Customer Reviews

Final Fantasy XIII: Platinum Hits

5 star:		(69)
4 star:		(71)
3 star:		(46)
2 star:		(43)
1 star:		(37)

 

 

I'm only a few hours in to the game, but my experience is already so sharply different from what I've read online that I'm going to add my two cents a little early. I will address the two big controversies that are fueling a lot of misinformation: the Xbox 360 version's graphics and the linearity of the gameplay, both of which have been grossly exaggerated.

Playstation 3 owners are very disappointed that Square-Enix has given so much support to Microsoft lately, and FFXIII going multiplatform was to many an abomination to God. I get it. Really, I do. This happened about fifteen years ago when Squaresoft shifted support from Nintendo to Sony after giving us Final Fantasy I, II(US), III(US), Chrono Trigger, and Secret of Mana, all of which I played and loved as they were released. Nintendo was THE Square system back then, just as many feel Playstation is today. But times change. Instead of being grateful that FFXIII is MULTIplatform instead of a Microsoft exclusive, many Sony fans and professional critics have started a smear campaign against the 360 version that has gotten way out of hand.

The Final Fantasy XIII graphics for the Xbox 360 are inferior to the Playstation version. The CGI video is compressed and the in game graphics are of a lower resolution. The framerate and loading times on the Xbox 360 version are better than on the Playstation. HOWEVER, if you are running the game on a reasonable sized television, the graphical difference is NEGLIGIBLE. The game looks absolutely fantastic to me on my modest 36" LCD screen. On all the online HD video comparisons I have seen, I see NO DIFFERENCE AT ALL between the two versions, with the exception of a little more tearing on the character's hair from time to time (I only noticed this after rewinding about six times,squinting, and holding my mouth just..so). So the bottom line with the graphics is: unless you are playing on a very large screen TV and have an obsessive attention to graphical detail, the XBOX 360 and Playstation versions are graphically identical.

Now for something just a little more important: the gameplay. There is a lot of hate for the linearity of the gameplay, so much so that it's already cliche and the game just came out this week. Phrases like "Corridor RPG," "Like a tunnel," and "Mash forward and A, then repeat," are floating around. This is true for the first HOUR, as it was for FF VI and VII as I recall. After that the maps start branching out a bit more, and much later the game world opens up for exploration (as is commonplace in previous final fantasy games). Final Fantasy and Japanese role playing games in general have always been very linear in nature. FFXIII has been streamlined a bit to emphasize the narrative and action, favoring momentum over the illusion of choice. But the extent of this has been greatly exaggerated. After the first hour, the maps are no more linear than any other FF game since VII. They are more or less straight forward with a few little detours and dead ends with extra enemies and chests. It is true that there are no towns (on the first disc anyway), but there is a shop at every save point. It is NOT true that you can not level up or customize your characters. About two hours in you are introduced to the leveling system, to which you invest experience points for skills that build up XIII's version of the job system. The battle system is a lot of fun, and is essentially the old school Active Time Battle system that started with FFIV, but streamlined for a much faster pace. It is true that you only actively control one team member at a time, but it works.

Much has been said about FFXIII as a technological marvel. The graphics and art design are gorgeous. Fully rendered cut scenes take the place of virtually all in-game dialog (no text bubbles!). The game has a level of shine and polish rarely seen in video games, regardless of whether you buy it for the Playstation 3 or Xbox 360. But for all this advancement, the game still feels very traditional. Playing it doesn't feel much different from Final Fantasies of old, going back to Super Nintendo days really. I've been a Final Fantasy fan since the first installment back in 1987. I've watched the series grow, triumph, and falter. So far I'm very pleased with Final Fantasy XIII, and am excited to see what happens next.

[SPOILER FREE]

A veteran of Final Fantasy 1, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12 and Tactics, for the first time, I have finally given up on a Final Fantasy game. Here are the contributing factors:

LINEARITY:
This word has been used so much in reviews that I feel it needs to be re-defined. Are the maps linear? In a general sense, yes, but there are dead ends, forks and roundabouts en route to your destination. You aren't walking down a hamster tube the whole time as some would have you believe.
However! One often FEELS as if they were walking down a hamster tube because this game lacks things that most great RPGs have in common:

Decision-making!

A good RPG should NOT be a novel. A good RPG should be more like a CHOOSE-YOUR-OWN-ADVENTURE-type book. In an RPG, there is no little to no fun in following a story that is completely predetermined.

Variety!

In the ~30 hours I've played this game, not once have I seen any side quests, mini-games or other distractions.

STORY:
To be honest, I found the general story behind FF13 much more interesting than the story of FF12. Despite that, it still falls short of the superb storylines found in games like FF 4, 6, 7, Xenogears, Chrono Trigger and the Lunar series.

