is FFXIII worth it?

bluemooner

im an on/off fan of the series. i loved 10 and 8 but i wasnt very impressed with 12 and never got around to finishing it...
But what is the general consensus on this one, is it worth the money? what is the average playthrough time like?
opinions???

Mindkiller

I played 12 hours and haven't touched it since.
It's very, very boring. I can stand how high strung everyone is in it.

Supposedly gets good after you throw 25 hours of your life away running down a corridor. I do not plan on verifying that anytime soon.

Lemegeton

the average playthrough is about 50 hours depending on how much time you spend in pulse. given that the rest of the game is **** most people spend a long time in pulse. to finish all the side missions you need to grind so much it easily goes over 100 hours. the problem is to get to pulse you need to wade through 40 hours of ****. so the general consensus is its not worth the trouble.

carbonkid

Depends what your after in an rpg. Its very liner for first 20/30 hrs but personally that wasn't what annoyed me about the game...X is probably my favorite and that was almost just as liner.

There are no villages to potter around in and buy items, cant talk to random people and after every fight your heath and status is back to 100%. Also if you die you go back to just before the fight...making the save points almost useless...which of you can find around every corner lol. The AI does too much of the work as well and theres so many cutscenes it loses it novelty pretty fast. Unfortunately i could go on

The game looks pretty awesome though!

seraphimvc

i think if you are a fan of the monster hunter series (the ACT from capcom),ff13 will be your kinda game. yup,i think ff13 is not actually a game for rpg fans :pac:

johnny_ultimate

I'm the same as everyone else - I put around 30 hours into it, haven't touched it in around two months. I got a chocobo, then just had little interest in returning.

The battle system is fantastic for sure. When it works, and once you get past the endless tutorial, it's full of room for tactics and visceral fights. It just takes so long to get there, and the major problem: battles genuinely are the only worthwhile things in this game. Sure, there's levelling etc..., but the story is hard to care about most of the time, some of the characters infuriating, and painfully linear until you get to Pulse (where non-linearity comes in the form of allowing you to choose when you fight enemies). Technically, it's a marvel, but it just doesn't do enough.

I'd personally feel you'd be better off picking up something like Dragon Quest IX or Persona 4 if you haven't already - JRPGs that do something different, and with plenty of variety.

Lemegeton

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

The battle system is fantastic for sure. When it works, and once you get past the endless tutorial, it's full of room for tactics and visceral fights. It just takes so long to get there, and the major problem: battles genuinely are the only worthwhile things in this game.

i disagree i think the battles are one of the worst parts of the game. i am sorry but you cannot say that its full of room for tactics when you only control the main character and have no input to the ai characters other than setting roles. tactics in this game boil down to assigning roles and i find that so limited and restricting. another thing, most fights and in particular boss fights boil down to staggering the enemy and because ravager class gives the only decent chain bonuses you end up being mainly a party of ravagers spamming magic attacks and occasionally switching to medic, commando or sentinel. The AI even if they are in the role you want make retarded decisions on what attacks to use and then when you get game over if main character dies the medic role should prioritize that person and it doesn't.
i found the whole system very dull and limited and was applying the exact same strategy to every enemy in the game. and dont get me started on the summons, what a joke they were.

seraphimvc wrote:

i think if you are a fan of the monster hunter series (the ACT from capcom),ff13 will be your kinda game. yup,i think ff13 is not actually a game for rpg fans

only pulse can really be used for that comparison and in the grand scheme of things that is a small portion of the game so i think that analogy is way off.

super_furry

Mindkiller wrote: »

I played 12 hours and haven't touched it since.
It's very, very boring. I can stand how high strung everyone is in it.

Supposedly gets good after you throw 25 hours of your life away running down a corridor. I do not plan on verifying that anytime soon.

