Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII - Demo Out Now in the West

Today the Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII demo was finally released in the west on Xbox Live, and PlayStation Network. Just like with the previous title, Final Fantasy XIII-2, the Lightning Return demo was designed to give players a small taste of what's to come in the next few weeks. In the demo you play as the main character, Lightning, as she makes her way through a small section of the game's story. Overall, this isn't anything special, considering this is the pattern most demos have followed since the early days of gaming; however, there is a little bonus this time around.

Even if you don't care about the Lighting Returns demo, and would rather wait for the main game, the demo does come with some extra content which may make it worth downloading. Like in Bravely Default's demo (another "Final Fantasy" title which will be released in the coming weeks), Lighting Return's demo rewards you with an extra for playing it. Along with the demo comes an extra costume for Lightning titled "Utsusemi." While this may not seem like anything special at first, the truth is, it is special.

In Lightning Returns all of Lightning's moves are controlled by the clothing she wears. Each costume has its own unique set of abilities and attacks (which can be customized), and because of this they are key to winning battles. As you take on enemies, you will constantly have to switch between the different outfits if you want to keep Lightning's combos going. Like in previous games there is a sort of "ATB" bar which limits you to how much you can attack at once, but unlike in past games this bar is actually tied to your costume. Once you have reached your limited number of attacks wearing a specific outfit, you must then change to another to keep the attacks rolling, and allow for your other costume to recover. It is a unique system which helps switch up the gameplay, and it alone is reason enough to download this demo. Every extra costume is worth it.

The demo itself is around 2GB, with the costume only taking up around 4 MB of space. While this size may vary depending on which console you are downloading the demo for, the requirements should roughly be the same. Just keep in mind that if you're downloading on a PlayStation 3 console, you will need to have double the amount of space so that you can download the install file, and install it.