After beating the game and logging in around 50 some odd hours into the game, I think I can give my final post-game impressions.
I'll start off with something my wife told me about the game after she beat it.
"If
Overdrift was an RPG, this (FFXIII) would be it."
As wacky as that sounds, it's rather fitting. FFXIII, like the video she's relating to, is very balls to the wall giving you essentially what you need with hardly any filler in-between. It really does throw out a lot of typical RPG conventions in order to convey its story to the player, but even with its shortcomings, it does have standout experiences.
Battle System
Wow, do I love the battle system in this game. Quick, fast, and in a hurry, the FFXIII battle system is one of my favorites ever. Kind of like an FFX/FFX-2/FFXII/Crisis Core hybrid on crack, FFXIII's is really fast paced and is non-stop. Thanks to the lack of MP and regaining of health after every battle, each one can be taken at full force. This does not necessarily mean you'll have a cake walk with each one, but it's one of the streamlined things I liked about it. Enemies hit back hard and one mishap will have you seeing the Game Over screen, so you do have to keep on your toes throughout the game. The system of course is definitely not without its mishaps.
Auto attack is nice to have considering the speed of the battles, but I can see how people will see it as being over reliant on it as it dynamically picks what the system thinks is the best course of action. If you were able to make preset attacks on top of auto attack, I think that would have worked nicely.
I do think the Optima system works wonderfully as it adds a strategic mix to the way you approach enemies, although it truly becomes more apparent as you fight harder enemies. Every character feels different in their specific roles, which helps lend to proper strategies depending on the enemy youre facing.
Thanks to the break bar that sends enemies into a vulnerable state of taking heavy damage more so than usual and the ranking system that rates you on how fast you dispatched the enemy, this battle system leans toward a lot of risk vs reward, especially with harder enemies. You can either play safe by taking precautionary measures against an enemy while whittling down his health or you can forgo your defense and aim to break the enemy as soon as possible. Its a fun dynamic while battling and the Optima system works well in this environment.
The AI works wonderfully most of the time, but when looking for something specific like haste, the computer will run through the entire buff list before issuing the proper command. Again, I think something like a gambit to maximize spell priority would help.
The summons do their job and are well integrated into the system. Theyre pretty much the limit breaks of the game and add a nice dynamic to the table that was built upon by FFX.
Music and Sounds
Excellent tracks from Hamauzu. A lot of it was fitting for many of the areas you visit and the character themes were rather spot-on. I did think the tracks felt they belonged more in a movie than they did in a video game, but that is probably what S-E's goal was from the get go. Aside from the main theme and battle theme, I wouldn't say they are all completely memorable, i.e. nothing on an FFIV boss theme or One Winged Angel scale.
Story
Arguably the weakest part of this game, the problem is not so much the content of the story but the structure overall. In the first half of the game you're essentially thrown into conflict that involves your characters in a fight for the survival of the world, get some back story on their recent past and why things are happening. Not a huge problem as its done rather well, but because it's so character driven and cramped, you sometimes lose focus on what exactly is happening overall.
The second half pretty much just goes, "alright guys... figure out what you need to do, look into your heart and save the world from something." Plus, I never had a huge feeling of impending worldy doom, which definitely would have helped the overall setting. It was somewhat reminiscent of the second half of FFXII where things just fell apart story wise.
Character interaction was good though, minus Snow moments and would have been way better if S-E opted to include the light novel stuff into the actual game. >=/ Aside from the glaring afro, Sazh was not a stereotypical black character in a JRPG
although I will hold reservations to how the English VAs work out. In fact, he is my favorite character out of the entire crew as hes so level headed and mature about the situation, regardless of his own predicament while having a Chocobo living in his afro.
Pacing and Difficulty
The story itself pretty much lends to the lopsided pacing of the game. The first half can be seen as a long tutorial interspersed within a metric ton of action. The story moves fast, therefore your progression is constantly moving forward (i.e. linearity). For me, this wasnt too much of an issue as the game reminded me of Uncharted 2, but as an RPG. The problem with the first half is that it takes to long to unlock all the battle skills available. I didnt have an issue with the forced parties as it gave you a very good handle on how each character differed, although others will see differently. I didnt find it too hard throughout this section and if I died, its because I was not using the right strategy. The drawback of the pacing in the first half is that you don't get to really breathe in the beautiful atmosphere they created, which are all different and amazing.
