Review: Beautiful, Boring Final Fantasy XIII Loses RPG Magic
- By Chris Kohler
- March 5, 2010 |
- 1:32 pm |
- Categories: Console Games, Reviews
The most important thing to understand about Final Fantasy XIII, the latest in the world’s most popular line of role-playing games, is that it isn’t a role-playing game.
You don’t have to take my word for it. Just ask its creators: In a recent interview, the director of this PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 game (available March 9) said the changes he made to this installment were so dramatic that it constituted a “new genre” outside the “RPG template.”
Various Final Fantasy directors have been making big tweaks to the series’ gameplay ever since it began in 1987, and it’s not as if there is some untouchable canon the series can never violate. In fact, coming up with fresh ideas is how Final Fantasy has stayed afloat in a stagnating Japanese RPG market.
This version’s gimmick is that it pares down the gameplay to a few basic elements: Turn-based battles against mobs of fantastic creatures and elaborate, movielike story sequences. But this time, Square Enix finally threw the baby out with the bathwater: The things that make RPGs feel so different from other games — the sense of a grand, nonlinear adventure and the rising and falling action of an open-ended world — are gone.
Final Fantasy XIII isn’t an RPG; it’s something less.
(Note: This review is based on 45 hours of play with the Japanese-language PlayStation 3 version of Final Fantasy XIII. I played the first hour of the English-language PS3 version, but was not able to try the Xbox 360 version.)
In large part, Final Fantasy fans play the games for the stories. These generally revolve around a ragtag group of misfits, living on the outskirts of an oppressive society, who level up until they are powerful enough to kill God — and usually have to before the end credits will roll. XIII’s take on the formula is a story of two worlds: Cocoon and Pulse. Cocoon is where all the good people live; Pulse is the freaky Other world that everyone would rather not think about.
XIII’s story is good — a little more human and less esoteric than in previous games — but it’s no Heavy Rain. It’s still over-the-top and cartoony, more like an anime box set than a feature film. The pleasure still comes largely from the design of the characters, the world and the legions of grotesque creatures that inhabit it. It bursts with color and variety, taking you from gorgeous natural environments to futuristic cities.
The music, which has been a hallmark of the series since Day 1, also excels. Longtime composer Nobuo Uematsu may be long gone, but in his stead Masashi Hamauzu (Unlimited SaGa) turns in a score with catchy hooks and blood-pumping battle melodies.
Through a series of hilarious misunderstandings and machinations by Cocoon’s transparently evil theocracy, our six heroes all get marked as servants of Pulse. Everybody on Cocoon freaks out, and the heroic half-dozen are branded enemies of the state, which means that they’re constantly fighting things everywhere they go.
And I mean everywhere. Final Fantasy XIII is an almost entirely unbroken string of battles against mobs of monsters. One of the reasons this isn’t an RPG is that role-playing games have some degree of variety. Previous games in the series, for all their differences, have been set in large, open-ended worlds that players can explore leisurely. You could find new towns and locations on the map, talk to people, buy new equipment and spend time hanging around the town fighting low-level monsters to raise your stats before tackling the next big dungeon.
In contrast, XIII is all big dungeons. The exit of each one is stitched directly onto the entrance of the next. You can never slow down and take the game at your own pace; it’s a constant rush forward, with no time to deliberate or relax. This is the big mark in the loss column for Final Fantasy XIII, because the sense of rising and falling action, tension and release, is what made previous games in the genre uniquely enjoyable. That’s why RPGs feel like epic journeys and not just really long videogames.
With the game design thus stripped down to a series of battles, the moment-to-moment action of the battle system — being the only meaningful interaction between the player and this game — must carry the player’s enjoyment all on its own. And although it has some appealing features, on balance, it didn’t do this for me.
Battles in Final Fantasy games are about picking actions off a menu and watching your characters execute them. In XIII, you only directly control one character; the others are run by the computer. Besides this, the game begins no differently: You select “Fight” from the menu and watch everybody go to town, using potions as necessary to bump your hit points back up. But as the game goes on, it trickles new features in, slowly raising the complexity.
Soon, it’s not enough to merely reduce the enemy’s hit points; you have to build up another, separate gauge and get the enemy into the “Stagger” state, where he lurches around and becomes especially vulnerable to attacks. Once you’re comfortable with that, your characters can be assigned roles, which specialize in certain types of actions: The medic can use healing magic, the saboteur can weaken the enemy’s defenses, etc.
