Why all the FFXIII hate???

I never understood why people had such an axe to grind against FF XIII; overall it is a solid game, has a great story, likable characters (well most of them), and the gameplay is one of the best among any JRPG I've played from this gen. Yes, it is not as good as any PS-era FF or FFX, but it's still a great game in my opinion. While playing it I tried understand where all the criticism of this game was coming from, but I honestly couldn't. I understand how a few of the characters are slightly annoying, and how there are minor problems with the paradigm system, but other then that I thought it was a pretty enjoyable game.

So my question is, why do you guys either love or hate this game, or are pretty even-keel about it? I guess I'm just trying to understand why so many people seem to dislike it so much.

Some people hated Vanille and the extremely linear nature of the levels. I'm actually OK with those, hell, I'd definetely give the game a 9.

The game is awesome, the linearity is a big con, but despite the linearity the game is awesome.

I sat there pressing X for 15 hours until I'd nearly lapsed into a monotony-induced coma. I've seen DVD menus with more interactivity. I didn't feel like turning my PS3 on for 2 weeks afterwards. I've never in my life experienced a "game" that so nearly killed my interest in the entire hobby.

I never understood why people had such an axe to grind against FF XIII; overall it is a solid game, has a great story, likable characters (well most of them), and the gameplay is one of the best among any JRPG I've played from this gen. Yes, it is not as good as any PS-era FF or FFX, but it's still a great game in my opinion. While playing it I tried understand where all the criticism of this game was coming from, but I honestly couldn't. I understand how a few of the characters are slightly annoying, and how there are minor problems with the paradigm system, but other then that I thought it was a pretty enjoyable game.

So my question is, why do you guys either love or hate this game, or are pretty even-keel about it? I guess I'm just trying to understand why so many people seem to dislike it so much.

Shenmue_Jehuty

[QUOTE="Shenmue_Jehuty"]

I never understood why people had such an axe to grind against FF XIII; overall it is a solid game, has a great story, likable characters (well most of them), and the gameplay is one of the best among any JRPG I've played from this gen. Yes, it is not as good as any PS-era FF or FFX, but it's still a great game in my opinion. While playing it I tried understand where all the criticism of this game was coming from, but I honestly couldn't. I understand how a few of the characters are slightly annoying, and how there are minor problems with the paradigm system, but other then that I thought it was a pretty enjoyable game.

So my question is, why do you guys either love or hate this game, or are pretty even-keel about it? I guess I'm just trying to understand why so many people seem to dislike it so much.

lightleggy

because it wasn't really turn based. It was actually real time and dynamic your placement in the environment actually had an effect on battle. Controlling the whole party during fights would have been quite a task and you would have been jamming on the x or a button even more. You had control over what your teammates did anyway through the paradigm system and they always use the correct abilities if you have learned your enemies.

I personally liked FF13 overall although it did have many flaws. It does take way too long to get interesting story and gameplay wise. They story had potential but does end up falling flat in the end. Some of the character's did end up being annoying like snow and vanille but great character design overall. The game was a visual treat for sure with production values through the roof as always for FF games. I do think adding auto battle to the combat system was a horrible idea and that they should have left it manual because it does for the early portion of the game (which is hours upon hours) it does lead to mashing the x button with no though at all but it does get much better once you reach pulse.The battles actually become a challenge and a good amount of strategy is needed to complete all of the stones.

Of course there was the complete abandonment of stuff like a traditional over world, towns, and shops. I guess they wanted to simplify the whole Jrpg exp and who can blame them. The genre is dying and many people just b and moan about how hard and complex they are. Im really intersted in seeing how FF13-2 turns out though.

I sat there pressing X for 15 hours until I'd nearly lapsed into a monotony-induced coma. I've seen DVD menus with more interactivity. I didn't feel like turning my PS3 on for 2 weeks afterwards. I've never in my life experienced a "game" that so nearly killed my interest in the entire hobby.

Jackc8

I find it funny that FFXIII is almost universally reviled for its linearity, yet FFX is one of the most fondly remembered games in the series.

