Amour-Fou♥Net

The weather finally decided to be absurdly beautiful this week, which has created a horrible conflict for me. (Okay not that horrible…) Here’s why:

As you may have noticed, I’ve been playing a lot of video games lately. No, not a lot; a shit ton. (Again.) But the sun has also been out, so I’ve had to make the incredibly difficult decision: Inside with the video games, or outside with the sun. So far I’ve been compromising enough to get both a sunburn and 25 hours into Final Fantasy XIII. Which brings me to…

My semi-coherent thoughts on FFXIII

First off, as any FF fan will understand, I have been eagerly awaiting this game for four years. Approx. Which basically means for the duration of my college career. For some background, here’s what I think of every other (main series) FF game (after the jump, duh):

1. FF I

   Good game, if very basic. (Beaten.)

2. FF II

   Broken game that I secretly love. (Beaten.)

3. FF III

   Decent game, but so hard that I almost threw it out the window. (Fought final boss and lost, losing hours of progress. Therefore: unbeaten.)

4. FF IV

   Great game. Love this one. (Beaten.)

5. FF V

   For some reason this one never grabbed me. (Unbeaten.)

6. FF VI

   Controversially, I don’t LOVE this game. I like it a lot, but it’s been slow going for me. (Unbeaten. (In final dungeon))

7. FF VII

   Loved this when I first played it, but it doesn’t really hold up. (Beaten.)

8. FF VIII

   Fucking awesome. I even love the Junction system! (Beaten.)

9. FF IX

   My favorite FF game. Adore this one. <3 (Beaten.)

10. FF X

    Could never get through this. Really didn’t like the characters. (Unbeaten.)

11. FF XII

    36 hours of my life I will never get back. This is basically a walking simulation. (Unbeaten.)

Okay so that’s out of the way. Now here’s how I feel about FFXIII:

Everything that people have been saying (that it’s too linear; that it’s basically just running in a straight line then battling then watching a cutscene then repeating…) is true. HOWEVER I am still really enjoying myself.

First of all, for the first time in maybe ever, the story not only makes sense, but is actually interesting. Every time there is a plot twist, or something new is revealed about a character, I actually find myself caring. I won’t post any spoilers because the game hasn’t even been out for a month, but there is one point during the game where something happens (or almost happens, anyway) that left me so shaken that I almost couldn’t pick up the game again after I saved. That may not be strange for a game like Heavy Rain, but it’s a rare quality for a JRPG.

Second, the battle system is absolutely awesome. It has its flaws–for example, I don’t yet know how I feel about my characters (about 22 hours in) all of a sudden being able to use any ability–but overall, it’s probably the most engaging system I’ve encountered in an RPG. I’ve heard a lot of internet people saying that FFXIII has not quite done away with the “push X to win” battles of past FF games, because of the presence of the “auto-battle” button, but I strongly disagree. The battles in XIII are so difficult that actual thought is necessary. There have been way too many times that, having stopped paying attention to the battle for a few seconds, I’ve looked back at the screen to see “Game Over.”

To be fair, though, much of this difficulty could be artificially inflated by the fact that only the leader character has to die for a “Game Over.” But the Paradigm and Crystarium systems are so smooth and streamlined that this doesn’t strike me as a problem.

The graphics are gorgeous, and the characters actually somehow manage to stray pretty far from the Uncanny Valley, which might be due to the fact that they move seemingly naturally, and that their eyes actually move separately from the rests of their faces, just like ACTUAL PEOPLE.

Okay so that’s how I feel about most of FFXIII. But, having just reached Chapter 11, I may be changing my mind. Though I enjoyed Chapters 1-9, Chapter 10 was one of the dullest, most monotonous, overall worst stretches (2-3 hours) of gaming that I’ve ever experienced, in or out of the FF series. If it weren’t for the chapter system, which indicates to me that I’m close to the end, I probably would have put the game down. I’ve heard that the game gets way, way better in 11 on, so I’m optimistic, but I haven’t played for a couple days because I was so fatigued after the soul-sucking ordeal that was Chapter 10.

Oh yeah, and an important note on the characters: I love Lightning and Sazh, want to punch Snow in the frat-boy-resembling face, am tempted to break my TV every time Vanille comes within spitting distance of the screen, and feel generally neutral toward the others. Wait actually also: Dajh is adorable and Serah looks like an 8-year-old. Okay enough of that.

Phew. My next post will (probably) not be as FFXIII-centric, but I can’t make any promises that it won’t be just as video game-centric, because that’s kind of what I’m doing right now.

Anyway, I rarely ask specific questions of commenters, but for those of you (I know you’re out there!!!) who have been playing FFXIII, what have you thought so far? Anybody seriously disagree with my admittedly semi-articulate assessment?

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 4th, 2010 at 3:35 pm. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.