I liked it in a way too for the battles. But battles alone does not a good rpg make. You need risk and reward in the dungeon design. You need proper exposition and not poorly introducing the player to the world. In FFVII, the game eases you in to it. We know that Shinra is destroying the planet but don't know how. We get a flashback of Cloud and Tifa when they were young and it positions Sephiroth as a war hero and someone people look up to "the great Sephiroth...", we find out about ancients and that Shinra is after it, we learn how materia is formed and exactly what Mako is and how it's poisoning the planet. An rpg should ease the player into the world.
FFXIII does no such thing. It uses terms like Fal'cie, L'Cie, Pulse, Cocoon, almost immediately. Players are confused. It takes hours to properly explain that Fal'cie are Gods despite being in the game nomenclature from fucking minute one. Tell me, is it ever confusing what an Aeon is in FFX or a GF in FFVIII or an Eidolon in FFIX? No. Because these games properly introduce story elements.
And that's just how the story is presented. I haven't gotten into the complete absence of character development aside from Hope and Sazh, the awkward pacing, the lack of quests, the extremely poor customization the bulk of the game, how it handholds you and makes up your party the entire experience until you reach Pulse, the lack of locales and npcs, the vapid exploration. I have mentioned the awful dungeon design.
FFXIII just isn't a good game. It's not even average. It's bad. FF has been divisive before but the fanbase previously had never came to such wide agreement that Final Fantasy had betrayed fans' trust. It is such a tremendous dip in quality.
I haven't bought a new Final Fantasy game since. Terrible game. Looking forward to XV breaking that games curse.