Flawed where it hurts, but oh- it makes up for it.
Just so you know, I'm a big fan of the Final Fantasy series. More over- I'm a big fan of the later FF titles- so I'm not going to sit it here and tell you nothing compares to Cloud on the Playstation One.
Final Fantasy XIII, for me, should have been a game that scored 10, one I could rave about. And it is, within the confines of an Xbox JRPG- a wonderful achievement.
But let me make one thing clear- its good because it pleases the gamer in a number of crucial areas- however it tragically lacks in a number of others.
From about 0.02 seconds into the beginning- you will marvel and applaud the design and art of this game. But being an FF title- so it should. At times you will sit there in just absolute awe of what you're are seeing and hearing. As with all previous recent FF titles there are clearly distinguished levels of graphica depending on what's going on on-screen eg: realtime playing- or a narrative interlude. Obviously, the fully cinematic CG cutscenes are jaw-droppingly stunning and frankly every bit as good as a feature length animation movie that studios like Dreamworks or Pixar would be jealous of. But it's where you'd expect most games to look fairly non-descript is where you'll see Square-Enix have surpassed themselves. Strolling your lead character through any environment in real-time play is a pleasure to behold. Flowing waterfalls, sprawling hillsides or the epic internal structures of a Vestige are just some of the sights that will get you looking, but look closer- you'll see Lightning's cape flapping gracefully- or Snow's fringe casually flopping across his face. Countless little details that are just brilliant and captured in perfect detail. The wonderful design goes into the other areas you'll spend some time in too. The Crystarium, a 3D levelling up system for your character looks hauntingly translucent and dreamy. Tiny little snippets of CG will play every time you cycle through each characters 'block' of the sub menus. With little many little details like this, you can just tell that Square Enix really have made this game with so much passion and thought.
If only the same could be said for the gameplay. And yes, I'm afraid it is a big downer. The linear progression of the game is at times so restricting it's almost unbelievable to think you're playing a Final Fantasy. And this is not a good sign. Previous FF titles have all been about involving your self in each of your parties levelling, development and progression. It's what has made them so immersive when combined with the untouched genius of Square's storytelling. Despite the above, exploration is quite simply just walking along a designated route. There are no real detours or hidden areas. Before, finding a valuable and rare piece of treasure was a real joy as more often than not a lot of work and research would have to go into finding it. (eg: Ultimate weapons and the parts needed to unlock them for your characters in FFX) Now, in FFXIII, the game has somewhat 'dumbed-down' Treasure will be quite clearly found in spheres that do little to hide themselves. They will more often than not be found just floating against a wall, sometimes guarded by a couple of fiends or conveniently near a save point.
The save points are another gripe. This will vary depending on the experience or level of the gamer, but for someone who is an RPG or FF veteran you will find it crude that at every single one from the outset- you are able to shop for items, shop for weapons, shop for armour and upgrade your weapons. Bizarrely, whilst the upgrading of weapons is a welcome and engaging section of the game, the components needed to do this can be simply bought from a shop. At every save point. The components (not to dissimilar from 'Loot' acquired in FFXII) vary in how much they upgrade your weapon, depending on how rare/common they are- but I was able to buy stuff at a fairly affordable rate that upgraded any weapon with ease, and found myself able to equip Lightning with top level Blaze fire Sabre before I had even got onto the 3rd disc. Again- dumbing down it would seem. For merely the 'Save' aspect though, I cannot moan about the frequent occurrence of save points, this is very welcome as before in previous FF's a large part of the challenge was actually surviving long enough, sometimes past 2 or 3 boss fights before you got the chance to save. Far less controllers will be thrown…..
The actual battles are my biggest gripe about the game. The Paradigm system is fairly easy to pick up, but frustrating to master, as some fights will have you needing to be very well assured and confident with them- this is tricky when the game is so restrictive and linear on character progression. For example for a more hench boss fight you'll need to change your parties fighting style (paradigms) as frequently as every 20- 30 seconds just stay in contention of victory. This is fine and certainly adds great pace to the battles, but when you realise you have no control over 2 out of 3 characters, and everytime you switch the characters they automatically cancel the list of queued actions. This all makes it feel dis-jointed and flimsy- meanwhile your foe has just unleashed a particular attack or action that has you at a disadvantage, through no fault of your own. In particular- I had my Vanille as my medic- doing a great job of curing evertime someone gets injured. But when my powerhouse- Snow, got KO'd, she would not revive him, even though I had unlocked that ability for her. She just carried on curing my controlled character, the ultra cool Lightning. So I then had to manually select a Pheonix down, revive Snow, and get back to the gameplan. By which time, my foe had managed to deal substantial damage- I saw the game over screen minutes later. Had they chosen to use the far far far superior 'gambit' system from FFXII- there would have been no problem here.
Whilst the 'Crystarium' looks cool- it's actually a bit of a joke in terms of how it evolves you character. It only allows you to evolve as far as it wants you too for that chapter of the story, killjoy? Oh- and it's game over if your party leader dies, the only person you control. So every single battle you have to maintain his/her life- making some battles just too much of a chore/frustration. You can have up to 6 characters in your party, yet you'll never get to switch them in battle unlike previous FF's..As a result you'll feel very out of touch with the three you don't use- naturally you'll find 3 you perform better with.
Despite the shallow battle and progression system the difficulty of the foe is so sporadic that too becomes frustrating. You can waltz through huge portions of the game without your skills ever really being tested- especially if you get the hang of the 'Stagger'system, then out of the blue you'll have a boss fight that is nigh on impossible and you'll almost certainly seek help from the internet. This really doesn't help with the immersive experience you want from an FF, we all like a challenge and expect to see the Game over screen but not in such a dis-jointed way.
It's just all very restrictive and totally not what FF should be about. It's saving grace is the story. You do put up with the shallow gameplay and linear nature of progression to continue with Lightning and Co and their epic, cleverly inter-twining journey that's full of exciting, shocking and very touching moments in a world that has been so brilliantly thought out..
Despite how unsatisfying the gameplay will feel at times, thanks to Square Enix's efforts on an audio, visual and storytelling level you will still find yourself immersed in this game, wanting more. If you're an FF fan, well- there's a few lovely FF references that will make you smile and restore your faith in the questionable authenticity of FFXIII, but generally I would advise to sit back, turn the surround sound up and turn off the lights…and try and forget about previous FF titles….