I mean I dislike them both, but linearity has nothing to do with it. I just dont really like the characters in either of them, and I find the combat in FFXIII to be boring.

I find it funny that FFXIII is almost universally reviled for its linearity, yet FFX is one of the most fondly remembered games in the series.

I mean I dislike them both, but linearity has nothing to do with it. I just dont really like the characters in either of them, and I find the combat in FFXIII to be boring.

TJORLY

[QUOTE="lightleggy"][QUOTE="Shenmue_Jehuty"]

I never understood why people had such an axe to grind against FF XIII; overall it is a solid game, has a great story, likable characters (well most of them), and the gameplay is one of the best among any JRPG I've played from this gen. Yes, it is not as good as any PS-era FF or FFX, but it's still a great game in my opinion. While playing it I tried understand where all the criticism of this game was coming from, but I honestly couldn't. I understand how a few of the characters are slightly annoying, and how there are minor problems with the paradigm system, but other then that I thought it was a pretty enjoyable game.

So my question is, why do you guys either love or hate this game, or are pretty even-keel about it? I guess I'm just trying to understand why so many people seem to dislike it so much.

Gen007

because it wasn't really turn based. It was actually real time and dynamic your placement in the environment actually had an effect on battle. Controlling the whole party during fights would have been quite a task and you would have been jamming on the x or a button even more. You had control over what your teammates did anyway through the paradigm system and they always use the correct abilities if you have learned your enemies.

I personally liked FF13 overall although it did have many flaws. It does take way too long to get interesting story and gameplay wise. They story had potential but does end up falling flat in the end. Some of the character's did end up being annoying like snow and vanille but great character design overall. The game was a visual treat for sure with production values through the roof as always for FF games. I do think adding auto battle to the combat system was a horrible idea and that they should have left it manual because it does for the early portion of the game (which is hours upon hours) it does lead to mashing the x button with no though at all but it does get much better once you reach pulse.The battles actually become a challenge and a good amount of strategy is needed to complete all of the stones.

Of course there was the complete abandonment of stuff like a traditional over world, towns, and shops. I guess they wanted to simplify the whole Jrpg exp and who can blame them. The genre is dying and many people just b and moan about how hard and complex they are. Im really intersted in seeing how FF13-2 turns out though.

I liked it! Finally a JRPG that was free from all the things that plagued the genre since Final Fantasy VIII: no annoying characters, no overcomplicated mechanics and no stupid card game. Add a charismatic lead character (Lightning is a huge cut above brooding, mumbling dudes like Cloud and Squall) and I'm willing to forgive the stupid, confusing story and the total linearity. 9/10 for making the second non-annoying Final Fantasy game in over 10 years (VII was the other one).

Oh and I like Vanille a lot: she's a really deep, well written character, tormented by guilt and remorse. If you think she's an idiot you missed the fact she was masking her true emotions the whole game.

Oh and I like Vanille a lot: she's a really deep, well written character, tormented by guilt and remorse. If you think she's an idiot you missed the fact she was masking her true emotions the whole game.

Black_Knight_00

This for Vanille haters.

About the linearity of the game, I have to agree with the haters. They should explore a wider open world with a bunch of side quests like they did on FFXII.

I liked it! Finally a JRPG that was free from all the things that plagued the genre since Final Fantasy VIII: no annoying characters, no overcomplicated mechanics and no stupid card game. Add a charismatic lead character (Lightning is a huge cut above brooding, mumbling dudes like Cloud and Squall) and I'm willing to forgive the stupid, confusing story and the total linearity. 9/10 for making the second non-annoying Final Fantasy game in over 10 years (VII was the other one).

Oh and I like Vanille a lot: she's a really deep, well written character, tormented by guilt and remorse. If you think she's an idiot you missed the fact she was masking her true emotions the whole game.

Black_Knight_00

sorry to tell you this but lightning is literally a female version of cloud, the devs even said so.

Fans dont like change.

I loved 13, best battle system and graphics of the series, sure it has flaws (to linear, confusing at times, upgrade system needs tweaking), but still a great game.