Sums up my experience of the game. Awful, boring, tedious rubbish. It might get better if you sink enough hours into it, but I've better things to do.

seraphimvc

Lemegeton wrote: »

only pulse can really be used for that comparison and in the grand scheme of things that is a small portion of the game so i think that analogy is way off.

caused' there is nothing worthy mentioned at all before the game hits grand pulse? happened to me anyway.

kisaragi

I'm going to go against the grain a little here... cause personally I loved the game! I'm a huge FF fan, have finished 3 - 13, some of them a few times, so I was a little disheartened to hear there'd be no shops, very altered battle system... etc

Even with all the changes it still feels like a Final Fantasy game however. I thought the story was great, and very well paced. There's a lot of cutscenes but none are too long and they all reveal something interesting... It's a great cast and everyone plays a key role in the story, with a lot of character development taking place.

As for the battles, personally I loved the traditional random battle style used in the older games, but the new system means that there's little downtime between battles, and they are actually fun to play... not having to worry about saving MP etc means you can pretty much do whatever you want during battle, and don't just have to mash "attack" til the enemy dies then cast cure all between fights.

Being able to restart if you die is great, because you WILL die. There is quite a lot of strategy involved in some of the fights, because you're level-capped by story events so you can't just grind to become uber-powerful to beat a boss. I personally found the AI great, the priority for which moves they use is usually spot on.

For the record I found the first 20 hours of the game great, even if it is linear.

Lemegeton

kisaragi wrote: »

It's a great cast and everyone plays a key role in the story, with a lot of character development taking place.

you are the first person i have come across to say they like the cast. Vanille and Hope are terrible

As for the battles, personally I loved the traditional random battle style used in the older games, but the new system means that there's little downtime between battles, and they are actually fun to play... not having to worry about saving MP etc means you can pretty much do whatever you want during battle, and don't just have to mash "attack" til the enemy dies then cast cure all between fights.

this is only true in the later parts of the game. for the first 20 hours or so you have so little attacks learned and cant learn any more that boss battles are just wars of attrition with you continually spamming the one attack over and over. you have such limited options for a large part of the game so where is the strategy?????

Being able to restart if you die is great, because you WILL die. There is quite a lot of strategy involved in some of the fights, because you're level-capped by story events so you can't just grind to become uber-powerful to beat a boss.
personally found the AI great, the priority for which moves they use is usually spot on.

sorry but using fire and flamestrike when they know firaga is not spot on. a commando using ruin when an enemy is staggered instead of launching them with an attack is not spot on.
and again where is the strategy beyond role switching

Retr0gamer

I'm waiting, I'd say in 6 months time the game will be 15 euros. I've got much better RPGs to play it seems

Mr. K

I enjoyed it, Lightning has pretty hair. As you can see in my sig! I seriously doubt I'll remember it in ten years time though!

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I'm waiting, I'd say in 6 months time the game will be 15 euros. I've got much better RPGs to play it seems

This is true.

Raze_them_all

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I'm waiting, I'd say in 6 months time the game will be 15 euros. I've got much better RPGs to play it seems

Even then it will be over priced.

elekid

Lemegeton wrote: »

you are the first person i have come across to say they like the cast. Vanille and Hope are terrible

That makes me the 2nd! I liked them all except Snow who I found a bit annoying (yes, I could hear Vanilles voice, but I still liked her character). I really enjoyed the story as well, way better than FFXIIs anyway.

this is only true in the later parts of the game. for the first 20 hours or so you have so little attacks learned and cant learn any more that boss battles are just wars of attrition with you continually spamming the one attack over and over. you have such limited options for a large part of the game so where is the strategy?????

The strategy is in setting up the right Paradigms and knowing the right time to use them. Admittedly a lot of the random battles were just hack and slash but there were some great bosses.

The battle with Cid is the one that stood out for me, you had to constantly counter his paradigm shifts with your own

sorry but using fire and flamestrike when they know firaga is not spot on. a commando using ruin when an enemy is staggered instead of launching them with an attack is not spot on.
and again where is the strategy beyond role switching

I always assumed that was because you can quickly cast 4 fires in the same time it would take to cast 1-2 firagas, so the fires had a greater effect on the stagger bar? Might be wrong though. The not always launching thing annoyed me too.

Even though I enjoyed the game enough to defend it, I do admit it that it had some serious problems and won't be to everyones (or most peoples) taste!

