Final Fantasy XV

Final Fantasy XV Windows Edition

Developers
	Square Enix Business Division 2
	HexaDrive
	XPEC Entertainment
DLC	Luminous Productions
Publishers
	Square Enix
Engines
	Luminous Engine
Release dates
Windows	March 6, 2018
Reception
Metacritic	85
OpenCritic	81
IGDB	81
Taxonomy
Monetization	One-time game purchase, DLC
Microtransactions	None
Modes	Singleplayer, Multiplayer
Pacing	Real-time
Perspectives	Third-person, First-person
Controls	Direct control
Genres	JRPG, RPG, Action, Open world
Vehicles	Automobile, Flight, Off-roading
Art styles	Realistic
Themes	Fantasy, Sci-fi
Series	Final Fantasy

Final Fantasy XV is is an open world action-adventure game in the Final Fantasy series that was developed and published by Square Enix, with assistance from HexaDrive and XPEC Entertainment.

Originally released worldwide on Playstation 4 and Xbox One on November 29, 2016, the game was later released on PC as Final Fantasy XV: Windows Edition which includes everything from Final Fantasy XV: Royal Edition, alongside many additional new features, gameplay, and story content such as new Nvidia GameWorks rendering effects not previously seen in console releases.

A benchmark and demo are both available. The game also contains support for the Steam Workshop which is used for modding. An official Mod organizer is available here (for Origin and Microsoft Store) and Steam version via the Steam store.

General information

Square Enix support page

Steam Community Discussions

Availability

Source	DRM	Notes	Keys	OS
Retail		Disc contains about 8 GB of data, the rest (~80 GB) must be downloaded through Steam.
Green Man Gaming
Humble Store
Microsoft Store
Steam
EA app (unavailable)		No longer sold since June 13, 2022.
Publisher website (unavailable)

Steam and Origin versions use Denuvo Anti-Tamper DRM.

Monetization

Type	Notes

DLC and expansion packs

Name	Notes
Powerup Pack	Pre-order exclusive on Microsoft Store.
Decal Selection	Pre-order exclusive on Origin.
Fashion Collection	Pre-order exclusive on Steam.
The Sims 4 Pack	Exclusive to Origin early purchasers. Ended 1st May 2018.
Half-Life Pack	Exclusive to Steam purchasers. Previously slated to be exclusive to early purchasers but was later changed to all Steam purchasers on 2nd May 2018 via Steam Workshop.
High-Resolution Pack	Free high-resolution movies and textures.
Episode Ardyn	Ardyn's playable story.

Essential improvements

Special K - FFXV Mini-Mod

Allows users to block certain input devices to prevent the game from hitching every time it loads the icon for another input device.

Lowers the Steam API overhead of the game; provides more stable frame render times and shorter loading times on certain hardware configurations.

Includes options that fix thread scheduling options in some threads, that causes starvation on graphics/audio threads.

Game data

Saved games from the Microsoft Store / Game Pass version can be manually transferred to Steam and Origin, see this reddit post.

The Steam and Origin versions do not respect a relocated Documents folder unless symlinks are used.

Configuration file(s) location

System	Location
Microsoft Store	%LOCALAPPDATA%\Packages\39EA002F.FINALFANTASYXVforPC_n746a19ndrrjg\LocalState
EA app	%USERPROFILE%\Documents\My Games\FINAL FANTASY XV\Origin\savestorage\
Steam	%USERPROFILE%\Documents\My Games\FINAL FANTASY XV\Steam\<user-id>\savestorage\
Steam Play (Linux)	<SteamLibrary-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/637650/pfx/

Save game data location

You can backup the save games by backing up the folders slotNUM. To import the save games back, copy slotNUM folders to their corresponding folders (e.g. "slot8" folder replace "slot8" folder). The NUM must match; otherwise, it won't work.

A simple way to test if an imported save game can work is to temporarily append the string "_orig" to the end of the current save game folder (e.g. rename the current "slot8" folder to "slot8_orig"), copy the intended slotNUM folder, then revert back or delete slotNUM_orig folder after done testing.

After importing the save games, the screenshot previews of the save games will remain the same as the previous save game, but the save games shall be different once you've loaded the save game. If you need the screenshot preview to be updated, then you can re-save in the same slot.

8 manual save slots are available, and 2 auto-save slots.