MUSIC:
Being honest again, I did think the title music was very good, as was the choir-driven boss music when you fight Barthandelus . . . ~20 hours later! All the music in between was either too soft to hear, some funky jazz stuff that needed to stay in Kansas City, or some weird drum and bass jungle beats.
Nobuo Uematsu is not god. There are other composers who have also cranked out great video game soundtracks: Yasunori Mitsuda, Hitoshi Sakimoto and Masaharu Iwata, to name a few.
But what all those great composers possess, is the ability to match the music to that particular moment on the screen.
Simply put, in FF13, most of the music doesn't fit the moment. The battle music is especially pathetic. Real good battle music should really get you in a MOOD to beat some guys around, not lull you to sleep.

CHARACTERS:
There are some good characters in this game. My favorite would be Sazh with the chocobo chick in his head. He's not as funny as Dave Chappelle, but he tries.
On the other end, the most annoying by far is . . . you guessed it! . . . VANILLE! She has just witnessed the Final Fantasy equivalent of 9/11, and here she is grinning and smiling and running around like a ditzy schoolgirl. On top of that, she moans and groans more than most adult entertainment.
But most inexcusable is the exclusion of the most important character:
YOU! THE PLAYER!

Final Fantasy 6 realized that the player was just as much a character in the game as the others were. If you recall, during the ~20 minute ending to Final Fantasy 6, the last character introduced was ". . . YOU!"

You were a character in that game because YOU got to DECIDE whether the raft went left or right, how to split up your teams, which town the airship landed near, which characters you rediscovered, whether Shadow got saved, and so forth.

So although Final Fantasy 13 has some good characters, in the end one ultimately feels detached because the player is not PARTICIPATING along with them.

WORLD MAP:
The lack of a world map was a terrible idea.
At the very least, a world map gives one the ILLUSION OF FREEDOM. You may be forced to walk down a mountain path on a world map, but you may also see villages on the other side of those mountains, seemingly inaccessible and mysterious. It may make you want to play the game more so that you can discover more of the world. In addition, it gets rid of the feeling of tunnel-vision claustrophobia that one gets in this game.
I had a hard time visualizing the world of FF13. Another thing that a world map does, is give the game some cohesion. Instead of just walking into towns, you now know where those towns and dungeons are in relation to each other. If you think about it, just about every major fantasy novel has a map.
I wonder why . . .

COMBAT:
In a nutshell, the combat is basically a dumbed-down version of the combat found in FF12. Instead of programming the actions of all your characters, you merely pick what task they should be doing and they automatically go out and do it.
If only your characters weren't so bloody stupid!
There are bonuses for characters attacking the same target. But guess what? If you have Lightning help out Snow, in the hopes of taking out that monster faster, what does Snow do? He switches over to the monster you just left! You can have 3 characters in your party fighting 3 individual battles.
So much for teamwork . . .
If the leader in the party dies, it is game over. The Medic often seems oblivious to this fact, healing characters that are not a priority, especially when you're at 245 HP and almost dead.

Early on in the game, there were some nice touches to spice things up a bit: You could find enemies that were fighting amongst themselves or change the weather to fight different types of enemies. A nice try at variety, but the developers didn't follow through with it or include it as often as they could have.

SUMMONS:
Not only is it mandatory to fight Eidolons, but once you get them, the reward is very small. Instead of the powerful creatures that laid waste to everything in sight, the Eidolons are now about as dangerous and effective as a Navy Seal with a Super Soaker. The Eidolons are good for healing and that's about it.

TOWNS:
There ARE towns in FF13, like Palumpolum . . . but they're just set-pieces, places where you fight your battles, not buy your gear.

STORES:
I thought the idea of "computerized stores" at the Save Points made sense for the futuristic world of FF13. After all, you are reading this review on Amazon, which is basically the same thing and here it is 2010.
But I was disappointed in how the upgrade system worked. While it is easy to pick out the best weapons and accessories, there is no indication of what materials actually DO and how they will help you meet your upgrading needs. You basically have to do it by trial and error, which is further complicated by the fact that gil is nearly impossible to come by.

POLISH:
The game is definitely polished and has some nice touches. I like the text on the load screens bringing you up to date. I liked the short animation of the character's faces on the Status screen. I liked the "Datalog" encyclopedia. A few other things. But if you take a piece of gravel from your backyard and polish it, is it worth anything? No. Although it looks nice on the outside, deep down it's still a worthless piece of gravel. FF13 may be polished, but polish means nothing when the original material is severely flawed.