Lemegeton

elekid wrote: »

That makes me the 2nd! I liked them all except Snow who I found a bit annoying (yes, I could hear Vanilles voice, but I still liked her character). I really enjoyed the story as well, way better than FFXIIs anyway.



The strategy is in setting up the right Paradigms and knowing the right time to use them. Admittedly a lot of the random battles were just hack and slash but there were some great bosses.

The battle with Cid is the one that stood out for me, you had to constantly counter his paradigm shifts with your own

yes that was good and so were others but again these are all late in the game. the bosses in the first half were incredibly dull

I always assumed that was because you can quickly cast 4 fires in the same time it would take to cast 1-2 firagas, so the fires had a greater effect on the stagger bar? Might be wrong though. The not always launching thing annoyed me too.

nope the stagger bar would jump more with firaga, i tested it. but the better reason for using firaga was that against fire weak enemies it would launch them which made staggering easier and stopped the enemy from attacking. the point im trying to make is that if this was my preferred style of play i cannot configure the AI to favor Firaga, so my strategy and playstyle is limited.

Even though I enjoyed the game enough to defend it, I do admit it that it had some serious problems and won't be to everyones (or most peoples) taste!

RedSpoon

I finished it in hope of it getting better but no, its not worth it.

johnny_ultimate

The battle system doesn't always work, but when it does it becomes a strangely compelling subversion of ATB battles IMO. While you do only control one character, try playing a harder battle without switching paradigms - insta-death. The tactics come before the battle itself, with you remixing your team to create something that works for you. It may get a little samey, and interface flaws are frequent (not being able to save different team settings is a major annoyance) but for me I found it to have some sort of depth, and it's extremely visceral.

My major problem is that the battle system is all there is to do, and hence it obviously does become a bit irritating when you're fighting the same enemy types repeatedly. Some corridors last like 2 hours, with enemy types maybe changing once or twice. It's infuriating, and doing the same thing over and over wears thin fast.

The best RPGs may have repetitive battle systems too, but they're broken up with towns and varied quests. The best, like Persona 4, have much much more outside mere battle systems. No luck here, only the same old grind for countless hours. And therein lies the major flaw of Final Fantasy 13.

Mr. K

elekid wrote: »

The battle with Cid is the one that stood out for me, you had to constantly counter his paradigm shifts with your own

I loved this part too,

his aesthetic reminded me of Safer Sephiroth

!

elekid wrote: »

Even though I enjoyed the game enough to defend it, I do admit it that it had some serious problems and won't be to everyones (or most peoples) taste!

Again, I agree. The lack of towns and linearity really took away from the experience. Especially since XII had an amazing level of freedom!

carbonkid

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I'm waiting, I'd say in 6 months time the game will be 15 euros. I've got much better RPGs to play it seems

Think i seen it in a game store goin cheap...trade in a game and its only a 5er...something like that ^_^

Retr0gamer

I don't trade in games though. I seen it for 25 or 30 already but it's not exactly an atlus game so I know it's not going to be rare and will be at rock bottom prices soon. Sure in japan it was selling for 500 yen 3 weeks after release!

carbonkid

I figure most people will never be satisfied with a new final fantasy because itll never live up to expectation...but has XIII actually flopped?

Retr0gamer

It hasn't flopped it's made a very good profit and sold a load ofcopies, just not as much as Square had hoped for and they produced more copies than they needed.

Lemegeton

carbonkid wrote: »

I figure most people will never be satisfied with a new final fantasy because itll never live up to expectation...but has XIII actually flopped?

not in terms of sales anyway. it may be tainted now but in its opening week it sold like crazy. as a new FF game always does.

johnny_ultimate wrote:

The tactics come before the battle itself, with you remixing your team to create something that works for you. It may get a little samey, and interface flaws are frequent (not being able to save different team settings is a major annoyance) but for me I found it to have some sort of depth, and it's extremely visceral.

im not saying there is not depth there and like you say it is mainly in the setting of the paradigms but in comparison to other rpgs out there its poor.

johnny_ultimate wrote:

The best RPGs may have repetitive battle systems too, but they're broken up with towns and varied quests. The best, like Persona 4, have much much more outside mere battle systems. No luck here, only the same old grind for countless hours. And therein lies the major flaw of Final Fantasy 13.