It’s run-of-the-mill stuff for the series, but here’s the twist: You can set up to six different combinations of roles before each battle, and in battle you switch between these combinations, which are called Paradigms. Final Fantasy XIII’s battles are about considering not just the six individual roles, but the many different combinations of roles that you can assign to your three characters, and how they work together during battle.
Once the game gets to this fully operational status, the battles become much more interesting. But it takes around 20 hours, prior to which the game is boring as hell. Final Fantasy XIII ramps up achingly slowly, only giving you two characters at first, and limiting the roles and characters you can use. For much of the time, you’re just watching the game play itself. For the first half of the game, using the roles that you’ve been given to obliterate anything that comes your way requires less strategy than beating a toddler at Connect Four.
This problem is exacerbated by the fact that Final Fantasy XIII is relentlessly linear. I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating: Many other RPGs are linear in the metaphorical sense, but the vast majority of this game is literally a straight line. Like the internet, it is a series of tubes in which you run forward, forward, ever forward, fighting battle after battle, breaking only to watch the lavish story sequences.
There’s a single exception. At about the 25-hour mark, you finally descend into the world of Pulse. Gran Pulse is a large open hub that breaks off into … well, more tubes, little winding capillaries that spider out from the heart. But the appeal of this area is less about the geography and more about what it represents — you can take a break from the story and undertake missions, which all involve killing some monster or another. These let you build up your stats, encounter side stories and generally avoid having to push forward.
This area came just at the right time, because I was sick of being in the tube. This was the most fun I had with XIII. But it’s too little and comes way too late: There’s not that much to do, because the missions just make you run back and forth across the plains killing monsters, and having to put up with all that bad level design just to get a little taste of (relative) freedom is the very definition of unbalanced. Then, once you’re done having fun, it’s back in the tube till the end of the game.
In a way, Pulse feels vestigial, the remnant of an old game design that the XIII team wanted to ditch but couldn’t entirely. For all the sacred cows that this game slaughters, it still clings to tons of almost-useless features. You can ride Chocobos (in one area, for a moment), you can use potions in battle (though you never need to), there are shops (that sell nothing essential), etc.
Taken together, these little bits of window dressing seem to be an apologetic gesture to series fans, little functionless adornments that remind one that this is still a Final Fantasy game. But it’s missing the big stuff, and that’s more important: I don’t need Chocobos to be happy, but I do need more than this.
Japanese RPGs, on the whole, have significantly lost their shine over the last few years. For all its flaws, Final Fantasy XIII has a certain level of polish that makes it more engaging than its peers, even if they hew closer to the old formula.
The fact that Final Fantasy designers are so willing to experiment is a good thing, because it’ll keep the genre from dying off. But Final Fantasy XIII should be considered a failed experiment. We can only hope it’s a stumble on the path to a brighter RPG future.
WIRED Beautiful graphics and music, lavish movie sequences, unique battle system.
TIRED Takes way too long to ramp up, boring level design, monotonous pacing.
$60, Square Enix
Rating:
Read Game|Life’s game ratings guide.
See Also:
Hmm. The Metacritic for this one is 84, and the 1UP review reads very differently. Something tells me that, like Heavy Rain, this is going to appeal to a certain segment of people and turn off others.
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At the same time, it’s the 13th entry into a series, so I don’t know how much innovation can come from it. Sure, it’s changed a lot since its roots over 20 years ago, but most of these since FF VII lit up the PSOne have concentrated on crazy cutscenes and interspersed gameplay.
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Having not played it at all, I can’t personally make a judgment call on it yet. However, a linear focus may help this series as XII seemed almost too damn open. Ebbs and tides, I guess.
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I’m thinking there may have also been a rush to get through it for a review, even though the Japanese version was played. The COD series has been linear for a very long time (since inception), but always gets solid reviews (with good reason). I’m thinking this may be similar. Yeah, there’s a definite point A to point B, but how you get there may vary a lot from player to player.
Re: the linearity of action games, that’s precisely the point I was addressing when I said:
“With the game design thus stripped down to a series of battles, the moment-to-moment action of the battle system — being the only meaningful interaction between the player and this game — must carry the player’s enjoyment all on its own.”
In short, games like CoD can get away with being linear when what you’re doing is engaging and fun all by itself. FFXIII’s gameplay, for the most part, does not fit that description. FF’s battles suffice as one piece of a grander RPG design; they are not especially entertaining in a vacuum.
“grand, nonlinear adventure and the rising and falling action of an open-ended world”
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Has this guy never played a JRPG before?!?!? Those things are more on rails than a roller coaster. Japan is a conformity factory. Why on earth would you expect a Western style open-end sandbox out of THEM?
