GamerEscape

Due to its exclusivity to Apple Arcade in 2021, I never got around to playing Fantasian, the most recent game done by Final Fantasy series creator Hironubu Sakaguchi and his studio Mistwalker. That said, I’ve certainly been incredibly curious about the game since it’s initial release, and now that Square Enix is helping to publish it for more platforms, it was a great time to finally check it out.

During PAX West 2024 I got to sit down and play Fantasian Neo Dimension for about 30 minutes on PlayStation 5.

Truthfully, I didn’t know much about the game going into my demo with it. After all, I was never really a part of Apple’s iOS ecosystem, so I had never bothered looking up more info about the game. Why hype myself up for something I could never play? Luckily now, thanks to Final Fantasy XIV Producer and Director Naoki Yoshida having dinner with Hironobu Sakaguchi, Square Enix will be publishing the game on more platforms.

It’s no secret that as time progresses, technology advances. With these advances of technology we get things like better computers, better displays, better graphics. Photos taken years ago will not look as good as photos taken today – something that felt very apparent upon booting up Fantasian Neo Dimension for the first time.

Years ago, when Fantasian was originally released, I found the idea of building dioramas and photographing them for use as environments in a video game incredibly interesting. And to be honest, I still think it’s a neat, unique approach to designing a game. But again, we’re all helpless when it comes to the passage of time. I have no doubt that the environments looked great on a phone a few years ago. Here, however, with a large display only few feet away from me, my eyes immediately locked on to the pixelation of the background.

My issues with the visuals, sadly, don’t stop there. Everything about the interface tells you that the game is a very obvious mobile port, with a user interface comprised of overly large buttons and menus. While exploring these menus, I came across a list of memory cutscenes and decided to play one. While the cutscene played, I was a bit taken aback as a large ‘X’ appeared in the top corner of the screen. This makes sense for a mobile title of course, but seeing it on the console version of the game feels…odd. Not only that, but the inclusion of the controller button next to this ‘X’ felt like it was poorly tacked on. It was a button next to a non-functioning button. It didn’t leave me feeling great about the quality of the port.

So now, with all of that out of the way, let’s talk about the gameplay! Fantasian Neo Dimension‘s battle system has something called Skill Trajectories, which can alter the path of your attacks. Some attacks may cut a straight line through foes or cover a small area, while another might be able to curve around or through enemies. I did a handful of battles in the Ancient Hill zone where the demo took place to get a basic idea of the battle system before deciding to check out a feature called Dimengeon.

Dimengeon stores up monsters as you battle and then gives you a chance to fight all of them at once. In the preview, I activated my dimension fight at a capacity of 21/30. This fight ended up taking up the majority of my time, but it was a great way to continue to experience the battle system. Getting large groups of enemies and deciding how best to use my attacks while also maximizing the amount of enemies I could hit with my trajectories felt almost puzzle-like. During this fight I also saw power-ups on the field, which the characters in my party could gain by attacking.

One of the new features for this version of the game is the inclusion of alternate battle music (Though admittedly, the idea of swapping out tracks from Nobuo Uematsu, which I haven’t had a chance to experience yet, seems a bit wild to me.). At any time during battle you can open up this menu and choose to play battle music from a selection of Final Fantasy titles:

• Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail
• Final Fantasy XIV: Endwalker
• Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth
• Final Fantasy VII: Remake
• Final Fantasy Pixel Remaster
• Final Fantasy XVI

The content that I was able to check out in Fantasian Neo Dimension was interesting, but from what I saw on the PlayStation 5, it’s not in the prettiest of wrappers. A Nintendo Switch version was also available to play, though I elected to play everything on the PlayStation 5 console. I’d be very curious to see if my qualms with the visual elements remain when playing it on a smaller screen, or a screen that’s more than a few feet away from me.

Fantasian Neo Dimension is out later this year for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, and PC via Steam.

Images courtesy of Square Enix.