gamergirly
Member
eXistor said:
Whatever they announce, they're definitely going to shake things up
-
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Final Fantasy XIII Post-Game Impressions
- Thread starter Shouta
- Start date
Whatever they announce, they're definitely going to shake things up
Nice impressions, detailed yet simple at the same time. Although I had already made up my opinion on the game before, these impressions just re-affirmed my opinion.
I wasn't a huge fan of FFX because of the linearity of the game, and since FFXIII is even more linear it doesn't seem like I'll like the game at all.
To me an RPG should be more than just the battle system and pretty graphics and cutscenes, since all those two basically amount to is a long interactive cg movie, so it looks like I'll be saving $60 this spring.
I wasn't a huge fan of FFX because of the linearity of the game, and since FFXIII is even more linear it doesn't seem like I'll like the game at all.
To me an RPG should be more than just the battle system and pretty graphics and cutscenes, since all those two basically amount to is a long interactive cg movie, so it looks like I'll be saving $60 this spring.
BlazingDarkness
Member
There are hidden bosses/cutscenes/ultimate weapons etc but they're all unlocked via hunts - there's no quirky mini games etcHanmik said:
Pizza Luigi
Member
Wait, it's already out?
Man, I am NOT following this game.
Man, I am NOT following this game.
BlazingDarkness
Member
In Japan, yeahPizza Luigi said:
donkey show
Member
Ultimate weapons are created through synthing. Other awesome accessories are created through desynthing or found as rare items or rewards through hunts. You don't need to go through any Zodiac Spear wackiness in this game.BlazingDarkness said:
BlazingDarkness
Member
Yeah thats what i meant, all the best/optional stuff is related to huntsdonkey show said:
There are no towns to visit? One of the reasons I loved FF7 and psx rpgs in general was the sense of exploration. i loved visiting towns and talking to the residents and listening to the local theme music. really helped flesh out the world. from your write up this seems like a dungeon crawler. that's ok i guess because it seems liek this game is very focused and as long as the combat and story are good i'll be fine. day one!
I agree very much to Shouta for the most part and I'm currently on Chapter 12. I found the mobs are getting really difficult as I didn't do much grinding if at all. The battle system is also nice but those random party members positions....
The story structure is kinda weird as well as mentioned.
The story structure is kinda weird as well as mentioned.
I don't mind the easy difficulty; I often intentionally underlevel myself in RPGs to create a higher challenge. I beat Tiamat in FFXII at an average level of 14, I remember, it was like a 70 minute fight. Epic. :lol
Linearity is fine by me, if the story is awesome (see: Xenosaga Episode III). Still, most impressions seem to say the opposite is true.
Oh well. Not like any of this is going to stop me from picking it up. = D
Linearity is fine by me, if the story is awesome (see: Xenosaga Episode III). Still, most impressions seem to say the opposite is true.
Oh well. Not like any of this is going to stop me from picking it up. = D
darkjedi187
Member
Excellent write up. Thank you.
Lionheart1827
Member
Shouta said:
Damnit, I was kinda worried about this. This is one of my most hated things about FF12, that game reminded me of phantom menace. Was the OST at least better than FF12's? FF12 didn't remind me of "FF" in the least but after seeing some of the trailers and videos of 13 made me think that maybe the music sounded more like that "FF" magic.
Either way, good review, makes me even more excited for the game.
Okay time for some final impressions. This is probably the last detailed post I will make about the game.
Story
I really liked the main characters. I liked every single one, even Fang. They're all very decent people, who have good character arcs. I really like how the game focused mostly on them interacting with each other, and how they react to the events in the story, and to the world in general.
I'm very confident that Toriyama took heavy inspiration from Lost for the narrative format of FFXIII, and that is both a good and a bad thing. When it works for most of the game, it works really well, and adds a lot of development to the characters without slowing down the main story. Unfortunately when it comes to becoming more creative with plot twists or needing to flesh out revelations and various worldview aspects, the team obviously lacked the stronger writing skills needed to put it all together.
The story, like pretty much every other FF game is a big of a mess, and not only are there inconsistencies, but there are also plot holes and just plain bad storytelling at times. The worldview is pretty well developed in terms of art and concept. There's a definitely a lot more material to the world than what is presented in the story itself, and some of it can be found in the game's "autoclip" menu option which provide a bit more detail on the various locations, characters, factions, etc in the game. Even with this function, it definitely feels like the overall tale has holes and subplots left uncovered. A bit of a pity, but I'm pretty used to this by now.
In the end, the characters carried the story through, and overall I really enjoyed the story. There's a very coherent and consistent overall tale, and the strong visual design of each area and the overall world helped to seal the deal along with a very likable cast of the characters. The telling of the story may be weak, but the little things definitely held it together.
Gameplay
The gameplay of FFXIII is a bit bipolar for me. On one hand, it has the fastest and probably the most enjoyable battle system in Final Fantasy yet. The battles take command battle systems to the next level in terms of being realtime and requiring attention and input from the player. Much like how FFX-2 played around with the ideas of using a command based system to introduce action elements like timing, combos, and interrupts and cancels, FFXIII does the same thing but faster and more demanding.
The battles require the player to set up the roles of the party in a maximum of 6 Optima formation slots, and changing between them within the battle changes the entire dynamic of battles in realtime. Regardless of what people might think of AI driven partners, it is required in FFXIII because of the speed and nature of the battles. In the end it works out, without compromising too much of the player's control, so it still feels like the player is actively dictating the events in the battle, while maintaining a high level of speed and action.
On the other hand, the gameplay outside of battles is almost non-existent. While this does not ultimately bother me as much as it should, because the battles definitely hold up the game well even though it is so battle driven, it is a bit of a waste that there are definitely entire cities and fields in the game which end up being one-time affairs without the chance of exploring it in times of peace. There's definitely a world out like any other FF game, but the narrative nature of the game turns pretty much everything into a dungeon of some sort.
Where the gameplay actually starts to affect my enjoyment though, is the way certain systems are developed in the game. Both the Crystarium (character growth) system and the Weapon upgrade system are flawed because their design clashes with the nature of the game's battle design. Weapon upgrades are purely monetary based - You need money to buy items, to put into weapons to upgrade them. You can use drops to do this, but there is no way you will ever have enough drops to make significant progress in upgrading weapons and changing them into the advanced forms.
