Final Fantasy XV: A New Empire is a multiplayer base-building game for mobile devices. While the game is free, it aggressively pushes in-game purchases through its mechanics more than most of its peers.

Final Fantasy XV: A New Empire is a base-building game in the vein of Clash of Clans. It uses licensed imagery and characters from the popular Final Fantasy game franchise, including Noctis Lucis Caelum and his companions. 

While you can interact with “heroes,” acquire items, and even get chocobos to use as mounts in A New Empire, the gameplay is very different from mainline Final Fantasy games. A New Empire centers around resource management, strategic decisions, networking with other players, and waiting. Just like in other popular freemium games, you’ll spend a lot of time in A New Empire simply waiting for bars to fill up so you can collect loot.

The big goal in A New Empire is to make a powerful base that shows off your expertise and work ethic. As you play the game, you’ll have the ability to place buildings and level them up. These buildings all have various purposes, ranging from giving you simple resources to unlocking various parts of the game.

In addition to making a base for yourself, you can also raid other players’ bases in A New Empire. This PVP aspect is a big part of the draw of the game. The more powerful you get, the better defended your base will be, preventing other players from taking your stuff. On the flip side, getting stronger also helps you overcome defenses and makes your attacks more successful. This means that there’s plenty of motivation to put in the time, energy, and money to make your account as strong as possible.

A New Empire has been criticized for years due to its aggressive marketing and the unforgiving freemium model. Players can spend real money to get a big leg up on the competition in terms of power, and since the game has a big PVP component, there’s a lot of motivation to spend a lot of money. Spending money isn’t required – there are plenty of players of A New Empire that don’t spend anything at all – but it’ll be a tempting option for anyone who plays the game regularly. A New Empire is more expensive than some of its peers, meaning that it’s easy to spend a few hundred or even a few thousand dollars on the game in order to get ahead.

There are two big things that should be discussed when talking about Final Fantasy XV: A New Empire. The first is that the game has a very strong focus on community. Your first and most important task should be to find a group of players that you enjoy talking to and interacting with. If you’re after a single-player game with no social components, find a different game.

The second thing is that Final Fantasy XV: A New Empire gets updated a lot. That means that any guide you find is going to be out of date unless it’s less than a week old. Each patch pushes the power of players in a big way, so the strategies and advice that worked during the last patch might be irrelevant in the modern meta.

In keeping with the second point, try not to push too hard. Imagine for a moment that you and a bunch of other people are playing a very long game of soccer. After a while, your team is up 3-2. Suddenly, a patch hits. You now score thirty points with each goal. This means that being up a single point doesn’t matter that much anymore. Patches in A New Empire aren’t quite this impactful, but they can seem like it to the people who play the game. The harder you work to stay way ahead of the field, the more each patch will drag you back to the center and require you to redo all of the grinds you’ve been working on.

Critics of A New Empire claim that the monetization practices are insidious and unethical. The game’s regular patch cycle ensures that whatever thing you were grinding for last week quickly becomes obsolete, whether it’s by giving all players big resource boosts so they can catch up or introducing a new mechanic that makes the old power system outdated. This has the upside of meaning that free-to-play players are often in a similar boat to veteran spenders, but it also means that you’re never done grinding or spending money. Every patch brings a new set of things that you’ll be tempted to purchase to keep up with the crowd.

The big strength of A New Empire is the game’s strong focus on community. While its gameplay often revolves around waiting for timers or watching numbers go up, the game practically forces players to work together to achieve their goals. This means that you’ll be sucked up by a group of players almost immediately. With a bit of searching, you can find a group of like-minded players that share similar goals. You’ll be able to work together in-game and spend lots of quality time hanging out as you build up your base.

A New Empire’s gameplay isn’t particularly riveting to outsiders, but it’s been carefully refined to be as addictive as possible. If you’re into base-building games, you’ll want to approach A New Empire with caution. With its aggressive monetization, addictive gameplay, and a strong focus on community, it’s easy to spend a lot of money trying to keep up with the game’s update creep. The game is fun, engaging, and ostensibly free, so you can certainly mess with it without spending, but be mindful of your mental resilience and try to avoid geting the game if you think you’re susceptible to marketing, freemium monetization tactics, or fear of missing out. It’s far too easy to spend thousands of dollars on A New Empire without thinking about it.

Are you a fan of Final Fantasy XV: A New Empire? What have the latest updates brought? Do you think it’s viable to play the game without spending money? Let us know in the comments below!