I liked FFXIII, the only character I found slightly annoying was Vanille but i got used to her(yeah i think Snow is cool)...anyways the plot was pretty interesting and i am definitely looking forwards to the sequel

The Voice acting was pretty bad, the linearity of the game was a big turn off and a crappy story.

I will give it props though for having awesome graphics and a decent battle system.

I sat there pressing X for 15 hours until I'd nearly lapsed into a monotony-induced coma. I've seen DVD menus with more interactivity. I didn't feel like turning my PS3 on for 2 weeks afterwards. I've never in my life experienced a "game" that so nearly killed my interest in the entire hobby.

Jackc8

this sums up why I hate FFXIII only I would say it sucks my shaft hardcore.

Great game. Haters are gonna hate.

I played through the game four times already.

What does that tell you about my feelings for the game? ;)

sorry to tell you this but lightning is literally a female version of cloud, the devs even said so.lightleggy

This topic has been done to death, and I'm sure you could Google this question and get links to where it has been discussed extensively by lovers and haters.

Nontheless, to me (a FF vet since the PSX era) it was a disappointment because it took out most of the things that made the FF series so great. The battle system is dull, as many pointed out it's just pressing X the whole time until you stagger your enemy and finish them off. With a lot of enemies and boss fights it's like you can't even fight it they way you want to fight it, there is basically one way [strategy] to defeat the enemy and this gets extremely repetitive over time. Not to mention the idiotic A.I. who take the most nonsensical actions when in battle, adding the fact that it's game over when the party leader is KO'd, and you get a very rage inducing experience. The leveling system is a disgrace, because they cap your development up to a certain point depending on what chapter your on. Not only that, but everyone learns the exact same abilities, there is no uniqeness to what this or that character can do (except maybe the fact that certain characters gain access to certain roles and abilities earlier, lame). The story is way too convuluted and cliche, drawing on much of the same archetypes of the last two installments (FFX & XII respectively). There is no open world for exploration and interactivity, no towns, no dungeons, no people, no out-of-the-way places where you used to find extensions of the story/characters or weapons/accesories/etc. Despite the possibilities of the current generation consoles, all we are given is a single line (more or less) to follow throughout the game. The only parts I relatively enjoyed were the flawless cinematics; the style and graphics are top notch (as usual), and the menu looks beautiful.

Other than that, for a Final Fantasy, it was VERY lackluster.

i didnt love it or hate it. i knew beforehand that it would have a lot of focus on narrative and im not a huge proponent of that in games so i guess i didnt feel terribly betrayed when the plot devices were flimsy and everything jumbled into a convoluted mess. it did combat really well, but there wasnt a lot of solid gameplay around it. between battles was just a lot of corridors with no sense of pacing (hardly any puzzles, exploration, hubs to rest at, or minigames to play). there were some good looking environments like a crystalized waterway, but that static quality seemed to mix into all the others. the overworld was empty, had obviously triggered environmental effects, no day/night cycle, the enemies seemed to run around on rails, and there werent many landmarks to make it seem less monotonous. the combat itself wasnt the kind that would harmonize particularly well with other elements (like that of ffxii) but it needed something to complement it in order for the game to be particularly good.

Great game. Haters are gonna hate.

Bigboi500

The game was ridiculously easy, as long as you did the annoying mandatory grinding you could beat the majority of the enemies and bosses in the game not even looking at the screen. Just hit X to auto stack attacks and occasionally switch paradigms to heal. The game is painfully linear with only a couple paths that diverge here and there to give the illusion of non linearity. Since the paths only lead to dead ends or lead to the same place the other would have taken you. Even the crystarium was linear that it gave you little to no choice of how to develop your characters. The game essentially plays out like this

1 Grind

2 Boss

3 Cut scene

4 Crystarium expands

5 repeat steps 1-5

I didn't hate it but it was definitely a low point in the series along side FFX2. I kinda had to force myself to finish it. I don't ever see myself playing through it again.

I don't really get it when people say " I kept smashing the X button for 15-20 hours" In most Japanese RPGs you will do the same, you will issue commands with the X or Cancel them with O button. This is nothing new, but here we are, seeing the same comments over and over about how repetitive Final Fantasy XIII was. Most RPGs are repetitive and requires patience.

