Never in my live I thought I would hate a Final Fantasy game until now
User Rating: 7.5 | Final Fantasy XIII PS3
Ah Final Fantasy what can I say about this game other than being one of the greatest series ever made but then can the series last this long? Final Fantasy XIII is of course the thirteenth game in the series and hearing a lot of mixed reviews on this game mostly being this game is horrible but seeing me I thought I would give it a try... The Story is what made me play this game. I had more fun watching the story than I did playing the game. But the only problem is it's really slow at first. A world called Pulse which was said to be destroyed long ago and only thing down there is hell, thus Cocoon was made as a Haven for the people to live in peace. You play as many different characters but you begin as a soldier name Lighting and she is on a train to a place to get what they call purged (which is like purified) but out of no where an explosion occurs and Lighting then kills all the guards and makes her escape, she then runs into a man name Sazh (which is my favorite character) who follows her in order to survive, which then pans to another character called Snow (2nd favorite) who runs an organization against the sanctum (the government) after the incident on the train they charge into the fight and gets murdered on the way (except Snow). Snow tries to save a woman but dies and told him to "take him home". After witnessing her death it pans to another character(s) who was actually the woman son name Hope and with him is a girl name Vanille who then go at them (for some unknown reason) and thus they all meet later who then got cursed to become Cocoons worst enemies... The Gameplay is really really boring to hell. You control many different characters through out the chapters switching between them but not on your own free will the game forces you to play as different characters you can only free choose until chapter 9 (yes that long). During battle is where it get SO BORING! you do not control your characters which is normal in a Final Fantasy game my only problem is the auto system, I have no idea why they added this it basically chooses the commands for you which is really stupid same goes for auto-gestalt during summons so I would suggest you choose the commands yourself to have more fun, also another problem is paradigm shifts if your dying and want to switch to a medic you'll HAVE to see them change wastes time and whats worst the enemies can still HIT YOU while shifting so you'll die before you'll heal. Also there is no level system in this game instead they use the gird system, like now it is in games like Final Fantasy X and Mana Khemia so you'll be needing a lot of these because they'll become so expensive later on trust me. And lastly the one thing that pissed me off the most in this game is the difficulty, it's seriously is retarded, at first it is really really easy you wouldn't believe it and the at chapter 9 it gets insanely hard you would die with just about EVERY enemy in the game, they will kill you with 2-3 hits every enemy I am not joking. Oh and the worst thing about this game if the party leader dies game over... yea even if the over two characters are alive... with revive... yea which is why I dislike games like Persona 3, 4 and Okage Shadow King for the concept. The Music OH GOD it's so GOOD I love the soundtrack for this game which is possibly one of it's good perks and I love to hear it my only problem is since the game is long and you'll die over and over and over again you'll hear the same bull for a very very very long time. On the plus side the game changes the music often on each chapter same goes for battle music so it won't get old fast. The sound effects are great each character has a sound each time they land a hit and magic all sounds different even with each level of magic so that's an A+ there. The voice actors could have done better, I like Sazh, Snow, Hope, and Sarah voices but everyone else could have done better, Lighting's Voice was too monotone but the sad part is it fits her :( Vanille was weird (dat accent), same with Fangs. I could name a lot more but there is just too much. The Graphics... my god... these graphics are the best I have EVER seen in a video game EVER. I cannot stress myself into saying the Graphics is the best thing about this game I kid you not. The characters are SO detailed, the ocean, the earth, the mountains, the cliffs, the sky, machines, enemies, magic, weapons, EVERYTHING in this game is just beautiful I could cry just looking at it. The camera could use some work I had problems looking around with the camera and I run into a lot of enemies because of it. Moving the character was also a problem I couldn't control them well they move funny but it's not that bad. What can I say about this game, it is the worst Final Fantasy when it comes to gameplay but other than that it's not that bad, could be worst... could have been better too.
Overall:
Story: 8.0
Gameplay: 4.5
Sound: 8.5
Graphics: 10
Controls: 8.5
Overall: 7.9