The problem? Enemies don't drop gil. There is no way to easily make money in this game outside of cash spikes at certain points in the game when you get a bulk of non-useful but valuable items to sell for money. This makes the entire weapon upgrade progress feel really artificial and it's more of a hassle than it is fun. You feel obliged to go out of your way to figure out how to make strong weapons and accessories even though it's just a menu driven system, because you need stronger characters. But you're not doing it because it's fun - like how you would look for better weapons in chests, or do sidequests to get better weapons, etc. Improving equipment in FFXIII feels like work, which is too bad, because the rest of the game does not.
For the Crystarium system, you need CP to advance on power grids to learn new abilities and gain stat upgrades. This is sort of like the Sphere Grid, but FFX had random encounters. FFXII used a License Board, but it also had huge fields with respawning enemies and lots of exploration. Ie: these games allowed you to grind a lot. FFXIII does not. Until a very late point in the game, there is basically no real grinding in the game. This means you pretty much get what you expect from each chapter, no more and no less. As such they even put limits on how far you can progress on each role, and the limits are removed as you progress in the story. This makes the growth system feel for more linear than it actually is, because when it opens up towards the end, there are some interesting customization options.
As far as optional content goes, there are some pretty fun diversions in the middle of the game, as well as endgame/post-endgame. The chocobo riding feels really good, but it is limited in where you can go with it. Completing optional missions on Pulse also unlocks additional historical details about the world below, which makes for interesting reading for those who want to know more. It's a big waste that none of that is actually in the story though.
For those who enjoy the battle system, the game definitely offers a lot of entertainment, and it is actually really fun to discover good party configurations and how to best use the Optima system. I feel the characters handle really different from each other, even in the same role, this is definitely a good thing for people who didn't like how every character in FFXII was pretty much a blank slate. It's obvious the game design here was geared towards giving players ways of experimenting with the battle system and as such pretty much all optional content is battle driven.
Graphics and Sound
FFXIII is the best looking JRPG on any system this generation. It is a huge milestone in graphics, and this is probably the closest FF has come in realizing the concept art in realtime. Most of the areas in the game are breathtaking, and there's a surprising amount of background animation and details in each area. While the game maps are rather linear, what stands out is the scale of the environments, as well as how well streamed the game is. There is generally only loading at the start of a chapter, and while chapters take place over huge areas connected to each other, there is pretty much no loading between areas, battles, cutscenes, etc.
The art direction in the game is also stunning. Kamikokuryou did some really amazing artwork for the game, and it's really nice to see that most of the details and uniqueness of his paintings were not lost in the conversion to a realtime 3D setting. It really adds a lot to the experience, and the great enemy design shows off really well in the game as well.
The game also sounds really good most of the time, although I have some issues with the overall realtime mix in the game. It seems to me that they focused way too much on the sound fx and music, and the NPC dialogue which plays automatically when you approach people in the game is often too soft or poor positioned. While it makes sense that if I'm running away from a NPC, their voices should fade out behind me in the rear speakers, it makes no sense at all to me that when I'm right in front of them, their softer on the front and center speakers than the general effect noises that surround me. The fact that most of the environments are rather loud and action movie-ish doesn't help. That's the sole flaw in the audio though.
Musically, the game is pretty outstanding. I think Hamauzu has done a really, really good job for the score and it helps the game not only look like a movie most of the time, but sound like one too. His score is very film-like, and employs various techniques not often found in videogames. It's definitely more western in concept, because the tracks blend very well with the events happening on screen, and are there to make the player feel certain emotions related to the visuals and events, rather than something that just sits in the background and creates a "theme". The quality of the music is really high too, and makes the entire production feel like the high quality blockbuster it is.
The FMVs in the game.... well I don't know what to say. They're the most amazing CG sequences ever rendered for a videogame. Probably the most expensive too, but hey you get what you pay for. It's impressive that for most of the realtime cutscenes, they actually compare very well with previous generation FMVs. There's a lot of great animation, especially on the faces, and it makes you feel that FMVs aren't really required. But just as you start believing that, the game throws in a real FMV, and it just reminds you what Square Visual Works are capable of when they bring their AAA game. It's total visual porn.
Final thoughts
So yeah, I really liked the game. It's not my favorite FF, it's not going to change my view on the world, and it's not going to massively shift my expectations for how games should be made or anything like that. It does have my favorite cast from FF ever though. It's rare that I like every single one of the main characters, but in this game they felt really close, and it was enjoyable to just see them stick together and go through the entire story.
The battles were really fun, and I enjoyed playing the game a lot because of that, along with how well realized the areas were, and how gorgeous the environments are. Towards the end though, I felt some of the battles in the final dungeon were pretty ridiculous. It's good that the game has a restart option for battles, because some of them are clearly just bullshit put there to annoy you and make you go "damnit, the end of the game is hard" when it's not hard, it's just annoying. The boss designs are all great and fun to play, it's just some crappy encounters that bring the bar down at the end.
I'll definitely be playing more of the game in the future, but I'll probably let the game rest for a week or so while I clear God of War and God of War 2. Don't wanna suffer from RPG burn out lol.
Story
I really liked the main characters. I liked every single one, even Fang. They're all very decent people, who have good character arcs. I really like how the game focused mostly on them interacting with each other, and how they react to the events in the story, and to the world in general.
I'm very confident that Toriyama took heavy inspiration from Lost for the narrative format of FFXIII, and that is both a good and a bad thing. When it works for most of the game, it works really well, and adds a lot of development to the characters without slowing down the main story. Unfortunately when it comes to becoming more creative with plot twists or needing to flesh out revelations and various worldview aspects, the team obviously lacked the stronger writing skills needed to put it all together.
The story, like pretty much every other FF game is a big of a mess, and not only are there inconsistencies, but there are also plot holes and just plain bad storytelling at times. The worldview is pretty well developed in terms of art and concept. There's a definitely a lot more material to the world than what is presented in the story itself, and some of it can be found in the game's "autoclip" menu option which provide a bit more detail on the various locations, characters, factions, etc in the game. Even with this function, it definitely feels like the overall tale has holes and subplots left uncovered. A bit of a pity, but I'm pretty used to this by now.
In the end, the characters carried the story through, and overall I really enjoyed the story. There's a very coherent and consistent overall tale, and the strong visual design of each area and the overall world helped to seal the deal along with a very likable cast of the characters. The telling of the story may be weak, but the little things definitely held it together.
Gameplay
The gameplay of FFXIII is a bit bipolar for me. On one hand, it has the fastest and probably the most enjoyable battle system in Final Fantasy yet. The battles take command battle systems to the next level in terms of being realtime and requiring attention and input from the player. Much like how FFX-2 played around with the ideas of using a command based system to introduce action elements like timing, combos, and interrupts and cancels, FFXIII does the same thing but faster and more demanding.