I find it interesting that no matter how painstakingly I choose my words, we can still end up with fundamental misunderstandings like this. There are a couple of points I’d like to make clear:
1. Not only did I not “rush through” the game for a review, the central argument of this piece is that doing so would have been impossible, since the game design rigidly locks players into a single method of play. It can neither be rushed nor lingered upon for the first 25 hours and after Gran Pulse.
2. “Linear” vs. “open” is a continuum, not a binary choice. Oblivion is much less linear than the average Japanese RPG, and that is significantly less linear than FFXIII.
So what is it then? A turn-based dungeon crawler, like a cinematic 3D version of Etrian Odyssey?
I will say this about your review and comments that I’ve heard to date - they’re not really consistent with your score/overall rating. I’ve often heard you say that the game is a good one, just not a great one. Or good, but flawed. But when you talk or write about the game, it’s almost angry. The tone doesn’t match the score. 6 out of 10 isn’t a great score, but I’d expect even less of a game that was “boring as hell” for 20+ hours.
Good review. This will certainly be another “split the fanbase” main-series Final Fantasy, but isn’t that almost always the case?
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Sarkazein: I’m not sure that FFXIII’s linearity is so much a reaction to FFXII (as you seem to be suggesting) as it is a continuation of the streamlining started in FFX, which famously didn’t feature an overworld for the first time in the series and was, overall, more linear than its predecessors. Like you, though, can’t really pass judgement on FFXIII, having not played it.
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ladyjaye: If I’m reading the review right, it doesn’t sound much like a dungeon crawler at all. Etrian Odyssey (like a lot of dungeon crawlers) has twisty labyrinths, and you have to go back to town every once in awhile. FFXIII’s dungeons sound like a lot of straight, one-way paths.
This review seems pretty in line with other reviews I’ve read. Boring for the first 15-20 hours, then it picks up a bit. I think the score is probably fair also since he’s probably just not giving it the “OMG IT’S A FINAL FANTASY GAME!!11!” bonus points.
If you think Japanese RPG’s are losing their luster, try Demon’s Souls and get back to us. Best title on the PS3.
Seems to be a growing trend in games these days to gut out as much gameplay as possible in the name of “streamlining” or being more “cinematic”. Mass Effect 2 suffered the same problem. It was virtually gameplay-free except for anemic shooting sequences.
Sometimes I think what hurt this game the most is the LONG development time. Fans have been waiting so long for this title that the hype kept building. As a result, there it is disappointing to hear that this game is not a “paradigm shifting” masterpiece. (I couldn’t help myself)
From my perspective, FFXIII gives us a look into an important element of the RPG genre. RPGs rely on a sense of exploration. The stories foster this by inviting players to dig deeper into the characters and world. Characters gain levels to uncover more of the hidden options in the battle system. Deftly designed maps coax player into searching for hidden rewards such as treasure. It seems like the exploration element in FFXIII resides primarily in the story. This is problematic if the story has pacing issues that adversely affect other elements of the game.
I think this game has gotten a lot of leeway due to it being a “Final Fantasy” game. Most reviews mention that there is a long chunk of gaming time that is boring as hell (from 15 to 25 hours, depending on the website) yet most say that if you endure the boring period, you’ll find a great game that is worth of an 8+ in a scale of 10. No other game would get away with 20+ hours of lackluster play and get such high marks. A shame, I was hoping to sink a good chunk on time on it, looks like I won’t be doing it any time soon.
FFX is the one of my favorite games. It was an amazing experience, and one of, if not the best rpg of all time. Its gonna be hard to top such a great game. Especially in a series where the story and gameplay is constantly being revamped. Maybe they might find the right combo to once again revolutionize the genre. From the sounds of it, this may not be the game that does this.
After having completed Final Fantasy X, I couldn’t believe how many reviewers and gamers missed or didn’t care that the game is essentially a straight line with minor freedom in which to move back and forth. It’s a beautiful straight line, sure, but I just didn’t feel tethered to the universe that it tried so hard to convey. I miss the toss-you-into-the-world-with-a-vague-objective approach of the Dragon Quest series (a JRPG that still gets it right!); they’re immersive because they allow so much breathing room. It sounds like Final Fantasy XIII hits all the wrong marks as to what I enjoy in RPGs.
Good review, Chris.
Sadly, people are sheep…I can’t remember the last FF game I played (late PS2 or early PS3) and spent so much time with the controller on the coffee table, I was stunned at the percentage of time spent watching vs doing. Sad to see that they have now completely destroyed what made the original FF’s (i.e. on gameboy) fun.