GRAPHICS:
There is a reason why I mention graphics last, and that is because in an RPG, graphics are not all that important. Part of the joy of fantasy is using your IMAGINATION. Unfortunately, as graphics have gotten more life-like, less is left to the imagination. Sometimes for the better, but often for the worse.
That being said, the graphics in FF13 are definitely impressive, even on the Xbox 360. Honestly, I don't feel like I'm missing much graphics-wise by not playing it on a PS3.

CONCLUSION:
Is Final Fantasy 13 a terrible game? No. Like I said, it has its good points and it is polished up pretty well, but deep down, there are severe flaws that ultimately made this game unenjoyable for me. It's not much of an ROLE-playing game when the most important character--the player--has little to no input or ROLE at all.

Final Fantasy XIII - Doesn't Live Up To Its Legacy

Warning: This will be lengthy, detailed review (Spoiler Free).

Who Am I:

Avid RPG fan that grew up with the Final Fantasy (FF) series, dating back to FF2 (US). I've completed the game in just under 45+ hrs. I have no interest in doing the side quests - read below for more info on that.

The Final Fantasy series has been near and dear to my heart for a long time. Very few RPGs can match the universe that this series has built in each establishment. So with each new Final Fantasy installment, criticism will be at an all-time high because the game has the highest of expectations and standards in regards to a RPG. Each FF game should drive the RPG market and show the shortcomings of the other RPGs. Unfortunately, FF13 has taken a huge step back in regards to the series and its attempt to evolve the RPG universe.

Let's get started with the review.

Linearity:

I know this word has been stamped, engraved into FF13 reviews. But most reviews have it correct when they speak of FF13's linearity. The one thing I will expand on is how this affects the entire game overall and not just the gameplay aspect. First, let me go over the level design.

The entire game is mission based. So once you complete a mission, you are done with that area with no return later. You can go back to very few areas during the last mission. Every mission is the same which makes FF13 feel very repetitive. Like others have said, you pretty much go down a tunnel, fight some creatures, fight boss, cut-scene, rinse and repeat. This is where FF13's RPG feel pretty much goes down the drain. There is absolutely no exploration, no world map, no towns, and no mini-games.

Yes the world 'opens' up after Chapter 11. But don't be fooled by reviews which state it is 'open.' It's just a big area with creatures in which you are allowed to do side quests. Side quests are summed up as - Get quest, kill monster, get reward, complete mission. While I have no problem with that particular formula, the problem I have is that you can't even do most of the missions because your party is limited on how strong it can get. When you finish the game, you are finally allowed to gain extra levels in order to do the side quests. But what is the point besides achievements/trophies? I use the example of FF3/FF7/FF10 where you are allowed to max out your level, get the best items, then when you feel like it, go beat the game. I read a review where they said it felt like an after-thought, I couldn't agree more.

Due to the linearity of the game, the story and characters suffer tremendously which hurts the game overall and not just the gameplay aspect.

Story, Characters:

This is the bread and butter of the FF series. With each installment, we (fans) expect an epic story with incredible characters that we get emotionally attached to. This is probably where I felt most 'robbed' when playing FF13. The story is the cookie-cutter save the world with little to no twists. While I understand many of the FF series have the same story, FF13 did a poor job of execution of telling it. It's simply too drawn out and gets boring at times. A lot of this has to do with the linearity of the missions. With it being level based and no exploration, you never have a chance to become immersed into the world and get emotionally drawn into what the characters are fighting for.

The six characters all have their unique personalities but you never really get a chance to develop any attachment to them. While the game does attempt to give you background stories for each character, it simply just falls short. This is the first Final Fantasy I have played where there really is no main character. Lightning, whom is on the cover, is probably one of least developed characters in the game. At several points in the game, you would think Vanille is the main character with the amount of story focus on her. I don't know how FF2, FF3, and FF7 did it but they had the formula right when it came down to character development.

Battle System:

The battle system has been revamped from previous installations. The turn-based combat is gone and now battles flow in real-time. This can make battles fun at times because you need quick reaction but also frustrating because you can't take a moment to decide what attack(s) to execute. There is an 'auto-battle' button that essentially plays the battle for you by selecting the best moves to use in any given situation. Also, you now also only control one lead character in battle, and your teammates are controlled by AI scripts. If the lead character dies, then it's game over for the whole party. I found this very annoying because your AI healer (whose commands cannot be customized) will heal another party member with lower health and you'll get hit the by the boss and die. Thankfully you can retry after each battle with no death penalty but it makes it very frustrating when this happens near end of a boss battle which you spend 10-15 minutes on.

Characters have 'roles' during the battles. It is essentially the job-system. For those who are unfamiliar, jobs are essentially broken down to: Medic, Attacker, Spell-Caster, Tank, Debuffer, Buffer. You can shift roles during the battle by executing pre-made 'paradigms.' You will find yourself on many battles switching back and forth from attacker-attacker-attacker to healer-healer-attacker. While the battle system is quick and intense, it is also tedious.

