The latest update to Square Enix’s Final Fantasy Tactics remaster adds New Game+, and fans are already debating whether Ramza’s story really needs the mode and what fresh possibilities this could open up for the beloved turn-based strategy game.

Update 1.5.0 dropped on June 17 and adds a bunch of UI improvements and adjustments to Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles. However, the big draw of this update is New Game+, something the original game never had back in 1998. This allows players to carry over their units and inventory from a completed game save into a new game, and continue to grind these units up to Level 100.

Other improvements in the update include letting you see a unit’s status effects at a glance, and another option lets you instantly remove all gear from a unit (which is, incidentally, a valuable tactic for drawing enemy fire to one character during battle). The new Zodiac Compatibility function on the status screen lets you see how well or badly each unit works together with each other. This sheds light on one of Final Fantasy Tactics' more mysterious elements: exactly how the star signs of your party members affect aspects like accuracy, the amount of damage dealt and health recovered.

Regarding New Game+, some fans are hyped that the additional mode will enable players to snag multiples of the missable Genji equipment. These pieces of top-tier gear can only be obtained by stealing them from Marquis Ondore during the battle on the roof of Linberry Castle Keep in Chapter 4. It also gives you a chance to pick up any of the optional party members you may have missed out on during your first playthrough.

However, the New Game+ doesn’t include any new difficulty levels or level scaling, dampening the challenge for seasoned players. There is also some continuing disappointment that the Final Fantasy Tactics remaster did not include content from The War of Lions version of the game, which was released on PSP in 2007. This has prompted fans to call on Square Enix to add in aspects from The War of the Lions. These include calls for the restoration of Lions-only content such as FF12’s Balthier as a playable character (a powerful reminder that Tactics and FF12 share the same setting), additional job classes like Onion Knight, and extra story scenes.

Yasumi Matsuno, the director of the original Final Fantasy Tactics, recently explained on X that “New Game+ was a feature I had been requesting since the very beginning of the remaster project. With so many guest characters in the game, I felt that they did not have enough opportunities to shine during a single playthrough. However, due to budget and development resource constraints at the time, the feature was ultimately postponed.” He went on to explain that thanks to the remaster’s commercial success, the developers were able to work on new updates for the strategy game.

Elsewhere, others have questioned if Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles really needs a New Game+ in its current form, as it does not have multiple endings nor challenging secret bosses. Others hope that Matsuno’s comment signals that devs will continue working on the title, perhaps adding on some more optional endgame content like a brand new dungeon.

Verity Townsend is a Japan-based freelance writer who previously served as editor, contributor and translator for the game news site Automaton West. She has also written about Japanese culture and movies for various publications.

Granblue Fantasy: Relink introduced a brand new audience to the floating islands of Zegagrande and the adventuring Skyfarers of the Granblue Fantasy series back when it launched in 2024. Marking the first console RPG adventure for the primarily mobile gacha series, Relink let players pull off dazzling arrays of anime spectacle as they worked together either with their CPU-controlled party or with their friends to tackle quests and monsters. Now, we are mere weeks away from diving into the massive new expansion, Endless Ragnarok, and during SGF we had a chance to sit down and speak with the creative director, Tetsuya Fukuhara, and narrative director, Sanshiro Hidaka, but also get some hands-on time with the new expansion.

Some of the most jaw-dropping moments of Relink were when Granblu's heroine, Lyria, would summon her big ol' lizard pal, Bahamut, to let him do what dragons do best - rain fire/laser breath down on chumps. Lyria's ability to summon Bahamut is a pretty big deal in the lore of the series, so it always bummed me out a bit that these moments were exceptionally rare in Relink. Serving more like set pieces than an actual system, imagine my surprise and delight when I saw that Summons was going to be a fleshed-out and powerful new mechanic in Endless Ragnarok.

Restricted to the expansion content and new chaos difficulty, these powerful allies are tied to a new bar that will fill as you fight. Depending on the strength of the summon, each will require one, two, or three bars of this new resource to call out onto the field. Instead of a lifebar, they have a timer and will stay out until that runs out. This fact makes summons not only a great offensive option but also a perfect option to absorb those particularly nasty Overdrive attacks that bosses in Relink like to bust out, since summons are invincible.

Multiplayer is a big part of Granblue Fantasy: Relink, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that summons can be used when you play with your friends too, and aren’t just a single-player-only treat. When playing online, each player comes with their own set of four summons, but only a single summon can be fielded at any given time. That said, while you and your friends may not all be able to terrorize the field as giant creatures of destruction, you will be able to string a chain of summons together. Each subsequent summon one of your party members calls forth will have its cost reduced by one, down to a minimum of one. This will incentivize players to bring out cheaper single or double cost summons first so the most powerful options can be brought out for cheap!

On how summons came to be, Fukuhara-san shared that the system was a rather late addition in the expansion’s development and he wasn't sure how the team would respond to the idea. “So, from the beginning, there was the wish to have everyone you meet as an option, but he was expecting that there would be pushback and that along with the staff would say, ‘Oh, we can only do half, we won't be able to meet deadlines’, but instead the response was the vision as intended. So, it did require a lot of elbow grease, but everyone was having a lot of fun while they were doing it.”

Some summons have already been revealed in earlier trailers with Relink bosses, including Furycane and Nazarbonju, but the full number reaches past 100, with a mix of both imposing beasts, citizens, and some silly ones too. When asked for each of their favorite summons, both Fukuhara-san and Hidaka-san’s picks fell on that lighter side: “There's like a crab rain summon where you just rain crabs on the field. And depending on how many of the Wee Snippers you have collected, the amount of crabs that rain down will actually increase,” Fukuhara-san tells us. Hidaka-san continues: “I really like the cat summon, where if you do it well, a lot of cats come out, and the more cats you have, the more power you have, much like in real life,” he laughs.

If the summons aren’t selling Endless Ragnarok for you, the expansion offers far more than just that. Alongside a new story and quests to uncover, players can test their mettle with the new Chaos difficulty, experiment with the Master Traits for improved character specialization and customization, or dive into Conflux, an intriguing roguelike mode. Crossplay support and various quality-of-life improvements and UI updates fill out the rest of the package, costing existing Relink players $29.99. Even with the small glimpse we’ve had, Endless Ragnarok looks to be packed surprisingly full for an expansion.

I can’t think of a single game that hasn’t been made better by the ability to summon giant creatures to fight for you, and it looks like Granblue Fantasy: Relink - Endless Ragnarok continues to prove that theory. Thankfully, veteran and prospective Skyfarers won’t have long to wait as Granblue Fantasy: Relink - Endless Ragnarok launches on July 9 and comes either as an upgrade for owners of the base game or together with it for $59.99 on PlayStation 4/5, Steam, and now Nintendo Switch 2.

Scott White is a freelance contributor to IGN, assisting with tabletop games and guide coverage. Follow him on X/Twitter or Bluesky.