The battles require the player to set up the roles of the party in a maximum of 6 Optima formation slots, and changing between them within the battle changes the entire dynamic of battles in realtime. Regardless of what people might think of AI driven partners, it is required in FFXIII because of the speed and nature of the battles. In the end it works out, without compromising too much of the player's control, so it still feels like the player is actively dictating the events in the battle, while maintaining a high level of speed and action.
On the other hand, the gameplay outside of battles is almost non-existent. While this does not ultimately bother me as much as it should, because the battles definitely hold up the game well even though it is so battle driven, it is a bit of a waste that there are definitely entire cities and fields in the game which end up being one-time affairs without the chance of exploring it in times of peace. There's definitely a world out like any other FF game, but the narrative nature of the game turns pretty much everything into a dungeon of some sort.
Where the gameplay actually starts to affect my enjoyment though, is the way certain systems are developed in the game. Both the Crystarium (character growth) system and the Weapon upgrade system are flawed because their design clashes with the nature of the game's battle design. Weapon upgrades are purely monetary based - You need money to buy items, to put into weapons to upgrade them. You can use drops to do this, but there is no way you will ever have enough drops to make significant progress in upgrading weapons and changing them into the advanced forms.
The problem? Enemies don't drop gil. There is no way to easily make money in this game outside of cash spikes at certain points in the game when you get a bulk of non-useful but valuable items to sell for money. This makes the entire weapon upgrade progress feel really artificial and it's more of a hassle than it is fun. You feel obliged to go out of your way to figure out how to make strong weapons and accessories even though it's just a menu driven system, because you need stronger characters. But you're not doing it because it's fun - like how you would look for better weapons in chests, or do sidequests to get better weapons, etc. Improving equipment in FFXIII feels like work, which is too bad, because the rest of the game does not.
For the Crystarium system, you need CP to advance on power grids to learn new abilities and gain stat upgrades. This is sort of like the Sphere Grid, but FFX had random encounters. FFXII used a License Board, but it also had huge fields with respawning enemies and lots of exploration. Ie: these games allowed you to grind a lot. FFXIII does not. Until a very late point in the game, there is basically no real grinding in the game. This means you pretty much get what you expect from each chapter, no more and no less. As such they even put limits on how far you can progress on each role, and the limits are removed as you progress in the story. This makes the growth system feel for more linear than it actually is, because when it opens up towards the end, there are some interesting customization options.
As far as optional content goes, there are some pretty fun diversions in the middle of the game, as well as endgame/post-endgame. The chocobo riding feels really good, but it is limited in where you can go with it. Completing optional missions on Pulse also unlocks additional historical details about the world below, which makes for interesting reading for those who want to know more. It's a big waste that none of that is actually in the story though.
For those who enjoy the battle system, the game definitely offers a lot of entertainment, and it is actually really fun to discover good party configurations and how to best use the Optima system. I feel the characters handle really different from each other, even in the same role, this is definitely a good thing for people who didn't like how every character in FFXII was pretty much a blank slate. It's obvious the game design here was geared towards giving players ways of experimenting with the battle system and as such pretty much all optional content is battle driven.
Graphics and Sound
FFXIII is the best looking JRPG on any system this generation. It is a huge milestone in graphics, and this is probably the closest FF has come in realizing the concept art in realtime. Most of the areas in the game are breathtaking, and there's a surprising amount of background animation and details in each area. While the game maps are rather linear, what stands out is the scale of the environments, as well as how well streamed the game is. There is generally only loading at the start of a chapter, and while chapters take place over huge areas connected to each other, there is pretty much no loading between areas, battles, cutscenes, etc.
The art direction in the game is also stunning. Kamikokuryou did some really amazing artwork for the game, and it's really nice to see that most of the details and uniqueness of his paintings were not lost in the conversion to a realtime 3D setting. It really adds a lot to the experience, and the great enemy design shows off really well in the game as well.
The game also sounds really good most of the time, although I have some issues with the overall realtime mix in the game. It seems to me that they focused way too much on the sound fx and music, and the NPC dialogue which plays automatically when you approach people in the game is often too soft or poor positioned. While it makes sense that if I'm running away from a NPC, their voices should fade out behind me in the rear speakers, it makes no sense at all to me that when I'm right in front of them, their softer on the front and center speakers than the general effect noises that surround me. The fact that most of the environments are rather loud and action movie-ish doesn't help. That's the sole flaw in the audio though.
Musically, the game is pretty outstanding. I think Hamauzu has done a really, really good job for the score and it helps the game not only look like a movie most of the time, but sound like one too. His score is very film-like, and employs various techniques not often found in videogames. It's definitely more western in concept, because the tracks blend very well with the events happening on screen, and are there to make the player feel certain emotions related to the visuals and events, rather than something that just sits in the background and creates a "theme". The quality of the music is really high too, and makes the entire production feel like the high quality blockbuster it is.
The FMVs in the game.... well I don't know what to say. They're the most amazing CG sequences ever rendered for a videogame. Probably the most expensive too, but hey you get what you pay for. It's impressive that for most of the realtime cutscenes, they actually compare very well with previous generation FMVs. There's a lot of great animation, especially on the faces, and it makes you feel that FMVs aren't really required. But just as you start believing that, the game throws in a real FMV, and it just reminds you what Square Visual Works are capable of when they bring their AAA game. It's total visual porn.
Final thoughts
So yeah, I really liked the game. It's not my favorite FF, it's not going to change my view on the world, and it's not going to massively shift my expectations for how games should be made or anything like that. It does have my favorite cast from FF ever though. It's rare that I like every single one of the main characters, but in this game they felt really close, and it was enjoyable to just see them stick together and go through the entire story.
The battles were really fun, and I enjoyed playing the game a lot because of that, along with how well realized the areas were, and how gorgeous the environments are. Towards the end though, I felt some of the battles in the final dungeon were pretty ridiculous. It's good that the game has a restart option for battles, because some of them are clearly just bullshit put there to annoy you and make you go "damnit, the end of the game is hard" when it's not hard, it's just annoying. The boss designs are all great and fun to play, it's just some crappy encounters that bring the bar down at the end.
I'll definitely be playing more of the game in the future, but I'll probably let the game rest for a week or so while I clear God of War and God of War 2. Don't wanna suffer from RPG burn out lol.