now that i agree with. i prob would not have to scrutinize the ff13 battle system so much and nitpick at everything if the game had something else to do to break up the constant battling. i am playing a JRPG now called Rogue Galaxy (PS2) and its got a perfect battle system and if i get bored of battling i can spend time in the factory building items. go battle in the insectron stadium, which for a minigame has a staggering amount of depth to it. that is the mark of a great RPG, when you can spend hours in the game without touching the main story.

super_furry

XIII wasn't a flop but it may have done damage to the series. I certainly won't buy the next one at release and I haven't really enjoyed a Final Fantasy game since IX.

carbonkid

IX was pretty amazing. Im guessing versusXIII will be more like VII or X and XV will be more like IX or XII. They'll be aiming to have something new for eveyone.

Retr0gamer

Versus XIII is actually going to be like Kingdom Hearts and Agito XIII like Monster Hunter.

Aurongroove

Speaking from someone who enjoyed the game:

the graphics, both fighting and field, are amazing and the best I've ever seen on any game so far, the music is a lot better then 12, and some tracks are genuinely quite wonderful as pieces of music (though it is still missing Umestu's heartiness ).

the story-arch, over all is quite good and touches on themes of patriotism, love, slavery (to an extent, lol), but the story telling (the script) is terrible and accounts for one of the worst messups of the title; characters are bland, distant, not funny and they spout nonsense which confuses the plot into ****, you really have to beat the game, and help things along by reading the in-game Analects and data-log [like FF8's Information section: and just as boring] to get the full picture and to get the the story they were trying to tell.

the fighting (IMO) is excellent though some hate it, it's based on speed and is similar to a slightly faster, less controlled version of X-2's dress sphere system(less controlled because you may only instruct your party leader about which moves to use, like Kingdom hearts.
you may quit and restart a fight at any stage, Hp bars are reset after each battle, you may re battle immediately after a game over: it;s nice and fast: so no punishing "forgetting to save before a big fight" accidents, you simply retry.


the most impressive things in the game is the well worked out equipment and character building system. the chrystaruim is similar to X's sphere grid, but it prevents over powering: you may only access new levels after defeating certain bosses, so no leaving balamb with 120 Str, or leaving Midgar with Finishing touch etc.
the equipment is excellently fair, for example normally a ribbon kills all status magic, and bosses might become immune to everything under the sun, making status magic useless past the half way stage, but here nothing gets left behind by god like equipment, or assumptions that no one will ever get hurt by poison,
The best you can get is 30-60% immunity to one status or 20-25 to all, kinda like 8, like wise there;s no huge emphasis on ultimate gear, an end game team might be wearing a max level accessory found in the very first couple of moment of the game.
weapons are leveled up.

also character uniqueness, similar to IX, each character has they're own feel, strengths etc and not like VII, VIII or XII where players are sort of "coat hangers" on which to place one's equipment/materia/GFs/Espers etc.

I love the game, but I know a lot don't. I'd say if you find a second hand copy, give it a go.

super_furry

Ugh a FF Monster Hunter clone? The success of that game baffles the ****e out of me. Honestly can't understand why a poor Phantasy Star Online imitation is suddenly the template to follow for all RPGs.

johnny_ultimate

super_furry wrote: »

Ugh a FF Monster Hunter clone? The success of that game baffles the ****e out of me. Honestly can't understand why a poor Phantasy Star Online imitation is suddenly the template to follow for all RPGs.

It's pretty much this:



It is mind boggling how big that series is in Japan.

NeoKubrick

super_furry wrote: »

Ugh a FF Monster Hunter clone? The success of that game baffles the ****e out of me. Honestly can't understand why a poor Phantasy Star Online imitation is suddenly the template to follow for all RPGs.

They probably say the same about Call of Duty.

Retr0gamer

It's really annoying how there's a few JRPG franchises now jumping on the Monster Hunter bandwagon and turning into Monster Hunter clones. If I wanted to play monster hunter (and I don't) I'd buy monster hunter. I buy your JRPG franchise because it's a JRPG!