Remember Final Fantasy X?? Did you use the Triangle Button during battles?? No, you kept SMASHING the X button for whatever hours you've put on it. Same thing with Final Fantasy XIII with it's more fast-paced mixed with Turn-Based and Real-Time actions. I kind of agree that the story is pretty confusing in Final Fantasy XIII and the biggest drag for me was that you had to read the datalog in your menu to literally understand what's going on. That's my biggest con with the game personally.

Overall, I loved Final Fantasy XIII and I can't wait to play Final Fantasy XIII-2. There are improvement added to the new sequel and hey, now people complain about the monster party that you collect saying it's like Pokemon. In the end, haters are gonna hate. Because their favorite "FF #" is the best and the rest of the series sucks.

I personally love all Final Fantasy games equally, I think I'm one of the five people on this site who likes Final Fantasy X-2, XII, XIII and looking forward to playing FFXIII-2.

The linearity is an obvious issue, but there's more.

• The crystarium system is poorly designed. There's no room for flexibility, and when it finally does branch out, there's no point because it's expensive to do so. Add the fact that the characters already have intended roles from the beginning, and that makes the crystarium a pretty-looking, but useless feature.
• The weapon upgrade system is also poorly designed, and is no fun at all.
• There's not much to do beyond the main quest, unless you don't mind endless hunting. The linearity of the game restricts variety.
• The characters are annoying. I don't know what people see in these characters when characters have been written better in other RPGs. The only good character was Sazh. I wish Nomura could put some variety into his designs.
• The story itself is nothing special, and I wonder how many RPGs people have played if they think this is brilliant. I won't harp on this too much though, because I care about gameplay more. I just find it amusing how the reviews talked about how good the story is when other games have far more memorable stories.

If you need further reason why FF13 gets a lot of hate, take a look at FFXIII-2, and what it's offering. Its existence alone justifies the hate FFXIII gets. I washed my hands of the series after I beat this game, because I feel that Square Enix just can't make a good FF game anymore. I've had this feeling for a long time now; FF13 was just the final straw.

The game really picked up post-game but I personally felt it was a chore getting through the story. It was basically a movie.It just went on and on... The summons were useless too.

It's definitely got alot of things going for it like amazingly gorgeous visuals, a fairly entertaining story (that unfortunately falls apart during the Grand Pulse parts of the game but I enjoyed it overall), a really well-balanced and exciting combat system, a well-balanced level of difficulty, fairly decent voice acting relative to other games in the genre, etc. But the overall design of the game comes across as lazy and the linearity is downright extreme. I don't mind a linear design (FFX was also very linear, but the linearity was handled much more elegantly in that game), but there has to be some sort of creativity/dynamicness. FXIII's world design and overall structure is as lazy as it gets.

I played through the game four times already.

What does that tell you about my feelings for the game? ;)

Brown-9

No offense but with its extreme repetitiveness, the thought of playing through the game four times actually makes me feel a little ill. I mean, don't get me wrong. I enjoyed the game during my first and only playthrough, but I don't think I could play through it again. It's too much of a grind.

I don't really get it when people say " I kept smashing the X button for 15-20 hours" In most Japanese RPGs you will do the same, you will issue commands with the X or Cancel them with O button. This is nothing new, but here we are, seeing the same comments over and over about how repetitive Final Fantasy XIII was. Most RPGs are repetitive and requires patience.

Remember Final Fantasy X?? Did you use the Triangle Button during battles?? No, you kept SMASHING the X button for whatever hours you've put on it. Same thing with Final Fantasy XIII with it's more fast-paced mixed with Turn-Based and Real-Time actions. I kind of agree that the story is pretty confusing in Final Fantasy XIII and the biggest drag for me was that you had to read the datalog in your menu to literally understand what's going on. That's my biggest con with the game personally.

Overall, I loved Final Fantasy XIII and I can't wait to play Final Fantasy XIII-2. There are improvement added to the new sequel and hey, now people complain about the monster party that you collect saying it's like Pokemon. In the end, haters are gonna hate. Because their favorite "FF #" is the best and the rest of the series sucks.

