Final Fantasy XIII

 

 

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Haven't beaten the game yet, I am at the open area but it too so friggen long to get there. Way to linear for way too long! Its a shame because the combat and graphics are amazing.

After having played Bioware's Dragon Age: Origins, which I think is the best RPG to come out in the past year in terms of gameplay/story, I was a bit dismayed by what many viewers are describing as a very linear game in FFXIII with lackluster gameplay and no consequential actions whatsoever. Everything is gorgeous to look at for sure and I actually thought perhaps this would have fared better as a str8-to-blu-ray Movie Trilogy release as I kind of felt like I was "playing" to see what happens in the cut scenes.

The story itself is somewhat compelling and interesting but average at best. I wasn't exactly hanging at the edge of my seat or drawn in by a Shakespearean plot. But I will admit that it's just so damned pretty to look at.

PROS:
- Amazing visual experience/graphics are best I've seen to date.
- Interesting characters with intersecting POV/storyline
- Highly customizable character stats with "crystarium"

CONS:
- A lot of grinding
- No consequences to any actions for most of the game except dying in battle.
- Convoluted plot with too many details for me to actually care for.
- very few NPCs to interact with
- Linear aspect prevents free-roaming/exploration except in some rare locations.

RPG-CRACK-ADDICTIVENESS: 6/10 because it's so pretty and I want to watch the cutscenes, not because I feel like I have to play.

That being said if you enjoy the Final Fantasy series you will probably not want to miss this. I would add that I don't base my reviews on purely visual aesthetics - while it is certainly an important factor to any video game release, I think a good game's strengths lie in the storytelling, characters, gameplay and how those factors all work together with the graphics which can be forgiven if it's actually that much fun to play. I will personally be looking more forward to trying out Heavy Rain and Dragon Age Awakening to remedy my RPG-crack-addict-fix.

Side Note: I've been reading a lot of "officially published reviews" on IGN/Gamespot and I don't know what kind of biased-sponsor-crack they've been smoking but I'm actually surprised everyone is giving this game such a high score when there are so many other great games out there. I'm a strong believer in plot-centric games that are actually fun to play.

UPDATE: I'm at Gran Pulse now and I am actually losing interest. The gameplay is super redundant. Wired Magazine did a really fair and unbiased review on their website and I'm glad someone out there has the critical thinking ability to discern what makes a game FUN. This game is JUST OK unless you're a FF Fan Boy.

Disclaimer: This is 100% my opinion. If you love this game, that's perfectly fine. I don't expect everyone to agree with my opinions. I just think SE is capable of greater, because they've done better in my opinion. /Disclaimer

In a lot of ways it's a well made game, in that there aren't any real technical problems with the game. The problem is with the design, not the art design that's fantastic and the graphics themselves are amazing. The actual game design is what isn't well crafted. There hasn't been such a severely flawed design of a Final Fantasy since Final Fantasy II. (the original version, the remakes on PSP/iPhone/GBA fixed a few of the problems with it)

Which is simply unacceptable. SE knows what they're doing, but some how that didn't translate into this game's design.

The best examples are;

1. They decided to add in AoE (Area of Effect)Attacks in a game where you have no control over your character movement. That makes no sense. You have no control over where the AI takes your party members or your own character. They just run around randomly. On the flip side, you can't get your own AoE to be all that effective either because you, again, have no control over where you're going. If you have in your head a path to your enemy that will get you some AoE damage against the enemy, it's probably not the way the AI will take you.

2. There's no control over party members. The AI only has 3 generic unhelpful settings. No customization for their priorities at all. After Final Fantasy XII's Gambit System, that is simply unacceptable. The Gambit System was amazing when you finally got around to getting all the skills for it. Which was a flaw in FFXII, but there was room for improvement in FFXIII but they ended up going with stupid AI that you can't do anything with instead. Instead of stacking two or three Cures or saving for Cura, the AI will cast one at a time right away. Which doesn't heal you enough for the damage you're taking.

3. Your character gets KO'd it's game over. You can revive the party members, but they can't revive you. It makes no sense. If they had allowed us to switch characters like the past two main Final Fantasy games (FFX, FFXII) have allowed us to do then you could just keep going. And because of 2 your unable to ensure your own safety unless you take on the healing position. Once again, they decided to go back in time.

4. The entire design leans toward Western RPG design, but completely fails to actually get it to work. The 'Sentinel' for instance is meant to be a tank (take all the damage away from the others in the party). However, that means nothing because of #1. You can't move your characters AWAY from the Sentinel who is taking all this damage, including AoE attacks. So your Healer is just standing right next to the tank using one Cure at a time, doing you no good. Thanks Example 2.

It seems to me that Square Enix was simply focused on pushing out amazing graphics. That's the highlight of FFXIII. The story is okay, even if all the story updates in the database end up repeating the same thing, just worded differently. Which was lazy and frustrating if you wanted to pay attention to them.