Summons (called Eidolons) for the most part are useless in the game. While they played a crucial part in other FF installments, they essentially are pointless in FF13 battles. There are only six summons (one for each character) and only the lead character can use their summon (typically once) during each battle. If you are expecting summons to do tremendous damage, well you will be disappointed. The only reason to summon is if your health is low and you know the boss is about to kill you, you can summon and your whole party will be at full health (and resurrected) after the summon has executed its attack. The best part of a summon is its animation and the fact you can skip the animation after seeing it once.

Graphics/Music:

This will be short. The game is very beautiful and crisp. The cut-scenes are top-notch. The problem is that you start to notice where all the attention went into and what other areas suffered because of this.

Music also has been a very high spot of the FF series. FF13's music director, Masashi Hamauzu, simply did not do a good job with this installment. Nobuo Uematsu has been the original composer for most of the FF series but this was the first one he wasn't involved in and you can tell the difference. While the music wasn't terrible, it wasn't anything memorable. Also, the most unusual part is that no where in the game is the traditional FF crystal theme music.

Final Thoughts:

Final Fantasy 13 was more of a chore to get through for me. While I did enjoy some moments of the game, mainly near the end, it was very lackluster overall. During no time in the game did I feel like this was a Final Fantasy (except the chocobos). I felt as if the Director was trying to make his own niche and sway from the formula. Well in my opinion it was a failed experiment. RPGs need exploration and deep story telling to be successful. This is why you always see games such as FF3(6) and FF7 on top of the list. There is a reason why those games, to this day, are considered masterpieces. You don't sway from masterpieces, you build off of them. Anyway, I know I left out some things such as equipment and upgrading but honestly I just wanted to focus on the main categories when reviewing a game of this magnitude.

Feel free to leave comments.

Overall Rating: 5/10

NOTE: there are SPOILERS in this review, so bail now if that's not your cup of tea.

Let me start out by saying that I am a Final Fantasy fan, and I have looked forward to this game for quite some time. I went out and bought it, played it, finished it, and was stunned by how disappointed I was.

The best thing I have to talk about are the graphics - they are phenomenal, even on the 360. I've seen this played on the PS3, and unless you are exceptionally nitpicky, the graphics are essentially the same. The soundtrack is also OK. Unfortunately, now I have to move on to my gripes, and there are many.

First and foremost, have they mentioned the linearity before? Of course they have, but as it is the most fatal flaw of this game, it bears repeating AGAIN! You are forced down each path just as fast as you can button mash your way through the numerous enemies, your road set before you to the point that you could almost rubber band your controller, press A like crazy, and survive. Unlike most RPG's, XIII doesn't give even the illusion of explorability. There are several factors contributing to the linearity. First, There are no extensive side paths to add mystery, and side quests are nonexistent until late in the game. Even when side quests are finally available, they consist of simply going to kill different monsters, much like the marks of FFXII. Second, there are no towns or cities. Well, OK, there are a couple cities, but not ones in which you get to relax and stop fighting so that you enjoy a mini-game (there are none) or something. Third, You buy things from the save points, eliminating virtually all NPC interaction until much later in the game and any hope of juicy tidbits from the rest of the world. Without towns, this game becomes a rather boring series of battles, one after another, and the only breaks come from the numerous cutscenes. Fourth, there is no world map or ability to travel to previously visited locations. I had no choice about where to go and what to do, and this is something that I should never have to say about ANY game.

I'll talk about the battles next. While battles are occasionally visually entertaining and adopt a fast-paced feel, I still found my eyes drooping with a sleepy boredom on more than one occasion. I have several problems with the combat system in this game. First and foremost, I was only able to control my party leader. Also, until very late in the game, I was rarely even allowed to use more than two characters while fighting. This meant that, 9 times out of 10, my actions during a battle were limited to two simple actions: hitting A to tell my leader to attack, or asking my buddies to shift their "paradigm" to heal or buff the team. There was no strategy involved, and I used items so rarely they may as well not have existed at all. Second, I didn't see a noticeable difference in combat when I improved my character through the chrysarium, which is basically a flashier but dumbed down version of FFX's sphere grid. Battles were uniformly moderately difficult throughout the game, never super easy, never super difficult, and eventually mind-numbingly boring. My third problem arose with the lack of any real rewards. For me, a five star rating and a refill on Tech Points don't count. Although I occasionally obtained items that could be used to "improve" weapons or accessories (there was no armor), I never received money (virtually useless in this game anyway) or useful items for my trouble. Fourth, I couldn't go back to 99% of the areas of this game, so farming and level grinding were impossible. Despite the absence of materialistic satisfaction, of greater loss to me was experience. Don't get me wrong, my characters gained experience from each fight. However, as my level was capped at virtually every stage, most of the time, I really had nothing to do with experience gained and no motivation to go pick any fights. The joy of creating an unstoppable demi-god was squarely squashed. Fifth, for the most part, all the monsters looked the same. For all the graphic beauty of this game, the monsters all looked like different colored versions of monsters conquered in previous chapters! Sixth, I can't forget the aeons/gf/or whatever they're called in this game - I actually have forgotten, because I never used them. Summons provided some more brief moments of graphic awe, but I rarely used them due to the fact that they were useless. The leader is the only character enabled to use a summons during a fight anyway, and they didn't stick around long enough to do significant damage anyway.