Tathanen
Get Inside Her!
Okay, so, post-endgame content. Is there stuff that is EXCLUSIVELY post-endgame? Things that don't unlock or become available or whatever until you beat the final boss? Basically, at what point do you recommend actually sitting down and focusing on all that stuff, before or after the game ends?
Tathanen
Get Inside Her!
7Th said:
So is it just an arbitrary switch, or is it one of those games where when you save after the final boss, you're ACTUALLY saving after the final boss? That is to say, you can no longer fight them, because you beat them, and you are saved in a world where they have been defeated?
And if that's the case, does the new stuff actually make sense as something that would appear because you beat said boss? Or is it, as suggested initially, just an arbitrary switch?
Hcoregamer00
The 'H' stands for hentai.
When I read Shouta's post-game impression, I felt really uneasy.
After reading Duckroll's post-game impression, I am actually quite excited for Final Fantasy XIII.
Damn, even the reviews of Final Fantasy XIII can make us bipolar :lol
After reading Duckroll's post-game impression, I am actually quite excited for Final Fantasy XIII.
Damn, even the reviews of Final Fantasy XIII can make us bipolar :lol
theMrCravens
Member
I just hope one day Square will take all the concept and ideas from FF IV, V, VI and VII, grind them into one epic game and release the final product.
Before I die please. (FF XXXVII)
Before I die please. (FF XXXVII)
Lé Blade Runner
Member
Good write-ups - thanks. The anticipation is just getting more painful.
Weird...a lot of the flaws duckroll and others are listing sound like huge pluses to me.:lol
-Very little grinding? Awesome.
-Strict progression system? Not really a problem to me, since one of my main complaints in FFXII and the last couple of FFs is that very few of the characters really felt unique given the fact that their skills eventually overlap fairly easily. This is especially true in FFXII.
-Extremely linear? Sweet!
This is sort of sounding like this is the "Call of Duty" of FF games which is perfectly fine for me. Hype meter is officially over 9000.
-Very little grinding? Awesome.
-Strict progression system? Not really a problem to me, since one of my main complaints in FFXII and the last couple of FFs is that very few of the characters really felt unique given the fact that their skills eventually overlap fairly easily. This is especially true in FFXII.
-Extremely linear? Sweet!
This is sort of sounding like this is the "Call of Duty" of FF games which is perfectly fine for me. Hype meter is officially over 9000.
Bebpo's Impressions
Shouta nailed it. The best way to described FFXIII is a bipolar game. Hell it almost feels like two different teams were making it at times with the huge difference between the first half and 2nd half of the game in story & gameplay.
Graphics
-Best looking game ever. Great image quality. At times it looks like you are walking through a gorgeous painting. On a tech level it may or may not be more impressive than Uncharted 2 (the models are, the environment probably not) but because of the art direction it's the best looking game ever. The cutscene animation and animation in general is incredible too. CG looks fantastic.
Bottom Line: Square spent a lot of money making XIII look good and it shows.
Sound
-The music very different for an FF. It's closer to the .hack series meets Persona 3/4 imo. Some very powerful tunes to enhance areas or cutscenes. The quality of the tracks is tremendous and there is A LOT of music in the game. Personally I feel like this is a good direction for the series to go musically. I would be very happy if Hamazu scored more mainline FF titles.
Bottom Line: Depending on your attachment to chiptune melodies, this may be the best FF score to date.
Story
-The first half of the game is very character development focused. It's not about the plot (you actually have no idea what the plot is most of the time), it's about the characters and they are a good likeable rpg cast once they get past their initial emo/angst subplots (so hold on for a bit if the first 6-10 hours makes you want to punch them in the face). The 2nd half is very plot, plot, plot with not much development for anyone at all. The plot also seems like it's just random scenes from a story with the database semi-filling in the rest, but a lot just seems missing. I feel like there is a good story somewhere in here. And if you take all the info you have and sit around with a bunch of gamers you could probably figure out the epic rpg tale that was trying to be told. But what's in there is just a mess of randomness and for the most part you never have any idea what's going on in the story and you don't care. It's very similar to the first time I played FFVIII!
Bottom Line: Good cast journeys through an utter mess of a nonsensical story.
Gameplay
Part 1: The structure
-It's different. It doesn't have the usual rpg feel. If you've ever played Grandia Xtreme, it feels kinda like that. All about the battle system and cutscenes between. Nothing else really. But like Grandia Xtreme it survives because the battle system is excellent. If you only play traditional rpgs and expect that out of FFXIII you're going to be unhappy at the changes. If you play a lot of rpgs and are used to all kinds of structure in your rpgs, you should enjoy XIII's different setup.
Bottom Line: Gonna piss off a lot of people, but not bad.
Part 2: The Battle System
------------Part A: Mechanics
-The battle system mechanics are excellent and hold the game together for 50+ hours. The battles are fun and there is a lot of strategy involved. The first half of the game has you making in-battle strategies to win. The 2nd half of the game opens up and it becomes like most rpgs, where it's all about the pre-battle team setup and equipment planning. Thankfully there's a restart option for battles so if you have a bad setup going in you can bail out and change the setup before retrying the battle. The combat engine feels like it's not fully fleshed out. For example you can juggle enemies but there is no extra combo bonus damage for keeping them in the air instead of just letting them drop and relaunching them each turn. Adding a combo counter that gives a damage bonus would give more incentive for people to pay attention to their attack timings in order to continually keep an enemy juggled.
Bottom Line: Very solid mechanics that emphasize strategy, but could've used slightly more depth.
------------Part B: The AI
-The game is like the "Tales of" series in that you only control one character while the others rely on AI. Unlike Tales, XIII has ABSOLUTELY ZERO AI CONTROLS. Actually let me rephrase that, you can change "optima" at any time which changes your job setups (in pre-planning you choose 6 three person job setups to switch between in battle) and that will at least tell the AI which spells/abilities to pick from. This is actually really good in action. For instace if you want your party to attack and then when the enemy rears his attack, block; then you keep it on attack optima and switch everyone to defend before the attack his. In a way this actually does let you select your commands for your AI and later on in the game you will be changing your optima (aka, commanding your characters) every 3 seconds in the battle. On the other hand you can't unselect which spells you don't want your AI to use or tell them which spells to use in what order or to use when. So the AI is not always efficient. To be fair though, this is the smartest AI I've seen in an rpg 90% of the time. They'll throw on elements the enemy are weak against onto your weapon, give you haste, juggle the enemies, etc...they make battles end quickly.
