Dissidia Duellum Final Fantasy Preview: Fashionable Factions

The Dissidia Remaining Fantasy spin-off sequence is making a return, however in a complete new kind, as Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy is a free-to-play recreation coming to Android and iOS gadgets on March 24, 2026. DualShockers had an opportunity to preview Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy forward of launch, which meant hands-on time with the brand new Remaining Fantasy crossover.

Dissidia has develop into a subseries of the Remaining Fantasy sequence, during which characters from throughout the franchise face one another on the battlefield. Often, these are preventing video games, translating the mechanics of every hero and villain into that style, equivalent to Tifa from Remaining Fantasy 7 as a quick brawler, or Terra from Remaining Fantasy 6 as a ranged character who blasts folks with spells.

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Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy is extra of an motion recreation, being nearer to Ever Disaster than the unique Dissidia Remaining Fantasy. Maybe the most important shake-up is the setting, because it’s someplace the Remaining Fantasy sequence has seldom gone earlier than.

Dissidia Duellum Brings Remaining Fantasy Characters Into the Actual World

Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy begins out by asking the participant’s favourite Remaining Fantasy, citing a completely gargantuan record of names. Sadly, this solely appears to find out one of many titles in your character profile.

As soon as the profile is about up, the intro film begins, and to the shock of nobody, Cloud Strife from Remaining Fantasy 7 kicks issues off, following Sephiroth via a portal. As an alternative of ending up in Kingdom Hearts or Tremendous Smash Bros. Final, the 2 enter the real-world, or, extra particularly, modern-day Japan.

The intro pits Cloud towards an Iron Big, one of many recurring elite monsters from the Remaining Fantasy sequence. Thus begins a prolonged tutorial for the battle system, which is mentioned in larger element beneath. As soon as Cloud is victorious, he is joined by the Warrior of Gentle from Remaining Fantasy (sadly, not Jack from Stranger of Paradise), Terra from Remaining Fantasy 6, and Lightning from Remaining Fantasy 13, and he is shortly recruited into their group.

The Remaining Fantasy characters work together with a human little one, who refers to them as “Ghosts.” The story segments largely encompass messenger sequences, because the Remaining Fantasy forged be part of the identical faux-WhatsApp group and begin sharing GIFs with one another.

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Who’s Who In Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy

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The preview construct of Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy has ten characters, with extra confirmed for the long run. These characters are:

Every character has an outfit based mostly on their look of their supply recreation, in addition to a contemporary outfit with a number of colour variants. These trendy outfits look nice, with a shocking concentrate on style over fanservice, one thing that appears to have fallen to the wayside with Ever Disaster.

Characters are earned via Character Tickets, with their costume variants classed as separate entities. There are 4 separate fight roles which are tied to them, and whereas they do not have distinct gear, they do have sure unique assaults that solely they’ll use in battle.

Dissidia Duellum Pits Gamers In opposition to Every Different (and a Boss)

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So, how does the fight work in Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy? Every match options two groups of three gamers going through one another on small maps. There are a number of crystals unfold throughout the map, that are guarded by monsters. As soon as a crystal’s radius is freed from enemies, a participant can declare it, incomes Bravery factors.

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A boss monster will seem on the stage, such because the Behemoth. To win the match, a crew must kill the boss throughout the time restrict. Nonetheless, it is resistant to assaults until the Bravery meter is crammed out, which they should do by claiming crystals, all whereas the opposite crew is competing for a similar crystals. As soon as the Bravery meter is crammed, characters can carry out a Bravery Burst, the place their assaults can harm the boss, which has a separate well being meter for every crew.

Gamers can (and may) assault the opposing crew, because it’s doable to kill them. That is solely non permanent, nevertheless, as they’re going to respawn on the fringe of the battlefield, the place they’re going to have to waste time returning to the battlefield.

The controls in Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy are finicky in touchscreen mode. The sport is performed vertically, with the participant in a position to transfer the digicam and the character by touching varied components of the display. Happily, there are auto options that make it simpler to focus on issues, nevertheless it takes some getting used to.