The second half of the game is where the exploration is so to speak, when you are given pretty much near full access to all the skills and whatnot. The difficulty also spikes, but because of the open environment and access to grinding, I was in heaven. Like many people have said, this game is really bipolar in its presentation. Regardless, I enjoyed the difficulty and the ability to quest it up a bit.
Im in the camp of not really caring if there were towns or losing NPC interactivity because of the online shops and story pacing, but I will say there were a lot of missed opportunities for that. I do miss having some sort of gambling mini game, though. =(
Leveling, Synthing/Desynthing, Loot
Again, due to the story structure, level caps were in place so that you arent necessarily overpowered throughout the game. As a hardcore grinder, this would have made me angry, but because the action was so fast paced, I didnt really care during the first half. Theres never really a need to grind so you can blast your way through your action packed adventure. On the second part of the game, the way the Crystarium opened up really appeased my grind happy nature, but I still was not overleveled in the least because the requirements were so high. To some, that might be a downer, but I embraced it like the Digital Devil Saga Mantra Grid. Im going to fill the sucker up no matter how long it takes!
The Crystarium in itself is really simple. Throw in CP gained from battles and get the stats or skills you desire
which youll end up getting anyway. It doesnt lend itself to customizability considering the characters are inherently different in the first place, but I do wish it gave you multiple paths of growth, i.e
Lightning should lean more towards magic versus attack. And due to the lack of other skill stats, aside from HP/ATK/MAG, the Crystarium is truly limited. CP requirements do get a little much during the end, but I love grinding so that didnt really bring me down.
Yet one thing I think people dont focus on too much is the weapon/accessory customization aspect of this game. This is where it fills in the gaps of the Crystarium as it can add that added layer of customizability for your character. You can essentially go through the entire game without ever doing this, but it will make your life a little harder. Also if you equip certain weapons and accessories together, you can access a chain ability is normally not available from individual accessories and weapons. For example, when you have a certain scarf and one of Lightnings later weapons, youll access Lucky Break which has a small chance of immediately sending an enemy into break status regardless of how full their bar is.
Synthing and desynthing weapons and items is also useful for upgrading your characters individual abilities and helps if you want to focus more buffing Lightnings MAG abilities versus her ATK for example. Its also necessary to do this to access the characters ultimate weapons and making new accessories. Desynthing takes an existing accessory and breaks it down into multiple items. Its a great way to get some extremely useful items that help a lot in the later hours of the game.
The only problem is that the synth/desynth system is only truly accessible if youre as grind happy as me. You need a ton of materials to reach those sky high levels plus Gil
which is pretty much nonexistent outside of finding it in treasure boxes and selling loot. The online shops at the save points help in regards to quick accessibility, but are pretty much used as selling points considering the prices for some a lot of the items are a bit much, especially with the lack of Gil dropping from enemies
which can be considered good or bad depending on your perspective.
Post game
Additional hunts and stats are unlocked after you beat the game, which is essential in defeating many of the later monsters found in the hunts. If you're planning on clearing all of them, I don't think you'd be able to do it before you finish the game. You can probably luck out with certain skills, but absolute persistence is necessary. Im about 80% done with the hunts, but thanks to finding some handy items which help boost my CP growth, I should be maxed out pretty soon. Let the beasting commence! I do appreciate the extreme challenge by these hunts and again it lends perfectly into my grinding obsession.
Final thoughts
FFXIII does many things right as it does wrong, but I think the game does create a solid foundation for whatever may come in the future. For me, the game is very enjoyable and is probably one of my favorite FFs because its so action packed and streamlined. The story and lack of typical RPG exploration never really took away from my enjoyment with the game and I am still finding excitement out of the game way past its completion. Ill definitely play the heck out of the US version when it comes out as I could get more out of the auto-clip and the backstory of the FFXIII world.
Altogether, FFXIII is different
but I love it. There are a lot of run of the mill RPGs nowadays and I appreciate the changes they were willing to make with FFXIII, which clicked for me. I never had any preconceived expectations aside from what I played from the Advent Children demo and I've been satisfied.