Bottom Line: 90% of the time very smart, but no AI options make the other 10% annoying.
-----------Part C: The difficulty - overall
It's harder than other FFs because they give you the option to retry at any time with no penalty. This is kinda like how with New Super Mario Bros Wii because they put in the auto-play Luigi for casuals they were able to make the game much tougher than the last few Mario games. So the battles in XIII are vicious, kill or be killed and the game has no problem showing you game over screens. I probably died a good 50 times+, which is a lot. The only issue I have is that the last 10-20% of the optional bosses in the game are really borderline masochist difficulty.
Bottom Line: Tough game, but doable because of retry option.
Part 3: The Crystarium Grid. Level capping and what it means for you and the difficulty
The grid kind of sucks. There isn't much variation in how you want to customize characters. They did this because they didn't want an FFXII situation where everyone was the same by the 2nd half. Even at the end of this game all 6 characters are quite different. For instance one character might get HP+120 and on the same spot of the board for another character they'll get HP+30. That's because it's already set that the 2nd character will have low HP for the entire game because they'll have high something else to balance it. Anyhow, it kinda sucks.
Now LEVEL CAP. This is new and a big deal to FF. Especially because the cap is pretty low. You can only get the stats on the board as far as the board has unlocked at anytime, this mean that's your stat cap. On one hand I totally approve of this because since the developers know EXACTLY what your stats are, they can design non-stop challenging battles around them. This is why the game is tough and challenging. Because you can't ever be overleveled like a normal rpg. Those used to running in circles and grinding to have an easy time in the main game are in for a shock. But the non-stop challenge from start to finish is fantastic and like the Shin Megami Tensei games the intensity of battles makes them even more fun. It also keeps fights short because they know your stats. The longest boss fight is probably 10-15 mins max. The usual ones are <6 mins.
Now WHEN THE LEVEL CAP FAILS is in the endgame. At endgame, the game opens up and there is 20-30 hours of optional sidequests content. But early on in that you will find yourself hitting the cap. This means that no matter how much more side content you keep doing, you're not getting any more powerful. Meanwhile the side content is getting harder as you progress through it. This has 2 implications:
1. This might just be me, but one thing I love about doing all the sidestuff endgame in an rpg is the feeling of POWER when you return to finish the main plot and see yourself doing far more damage than you were before you went off the main path. It's fun because you actually feel like you've accomplished things through powering up on these sidequests and you get to visually see the results as you stomp through the rest of the main game. In FFXIII that doesn't happen because of the cap. Shouta and Duckroll did the last dungeon around 40 hours in. I did it around 52 hours in after over a dozen hours more of sidequesting. Yet, when I did the final dungeon I had the same stats as them and it was just as difficult. It basically felt like I had wasted 12 hours because none of that made me any more powerful. Not a fan!
2. In terms of the optional bosses. You can actually reach a point where it is just impossible to beat them because you are capped too low to survive. After you finish the game the cap extends a bit, so a lot of the optional content is supposed to be done post-game. But if you're like me and trying to win anyways because you're doing all the sidestuff before the final duneon, then you can spend hours retrying a boss feeling like you can almost beat them, but you can't because you are capped too low. I found this frustrating. It also doesn't help that when you finally finish the game and get the cap extended, the final stats you need to take on the last 10-20% of the optional bosses are ridiculously expensive and require hours and hours of grinding. For example I finished the game around 54 hours with 70% of the optional quests done. One of the guys on the gamefaqs board got them all finished and was over 100 hours in. So the last % requires a ridiculous amount of grinding time commitment :\ Grinding also sucks in XIII because there are no random encounters and the enemies are spaced far apart and don't give a ton of CP(xp).
Bottom Line: The level cap makes a very balanced and challenging linear game, but severely hurts the game once it opens up in linearity.
Part 4: Money
The economy is mess. Enemies don't drop any money and for the most part they don't drop any items worth any money. Basically for the entire first 20 hours of the game you only get money when the developers want you to. Maybe 8k gil max. Yet, the prices for items are NORMAL GIL PRICES that you would see in other FF games where enemies drop money. Then in the 2nd half you get huge amounts of money but it's one time only. Like in one spot you'll get 600k suddenly but then when you spend it it's hard to get good money again for the rest of the game. This is all because money is what decides how far you can upgrade your weapons. If you had all the money in the world, at the start of the game you could upgrade your ATK+8 sword into an ATK+1000 sword. Obviously for the first half of the game the developers wanted to limit how far you could advance your stats (to keep with the level cap), which is not far at all. Maybe you'll get an ATK+8 sword to ATK+58 by 20 hours in. Then in the 2nd half the game still limits your weapons by requiring specific items to upgrade your weapons past a certain point and that item costs 2 million gil which is impossible to get Or it's dropped by the hardest enemy in the game that kills you in 1 hit around endgame levels. So basically again in order to level cap you and make a challenging game the economy is awful and your weapon growth is capped for each period. It's only post-game when you really don't need it that you start getting the money. But that's kind of the backwards thinking in a lot of jrpgs. Beat the hardest enemy in the game and then get an item that is useless now because you already beat the toughest enemy and there's nothing left where the item would actually matter against.
Bottom Line: The money economy is so bad that I honestly feel they're going to change it in whatever directors cut they do.
Part 5: Replay Value
The main story is about 35 hours with about 30 hours of optional content (though to do the last 5-10 hours you'll need to grind 30-40 hours). The game has enough material in it that it feels like a good length complete rpg. The first half of the game is probably not very replayable because it's so linear and you can't do much differently (although since you know how the game works you can run past most enemies and blow through the areas on 2nd play), the 2nd half is more replayable but it's still just the same optional content and I don't see it being very replayable. This is more of a game you will get to the end and then do everything to your ability, beat it, then do more to your ability. Then when you feel fully satisfied you'll shelve it and never touch it again. I don't see how DLC could work at all in the gameplay context, so I don't expect it. Unless the DLC is a movie viewer, which would actually be appreciated since the cutscenes look so good.
Bottom line: Good length rpg with lots of optional material like any FF, but not replayable.
Overall
A different FF, but a fun one. Definitely the best looking and arguably the best sounding rpg with a jumbled mess of a story but characters who present a reason to enjoy the journey as popcorn entertainment. The gameplay takes FF to exciting new places and brings in a level of challenge that has been forgotten in the series for many years. But as you get deeper and deeper into the gameplay you'll likely become more aware, annoyed and frustrated at the flaws and caps. Assuming you haven't already gotten frustrated and given up on the game because the game structure doesn't sit with you well. In the end it's a new and exciting FF and a heavily flawed one as well. It's actually too bad the US version is so soon after the Japanese version, or maybe they could have done some balancing changes after receiving feedback. It feels like the Persona 3 gameplay that should have been the Persona 4 gameplay if it had a handful of adjustments due to user response. Maybe in FFXIII International in a year...