Mr. K

Retr0gamer wrote: »

If I wanted to play monster hunter (and I don't) I'd buy monster hunter.

Hang on, isn't Monster Hunter brilliant? I had Tri recommended to me recently, I was kinda intrigued?

On a Versus XIII note, being like Kingdom Hearts is good thing. Not very original, but suitably different.

super_furry

Mr. K wrote: »

Hang on, isn't Monster Hunter brilliant? I had Tri recommended to me recently, I was kinda intrigued?

I think it's rubbish. And badly designed rubbish at that. I bought Tri on adverts, but it's just a poorly made game. There's so much faffing about and messing with awful menus when you want to do the simplest of things, the game itself is a boring grindfest and online is dominated by super-hardcore players with godlike characters.

Retr0gamer

Monster Hunter just isn't for me. Tried a bit of Tri despite having played the beta of the first game years ago and hating it. It felt like a grindfest and I gave up. It's a poor mans MMO.

Mindkiller

Monster Hunter is terrible. Its success is bewildering.
It is kind of like the Japanese Call of Duty.

Dissapointed to hear that Agito is going to be like that. I was looking forward to a handheld FF.
Seems like handheld JRPGs are the only ones worth bothering with these days.

Mr. K

Good to know, I won't waste my time or money on it so!

Retr0gamer

Well you might like it. I'm just waiting on Gothpunk to jump in and defend it and he's put way more time into than me.

bruceyowens

bluemooner wrote: »

im an on/off fan of the series. i loved 10 and 8 but i wasnt very impressed with 12 and never got around to finishing it...
But what is the general consensus on this one, is it worth the money? what is the average playthrough time like?
opinions???

fantastic game, great story and the score is beautiful. i'd definitly recommend it if you're a fan.

Retr0gamer

FFXII divides the FF fanbase right down the middle. I think it's boring with loads of gameplay flaws and a terrible story that was obviously rushed because it could have been excellent.

GothPunk

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Well you might like it. I'm just waiting on Gothpunk to jump in and defend it and he's put way more time into than me.

Somehow I managed to resist. :pac:

I think of it like this - think about how multiplayer components have become the norm for many FPS/TPS/Action games. This is what is happening in Japan, it's not that they're making all the games like Monster Hunter, they've realised that the Japanese player base like local (e.g. Adhoc on PSP) multiplayer. So sure you have games like God Eater that are clear Monster Hunter clones, but then you have Valkyria Chronicles 2 and Peace Walker that take the mission based structure that previous games in the series already had and adapts them to the portable format.

So when people say Agito XIII is going to be like Monster Hunter, you should read that it'll be mission based and you'll be able to play the game alone or with friends - not that you'll be fighting giant monsters and grinding missions to get specific materials. Peace Walker is partly a Monster Hunter clone and look how that turned out - as an absolutely fantastic game.

landsleaving

My 2c on FF XIII

I put a LOT of time into it, I did some grinding, as much as it would let me, in the hopes that when the freedom that I'd so much about after 20 hours came back, I'd be well prepared for it.

Unfortunately I got sick of what is a quite good battle system. The battles themselves are far too long, even some of the lesser enemies take an age to beat and towards the end, there are enemies which can do little damage to you but can take 10 minutes plus to kill. It's intolerably frustrating.

The promised freeodm amounted to little more than a wider corridor in the context of the point you first arrive at it, and while I know I can eventually go back and fully explore and enjoy the area, I also know that there's little more to it than some even longer battles. Now they may be challenging, and some may be fun, but I#ll ahve to grind like a lunatic to be able to get anywhere and I just have no desier to do it. The battles, when they're done right, are exciting, tense and genuinely challenging. Unfortunately most of the time they're either too easy, too long or too hard. All the level capping didn't help, it just simplified things too much.

There's too little outside of the battles basically. I could forgive the linearity if there was some variety, but frankly, there isn't. All the quirkiness, humour and sense of fun has been ditched (like dressing cliund up and doing squats in VII, or IX.. just IX in general) Thre's no charm, just a terribly chessy script that sort of hooks you, then eventually frustrates as much as all the battles.