The visuals in fight are surprisingly beautiful for a cell recreation, with the extra reasonable Remaining Fantasy 7 Remake/Ever Disaster aesthetic modified out for a cel-shaded search for the characters. The degrees are based mostly on actual areas of Japan, they usually look first rate for what they’re attempting to painting. The soundtrack consists of Remaining Fantasy hits, together with some new remixes, and nothing else must be mentioned about its high quality.

How the Gacha Mechanics Work in Dissidia Duellum

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The principle fight gimmick in Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy entails the Capacity system. A personality can take 5 Skills into fight, a few of that are shared amongst the entire identical kind, and a few are unique. For instance, Terra from Remaining Fantasy 6 can use the Fira spell shared by all Ranged characters, however Meltdown is unique to her.

Every Capacity has a cooldown timer when utilized in fight, which suggests they can not be spammed. Whereas Skills are highly effective instruments to make use of towards different gamers, they deal much more harm to bosses as a part of a Bravery Burst, that means gamers should be very cautious about once they use them.

It ought to be famous that not all Skills are assaults. There are some which are movement-based, equivalent to Minwu’s Teleport, which places a personality subsequent to the closest crystal, whereas others heal or buff allies.

So, what concerning the Gacha mechanics? The participant does not get entry to all of the Skills immediately: they’re drawn utilizing a, you guessed it, particular forex. This implies the extra highly effective strikes are locked behind random probability, or, you realize, paying cash for the possibility of getting them. It is also doable to boost Skills utilizing Development Eggs, that are one other useful resource the participant wants to trace.

The Capacity system drastically adjustments how every character works, that means the possibilities of enjoying opponents with equivalent builds are slim. The distinctive Skills of every character imply there’ll virtually actually be a tier-list of heroes, particularly when extra are added to the sport sooner or later, however the choices provide all types of thrilling choices for builds.

The Specter of Dissidia NT Hangs Over Duellum

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After enjoying the Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy preview, there was one burning query left in my thoughts — will it have the identical drawback as its religious predecessor, Dissidia Remaining Fantasy NT?

The primary two Dissidia video games have been 1v1 preventing video games, that means gamers had solely themselves in charge in the event that they misplaced. Dissidia NT modified the formulation, turning it right into a 3v3 recreation. This resolution killed the sport, because it meant there wanted to be six gamers of roughly equal ability to maintain matches balanced and enjoyable.

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If one participant was a beginner or in the event that they give up mid-match, it was principally a loss for his or her crew, as the opposite two members have been outnumbered. This was the most important design flaw with Dissidia Remaining Fantasy NT, and it appears like Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy is making the identical mistake, particularly as it is a cell recreation.

This brings me to the second main subject with the preview — we by no means truly killed the bosses. Every recreation resulted in a loss as a result of the groups have been too centered on killing one another and utilizing up Skills simply to outlive. A ton of cooperation is required to take down a boss, and the timer turns into the most important enemy, as a result of matches simply maintain operating out the clock.

Dropping the boss, the opposing crew, and all of the common monsters/crystals into such a small area implies that it may be straightforward for issues to get complicated, particularly when attempting to focus on foes with particular Skills.

Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy will be performed utilizing AI companions towards AI opponents, however a lot of the content material is tied to aggressive modes. I concern folks attempting to play it like a solo recreation are going to get pissed off once they’re dropping towards opponents who’re actively speaking, which, to be honest, is a matter with a whole lot of multiplayer titles.

All that being mentioned, the Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy preview was performed with a small group of individuals in a brief time frame. If a aggressive scene does construct up across the recreation, then this shall be much less of a problem. When there are six gamers with totally optimized builds battling it out, Dissidia Duellum Remaining Fantasy will be an thrilling multiplayer expertise. It simply wants these particular circumstances to get the place it must be.

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Techniques

Launched

March 31, 2026

Developer(s)

NHN PlayArt Corp., Sq. Enix

Writer(s)

Sq. Enix