Bottom Line: 8/10, a good, but not amazing, rpg. Low for an FF, but considering the rpg competition over the last 5 years of this generation, XIII still ranks as one of the better rpgs this gen.
Shouta nailed it. The best way to described FFXIII is a bipolar game. Hell it almost feels like two different teams were making it at times with the huge difference between the first half and 2nd half of the game in story & gameplay.
Graphics
-Best looking game ever. Great image quality. At times it looks like you are walking through a gorgeous painting. On a tech level it may or may not be more impressive than Uncharted 2 (the models are, the environment probably not) but because of the art direction it's the best looking game ever. The cutscene animation and animation in general is incredible too. CG looks fantastic.
Bottom Line: Square spent a lot of money making XIII look good and it shows.
Sound
-The music very different for an FF. It's closer to the .hack series meets Persona 3/4 imo. Some very powerful tunes to enhance areas or cutscenes. The quality of the tracks is tremendous and there is A LOT of music in the game. Personally I feel like this is a good direction for the series to go musically. I would be very happy if Hamazu scored more mainline FF titles.
Bottom Line: Depending on your attachment to chiptune melodies, this may be the best FF score to date.
Story
-The first half of the game is very character development focused. It's not about the plot (you actually have no idea what the plot is most of the time), it's about the characters and they are a good likeable rpg cast once they get past their initial emo/angst subplots (so hold on for a bit if the first 6-10 hours makes you want to punch them in the face). The 2nd half is very plot, plot, plot with not much development for anyone at all. The plot also seems like it's just random scenes from a story with the database semi-filling in the rest, but a lot just seems missing. I feel like there is a good story somewhere in here. And if you take all the info you have and sit around with a bunch of gamers you could probably figure out the epic rpg tale that was trying to be told. But what's in there is just a mess of randomness and for the most part you never have any idea what's going on in the story and you don't care. It's very similar to the first time I played FFVIII!
Bottom Line: Good cast journeys through an utter mess of a nonsensical story.
Gameplay
Part 1: The structure
-It's different. It doesn't have the usual rpg feel. If you've ever played Grandia Xtreme, it feels kinda like that. All about the battle system and cutscenes between. Nothing else really. But like Grandia Xtreme it survives because the battle system is excellent. If you only play traditional rpgs and expect that out of FFXIII you're going to be unhappy at the changes. If you play a lot of rpgs and are used to all kinds of structure in your rpgs, you should enjoy XIII's different setup.
Bottom Line: Gonna piss off a lot of people, but not bad.
Part 2: The Battle System
------------Part A: Mechanics
-The battle system mechanics are excellent and hold the game together for 50+ hours. The battles are fun and there is a lot of strategy involved. The first half of the game has you making in-battle strategies to win. The 2nd half of the game opens up and it becomes like most rpgs, where it's all about the pre-battle team setup and equipment planning. Thankfully there's a restart option for battles so if you have a bad setup going in you can bail out and change the setup before retrying the battle. The combat engine feels like it's not fully fleshed out. For example you can juggle enemies but there is no extra combo bonus damage for keeping them in the air instead of just letting them drop and relaunching them each turn. Adding a combo counter that gives a damage bonus would give more incentive for people to pay attention to their attack timings in order to continually keep an enemy juggled.
Bottom Line: Very solid mechanics that emphasize strategy, but could've used slightly more depth.
------------Part B: The AI
-The game is like the "Tales of" series in that you only control one character while the others rely on AI. Unlike Tales, XIII has ABSOLUTELY ZERO AI CONTROLS. Actually let me rephrase that, you can change "optima" at any time which changes your job setups (in pre-planning you choose 6 three person job setups to switch between in battle) and that will at least tell the AI which spells/abilities to pick from. This is actually really good in action. For instace if you want your party to attack and then when the enemy rears his attack, block; then you keep it on attack optima and switch everyone to defend before the attack his. In a way this actually does let you select your commands for your AI and later on in the game you will be changing your optima (aka, commanding your characters) every 3 seconds in the battle. On the other hand you can't unselect which spells you don't want your AI to use or tell them which spells to use in what order or to use when. So the AI is not always efficient. To be fair though, this is the smartest AI I've seen in an rpg 90% of the time. They'll throw on elements the enemy are weak against onto your weapon, give you haste, juggle the enemies, etc...they make battles end quickly.
Bottom Line: 90% of the time very smart, but no AI options make the other 10% annoying.
-----------Part C: The difficulty - overall
It's harder than other FFs because they give you the option to retry at any time with no penalty. This is kinda like how with New Super Mario Bros Wii because they put in the auto-play Luigi for casuals they were able to make the game much tougher than the last few Mario games. So the battles in XIII are vicious, kill or be killed and the game has no problem showing you game over screens. I probably died a good 50 times+, which is a lot. The only issue I have is that the last 10-20% of the optional bosses in the game are really borderline masochist difficulty.
Bottom Line: Tough game, but doable because of retry option.
Part 3: The Crystarium Grid. Level capping and what it means for you and the difficulty
The grid kind of sucks. There isn't much variation in how you want to customize characters. They did this because they didn't want an FFXII situation where everyone was the same by the 2nd half. Even at the end of this game all 6 characters are quite different. For instance one character might get HP+120 and on the same spot of the board for another character they'll get HP+30. That's because it's already set that the 2nd character will have low HP for the entire game because they'll have high something else to balance it. Anyhow, it kinda sucks.
Now LEVEL CAP. This is new and a big deal to FF. Especially because the cap is pretty low. You can only get the stats on the board as far as the board has unlocked at anytime, this mean that's your stat cap. On one hand I totally approve of this because since the developers know EXACTLY what your stats are, they can design non-stop challenging battles around them. This is why the game is tough and challenging. Because you can't ever be overleveled like a normal rpg. Those used to running in circles and grinding to have an easy time in the main game are in for a shock. But the non-stop challenge from start to finish is fantastic and like the Shin Megami Tensei games the intensity of battles makes them even more fun. It also keeps fights short because they know your stats. The longest boss fight is probably 10-15 mins max. The usual ones are <6 mins.
