Final Fantasy 15’s exclusive Google Stadia content is just now starting to gain awareness after being available for months… and it’s really broken. Fans have been left scratching their heads at this bonus gameplay as videos of the Stadia-exclusive “Crazy Challenge” minigames began making the rounds on social media earlier this week, showing off some less-than-stellar game physics and animation.
Although Final Fantasy 15 was released back in 2016 on most major gaming outlets, a port for Google’s up-and-coming streaming service was released in November 2019 as a launch title for the new Stadia platform. This version came with all the DLC bonus content that was previously released for Final Fantasy 15, as well as a series of exclusive minigames dubbed “Crazy Challenges” – two of which are based around main protagonist Noctis Lucis Caelum using the party’s transforming Regalia car to complete some truly bizarre tasks.
As reported by USGamer, Overwatch Social/Digital Team member Noah Sanchez posted a number of Final Fantasy 15 videos on his Twitter page that demonstrate the very glitchy and very incomplete vehicle gameplay that serves as the basis of these two minigames: “Challenge Rally,” a sort of monster truck obstacle course that has Noctis seemingly crashing into walls and hilariously sliding along the track on his truck’s side, and “Magna Flight,” where Noctis pilots the Regalia “Type-F” in flight mode to collect old cars and other various debris for his friend Cindy… via a kind of magnetic ball that causes everything nearby to float into its field with the bare minimum of animation. Check out some of the videos below:
Due to Stadia’s rocky launch, most Final Fantasy fans were unaware that these bonus minigames existed, but since Sanchez brought them to the public’s attention players have begun to mock them for their shoddy physics and poor animation, adding more bad publicity for Google’s streaming service. Indeed, Stadia is currently fighting an uphill battle to remain relevant among gamers after its disastrous beginnings, and this latest debacle is unlikely to help the situation.
While these minigame videos are certainly fun to watch in a “so bad, it’s good” kind of way, the fact still remains that Google Stadia’s exclusive Final Fantasy 15 bonus missions should have spent more time in development before being released. It isn’t a good look for the fledgling streaming service to feature content so buggy and unfinished, especially as the draw for a major title that was already released on other platforms no more than three years ago. Hopefully, the woefully glitchy status of Stadia’s Final Fantasy 15 “Crazy Challenge” missions doesn’t hurt the service’s reputation too much, because at the moment it is getting the wrong kind of attention – which is the last thing Google Stadia needs right now.