System	Location
Microsoft Store	%LOCALAPPDATA%\Packages\39EA002F.FINALFANTASYXVforPC_n746a19ndrrjg\SystemAppData\wgs
EA app	%USERPROFILE%\Documents\My Games\FINAL FANTASY XV\Origin\savestorage\
Steam	<Steam-folder>\userdata\<user-id>\637650\remote %USERPROFILE%\Documents\My Games\FINAL FANTASY XV\Steam\<user-id>\savestorage\
Steam Play (Linux)	<SteamLibrary-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/637650/pfx/

Save game cloud syncing

System	Native	Notes
EA app
Steam Cloud
Xbox Cloud		Save data can be cross-saved between Xbox and PC.

Video

Display settings.

Graphics settings.

Graphics feature	State	Notes
Widescreen resolution		Aspect ratios narrower than 16:9 are letterboxed. Some in-game and pre-rendered cutscenes when in 21:9 and 32:9 aspect ratios are pillarboxed.
Multi-monitor		HUD is spanned.
Ultra-widescreen
4K Ultra HD		Up to 8K.
Field of view (FOV)
Windowed
Borderless fullscreen windowed		Exclusive fullscreen also available but may not work correctly, see Issues unresolved.
Anisotropic filtering (AF)		Only goes up to 8x in-game, set 16x in config file or force via GPU control panel.
Anti-aliasing (AA)		FXAA, TAA, SSAA through Resolution scaling option.
High-fidelity upscaling		DLSS 1.0
Vertical sync (Vsync)
60 FPS and 120+ FPS		Presets for 30 FPS, 60 FPS and 120 FPS. See Frame rate (FPS).
High dynamic range display (HDR)		HDR experience can be improved using: RenoDX SDR based stretching.
Color blind mode		See the glossary page for potential workarounds.

Frame rate (FPS)

Unlock or set to desired framerate
Go to the configuration file location. Open GraphicsConfig.ini. Set MaxFramerate=xx (where XX is the desired value). Save and close the file. Notes Do not use 0 as this can cause a division by zero exception and crash the game.

Input

Mouse and keyboard settings.

Gamepad preset selection menu, displaying generic buttons. Xbox and DualShock buttons are also natively available.

Keyboard and mouse	State	Notes
Remapping		Delete cannot be bound to commands. Right and left modifier keys (⇧ Shift, Control, Alt) are considered the same key.
Mouse sensitivity
Mouse acceleration		There seems to be a slight smoothing effect.[citation needed]
Mouse input in menus		No cursor, instead you can move the selected option up or down by moving the mouse up or down.
Keyboard and mouse prompts
Mouse Y-axis inversion
Controller
Controller support
Full controller support
Controller remapping		3 different presets.
Controller sensitivity
Controller Y-axis inversion		Found under the Camera section.

Controller types

XInput-compatible controllers
Xbox button prompts
Impulse Trigger support

DirectInput-compatible controllers

PlayStation controllers		Has native support (due to release on multiple Windows game stores other than Steam); however, using Steam Input is highly recommended. Steam Input is officially supported with an official Steam controller configuration preset provided for DS 4 and the correct DS button prompts loaded in game, and has additional stuff including rumble support and wireless adapter support.
PlayStation button prompts		DualShock button prompts is only loaded by the game when DualShock 4 is used.
Motion sensors support
Light bar support
Adaptive trigger support
DualSense haptic feedback support
Connection modes	Bluetooth not tested. Wireless adapter only d-pad/movement working.

Nintendo controllers

Other controller(s)

Additional information
Button Prompts		The type of button prompts loaded is automatically determined by the game based on the controller used; the user cannot manually choose between different button prompts. To make sure the game loads the correct button prompts, avoid pressing any keyboard buttons until the Title Screen. Once at the the Title Screen, and before loading the game further, the user can confirm which type of button prompts is loaded by the game by going into OPTIONS → Controls.
Controller hotplugging
Input prompt override
Haptic feedback		Steam Input and XInput only. Can be disabled.
Simultaneous controller+KB/M		Rapidly changes button prompts.

Audio

Audio settings.