@thatrantguy - You know, it’s possible to dislike a game without deriding those who do. Have you considered the possibility that other people might just have different opinions from you without being “sheep”?
OH YEAH THERANTGUY. ALL THOSE GAMEBOY FINAL FANTASIES.
OH YEAH THERANTGUY. ALL THOSE GAMEBOY FINAL FANTASIES.
lrn2 videogames
OH YEAH CHRONOGEARS. CLICK THE COMMENT BUTTON TWICE.
lrn2 wired.com
Unless Chris Kohler is completely fluent in japanese im throwing this review away. I can’t possibly take a review seriously if the review doesnt know the language of the game
Too much gay/emo/metrosexual characters. Who plays this game has also Twilight-posters at the ceiling over his bed.
zenitram_27-
Chris can speak and read Japanese. Feel free to chose another reason to dismiss his review.
“Takes way too long to ramp up, boring level design, monotonous pacing.”
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Wait, did he just review his reviews?
I hope you get fired Chris.
There comes a point where a reviewer lets their personal tastes and bias overshadow basic logic and objectiveness to such a degree, that they completely lose touch with reality. If you really feel like proving me wrong, I would like a list of every game you’ve ever scored higher than 60, with a one sentence summary of why it’s better than FFXIII.
I promise you, it will look like a list written by someone with no grasp on reality.
First, one thing I’ve found over the past couple of years is that many of the “big” Japanese games/franchises have stagnated in regards to gameplay. They’re using outmoded concepts and themes while gamers have moved on. Nowadays, playing Japanese games feels like I’m playing games from fifteen years ago, except without the nostalgia they’re just uninspired. Katamari, Dead Rising, Final Fantasy, Metal Gear, Devil May Cry… none of these games seem to have pushed the envelope that they were pushing a decade or two ago. Of course, that might just be my tastes changing, but even so it doesn’t feel like Japanese developers (for the most part) are keeping up.
Second, Shinta, reviews are /entirely/ subjective. They are one person’s opinion. There’s no way you can get around that and the best way to trust reviews is to find a reviewer you agree with in the first place. If–after reading a few of Chris’ reviews–you don’t agree with them, stop reading his reviews and find someone who has the same tastes as you.
Finally, people still look at “scores” to determine a game’s worth? Really? Why? Sure it’s easier than, you know, reading, but the words *are* the review, not the score. I wish reviews would do away with them entirely. The only “scores” I trust are RottenTomatoes’ for movies, simply because they add/remove from the overall score depending on whether the review is positive or negative, it is not an average of scores given. It’s like asking 100 people in a room if they liked or disliked a movie.
@technophile: I understand the concept of opinion, and how that plays into reviewing. Sure. What I’m saying is that at some point, if you’re a professional reviewer you have to temper your own bias to at least fit into a minimum framework that we all call objective reality. For example, writing that red is actually blue is still wrong, no matter how passionately you believe it.
Giving the new Ace Attorney a 7/10, and giving FFXIII a 6/10 is still wrong, no matter how your opinion comes down on it. That’s a score for a user review, not a “professional.” The music and graphics alone are enough to beat that score. The story is amazing. The battles are challenging, and engaging. They require an interesting mix of strategy and reflexes that is rare in the RPG genre.
Honestly, just ask yourself one question. If this game was not called FFXIII, would it be scored 6/10? Of course it wouldn’t. No way, no how. It’s possibly the best looking game to ever come out on PS3, and the soundtrack is up there with the very best in the entire series. The game has virtually zero load time. It’s a AAA game, without a doubt.
Now, you can talk about how you like or dislike it, but you can’t tell me red is actually blue, because it’s a lie, much like this review score.
I gave the new Ace Attorney game a much deserved 8 out of 10.
@shinta: Graphics and Music do not a game make. He’s calling this just as linear as the Ace Attorneys with more boring bits.
i liked it… i played the japanese version… never tried the english one cuz i find english dubs on anime like media to be disturbing.
i like how they simplified the command interface… controlling only one key player really changes the dynamic of the game. good job square!
Heavy Rain and Final Fantasy are both different kind of games. But I think Heavy Rain is set to be the most emotionally charged game that has ever been launced till date.
So basically they have continued the trend of reducing actual hands-on gameplay, essentially eliminated exploration and plot variation, all in favor of even more visually stunning graphics.
Great.
I can buy a movie for $20, I don’t see why I should pay another $40 for the dubious benefit of being able to hit a couple buttons & watch my characters play for themselves once or twice an hour.