Next, I feel the need to mention the lack of treasure. For me in the past, I received a great deal of joy in battling to the deepest depths of a dungeon in the most remote part of an obscure corner of the world to find the ultimate treasure. My fun was squashed here due to the facts that there was no really valuable treasure, and what treasure existed was blind-man easy to find. You could buy any weapon or accessory that could be found and upgrade it to it's "ultimate" status, so once again I experienced a lack of motivation to go and look for something better.

Finally, I wanted to mention character development. The cutscenes in this movie (game?) do a passable job of developing the characters, even if characters are developed into FF stereotypes. However, the development of the main character, YOU, is nonexistent. I did not feel like I was ever truly, deeply involved in the development of my characters.

I tried to like this game. I wanted to like this game. I just couldn't like this game. As a stand-alone game, the only plus that FFXIII has going for it are the graphics and, maybe, the story line. As a continuation to an epic series, well, it isn't, it doesn't, it shouldn't.

In summary, it seems like SE has sacrificed everything that makes a good game for good graphics. I have bad news for them - graphics alone will not sell games! I, for one, will probably rent the next SE creation instead of buying on opening day. In fact, if the next FF doesn't improve drastically, I will discontinue my support of their products entirely, and I imagine that there are many hardcore fans as well as first-timers that feel the same way.

If you are an action or first-person shooter (FPS) gamer interested in trying something new such as a role-playing game (RPG), I highly recommend Final Fantasy XIII.

I have played action and squad-based FPS games beginning with the DOOM series on MS-DOS through the Halo and Call of Duty series on Windows PC and Xbox 360. My only other experience with a RPG was the excellent Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic (Windows PC version), and I had no experience at all with previous versions of Final Fantasy, so I was able to appreciate this game in its own right without expectations or bias.

First, as even most of its critics will admit, it is visually stunning. The eye candy in this game is simply beautiful, even with this slightly lower resolution Xbox 360 version. (If you have both an Xbox 360 and a PS3, get the PS3 version of this game). The settings and people in the game are attractive (even some of the villains), the battles are colorful and lively, and the cutscenes are cinematic. It is a pleasant change of pace from the often dark and foreboding battlefields of FPS games. The musical score adds to the beautiful aesthetics of the game.

The story and mythology are confusing at first, but the details of the plot become subordinate to the fact that you begin to care about the characters and want them to succeed. The six main characters have distinctive personalities, and the voice acting brings them to life.

Several critics have complained about how "linear" the game is, but that shouldn't be an issue for action gamers, and it wasn't for me. We are used to starting at point A and fighting our way to point B along a predetermined path, so the "linearity" of this game was familiar and no problem at all. In fact, it helped the story to move along and it made sense for the storyline, since the main characters are essentially fugitives from justice. They have a short amount of time to accomplish a goal before being turned into either crystal statues (if they succeed) or monsters (if they fail), while also being on the run from the authorities. It would have been inappropriate to the storyline for them to spend much time wandering around aimlessly, shopping and chatting with random people in villages or wherever.

The battle system seems simple on the surface but there is actually a lot of depth underneath it. While some critics bemoan not being able to micromanage each individual character in the battle team, the chore of managing the non-leader character(s) is (thankfully) well-handled by the game's artificial intelligence. The battles are too fast-paced (a good thing) to allow that kind of micromanagement of 2 or 3 battle team members. The challenge during battles is to intelligently and frequently reassign each of the battle team characters to one of six roles or jobs during the battle, which the game calls the "paradigm" system. That will keep you plenty busy during some of the tougher battles. There are also the many decisions that have to be made about which characters to use in a battle, which one to use as the team leader, how they should be leveled-up (powers/strength/abilities enhanced), which weapons and accessories to equip them with, which weapons/accessories should be upgraded, when scarce "shrouds" should be used to buff up a team before a tough battle or to enable a decisive preemptive strike, etc. All of these decisions determine how the battles play out.

