Final Fantasy 16, the next RPG game from Square Enix’s sweeping open-world series, has been officially rated M by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board, meaning that it is recommended for consumers over the age of 17 in Canada and the United States. Once the Final Fantasy 16 release date arrives, the game will allegedly contains nudity, some very mature themes, gore, and bad language, possibly making it a more explicit FF than we might have seen in the past.
“Battles are fast paced, accompanied by impact sounds, cries of pain, and large explosions,” says the ESRB, in its description of Final Fantasy 16’s M rating. “Blood-splatter effects frequently occur when characters are slashed and killed. Cutscenes depict additional acts of violence and blood: a character’s hands severed by a sword; a guard’s throat slit by a knife; a character impaled through the chest; a prisoner’s shoulder stabbed and twisted by an interrogator’s blade.”
It already sounds more brutal than Final Fantasy 15, which has a Teen rating from the ESRB, and the remake of Final Fantasy 7, which carries a Teen rating also. But there’s more – the ESRB lists “blood and gore, partial nudity, sexual themes, strong language, [and] violence” as all contributing to the M certification.
“The game contains some sexual material,” the Board continues. “A character caressing and straddling a man in bed; references to prostitution; sexual moaning sounds in a brothel; dialogue such as, ‘I’d be happy to show you…provided I can afford it’ and ‘…thank you for your service. My chamber is just upstairs.’ Some characters are depicted with partially exposed breasts and buttocks. The words ‘f**k’ and ‘sh*t’ are heard in the game.”
We’ll have to see it for ourselves, when Final Fantasy 16 ends its six-month PS5 exclusivity and ships over to PC somewhere around the end of 2023 or beginning of 2024, but it sounds like the RPG series has gotten a little edgier.
Check out some of the other best JRPGs, or perhaps the best Final Fantasy games on PC. You might also want to take a look at some of the best sex games, if Final Fantasy 16 is set to go the way of The Witcher.