It's a pity, I loved it at first, but I'm maybe an hour from finishing it and I don't have any desire to play that hour. The battle system starts off well, but through a combination of giving, then removing freedom from the player, and the intense boredom of fighting the same enemies for way too long (both in terms of how many times I've fought them, and how long the battles last) just sucked my enthusiasm away.

I wanted to love it, I tried to love it, I put the hours in, I really tried to make it work, but I'm sorry Final Fantasy, things have changed, you've changed, and I've moved on. I can't do this anymore. I knew it was over a long time ago. I'd just be wasting both our time if I hung around any longer. I'm sorry, it's not you, it's me. Actually. It is you.

Aurongroove

Retr0gamer wrote: »

FFXII divides the FF fanbase right down the middle. I think it's boring with loads of gameplay flaws and a terrible story that was obviously rushed because it could have been excellent.

where FXII let me down was it's heartless forgettable music, try singing a theme from it, got anything? didn;t think so, yet I could sing several from XIII, X, IX, VIII VII etc.

also, the battle system started off well, but it sort of went bust twords the last of the extra dungeons and special bosses: The only tactics for almost all of these extra dungeons is casting Curaga constantly against hoards of undead, using the reverse/lure trick on other wise logistically impossible bosses (logistically impossible, but tactically brain dead) and having all buffs cast constantly in order not to die, and using espers (shemhazi, zodiark, and the gravity dude) for one off shots and for nothing else becasue they're as week as ****.

the game could've been massivly improved if they had a way of genuinely strengthening espers (ie, another licence grid area where an nesper might get +80 defence, or "come with auto haste", or upgrades thundara to thundaga, or and I'm sure the console could handle the processing power: enable multiple summons etc)

and also if they had some IN GAME way of guiding you to rare weapons and rare monsters,

for example the best knife in the game is a rare drop (like 1.25%) from a rare monster I've never even seen, another staff is taken from a rare monster which appears once and once only in a special spot, just after defeating another rare monster (which itself is a once off encounter!!!

And the system is too easy to cheat: 3 screens washes away all your sins, you can steal over and over from elementals (steal, run three screens away, return steal again) and do almost anything you want. for me thats as bas as the xItem cheat from VII, and well... the nentire junction system, lol, but at least the junction system has a kind of fun brokenness to it. in XII you have to get struck by break (only that one spell, nothing else) to have the final esper show you his summon sequence WHAT THE ****?!

completely potty. FFXII, was definatly my FFXIII, and while it isint as big a joke as X-2 was, it was still quite a shock to the system after the godly X, IX, VIII, VII, and let's face it, VI, V and chrono trigger

Retr0gamer

Actually I didn't like the soundtrack to begin with as well. I'm a massive Hitoshi Sakimoto fan and couldn't believe a soundtrack could be so forgettable. However I've since downloaded the soundtrack and it's actually amazing to listen the whole way through. The problem isn't that the soundtrack is bad but that the sound mixing is terrible. Square had one of the best soundtracks ever made but game prominence to the sound effects and left the soundtrack barely audible in the background, a total sin imo. The only tracks that stand out then are the bombastic ones like Esper Battle.

carbonkid

Aurongroove wrote: »

completely potty. FFXII, was definatly my FFXIII, and while it isint as big a joke as X-2 was, it was still quite a shock to the system after the godly X, IX, VIII, VII, and let's face it, VI, V and chrono trigger

I have to say im one of those who really enjoyed FFXII...really enjoyed the freedom and stunning scenery (unlike XIII you could actually travel to). Saying that, it still doesnt compare to X and almost everything before.

Hironobu Sakaguchi (original creator) retired from Final Fantasy after helping on X so i assume that has a large part to do with it.

