Current Events > So, Chocobo GP sounds like a trash heap

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://www.reddit.com/r/NintendoSwitch/comments/tb0fnk/holy_cow_chocobo_gp_is_a_hot_mess/

I've been excited about this game since it was announced. The Prize Pass gave me some trepidation, but I still figured "Hey, you know what, I'll grab it anyway." Boy howdy I hope SE gives this game some attention.

So, for starters: the paid Prize Pass is required to unlock some characters, and lasts for 70 days. Currently, Cloud is locked behind Prize Pass progress, at level 60 of 200. On the premium line. All other rewards on the first paid PP are:
3 decals to customize your ride.
37 sets of EXP boost stickers for the Prize Pass.
3 menu backgrounds
5 recolors for Cloud
2 rides for Cloud (note: rides change your grip/speed/acceleration)
23,250 gil
Notice that Mythril is completely absent from this, so there is no apparent way to grind out Mythril to cover the cost of the next Prize Pass, which costs 800 mythril. This is priced at $9.99 (USD) for 1000 mythril as the smallest pack, and mythril also appears to be required to purchase new BGMs (200 per) to change that god awful grating menu music. Mythril can also be spent to buy level-up tickets to skip portions of the Prize Pass. It seems that daily logins will reward mythril (I got 50 for logging in today), but there's no guarantee that it will EITHER be enough to get the next PP or that this would be a reliable way to get the currency.

Here's the free Prize Pass rewards (which paid pass owners will also get):
2 decals
20 exp boost stickers
2 menu backgrounds
10,070 gil
Free players will be unable to get enough gil from the prize pass to unlock Squall until level 89. There are daily and weekly tasks, such as play chocobo GP, do air tricks, etc. Daily rewards total to 70 gil, while weekly rewards total up to 1000. The cheapest items in the coin shop are 500 gil, with new rides being 9000, and recolors ranging from 1,500 to 30,000.

I felt like I needed to get that all out of the way before I got to the meat of my problem, though. All of that is based on progress in the Chocobo GP mode, which is a tournament consisting of 4 races, eliminating half of the players each bracket.

Now, the problem here is that the online is an actual dumpster fire. I played two rounds of Chocobo GP. The first just flat out disconnected after the second race. The second, I encountered several hangs on white screens where the following occurred:
Some racers were frozen at the starting line.
Others got a head start to go before everyone else.
One race where this happened just randomly bumped me to the final lap from the start and gave me 1st place after finishing it, even though there were definitely people ahead of me.
Another race, it started me on lap 2/3 and then gave me first place on the final race, giving me the win for the overall bracket, halfway through that lap. This one was extra funny, because it played music and showed a character animation as though I had lost while I was waiting for players to actually, you know, race the track.
I have absolutely no idea what's wrong here, and am hoping it's just launch day online woes, but for now, it is just broken, which feels absolutely insulting for a $50 game that has an $8 battle pass and locks all progress on said pass behind this broken mode.

Edit: I want to add that it kind of sucks extra hard because the core game underneath is actually fun. Like, it's good for what it is: a Final Fantasy Themed kart racer. But some of the fun just ends up getting sucked out by the buggy online and battlepass-locked characters.

Edit 2: While the "Options" description clearly states "Edit button settings, , etc." and "Sound Settings" states ", SFX, Voice, Volume, etc." it actually appears that there is no way to actually use BGMs that you've bought and you are stuck with the default menu music (that THANKFULLY does cut the vocals and becomes infinitely less grating after the first round of them). Either SE dropped the ball and forgot to actually include "Change BGM" in the settings, or they dropped the ball and added some really misleading descriptions to the menu options. Either way, you're currently stuck spending $2 for a BGM track that can't be used.

So it's basically worse than the quality of a F2P mobile game but with a $50 price tag. Ouch.

Ugh why is it so hard to just copy Mario Kart and call it a day? They've got a perfect example of what works right there.

EmbraceOfDeath posted...

Ugh why is it so hard to just copy Mario Kart and call it a day? They've got a perfect example of what works right there.

Square has been fishing for another revenue stream to match ff14 for a while now. They've got this, they published babylon's fall, there's the avengers game, etc, and that doesn't even include all the mobile gacha games they have.

They're failing miserably on every attempt because it looks like they're just trying to copy blindly from other companies without understanding what makes those systems work and what doesn't.

Holy cow I just saw Korone playing this on stream and I was completely oblivious to the GAS shit. This is foul.

Guess I'll stick to the free version of the game then. I assumed the dlc would roll out the way CTR:NF did it, but if you literally need to pay just for the right to earn shit, then I'll pass.

Someone will defend this shit

Bump

I don't understand. It looked absolutely awful when it was announced.

Why did people care?

Wait after reading all of that shit, this sounded like some shitty p2w mobile game, you're telling me this dogshit has a $50 price tag?

SE never fucking change, god awful fucking company lol

DeadBankerDream posted...

I don't understand. It looked absolutely awful when it was announced.

Why did people care?

People just want a real competitor to Mario Kart.

Lame

I hate Games As a Service

What's even worse is that Mythril you can buy with real money actually FUCKING EXPIRES.

BakonBitz posted...

What's even worse is that Mythril you can buy with real money actually FUCKING EXPIRES.

Jaysus. What a dumpster fire. I tried out the lite version and the races aren't even fun. They're like a minute long and one item can easily move you from first to last or vice versa.

BakonBitz posted...

What's even worse is that Mythril you can buy with real money actually FUCKING EXPIRES.

Completely unacceptable.