I used to be a huge fan of the series, but the last few titles and this have pretty much soured me, & many others, & quite frankly the franchise is only here due to momentum.
@technophile - Quit telling people who post here to voice their disagreement the reviews are subjective. We all know that. So are our opinions of those reviews, and Wired gives us this space to vent. If you don’t like reading what other people think of a reviewer’s reviews, find one that doesn’t have comments, or buy the magazine.
for the fist time i play its more interesting and impreesively with their graphic.but after the change its more others
florist sarasota
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@Kohler:
Great review, and I concur. Real pity, too, given how staggeringly beautiful the graphics are, coupled with the fact that we’ll be waiting god-only-knows how many years for SE to take another shot.
@SaintWaldo Lot of aggression there. Asking for someone to be fired over this review is a tad over the top, don’t you think? I think a lot here are FF fans and can’t bear to see it get a “poor” score. And what do I do if I don’t like reading comments to my comments to others’ comments of the review?
@Shinta You make a good point regarding trying to reduce personal bias, though we obviously agree it can never totally be expunged from reviews such as this. But, then you go on to say that because Ace Attorney gets a 7/10, Final Fantasy XIII should get a higher score? How can you even compare these two games? May as well compare it against Gran Turismo and Guitar Hero for all that would be worth. If you must compare the score (and I say it again, I feel the review would’ve carried more weight without a number at the end), compare it against other Final Fantasies, Dragon Quest, etc.
“You don’t have to take my word for it. Just ask its creators: In a recent interview, the director of this PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 game (available March 9) said the changes he made to this installment were so dramatic that it constituted a “new genre” outside the “RPG template.”
-Nowhere does it say this is NOT an RPG. They changed the usual RPG standards and made a new take on an old recipe. Final Fantasy XIII is listed as an RPG because it is an RPG.
“One of the reasons this isn’t an RPG is that role-playing games have some degree of variety.”
LOL!!! You have no clue what an RPG is man.
A Role Playing Game (RPG) is a genre of video game in which the player controls one or more characters, usually on some kind of quest.
“XIII’s story is good — a little more human and less esoteric than in previous games — but it’s no Heavy Rain. It’s still over-the-top and cartoony…”
Have you ever played a JRPG dude? Wow you are thick… I don’t think you have ever even played a FF game based on that statement you made. FF stories are about as epic as you can find. The formula for FF games story doesn’t changed much because that is the Key theme for the entire series… Every game is based on 6-8 people, usually in the teens that get together to save the world. The game always has pretty out there characters, some that are completely unbelievable. JRPGs are meant to be about fantasy lands with very colorful landscapes and even more colorful outcomes. Let’s be honest man… I don’t think you know much about the RPG genre.
I can’t finish your review because you don’t deserve it… Final Fantasy XIII is an amazing game that takes the franchise into a brand new direction and breathes new life into the series. To call FFXIII boring and that it “loses RPG magic” is probably the most idiotic statement made in all the FFXIII reviews I’ve read. I then would have to ask, did you really even play this game? If you did play this game, you say you played 45hrs of the Japanese version, so how can you comment on the story of the game at all? Take some time off and play through FF1-12 and then play 13 again. Once you’ve done this, write your actual review on the game. When one is fully educated on the topic, only then can he make a true opinion.
“…prior to which the game is boring as hell” Grats on making a review you true to the heart FPS’er. Go back to shoot and kill games with no story.
@micebon
+Comment on Review
The creators of Final Fantasy XIII talk about it not being an RPG in an article on 1up.com:
http://www.1up.com/do/previewPage?cId=3178060
I don’t understand your criticism on his view of the story. You pretty much backed up his claim. The idea of teenagers saving the world is typical anime.
The stories in the series were impressive to me when I was a teenager. I was really into Final Fantasy IV’s (or IIus) story when I was 13, but by the time I grew up and started playing Final Fantasy VII and on, the stories were just kinda meh. They appeal to kids, but do nothing for you as an adult. A good literary comparison would be a novel based off of a Dungeons and Dragons licence to George R.R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire series, or Steven Erikson’s Malazan series. Though I did Find Final Fantasy X’s story to be decent, but IIRC, the game’s story was based on a novel.
And your definition of an RPG pretty much covers every game out there. I’m the original Super Mario Bros. Mario is on a quest to save Princess Toadstool from the evil Bowser.
/end reply
As far as the review goes, I found it to be the most fair one yet. Kohler doesn’t seem to be blindsided by the game’s title. Pretty much every review I have come across comment on how the game is really slow and boring to start, just the same. The game is still given a perfect score in other reviews despite the glaring problems. Kohler isn’t afraid to dock points for it’s faults.
