Final Fantasy XIII Review

Nearly 14 months after buying an Xbox 360, the game I was so excited for, the game that sold me on the console, finally was released.  With high expectations and a renowned love for the first four games in the series, I experienced the most disappointing game I’ve ever had the displeasure of playing. 

Final Fantasy XIII Review

Platforms: Xbox 360(Reviewed), Playstation 3

Release Date: 9/3/2010

My first gripe is the fact that the Final Fantasy series is renowned for it’s plot, and the innovations in story telling quality.  Except with Final Fantasy XIII, which manages to create one of the least comprehensive, moronic plots I’ve ever heard.  From what I can gather, you play as six characters scattered across the land, who have been chosen by some kind of all powerful being called a fal’Cie, where you need to avoid military troops who believes that those who are chosen must be killed or captured.

They wish to do this because those chosen by the fal’Cie and need to do something for said fal’Cie.  They never flat out say what they want done, but you either do it or die.  That is about all I could understand from the plot.  The rest of the game has terms like Purge, Pulse, Sanctum, PSICOM, and many other overly pretentious sounding terms being thrown around like they are both understandable and sound really cool.  I feel like I missed the first three hours, where the game explained all of it’s lore to the player.  But the game certainly doesn’t feel like it’s cutting corners, oh no, let’s have tutorials that last up to the 12 hour mark.  

The game’s plot does give the game a very linear feel up until chapter 11 out of 13.  As fugitives your group of six underdeveloped playable characters need to escape to some nearby planet known as Grand Pulse, here is where the game becomes a mission based exploration game where you traverse unique terrain.  You also have nearly 100 unique enemies to fight in the form of challenges that are scattered across the lovely lands in Grand Pulse.  
However, that doesn’t excuse the linearity of the rest of the game.  you are going through over glorified hallways that have the occasional item off to the side and non-random enemy battle, which leads to the game’s oversimplified combat system.  Many people have used the whole, “Press X to win”, line while talking to this game, but it’s not that simple, you press A/X and occasionally use LB/L1 to change you battle set up.  
It isn’t all that better, and it does often feel like you’re watching a very repetitive, yet beautiful, CG movie.  I really do believe this to be one of the most beautiful games I’ve ever played, but a combat system that is flawed to the very core cannot be saved by even the loveliest visuals.

There is an option to select one of your character’s abilities, but the rest are determined by a form of class, or Paradigms as the game calls them.  But why would you even bother if the game automatically chooses the best attacks to use on enemies.  You don’t even have MP to concern yourself with, which removes a massive sense of strategy.  
In addition, you only control one character, while the other two have actions designated by a paradigm, which only makes your presence in the actual battle seem more pointless.  Since the only major strategy is deciding who and what classes you want in the six customizable Paradigm layouts.  But the game does that for you as well.  SquareEnix thought that the player was so stupid that we can’t even decide upon a class set up.  But half the time when you regain control of a group, they have crap Paradigm set ups and you need to retry or die to change them yourself.
Although, there are some points where the game can get more difficult, namely the battle with Odin, the final boss, and some diabolical optional bosses.  But those bosses can be trumped by a decent amount of grinding and level ups in this game’s “skill tree”.  Although, the “skill tree” is just as linear as the main game.  You only choose what individual class/Paradigms you have.  They do try to increase playtime by opening up every class to every character, but who would want to make their mage character into a melee focused character?

But to me one of the biggest missteps is the music.  Nobuo Uematsu is a wonderful composer, he has been writing this series music since the beginning, he is a universally loved figure, so why would you replace his music with relatively forgettable tracks.  The music is often too calm for a game like this, with the exception of the battle them, which is great, but feels lacking due to the absence of the iconic victory theme.  And when it’s not calm it’s often too in your face, there is an absence of subtly in many tracks.  Rather then building an atmosphere, I felt like I was being instructed on what I should be feeling.
The same can be extended to the characters, the game made the decision of only having 6 playable characters, which would theoretically allow for better development and better overall characters.  And I can safely say that I don’t feel anything for any of them, I only like the characters due to their design or their combat prowess.  

This game is plagued with poor design decisions, from the horribly told narrative.  Some of the worst music in a franchise that is so well known for it’s music, that it gets it’s own rhythm game.  Characters who lack depth and very are tedious to watch.  Gameplay that focuses on looking good, rather than being actually being.  And only has some lovely visuals to show for it’s five year development cycle and massive budget.  I feel really stupid for being so hyped up for a game of this quality and am very disappointed with SquareEnix’s final product.  I just hope they’re able to fix enough with the sequel.
17/40
Subpar
The game is far below average and has little going for it. There may be makings of a good game, but it’s hampered by poor execution by the developer.
Would you still believe that I consider this game a guilty pleasure?