I personally love all Final Fantasy games equally, I think I'm one of the five people on this site who likes Final Fantasy X-2, XII, XIII and looking forward to playing FFXIII-2.

Jack_240

I think your being a tad too technical there.

There is button mashing in every game, sure, but in RPGs you should be thinking about your actions and strategy before executing them. In past FFs, you had to go through battle commands and input the specific actions you wanted. Why? Because it was critical. FF XIII appeases to the casual crowd by taking out almost every thought of what should be done and replaces it with an auto-battle system. The only time the player needs to adapt to the battle is when they need to use a specific role(s) and have to paradigm shift in order to do so. There's just no variety and it gets really dull really quick.

FFXIII really streamlined the experience,and alot of people did not like that, pretty much.Personally I didn't give a crap about the linearity,I just needed some more end-game content. The only thing there really was was cieth stone missions but those got tiresome after awhile.

The game overall was good though. Great battle system, great music, great presentation overall (graphics and art style). It just got dragged down from the lack of end-game content, a mediocre, disappointing weapon upgrade system, and a story theat fell apart halfway through and some intolerable characters as well.

A good game I enjoyed but not as good as most previous installments.

[QUOTE="Jack_240"]

I don't really get it when people say " I kept smashing the X button for 15-20 hours" In most Japanese RPGs you will do the same, you will issue commands with the X or Cancel them with O button. This is nothing new, but here we are, seeing the same comments over and over about how repetitive Final Fantasy XIII was. Most RPGs are repetitive and requires patience.

Remember Final Fantasy X?? Did you use the Triangle Button during battles?? No, you kept SMASHING the X button for whatever hours you've put on it. Same thing with Final Fantasy XIII with it's more fast-paced mixed with Turn-Based and Real-Time actions. I kind of agree that the story is pretty confusing in Final Fantasy XIII and the biggest drag for me was that you had to read the datalog in your menu to literally understand what's going on. That's my biggest con with the game personally.

Overall, I loved Final Fantasy XIII and I can't wait to play Final Fantasy XIII-2. There are improvement added to the new sequel and hey, now people complain about the monster party that you collect saying it's like Pokemon. In the end, haters are gonna hate. Because their favorite "FF #" is the best and the rest of the series sucks.

I personally love all Final Fantasy games equally, I think I'm one of the five people on this site who likes Final Fantasy X-2, XII, XIII and looking forward to playing FFXIII-2.

PolygonBust

I think your being a tad too technical there.

There is button mashing in every game, sure, but in RPGs you should be thinking about your actions and strategy before executing them. In past FFs, you had to go through battle commands and input the specific actions you wanted. Why? Because it was critical. FF XIII appeases to the casual crowd by taking out almost every thought of what should be done and replaces it with an auto-battle system. The only time the player needs to adapt to the battle is when they need to use a specific role(s) and have to paradigm shift in order to do so. There's just no variety and it gets really dull really quick.

I very rarely had to think about my commands in FFVI-FFIX. Most of the time I could easily get by spamming the attack command or my most poweful spells, pretty much.

As for dullness, well, pretty much any turn-based RPG will become dull after a while. Although I think in some ways FFXIII felt a little less dull, due to the star rating system giving me incentive tomix things up and try as hard as possible, and with the paradigm system I had fun mixing the different roles with different characters and creating different teams and seeing how well they work. So really there is variety when it comes to the paradigm system and while FFXIII can get dull at times, that's not something that is exclusive to FFXIII,not by a longshot.

I loved FFXII, so it wasn't change from FF traditions that made me hate FFXIII. Rather that they went the complete opposite direction from everything I liked about 12, and it showed that the 2 games were made by different development teams.

Linearity, lack of towns or interaction with NPCs, boring level design, repetitive pacing, bizarre but uninteresting storyline, annoying characters, battles that drag on far too long. It all added up to a game experience that felt like a chore to finish.

If I had to be positive about it in any way the boss battles can actually be quite fun. There's some strategy involved in them where as most FF games you can easily beat the bosses with summon spamming. Also the crystarium system is ok and the graphics are pretty.