I found this to be the case with Final Fantasy XII as well. 10/10s everywhere with much of the reviews giving the gist of “this game isn’t all that good, but OMG it’s Final Fantasy!!”
I’m not sure what it is. Maybe most reviewers feel they need to find a reason for a game in this series to be good and ignore it’s faults, or they’re just afraid of the backlash they’ll receive from the die hard fans. It’s such a hard series to get a strait review on.
From what I read in this review and many others, I’m going to check out the demo first before I decide on purchasing. Even then, I may not even bother though. If they want me to play through 20 to 25 hours of boring, the last half of the game should be the best experience ever.
“I hope you get fired Chris.”
Why is the gaming community over-loaded with such hate-filled jerks? Just because a review doesn’t match your pre-conceived notion of what you want it to be, gives you no call to use such malice against another person. After reading that single comment, I automatically skipped down to the next comment just because I’m tired of reading whiny spoiled rants from people who somehow feel self-empowered just because they have a controller in their hand and diddle their lives away in some fantasy world. When you choose to post in the real world, this kind of comment directly reflects the gaming community, gives them a bad reputation, and overall spreads bad Karma. Is it too much to ask people to not be childish and realize that differences of opinion happen?
All in all a decent review, even if people are a bunch of jerks in their comments.
@3drage: “Why is the gaming community over-loaded with such hate-filled jerks? Just because a review doesn’t match your pre-conceived notion of what you want it to be”
My whole point is that it has nothing to do with my pre-conceived notion. My whole point is that ANYONE who does not have an obvious axe to grind against JRPGs, or the Final Fantasy series could easily tell that this game is not a 6/10. It’s one of the best games of this generation.
And talking about his job isn’t off limits, since it’s blatantly obvious that many reviewers are writing controversial reviews to get more views off of Metacritic. It’s basically using his public platform to spread misinformation that directly translates into the diminished sales of a product that has had millions, upon millions invested in it. It’s one of the most expensive video games ever made. Every single shot is dripping with extremely detailed, artistic design that rivals any game ever made.
I promise you, no site is cowering in fear of a backlash, and adjusting their scores to go artificially higher out of fear. They are honestly doing the opposite, and holding Final Fantasy to a huge double standard, and lowering the score far more than if they would just look at the game for what it is, instead of what they think it should be. Half of the negative reviews that I’ve read have included a long-winded statement on why the entire JRPG genre should change. This game doesn’t represent the entire JRPG genre. Reviewers have lost the ability to report the truth, and instead abuse their platform to promote biased, inaccurate information.
Here’s a crazy idea. Why not get someone who actually likes JRPGs and have them review the game? You usually don’t take any random person and have them review the newest baseball video game. You get a baseball fan, who can talk about it without calling things like pitching “boring.”
@Shinta
I found his review to be quite fair. I’m not picking up anywhere in his story that he may have an axe to grind. Nor does his review talk about how JRPGs should change.
What I love about Kohler’s style is that he reviews the game based on the merits of it’s gameplay. Every big budget game is gorgeous these days, it’s not a good measuring stick anymore. Gameplay is the only deciding factor and really, should be the only thing that matters. He just goes over each aspect of the game, says whether or not it’s good, and moves on to the next. Most reviews I see puts way too much emphasis on the graphics, sound, and story.
He says the has some glaring faults, and scored it as such. Why get angry over that? The game is held to such a high standard not because it’s a Final Fantasy game. It’s because this generation has seen the release of some of the greatest RPGs to come out in a long time. Look especially to tiles by Bethesda and Bioware (Oblivion & Fallout 3, and Mass Effect & Dragon Age respectively). There have also been a whole slew of quality RPGs by many developers as well. But the aforementioned 4 raised the bar so high that there just isn’t much room to move. And then you take the on rails experience like Final Fantasy XIII and put it next to the open ended style of those games (well at least Mass Effect, when it comes to dialog and story), how can you really compare?
And that last point is where you get the statement, “Final Fantasy XIII isn’t an RPG; it’s something less.” And considering that, I could see why the producers want to distance themselves from the genre.
I didn’t know who Kohler was, but with so many personal attacks against him, I thought I’d look him up a little. His credentials are a hell of a lot better than most video game journalists out there, especially when it comes to Japanese video games. I’ll spare you the details as google.com makes figuring out who he is pretty easy. I’d suggest looking him up before you attack him again.
