So, There's a Final Fantasy XIII Countdown Clock

I'm not sure when this went up, but there's a countdown clock on Square Enix's official site counting away to Final Fantasy XIII -- right down to the millisecond!

It looks a little something like this:

That is all.. carry on, carry on.

In other pointless FFXIII news, how come Square Enix makes its top-tier team use cheapo Dell monitors to create FFXIII's gorgeous visuals?

Those images are from the recent Final Fantasy Academy broadcast. Here are a couple of additional clips that I didn't link to in my previous story on the broadcast.

In this clip, the show cast visits Square Enix's visual production lab where they're greeted by the game's lead facial motion designer and event motion designer. Midway through, you get a look at the texture parts that are used for Snow. They also discuss the use of normal textures to bring out very specific details.

Warning: this clip has a brief passage from Dear My Friend.

This next clip has four minutes of battle footage as played by Yama-chan and the cast. I believe this is just the TGS demo. Stick around for Shiva footage followed by a boss fight.