Now, let's talk about the linearity. First I'd like to debunk the story defense. IE: "They're fugitives! They can't chill out in towns!" That's a huge cop-out. How does one know that they're fugitives right away? Right, they don't. So they could easily work into the story them being in a town. SE have said that towns are 'hard'. They were lazy. Level-5 created some of the best towns in White Knight Chronicles, you may hate the game, but those towns were HUGE and you could go in and out of the Houses without any additional loading. It was all one huge instance. Sure the graphics aren't as good as FFXIII, but graphics and nothing else hardly makes a game great.

Now, let's talk about FFX, because people always defend FFXIII by pointing out FFX's linearity. Yes, FFX is linear. However, you can return to nearly ever place you visit. At a certain point, you can go where you want in the previous places. You've got the ability to EXPLORE and BACK TRACK. And there are tons of different side-quests to fill out your time between battles and story.

In FFXIII all you have are battles along a path toward story sections. Eventually it opens up, but by then I was so bored that I didn't even care. It's too little too late. There's still nothing to do in those 'open' areas aside from battles.

Now on to the battles, I found them extremely tedious. Now I know that's rather ironic, given that many consider turn based combat boring but I find it enjoyable. I get that, but FFXIII's battle system required zero thought on my part. (again I realize the irony, but turn based is only tedious if you go grind, which actually helps to break the game making the entire game boring and it's all because you over powered yourself) I can play about 30 minutes before I get physically and mentally tired, because it doesn't require any thought from me that my body just might as well be laying there sleeping.

Paradigm shifting doesn't add any depth at all, as many suggest. It's just an annoying obstacle to separate the abilities your characters. Add to that in each battle the first shift you do, takes forever. While you still take damage you have to watch them flip their weapons to shift.

It's just ugg... I was not a fan of this game. The Positives are obviously the graphics, they're some of the best (if not the best) in the genre. The Music is pretty good in most cases. The story is interesting, but the lack of Japanese audio is annoying and shows how little SE knows of their userbase. The English dub leaves a lot to be desired. Vanille is terrible. The voice actress for her is awful. Throughout half of her dialog she has a forced and annoying accent. The other half she doesn't have it, then her accent kicks back in full force to make up for the fact she didn't have it for awhile. It's... ugg. The story isn't enough to warrant playing through all the tedium.

There's no reason for SE to not include Japanese audio on the PS3 version. The 360 and PS3 versions aren't the same, they could never be because of DVD. The PS3 version is uncompressed. The 360 has compressed visuals and audio. Besides, FFXIII was advertised as a 360 exclusive by Microsoft, so they obviously didn't care that much about equality for each version. Not that it's the first thing pertaining to FFXIII that they'd have lied about.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent game!
Final Fantasy rarely disappoints, aside from one or two terrible releases overall its great. This game has a most excellent storyline, well developed characters and the music is... Read more

Published 2 months ago by Aeltari

4.0 out of 5 stars If You Enjoy Story-Driven RPG's...
Despite all the criticism it got, I found Final Fantasy XIII to be a great game. I really liked the story, because I felt it was refreshing and original whereas a lot of modern... Read more

Published 3 months ago by Warran Penner

5.0 out of 5 stars Good game for the fans.
The game is very good, the graphics are astonishing. Gameplay-wise, the paradigm system gives a lot of flexibility for all characters. Read more

Published 4 months ago by Andre Almeida Sousa

5.0 out of 5 stars I didn't get the game. I got a refund. I got another version of the game.
Well i didn't get the game on time. It was 2 days late. I told amazon and they were so quick to respond. They gave me a full refund. It was so quick. Read more

Published 4 months ago by Brian of Niagara Falls

5.0 out of 5 stars good
This video game is very Good and the Transport speed was so fast i will visit again.thank you very much!

Published 4 months ago by Joe

4.0 out of 5 stars Not Perfect but still great
I started playing Final Fantasy from the seventh game. I went back after they remade the older ones. FF13 is a great game. The first few chapters are pretty boring. Read more

Published 7 months ago by Craig

5.0 out of 5 stars great game
the game was great itself and i enjoyed the battle system.Some of you player that has been playing for over a decade or 2 would dislike the battle system. Read more

Published 7 months ago by Singha.A

3.0 out of 5 stars Based on watching someone else play
I haven't played FFXIII yet, but my girlfriend has and I glanced at the TV enough to get an idea about it. She gives it 2.5-3.0, and that seems about right as an observer. Read more

Published 14 months ago by TMLTurby

4.0 out of 5 stars everyone in this game is emo - even the black dude
everyone in this game is so emo. oh no - i blame you for killing my mom. oh no - i blame you for my sister. oh no, i blame myself for my fiance. oh woe is me. Read more

Published 14 months ago by mike

4.0 out of 5 stars Pretty on the outside, horrid on the inside
Ever heard of the saying "Don't judge a book by its cover"? Well this game can relate to that. Google and youtube the game and you will be absolutely amazed and stunned. Read more

Published 15 months ago by Blitz

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