@shinta
lol sorry shinta but you’re not fooling anyone here (maybe yourself?)
the score seems quite reasonable based on the content of the review. i took a look at these other metacritic reviews you refer to and the majority seem to make very similar comments, yet confoundingly still score it quite high.
to be honest i’d have a much easier time believing such dedicated gaming sites would be loathe to alienate large portions of their readership by giving a game such as this an accurate scoring.
quite simply, comments such as yours reflect on one person only.
Every review I’ve seen has mentioned that there is a 15-25 hour period of extremely boring gameplay, and then you get to the good stuff. Regardless of the great graphics and millions upon millions invested in making this game, I don’t want to spend 15-25 hours playing a boring game just to get to a good one. More so when you take into the account that the game is constantly clocked into the 45-50 hour mark. That means nearly 50% of the game is boring gameplay! In this day and age, that’s unacceptable.
I haven’t been optimistic about this game since I read the combat system was going to be “ATB bar”-based. I wish ATB would finally crawl into a corner and die.
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You can be the most beautiful game ever made, with “Avatar” (movie) production value, but if you’re still turning all battles into “filler” by making them so you win by waiting for a bar to fill up and then selecting “Fight” or “Item->Potion” from a menu as fast as possible, then the game is still going to be mediocre. I like to look at a beautiful painting, but not for 40 hours.
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What was so wrong with the tactical, turn-based battle system in FFX? Every character had particular strengths to distinguish them, and could be hot-swapped in battle (wondering why more games that only let you use a fraction of your party don’t do this). You were rewarded for thinking out your next few moves in advance, like a chess game…not punished for not hitting the “Fight” menu option or navigating the item/magic menu as quickly as possible.
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The review sounds more or less like what I expected. Gameplay takes a back seat to art and story direction. It’s a remarkable game that gets all three right, though. Not sure if 6/10 would be the rating nailing 2 of 3 merits or not.
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I think a lot of the review scores reflect the frustration with what a big budget, high profile game like this COULD be.
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I know I’m frustrated with Square.
Haven’t played it, can’t agree or disagree, but will wait until it’s $40 or less or I can borrow it. Never been a big FF fan, but still like to give them a shot. This sounds a whole lot like Enchanted Arms to me, but It’s GOTTA have a better story.
Also, since Persona 3, which I would easily rank as the worst game I have ever played, having computer controlled characters makes me want to cry. I can’t even tell you how many times I died fighting low level monsters because my character would trip and fall, or get stunned, and the computer characters would continue using incorrect attacks until everyone died. That spells FUN with a capital SUCK.
And what do I do if I don’t like reading comments to my comments to others’ comments of the review?
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Head… spinning…
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Anyway, moving on…
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Shinta: Calm down there, fanboy/girl. I’ve been reading Chris Kohler’s reviews for years, and there’s a reason for that. He’s knowledgeable and fair, and because of that (and although his tastes in games may not always align with mine), I respect his opinions. Much the same goes for the other reviewers at Wired. This is always the first place I come to read reviews of new games (by the way, I’m currently playing Ace Attorney Investigations, and it is very much an 8/10).
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After reading the FFXIII review here, out of curiosity, I went to see if certain other sites whose reviewers I tend to trust to see what they thought. Across the board, the scores were mixed, and the major complaints within the reviews themselves were the same. Clearly, this is a game that some critics really enjoyed, and others thought is mediocre. I agree with Scoob79 in that it’s refreshing to see a Final Fantasy game, of all things, not being automatically held aloft by everyone because of the name. Kind of wish that was done more with FFXII when it was being reviewed; despite that game’s many positives, me and many other FF fans just couldn’t get into it.
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Also, for the record, Kohler is very much a JRPG fan. I’m looking forward to his review of Dragon Quest IX later this year Also, Shinta, just curious: you’ve played FFXIII yourself, right?
The game is aimed, oddly, at some magical median between the typical teenage gamer (short attention span, lack of problem-solving skills, inability to recognize that when there is no obvious answer you should wander around aimlessly in the savannah waiting for a naked boy to appear) and the 30-something veteran gamer (who understands pacing, the importance of story and doesn’t need to be spoon-fed the dots to connect them). This alone is enough to justify classifying it as overall good (6/10 being that).
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I am one of a handful of people I know who finished Xenosaga. Out of a group of contemporaries and friends numbering in the few dozens who enjoyed not just RPGs just JRPGs I was the only one. The extremely linear, story-driven, cutscene-intense game simply won’t appeal to everyone. But we’ve been getting larger and larger doses for years now and people have become innoculated to it. Veteran gamers grumble (I know I do) about the little things, while the teenagers blithely ignore the fact that there are obvious gaps in things. Or, more disconcertingly, don’t even realize the gaps are there to begin with.