Now WHEN THE LEVEL CAP FAILS is in the endgame. At endgame, the game opens up and there is 20-30 hours of optional sidequests content. But early on in that you will find yourself hitting the cap. This means that no matter how much more side content you keep doing, you're not getting any more powerful. Meanwhile the side content is getting harder as you progress through it. This has 2 implications:
1. This might just be me, but one thing I love about doing all the sidestuff endgame in an rpg is the feeling of POWER when you return to finish the main plot and see yourself doing far more damage than you were before you went off the main path. It's fun because you actually feel like you've accomplished things through powering up on these sidequests and you get to visually see the results as you stomp through the rest of the main game. In FFXIII that doesn't happen because of the cap. Shouta and Duckroll did the last dungeon around 40 hours in. I did it around 52 hours in after over a dozen hours more of sidequesting. Yet, when I did the final dungeon I had the same stats as them and it was just as difficult. It basically felt like I had wasted 12 hours because none of that made me any more powerful. Not a fan!
2. In terms of the optional bosses. You can actually reach a point where it is just impossible to beat them because you are capped too low to survive. After you finish the game the cap extends a bit, so a lot of the optional content is supposed to be done post-game. But if you're like me and trying to win anyways because you're doing all the sidestuff before the final duneon, then you can spend hours retrying a boss feeling like you can almost beat them, but you can't because you are capped too low. I found this frustrating. It also doesn't help that when you finally finish the game and get the cap extended, the final stats you need to take on the last 10-20% of the optional bosses are ridiculously expensive and require hours and hours of grinding. For example I finished the game around 54 hours with 70% of the optional quests done. One of the guys on the gamefaqs board got them all finished and was over 100 hours in. So the last % requires a ridiculous amount of grinding time commitment :\ Grinding also sucks in XIII because there are no random encounters and the enemies are spaced far apart and don't give a ton of CP(xp).
Bottom Line: The level cap makes a very balanced and challenging linear game, but severely hurts the game once it opens up in linearity.
Part 4: Money
The economy is mess. Enemies don't drop any money and for the most part they don't drop any items worth any money. Basically for the entire first 20 hours of the game you only get money when the developers want you to. Maybe 8k gil max. Yet, the prices for items are NORMAL GIL PRICES that you would see in other FF games where enemies drop money. Then in the 2nd half you get huge amounts of money but it's one time only. Like in one spot you'll get 600k suddenly but then when you spend it it's hard to get good money again for the rest of the game. This is all because money is what decides how far you can upgrade your weapons. If you had all the money in the world, at the start of the game you could upgrade your ATK+8 sword into an ATK+1000 sword. Obviously for the first half of the game the developers wanted to limit how far you could advance your stats (to keep with the level cap), which is not far at all. Maybe you'll get an ATK+8 sword to ATK+58 by 20 hours in. Then in the 2nd half the game still limits your weapons by requiring specific items to upgrade your weapons past a certain point and that item costs 2 million gil which is impossible to get
Or it's dropped by the hardest enemy in the game that kills you in 1 hit around endgame levels. So basically again in order to level cap you and make a challenging game the economy is awful and your weapon growth is capped for each period. It's only post-game when you really don't need it that you start getting the money. But that's kind of the backwards thinking in a lot of jrpgs. Beat the hardest enemy in the game and then get an item that is useless now because you already beat the toughest enemy and there's nothing left where the item would actually matter against.Bottom Line: The money economy is so bad that I honestly feel they're going to change it in whatever directors cut they do.
Part 5: Replay Value
The main story is about 35 hours with about 30 hours of optional content (though to do the last 5-10 hours you'll need to grind 30-40 hours). The game has enough material in it that it feels like a good length complete rpg. The first half of the game is probably not very replayable because it's so linear and you can't do much differently (although since you know how the game works you can run past most enemies and blow through the areas on 2nd play), the 2nd half is more replayable but it's still just the same optional content and I don't see it being very replayable. This is more of a game you will get to the end and then do everything to your ability, beat it, then do more to your ability. Then when you feel fully satisfied you'll shelve it and never touch it again. I don't see how DLC could work at all in the gameplay context, so I don't expect it. Unless the DLC is a movie viewer, which would actually be appreciated since the cutscenes look so good.
Bottom line: Good length rpg with lots of optional material like any FF, but not replayable.
Overall
A different FF, but a fun one. Definitely the best looking and arguably the best sounding rpg with a jumbled mess of a story but characters who present a reason to enjoy the journey as popcorn entertainment. The gameplay takes FF to exciting new places and brings in a level of challenge that has been forgotten in the series for many years. But as you get deeper and deeper into the gameplay you'll likely become more aware, annoyed and frustrated at the flaws and caps. Assuming you haven't already gotten frustrated and given up on the game because the game structure doesn't sit with you well. In the end it's a new and exciting FF and a heavily flawed one as well. It's actually too bad the US version is so soon after the Japanese version, or maybe they could have done some balancing changes after receiving feedback. It feels like the Persona 3 gameplay that should have been the Persona 4 gameplay if it had a handful of adjustments due to user response. Maybe in FFXIII International in a year...
Bottom Line: 8/10, a good, but not amazing, rpg. Low for an FF, but considering the rpg competition over the last 5 years of this generation, XIII still ranks as one of the better rpgs this gen.
Hcoregamer00
The 'H' stands for hentai.
george_us said:
I agree with you on "very little grinding." That is a HUGE plus in my eyes.
DevelopmentArrested
Banned
wait wait wait NO TOWNS? youre joking right?
D
Deleted member 22576
Unconfirmed Member
Yeah, I tend to like linear RPGs too.
It's way to easy for me to get overwhelmed when there are seemingly infinite places to go, people to meet and things to do.
It's way to easy for me to get overwhelmed when there are seemingly infinite places to go, people to meet and things to do.
RPGCrazied
Member
So just hunts for side-quests?
Sounds kinda neat you can get new cutscenes throughout pulse
Sounds kinda neat you can get new cutscenes throughout pulse
About the grinding, I think it's being misrepresented. The flaw is not that the game has very little grinding, that's definitely a plus. The flaw is that towards the end of the game, when you have a lot more alternate options to spend money and CP on, you find that you just don't have enough to justify experimenting much and you end up feeling really restrained.
yellowjacket25
Member
Thanks for the detailed impressions. They have been very interesting to read.
I hope the next mainline FF game develops FFXIII's ideas on pacing and structure. It will remove dungeon crawling completely and moving from scenario to scenario will be done through a sleek, textual menu. The game will be going from combat to cut-scene to combat and so and it will be glorious.