In summary, if you are new to the Final Fantasy series (the games are not really related to one another so there is no need to have played any of the other ones to enjoy this one) or RPGs in general and want to try one out, I highly recommend Final Fantasy XIII as a stunningly beautiful, well-paced, and enjoyable way to experience a role-playing game. Search for "Final Fantasy XIII international trailer" online, watch the trailer and see for yourself.

Final Fantasy XIII.. Ah such a topic of complaint. However keep in mind that the people writing these other reviews have not even scratched the surface of this game. IT CAME OUT YESTERDAY. Yet they complain about how bad it is and they are only 3-5 hours into the game.

The graphics... 5 stars, beautiful absolutely amazing.

Battle system... 5 stars, completely new and stunning, an earlier review said that it was just mashing the A button, well the first 5 hours.. DUH! its completely new, they break you into it over time slowly so they dont confuse you, at first you can just push A to win. They apparently havent gotten to paragrim shifts and all that good stuff which would be entirely confusing without the slow introduction to it.

story... 3.8 stars, It's an amazing story!... but don't get me wrong, final fantasy has definately done better.

voices... 4 stars, i would say 5 stars, but the pre teen girl is high pitched and obnoxious like you wouldnt believe.

I will go into more of a review as i myself get farther into the game, but as of now there is no real reason to complain, it is just a game that you should BE PATIENT with and not hope to grasp the entirety of it within the first few minutes.

Please comment on this review if you wish to know more at anytime. I will try my best to keep updated at regular intervals.

UPDATE*********

I am now a bit further along into the story, and as for the people that complained about it being too linear with no side quests or anything here goes:

This game has really opened up ALOT it is now more free roaming than it was in the begining, I still engulfed in the story and it hasn't been hurt at all by the NOW AVAILABLE side quests.

voices i'm still liking, even the girl has grown on me.

Graphics still superb and beautiful

battle system.. This changes and alot from the begining of the game, it is no longer just pressing the A button over and over, you can switch styles, choice attacks and who to attack tactically during a battle and yes this all actually helps you win, it matters who you defeat first.

This game is REALLY quite fun. i bet most reviewers now change their reviews about how linear the game is and it starts getting better reviews, will still keep updated as i go along in the game. Please rate if this review is helpfull :)

I was one of the many idoits who bought into the game's hype.I am a long time fan of this series and the very little footage they showed in the E3 trailers and video stills looked promising enough,so I guess I shouldn't be too hard on myself.I bought this game last year on release day.It was probably one of the most anticipated games of 2010.After getting home from work,I was anxious and excited to try out my new game,fired up my PS3 and.....within the first hour of it I was already bored.Being the fangirl that I am,I tried to convince myself I was into it but deep down I knew something just wasn't right.It just wasn't Final Fantasy.

Now you may ask,"Does this game really deserve a 1 star review? Is it really that bad?" Well...I've been a fan since 1997 when Final Fantasy VII(Final Fantasy's Citizen Kane)was released.Since then I played all the games(I even bought a NES and dowloaded emulators so I could play 1,2 and 3 in their original versions),collected Final Fantasy related paraphernalia,named my daughter 'Selphie' and went to comicons in costume.It was one of my favorite series and I loved games 1-10(hated 12)but after playing 13 all the love I had for the series disappeared.That's right,I am no longer a fan of the FF series.So to answer your question yes it is that bad.

Technical aspects of the gameplay and plot synopsis has already been touched upon by other reviewers so I won't go into that too deeply.I'll just point out the game's major flaws in these two areas.

GAMEPLAY:It's very linear.no exploration,no towns,no sidequests,no ultimate weapons to collect.After a 15-20 minute cutscene,you travel through a linear corridor to a cutscene(which is represented as an orange dot on your map) then a lengthy,repetitive boss fight and after that..(wait for it)...another cutscene!That pretty much sums up the basic gameplay.Sounds fun right? Nothing like the Final Fantasy I fell in love with.

STORYLINE & CHARACTERS:Story and characters is what the series is known for and if the story sucks,the game sucks and if the characters aren't memorable the games sucks even worse.While FF12 had solid gameplay it failed to deliver in terms of story and characters.FF13 features the "best" of both worlds not only does it have awful gameplay but it also has forgettable characters.A cookie cutter plot with cookie cutter characters.The characters are nothing more than archtypes.Lightning,Stoic heroine with a tragic past who acts cold toward others as a way of coping (a la Squall),Vanilla,A cheerful,spunky tweeny brat who lifts the party's spirits in tough times(it's not like Final Fantasy hasn't had one of those or anything :P),Sazh,Ignorant gun-wielding black guy,you get the idea.So,redundant gameplay,shallow plot and characters that nobody cares about.Wow SqaureEnix,you've got a masterpiece on your hands.

