing this, and I ended up with horrible VR Hair.