Bitmap Frogs
Mr. Community
7Th said:I hope the next mainline FF game develops FFXIII's ideas on pacing and structure. It will remove dungeon crawling completely and moving from scenario to scenario will be done through a sleek, textual menu. The game will be going from combat to cut-scene to combat and so and it will be glorious.
Final Fantasy: Shadow of the Colossus?
Hcoregamer00
The 'H' stands for hentai.
7Th said:I hope the next mainline FF game develops FFXIII's ideas on pacing and structure. It will remove dungeon crawling completely and moving from scenario to scenario will be done through a sleek, textual menu. The game will be going from combat to cut-scene to combat and so and it will be glorious.
Oh you!!!!
I know you are being sarcastic, but some people will believe it.
:lol
SEGAvangelist
Member
DevelopmentArrested said:
This has me worried too. Can you even walk up to people and press "x" to talk to them?
ColdSoup said:
Sazh, hands down. He's the most mature and realistic character. He's not totally serious, but he understands the gravity of situations, and he has a strong heart. He also has a chocobo living in his hair, and I love the rapid attacks his guns use in battle, especially when you enchant a weak element him and use his wide range area blast. He really cleans up well in battles with large groups of enemies with common weaknesses.
BlazingDarkness
Member
They talk on their own when you walk near to themTeam Vernia said:
donkey show
Member
Well there is one part you have to press circle/x to talk to people, lol.Team Vernia said:
Its funny when you read the countless "JRPGS ARE DEAD" threads or the WRPG vs JRPG pissing contests that you'll inevitably encounter several posters who'll whine and complain that JRPGs lack innovation, they're slaves to two decade old conventions and thats why they're TEH D00M3D!!! Yet these same posters whine and complain when someone decides to buck the trend and try something different. It looks like XIII gets rid of the tired town/dungeon/town/dungeon format, but most people don't seem to be too thrilled at the prospect.
For me, I'll give it a shot. I'm concerned about the games pacing. However, SMT Nocturne had very little in the way of towns to visit, it was almost all combat, and fairly linear too and people love that game. On the other hand, you have LOTR:TTA which had a great combat engine (its more than a FFX ripoff) but the game is one long dungeon crawl thats pacing is poorly broken up by terrible storytelling. Who knows how this will be received. I loved XII and I've found a way to find some enjoyment out of the FF games, even the ones I didn't care for like V and VIII.
For me, I'll give it a shot. I'm concerned about the games pacing. However, SMT Nocturne had very little in the way of towns to visit, it was almost all combat, and fairly linear too and people love that game. On the other hand, you have LOTR:TTA which had a great combat engine (its more than a FFX ripoff) but the game is one long dungeon crawl thats pacing is poorly broken up by terrible storytelling. Who knows how this will be received. I loved XII and I've found a way to find some enjoyment out of the FF games, even the ones I didn't care for like V and VIII.
RedRedSuit
Member
truly101 said:
Changes are only good when they're away from bad things and towards good things. A change towards extreme linearity -- the "new definition" of linearity according to Shouta's final impressions -- does not sound like a good change but a bad change. You don't get a genre out of its rut by changing towards things most people find bad. Change itself is neither a virtue nor a flaw. So, that observation doesn't mean much in my opinion.
Besides, unlike JRPGs in general, the Final Fantasy series is not typically seriously accused of stagnation or lack of innovation. Every FF is typically quite different from all others. Starting for a decade ago: VII was the first quintessential 3D RPG, VIII was really strange, X was different from most RPGs again, XI was online, and XII was yet again rather innovative and different.
RedRedSuit said:
But whats a bad change and what a good change can vary by person and it also depends on the context. FFXII is not particularly linear, yet most people hated the way the story kinda meandered and didn't propel the player. FFX was the opposite, but it got rid of the overworld and people didn't like that. Some didn't like the mission structure of FFX-2 even though it offered freedom of choice.
I think my point is I'd rather people try it out making up their minds. Some changes may seem extreme, but may work in the context of the game (see Dragon Quarter). Shouta thinks the game is too linear for his tastes, but he's played it. It didn't seem to bother Duckroll that badly. I'm going to keep an open mind about it. The extreme linearity may work for FFXIII in ways it wouldn't for other games. I haven't played it yet so I don't know.
H_Prestige
Banned
truly101 said:
Were people complaining about that before? The basic formula for FF games was essentially the same up to FFIX. Then X came and threw a lot of things out the window. XIII follows the same philosophy as X, but takes it even further.
gamergirly
Member
7Th said:I hope the next mainline FF game develops FFXIII's ideas on pacing and structure. It will remove dungeon crawling completely and moving from scenario to scenario will be done through a sleek, textual menu. The game will be going from combat to cut-scene to combat and so and it will be glorious.
I think I was okay until you said "and it will be glorious" :lol
RedRedSuit
Member
truly101 said:
It goes without saying that it's a matter of opinion. However, most impressions of this ultra-linear FF XIII structure have been negative. "New definition" of linear sounds bad enough, but I've seen many perfectly reasonable people call the game especially "repetitive" and that they couldn't find a "connection" to the world. The decision to make FF X as linear as it was was controversial itself, but it wasn't nearly as controversial as this. And while many people disliked FF XII's plot, I would contend it was simply because it neither well fleshed out nor a particularly exciting story -- not that the world was too open, or that it didn't propel people into the story enough. (It was pretty easy to know what to do if you just wanted to follow the story; it just wasn't that great a tale when it came right down to it, especially towards the end.)
I contend most people that are concerned with these reports WILL still play the game for themselves. I certainly will. On the other hand, I completely understand the point of view that you can't just play every game just to "decide for yourself." If you read some impressions of the game, and it sounds like it has everything you dislike and only a few things you like, then I see nothing wrong with deciding to skip it. After all, it is $60+ and 40+ hours of your life.
The point of my original response to you was simply that it doesn't make sense to call out those people that clamor for change in JRPGs yet decry this ultra-linear change in FF XIII -- because this change, which still a change, sounds like a bad one. It's like, let's say I'm complaining about Star Wars Episode II, and how it had too many cringe-worthy pieces of dialog between Amidala and Anakin. I want change! Then Lucas comes out with Episode III, and instead of cutting down on the romantic dialog, he cuts down the amount of light-saber and space battles by 100%. Well, I wanted change, and I got it! Except, it wasn't nearly the right kind of change.
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