With the Tokyo Game Show and now Jump Festa, it seems that Square Enix has abandoned the "Closed Mega Theater" concept that has been a fixture of its booths as far back as I remember (my first Jump Festa eight years ago had the theater, complete with special Square Enix greeting cards handed out to visitors).

At TGS, in place of the Closed Mega Theater, visitors to the Square Enix booth were treated to the top trailers after playing either Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep or Final Fantasy XIII. This trailer showing was different from the footage airing in the public open theater at the front of the booth.

At Jump, Square Enix had the same system in place, but the order was reversed. Those waiting in line to get into the Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep demo area were able to view trailer footage on two large screens. I prefer this method, as due to the wait time, I was able to watch the trailer footage three times!

The line was behind a large Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep screen and could only be accessed by those who had received a ticket handed out earlier in the day, so it had the feel of a privileged closed door session. The doors weren't closed too tightly, though. I'm not sure if Square Enix realized it, but you could sorta see the footage through the screen:

Look closely, and you'll see an image from the new Final Fantasy Versus XIII trailer. The reel also contained footage of all the expected major Square Enix titles -- Birth by Sleep, Agito XIII, Final Fantasy XIII, and 3rd Birthday. And, of course, the usual warning messages about not taking videos.

Versus XIII was the main attraction, although it was more of a tease than a proper trailer. The footage began with the words "real or fantasy" set against a black background. The "fantasy" lingers for a few seconds as the scene switches to a bright daytime scene of main character Noctis standing on the side of what looks like a highway, leaning against a gate. As a vehicle approaches from the distance, the Versus logo and various bits of latin text flash on the screen. The vehicle stops, and as Noctis gets in, we see brief flashes to past trailers, including an image of heroine Stella in her formal attire. Noctis crosses his legs (this is important -- see below), and the car speeds off into the distance.

The trailer leaves with the phrases "Work in progress" and "Revelation will come next time."

It's just about a minute in length, but there's a lot to take away from the trailer. The car, for instance, is, I believe, the same car that was shown in the early Versus trailers. The car is also driving down a similar highway as depicted in those trailers. The difference here, in addition to the switch to daytime, is that everything is in realtime -- the car's exterior and interior, the roadside, and of course Noctis himself.

You can tell the footage is realtime because the image quality isn't as clean as CG. Aside from that, though, you might not notice the difference. The modeling detail, animation, and particularly the lighting are all first rate.

I mentioned above that Noctis crossing his legs was important. While watching the trailer, I noticed that the soles of his shoes emitted a red glow. This was easily noticeable, as the camera positioning when Noctis enters the car and crosses his leg had the shoe directly facing the camera.

Later, while taking pics of Square Enix's booth, I came across this display of the latest in Versus fashion:

Look closely at the shoes:

Notice the red glow from the bottom? The red emitting light is apparently a part of the shoe style.

If you're in the mood, you could probably speculate on how the red glow will fit into the game, either as part of the story (example: the government tracks people by a unique color emitted by their shoes) or as part of the gameplay (example: your shoes emit a unique color depending on the level of your combo attacks).

Or maybe Tetsuya Nomura and clothing designer Roen just decided that having shoes emit a red light would be a cool fashion statement.

The "Revelation will come next time" message at the end of the trailer indicates that we'll soon know so much about Final Fantasy Versus XIII that we'll be able to stop writing about clothing.