[QUOTE="Brown-9"]

I played through the game four times already.

What does that tell you about my feelings for the game? ;)

GreySeal9

No offense but with its extreme repetitiveness, the thought of playing through the game four times actually makes me feel a little ill. I mean, don't get me wrong. I enjoyed the game during my first and only playthrough, but I don't think I could play through it again. It's too much of a grind.

Everyone feels differently about XIII, and I can totally see why people wouldn't dare return for a second playthru, let alone a fourth (or a fifth... considering it already).

The combat system just clicks with me in all the right ways, so I don't find the grind to be anywhere as bad as it is certain other FF games.

[QUOTE="PolygonBust"]

[QUOTE="Jack_240"]

I don't really get it when people say " I kept smashing the X button for 15-20 hours" In most Japanese RPGs you will do the same, you will issue commands with the X or Cancel them with O button. This is nothing new, but here we are, seeing the same comments over and over about how repetitive Final Fantasy XIII was. Most RPGs are repetitive and requires patience.

Remember Final Fantasy X?? Did you use the Triangle Button during battles?? No, you kept SMASHING the X button for whatever hours you've put on it. Same thing with Final Fantasy XIII with it's more fast-paced mixed with Turn-Based and Real-Time actions. I kind of agree that the story is pretty confusing in Final Fantasy XIII and the biggest drag for me was that you had to read the datalog in your menu to literally understand what's going on. That's my biggest con with the game personally.

Overall, I loved Final Fantasy XIII and I can't wait to play Final Fantasy XIII-2. There are improvement added to the new sequel and hey, now people complain about the monster party that you collect saying it's like Pokemon. In the end, haters are gonna hate. Because their favorite "FF #" is the best and the rest of the series sucks.

I personally love all Final Fantasy games equally, I think I'm one of the five people on this site who likes Final Fantasy X-2, XII, XIII and looking forward to playing FFXIII-2.

DJ-Lafleur

I think your being a tad too technical there.

There is button mashing in every game, sure, but in RPGs you should be thinking about your actions and strategy before executing them. In past FFs, you had to go through battle commands and input the specific actions you wanted. Why? Because it was critical. FF XIII appeases to the casual crowd by taking out almost every thought of what should be done and replaces it with an auto-battle system. The only time the player needs to adapt to the battle is when they need to use a specific role(s) and have to paradigm shift in order to do so. There's just no variety and it gets really dull really quick.

I very rarely had to think about my commands in FFVI-FFIX. Most of the time I could easily get by spamming the attack command or my most poweful spells, pretty much.

As for dullness, well, pretty much any turn-based RPG will become dull after a while. Although I think in some ways FFXIII felt a little less dull, due to the star rating system giving me incentive tomix things up and try as hard as possible, and with the paradigm system I had fun mixing the different roles with different characters and creating different teams and seeing how well they work. So really there is variety when it comes to the paradigm system and while FFXIII can get dull at times, that's not something that is exclusive to FFXIII,not by a longshot.

yes, no one can ignore the auto-battle system, but Final Fantasy XIII had something that the previous FF games didn't and that's diversity in issuing commands. You won't attack enemies with the same ATTACK command over and over. You will use magic, attack, ruins..etc. to stagger your enemies then you'll attack him with the commando role or something else and so forth. Unlike the traditional RPGs where you occasionally use magic unless it's a powerful enemy or a boss.

I played through the game four times already.

What does that tell you about my feelings for the game? ;)

Brown-9

[QUOTE="Brown-9"]

I played through the game four times already.

What does that tell you about my feelings for the game? ;)

RandoIph

My word, and I thought I loved FFXIII. :P

Yes honey it is your opinion and sorry to say it means nothing youre pretty clueless FFXIII is exactly the opposite of what you think if you can't understand this certainly youre a novice gamer that don't have any knowledge about JRPG and the standards of this franchise,FFXIII is everything that a JRPG should never be and that's why it is hated it deserves all the hate it is an abomination that brings shame for this franchise.

We can leave the two-year old thread where we found it...