This was supposed to be a piece about why our Final Fantasy 15 review will be delayed because Square Enix is having difficulty granting us early access to the Xbox One version. This has been going on for days now. Had we gone with the PlayStaton 4 version we would’ve had a review for you in time. However, considering that our mission is to provide a review of the Xbox One version because that’s what matters to you, it’ll have to wait until we thoroughly test out the game. This might take a week or more. What I’m going to say next might sound like a rant so bear with me. I don’t think I’m being unreasonable, I’m just concerned.
Final Fantasy 15 is one of the biggest games to come out this year, maybe even the biggest. As we all know, when it comes to Xbox One, developers don’t really spend much time optimizing games to achieve parity even though it’s possible with a little bit of extra work and help from Microsoft. Destiny, The Division and other major titles are just some examples of this. Luckily the visual differences are usually so minor that they aren’t noticeable unless you do a close examination.
What concerns me more than anything is when developers don’t care so much that they don’t even bother to update the icon for games and would rather just copy and paste it from the PlayStation 4’s assets. While I can’t launch Final Fantasy 15 at the moment because Square Enix is having issues with providing access to the Xbox One version, I’m sitting here looking at the ugly, low-resolution Final Fantasy 15 icon and thinking how this is even possible. Are the developers that lazy that they didn’t even bother to make a custom icon for the Xbox One version? You can’t even read the Final Fantasy 15 text. It looks like it says Finvt Fvntvsx W. Seriously? How is this acceptable?
I know this is a simple little issue to complain about but come on man. Did the developers not even bother to make the main icon for the game—the icon you see constantly—legible on Xbox One? I have 250 games installed on my Xbox One at the moment and I just flipped through all of them. Final Fantasy 15’s icon has to be the ugliest of them all, and the only one I can’t read without sticking my face directly into the screen. I think many Xbox One owners will have trouble reading the name of the game from a normal viewing distance because the icon is that bad. This doesn’t bode well for the Xbox One version if I’m honest. I don’t want to scare you but when a developer doesn’t even bother making a custom Xbox One icon, do you think they bothered with the main game? I don’t think so but maybe I’m wrong. I hope I’m wrong.
Hopefully the rest of the game is better and features consistent performance and not-blurry graphics. However, judging by my initial reaction when it comes to the artwork, I don’t have high hopes. Look forward to our review later on in the week when we can get the game to work. Until then, we’ll keep you posted if we encounter any serious issues. I’m hoping for the best and so should you.
Asher is a games journalist, former News Writer (Gaming) at Windows Central. They contributed 1110 articles to ICXM between 2015–2017, focused on opinion pieces, game reviews, Windows and PC, and Xbox news: wrote over 1,100 ICXM pieces on Xbox news, hardware reviews, and platform commentary before joining Future plc’s Windows Central in 2017.