FF13 is lacking in story, characters and gameplay the three things that make a Final Fantasy game.So needless to say it sucks!It's not a Final Fantasy game,it's a lame interactive movie with Final Fantasy's name on it.84% of the game is cutscenes and the rest is what I dare call gameplay,you could watch Spirits Within and get the same amount of gameplay from it(doesn't the Spirits within DVD have a menu or special features option? lol).When FF13 isn't pretending to be a soap opera,it's either having the player hold the analog stick upward for 10 minutes or having them tap the 'X' button 10,000 times to win a boss fight.That's all there is to this game.It's linear,it's boring,it's cruel oh and did I mention LINEAR?The game has more lines than Scarface's work table and it doesn't get better.The rumor about the game getting better after chapter 11 is not true.FF13 is like bad sex:The game pushes on,you endure it and hope it gets better but the climax never comes.

Everything that goes up must come down as they say.Final Fantasy has had a great run but just can't keep up with todays new franchises.They should just let this old cash cow die and pass the torch to a new franchise.Final Fantasy's influence will last for generations and won't be forgotten.Here lies Final Fantasy 1987-2001 it will be missed.

If my review along with the other negetive reviews won't discourage you,then go ahead and play it at your own risk,you'll see what were talking about.The game was at the bottom of my trash can just a month after I bought it.If you're going to play it it isn't even worth the cost of a rental so if you can borrow it from a friend(he or she will probably pay YOU just to take it)play it,milk it for what it's worth(not much) and then forget it.

-Angela

i can understand why people are upset, but being a long time gamer that never really played any final fantasy i just have to say its a pretty good game. the only real complaint is the game isn't an 'open' world. its just one straight line pretty much, its just really annoying to have to level up your character by going back and forth and fighting the same enemy's over and over again.

So after playing this for about a month now and I have to say, I was a bit skeptical about the game, even being a veteran of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, X-2, and 11. I've been reading reviews about it from various websites, stating that this might not be open for the public or the fandom of the Final Fantasy series, so I bit the bullet and got a copy of the game for the Xbox 360. Let me do a rundown of what I think of the game in categories.

GAMEPLAY:

I can tell Square-Enix was trying something new here. The new system they have made is quite "different", if I had to say anything, from all of the other games. It does take a little while to get used to it, but after you get the hang of it, it becomes second nature to play. I do frown on Square-Enix on making you not able to control all of your characters in battle, and having most of the battles take almost forever to complete (and I'm not talking about boss battles). I really do like the new Crystarium system. It really does feel like the Sphere System from Final Fantasy X, but a bit more tedious to level up. Instead of gaining levels to move your pointer and use a sphere to level up a certain stat, you have to collect Crystal Points to progress to the next stat upgrade (HP, Strength, Magic or Abilities). At first, it's very easy to level up, but as you get farther into the game, it gets even harder to level up your characters' stats when you only get about 120 CP per battle (depending on who you fight). I also really like how you don't require MP anymore while casting spells. Now that's a big improvement in difficulty in my book. Another really great thing about gameplay is when you finish a battle, you are fully restored to full HP on everyone. I give this section a:

4/5

GRAPHICS

Now where do I start with this? Oh, how about how amazingly stunning and realistic cut-scenes are. It makes me really happy how Square-Enix made the facial movements look so "real". It makes it seem like I could reach out and touch their faces while watching it on my HDTV. It sure does make me surprised that even though I play it on the Xbox 360, which isn't as graphically prowest than the PS3, it still looks spectacular. I really do give kudos to Square for such a fantastic job with the graphics. If I knew someone with a PS3 and likes the game, I'll see about comparing the 360 version with that and see if I notice a difference. I give this section a:

5/5

STORY

Square-Enix has been well known for their unique ways of writing down a script for a game's story, but this one might not cut it for me. I started out playing the game, trying all I can to get into the story and after about 5-10 hours of gameplay, I'm still confused, but a friend of mine who got a little big farther than I did said that I should read the Entry Logs in the Character Menu. After I read everything in the Data Log, everything thing made more sense now, but later on, more questions came into mind and I got confused with the story again! I bet if someone was a bit more patient with the story, they would be more intertwined with the game's main plot, but I wasn't. Maybe you could be... I give this section a:

3/5

CHARACTERS:

Lighting was bitchy at the start, Snow is a bad-ass, Vanelle sounds like a porn-star with her moans are groans, Hope is a whiny bitch, Sazh is pretty cool for being a black guy and having a Chocobo chick in his affro, and Fang is just about as awesome as Snow and is a female. That's all I'm gonna say. I give this section a:

4/5

OVERALL:
4/5

The game is different and hard to get used to, but it's not like Square-Enix is gonna do the same thing for the last 13 games, right? You all have to understand, every Final Fantasy game introduced something new...