Audio feature	State	Notes
Separate volume controls		Master, Music, SFX, Voice, Audio players.
Surround sound		Up to 7.1. Supports Spatial Audio (Windows Sonic and Dolby Atmos HRTF).
Subtitles		Option to display speaker names also available.
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost
Royalty free audio

Localizations

Language	UI	Audio	Sub	Notes
English
Simplified Chinese
Traditional Chinese
Czech				Fan - AI
French
German
Italian
Japanese
Korean
Polish				Fan translation, download.
Brazilian Portuguese
Russian
Spanish
Latin American Spanish

Network

Multiplayer types

Type	Native	Players	Notes
Local play
LAN play
Online play		4	Co-op
Asynchronous multiplayer
Crossplay		Supported platforms: Xbox One Originally supported on the Microsoft Store version, but later removed due to the console version's Comrades mode shutdown on June 23rd, 2020.

Connection types

Type	Native	Notes
Matchmaking
Peer-to-peer
Dedicated
Self-hosting
Direct IP

VR support

3D modes	State	Notes
Native 3D		Dual-View Rendering Use Geo-11 fix in 3D Fix Manager for SBS, TAB, Interleaved and Anaglyph. Or Geo-11 fix with 3D Game Bridge GUI for Eye-Tracked Lightfield displays.
Nvidia 3D Vision		Dual-View Rendering Use Geo-11 fix for Frame Sequential or Row Interleaved.
vorpX		Dual-View Rendering (G3D) Game officially supported by vorpX.

Devices
Tobii Eye Tracking		Supports: Aim at Gaze, Camera at Gaze, Extended View - Only Head Tracking, Magic at Gaze, Warp at Gaze, Zoom at Gaze.

Issues fixed

Stuttering

Add game executable as exception to Windows Security's Control Flow Guard (CFG)

Stuttering during combat due to Prompto photo feature

Prompto takes photos randomly during combat which can cause stuttering on some PCs. Making the snapshot in the config folder read-only can alleviate stuttering during combat. Note that the game will say it can no longer save, but it is only the photos that cannot be saved; Autosaves and Manual saves work properly. All photos would be blacked out during the leveling-up menu. The in-game camera also wouldn't work.

Disable button prompts

This is an alternative to disabling input devices with the Special K mod, see Essential improvements.

Disable the "Guide" in the in-game settings

Broken ambient occlusion

While using the 1360x768 resolution, and possibly others, ambient occlusion may be broken (most noticeable on cars during the daytime, while moving the camera).

Try a different resolution (1280x720 and 1920x1080 don't have this problem)

Set resolution-scaling to %125 (in the "Graphics" menu)

Disable Ambient Occlusion

Low GPU utilization

Soundblaster branded speakers and soundbars have RGB effects, (like getting hit makes them flash red etc) however this can cause the game to not use more then 60% of the GPU. There is no option in game or in the Soundblaster Connect app to disable this.

Turn speakers off and turn them on after booting the game and reaching the title screen. This prevents the game from making use of the RGB affects but allows proper GPU usage. The game most likely only checks if there is a compatible speaker once at boot so when the speakers are off it fails to enable the RGB integration..)

Issues unresolved

Exclusive fullscreen not available

Setting the "Fullscreen" option to "On" should enable exclusive fullscreen, however on some configurations the game may still run in borderless windowed mode. A possible workaround is to use the Special K framework (see Essential improvements) and select "Fullscreen Mode" in the display tab of the Special K control panel.

Other information

API

Technical specs	Supported	Notes
Direct3D	11

Executable	32-bit	64-bit	Notes
Windows

Middleware

	Middleware	Notes
Physics	PhysX
Cutscenes	Bink Video

Modifications

More responsive NVIDIA Turf Effects grass + longer lasting trails

Small edit to the responsiveness and longevity of flattened grass. Requires NVIDIA Turf Effects to be enabled.

ffxvDitherPatch

This utility allows you to narrow the terrain blending (dithering) effect.

System requirements

Windows
	Minimum	Recommended	4K HDR
Target	720p	1080p	4K (HDR)
Operating system (OS)	7 SP1	8.1	10 (Creators Update)
Processor (CPU)	Intel Core i5-2500 3.3 GHz AMD FX-6100 3.3 GHz	Intel Core i7-3770 3.4 GHz AMD FX-8350 4.0 GHz	Intel Core i7 7700 AMD Ryzen 5 1600X
System memory (RAM)	8 GB	16 GB
Storage drive (HDD/SSD)	100 GB		155 GB
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce GTX 760 Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 AMD Radeon R9 280 DirectX 11 compatible	Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 AMD Radeon RX 480 6 GB of VRAM	NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti
Sound (audio device)	DirectSound compatible

A 64-bit operating system is required.