NeoKubrick

Aurongroove wrote: »

where FXII let me down was it's heartless forgettable music, try singing a theme from it, got anything? didn;t think so, yet I could sing several from XIII, X, IX, VIII VII etc.

also, the battle system started off well, but it sort of went bust twords the last of the extra dungeons and special bosses: The only tactics for almost all of these extra dungeons is casting Curaga constantly against hoards of undead, using the reverse/lure trick on other wise logistically impossible bosses (logistically impossible, but tactically brain dead) and having all buffs cast constantly in order not to die, and using espers (shemhazi, zodiark, and the gravity dude) for one off shots and for nothing else becasue they're as week as ****.

the game could've been massivly improved if they had a way of genuinely strengthening espers (ie, another licence grid area where an nesper might get +80 defence, or "come with auto haste", or upgrades thundara to thundaga, or and I'm sure the console could handle the processing power: enable multiple summons etc)

and also if they had some IN GAME way of guiding you to rare weapons and rare monsters,

for example the best knife in the game is a rare drop (like 1.25%) from a rare monster I've never even seen, another staff is taken from a rare monster which appears once and once only in a special spot, just after defeating another rare monster (which itself is a once off encounter!!!

And the system is too easy to cheat: 3 screens washes away all your sins, you can steal over and over from elementals (steal, run three screens away, return steal again) and do almost anything you want. for me thats as bas as the xItem cheat from VII, and well... the nentire junction system, lol, but at least the junction system has a kind of fun brokenness to it. in XII you have to get struck by break (only that one spell, nothing else) to have the final esper show you his summon sequence WHAT THE ****?!

completely potty. FFXII, was definatly my FFXIII, and while it isint as big a joke as X-2 was, it was still quite a shock to the system after the godly X, IX, VIII, VII, and let's face it, VI, V and chrono trigger

A quote from Paths of Glory applicable to the love-affair with an outdated system and now turgid gameplay that some people don't want to let go: "Colonel Dax, you're a disappointment to me. You've spoiled the keenness of your mind by wallowing in sentimentality. You really did want to save those men, and you were not angling for Mireau's command. You are an idealist - and I pity you as I would the village idiot.".

Retr0gamer

But turn based isn't an outdated system, it's perfectly valid and I much prefer it to the real-time battles of FFXII that dragged out with little interaction. It didn't feel like a step forward for me, more like a side step. Turn based systems forme offer much more tactical oppurtunities in my opinion and game like Persona 4, Nocturne, Grandia etc. show just how good turn based systems can be. The fact is I much preferred their battle systems to FFXII or KOTOR which bored me. Other than FFX which had a superb battle system, final fantasy's ATB system was not a good battle system at all.

elekid

I liked the gameplay and exploration in FFXII but was deeply disappointed by the story/characters. If you could transplant FFXIIIs story and characters into XIIs gameplay it would make for a great game IMO. FFX was the last one I've fully enjoyed as a result.

(On FFXIIs soundtrack, I have it but never really listen to it because I consider it "boring", with a few exceptions. I must give it another chance).

Mr. K

GothPunk wrote: »

Peace Walker is partly a Monster Hunter clone and look how that turned out - as an absolutely fantastic game.

I'm finishing Portable Ops before I play PW, I can't wait! I've had Portable Ops since 2007, it didn't grab me then. I'm loving it now though, I hear PW is better in every way.

Why has no one +1'd my comment about Lightning's pretty hair...?

elekid

Mr. K wrote: »

Why has no one +1'd my comment about Lightning's pretty hair...?

She does have pretty hair, but I preferred the way her scarf moved when she ran so I always played as her when I could. Talk about stretching for reasons to like the game

Cyzrane

FFXIII is utter tripe and no other series on the face of the planet would get away with the incredible disdain with which it treats its fanbase. So, no it's not worth it.

People really have to abandon the brand loyalty they have to the Final Fantasy series. I loved them when I was younger, in particular VI, VII and IX (to a lesser extent also VIII), but just because I loved those games doesn't mean I should keep feeding Square-Enix all my money for churning out sub-par products from the "JRPG-O-Matic". Whatever vestiges of pride and fun that Final Fantasy held are long gone, and now they're just swindling their fans with barefaced cheek.

Show Square-Enix that you're not just a magpie with money attached to it; show them that you won't just be attracted to a new, shiny box with the Final Fantasy label and an androgynous teenager on the front. They, in an ironic fashion, have become like the very villains they have created: bloated and self-important and corrupted to the core by their avarice.

...So yeah, don't buy FFXIII.