I've been an avid fan of the Final Fantasy series since Final Fantasy 4, 5, and 6 were released in the United States. It's been nearly twenty years that I've loved this series... and this is the last Final Fantasy game I will play. It's not that I'm not open to a new installment of the series, but rather that the last two games have been so unpleasant that I'm unwilling to take a chance until someone whose opinion I trust tells me "No, it's okay, this new game is NOTHING like 12 and 13".

But this review isn't about Final Fantasy 12, which I played about 75% of before deciding I had better things to do. It's about Final Fantasy 13, a game so beautiful that I mistakenly gave it a chance to be fun. Five hours into the game, I have a glimmer of an understanding of the story; there are these giant demigod-like entities called Fal'Cie, which will on occasion choose people to become l'Cie, whose sole purpose is to carry out some mission (called a Focus) and then turn into crystal. Apparently, that's a good thing, unless you're from the neighboring planet that everyone seems to hate even though it would appear that there's no way to actually travel between the two. Being a "Pulse l'Cie" when you're on the planet "Cocoon" is apparently grounds for everyone to simultaneously decide to hate you.

After those first five hours, I hadn't had any fun. "Okay," I thought, "It's just setting me up to have fun later. It's not like Diablo 2 or anything, where the early game is a bit tough and not as fun as the end game, but I guess I expected some fun since I really enjoyed the early game of Final Fantasy 7 and 8." So I kept playing, leveling my characters up on an unusually linear, well-defined, completely boring new skill system, which seemed a lot like the Sphere Grid from Final Fantasy X but without any of the ability to deviate from a single path and do something interesting. Nope, you picked a tree and filled out some passive benefits (like +life) and some active skills (which were only available when your Paradigm used that particular role for that particular character). I got about 15 hours in, and still wasn't having fun.

I realized that much of the reason the game wasn't fun came in a two-fold double whammy of boredom: first, the story was complicated and difficult to follow. Unlike Final Fantasies 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and a little bit of 10, this game didn't introduce a clear opponent: you're just some outcast group of people (surprise! that totally never happened in the 7 games I just mentioned!), running away from the nebulous and vast forces of some rather powerful militaristic organization. The problem was that it wasn't clear where you were going: why was I going on this obnoxiously linear path? Where were the side quests? In fact, where was the MAIN quest? At 25 hours in, I hadn't figured out what the MAIN quest was, other than to not carry out their Focus (that thing the fal'Cie told l'Cie to do). But there weren't any side quests to do for entertainment or side story, just keep running.

That's where the second kicker comes in: despite some heavy monotony and/or predictability in former Final Fantasy games, at least the combat was fun. Final Fantasy 4, 5, and 6 were okay in this regard, but had some charm and the comedic story deviations were worth it. Final Fantasy 7 and 8 had great combat, and 9 returned to 'okay'-dom. FFX had interesting combat; some parts good, some parts bad, but definitely on par with 7 and 8. Final Fantasy XIII had none of that. You pick a "paradigm", which selects roles for ALL of your characters, and whichever characters you aren't controlling automatically cast spells on an enemy using some kind of seriously deterministic algorithm for deciding which spell to cast 3-6 times in a row. Which is completely different from what your character does, which is continue tapping the A button to select "auto-battle", which instructs the character you're controlling to do the exact same thing that your allies are doing: use an algorithm to figure out what attacks to perform on an enemy. Oh, wait, that's the same thing. Whoops.

So we've got a monotonous, difficult to follow story that makes no sense, characters you'd rather see die for their wimpy whining than follow along on their misguided quest to not be l'Cie, and combat that you'd rather run away from because it's so boring. It's now 45 hours in, and I'm not sure why I played for 40 hours longer than I decided the game wasn't fun. Probably because it's a Final Fantasy and I was a hardcore fan. It has to get fun at some point, right?

So I finish the game. It took me about 60 hours because I got sidetracked on a hunt system similar to the Marks of FFXII, which were only marginally more interesting battles because I had to use OTHER paradigms. After 60 hours of playing the game, start to finish, I hadn't had any fun. None. At no point did I say to myself "This game is good, I totally want to play it". No, as an idiotic loyal fanboy, I said "This game is a Final Fantasy, so I want it to be good, so I'm going to keep playing it".

It wasn't good. 60 hours of my life spent playing a game I hate. Lesson learned: when Hironobu Sakaguchi, the guy who designed the Final Fantasies up through 9, jumps ship, it's time to abandon the series. No more Final Fantasies for me.

On the flip side, Lost Odyssey (a game created by Hironobu Sakaguchi) was an excellent game. You should play that instead of Final Fantasy XIII, which was awful.