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20+ hours of staid gameplay with plot being shoved down your throat fast and furious is a lot to ask of gamers. It’s the new direction, yes, but it’s still a lot to ask. The fact that the game breaks open in Gran Pulse for a while indicates the designers were aware of this. Mass Effect 2 presented its similar illusion of freedom earlier on and was received more warmly based on that alone, I’d guess. That and the continuity of story and characters (such as it was) that was remembered fondly by the handful of people who actually managed to squeak through to the end of the game. The only surprise was that people complained about driving being removed. Masochists. You’re on a spaceship for crying out loud. You can land your shuttle on top of the sand worm if you wanted to.
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The story is solid, the hook is deep, and the riffs come just often enough to keep you feeling like a jilted lover. That’s the beauty of the game. Shops? I can’t remember the last time they were important aside from being potion vendors (Final Fantasy IV maybe?). Chocobos? Kitsch, memorable, fun, but ultimately not integral to the series. Overworlds? Decidedly blech compared to the sandbox people are used to thanks to GTA et al.
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Story has always been the driver of RPGs. You take on the role of a character and push him/her to success or failure as you see fit. If, perhaps, there had been a Paragon/Renegade system for FFXIII and two or more available endings it might have been worthy of a higher score, eh Chris?
Nice review, but sad to see. I’ve noticed the streamlining trend myself since at least FFX. That said I’ll probably look for a second or third opinion only because I still have some lingering loyalty and hope they developed the story and characters enough to make it fun.
FFVII and FFX were two of the best games ever imho. Even then the battle system was not the selling point and I dont think it ever will be. It was the story and character development complemented by interesting upgrade systems, varied environments, and stunning graphics. Technically this is only the second game since FFX (I count FFXI as a spin off that really shouldnt have gotten its own number), so I’ve only played one FF game since, but I felt FFXII had a forgettable story and characters and an uncharacteristically enclosed environment. Too much time was spent on graphics and putting enemies in plain view. Even if it was only an illusion I preferred the spites on the open world for several reasons. It made it seem open ended because you could technically explore the whole world and it added tension to the dungeons and over world travel when you never knew when an enemy would hit or what it would be.
It appears from this review FFXIII picks up where FFXII left off so I think I’ll either skip it or wait until its $20 a year from now. If there is ever a reboot of the franchise back to its roots I’ll be the first in line at the store though.
@R_Kasahara: Yeah, I played the import and I really loved it. Getting the English version tomorrow.
Anyway, that’s all I have to say. I think I’ve gone overboard enough for one thread.
I don’t think the score is accurate. His criticisms are mostly accurate. I say mostly, because the first 25 hours of the game is definitely not “boring.”
@R_Kasahara:
I noticed that about the reviews for XII as well. It wasn’t a game I couldn’t get into. What really grabbed me though was how all the reviews for that game had a negative tone, listing fault after fault. But when it came time to score it, I think every reviewer just turned a blind eye to what made the game bad.
@Ardent:
I find your use of the word inoculated (by cut scenes/story) very interesting. It sort of goes hand in hand with my earlier comment about how judging a game by it’s graphics and presentation no longer works. Mind you, Blizzard has proven that a game can be graphically inferior, yet still be a success. All of their titles are graphically dated by the time they come out, but they design games well enough that they can hold up on gameplay alone.
@Scoob79
And yet, there are cutscenes. They don’t have to be cutting-edge breathtaking graphics engines to impress, frankly. It takes good writing and coherent storytelling. I point to Max Payne (both games) as some of the finest cutscenery in gaming history (and I’m not alone, inFamous made obvious tributes to it in its cutscenes just recently), and it was just static artwork in layers with voiceover.
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Graphics/presentation are a very strange animal. It would be nice to say they never hurt, but at times you really question whether a game was released to demonstrate the prowess of the engine or if the developers actually thought they had a good product. Very rarely do you get a great meeting of a new engine and awesome plot. Recently, only FarCry 2 and its Dunia engine comes to mind. Everything else is built on modified, proven engines because it’s easier to focus on the storytelling.
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I found FFXII depressingly open-ended. Like it was trying to be GTA but obviously fell short. The linearity of the main plot and the glaring problems with the side questing disconnect from said plot just served to hurt the overall experience for me. The combat dynamics, character dynamics and everything else (including the environments) was wonderful, however. It’s hard to sit there and try to take away from a game that, had there been less/no side quests, would probably be in most FF players’ Top 5.