Or are the nostalgiacs overreacting? So many positive reviews. 83 on Metacritic. The first FF game that made people who don't play RPGs get into the series (and genre) in years. My adult cousin used to make fun of me because I like FF. Now he can't stop talk about it. :D

On the side note, wish Square would release details on the new leveling and weapon upgrade systems in XIII-2. Those were the only flaws I found in the original.

It depends:

I hate the amount of cutscenes there are,and i have to force myself to keep my interest in the game.
In the old days,and even in games like ff tactics,i long to hear about the story because i am interested.In FFXIII though,i find it hard to keep interested because i don't care about any of the characters,except maybe cid and sazh a little bit,even then i keep forgetting the names of the characters because they are just plain forgetable.

FFXIII gameplay is a mixed review:Some people like me:Think they did a terrible job,because the designers took out all towns and the need to heal up after fights and buy potions,x potions ethers and remedies.I would have been happier if they did,because it would add more semblance of strategy,rather than casting scan and the game auto using the weakness of that enemy.Just seems like its way too abusive in use,and breaks the game's difficulty a little too much.

I wish i could like the game,but my advice:If you wanted to try it out,rent it first.

I might like FFXII,i dunno,but there is a good reason why ff6 and ff7 and ff9 are so popular.

Oops. Guess I forgot to mention I already played the game twice. :D I guess it really is just different tastes. For me, I thought the exclusion of towns made sense: you are fugitives after all. And the full-heal-after-battle thing works, given how much enemies can hurt you so easily. And for me, it was hard to abuse the scan-and-auto when the game really gets strategic towards the end of the game. Of course not Disgaea-strategic but you get the point. Overall I think they did a great job.

Although I know how it feels. Some people are just not used to total upside-down change. I had the same feeling when I first played a 3D Mario. HAHAHA. :D

Personally:I think FFXIII is a sign of the decline in modern games.
In the late 90's there were so many great games coming out.Sure there were some bad ones,but there was also a lot of really good games.
FF9 for instance,and legend of legaia and kartia word of fate and parasite eve,and breath of fire 3,and suikoden 1 and 2.
Etc etc.

I felt that they concentrated less on graphics,and more on the content,and this made some noticeable effects.As modern jrpgs and games came along,they concentrated more and more in 3d graphics and trying to make it as realistic as possible with the water ripple effects and the waves of the water and the facial graphics to make the people seem more like virtual reality.The problem with this,is that some games didn't concentrate as much in character development,and it kind of seemed ridiculous.

I think mgs4 has far too many cutscenes.Its a good game within itself with some pretty good cutscenes,but i think there is a bit too much filler content in parts,like the cooking of eggs.I still like otacon though.

At the end of the day, Square are in the same boat as all Japanese developers right now - it doesn't matter what they do, because Western gamers are not interested in their products. Final Fantasy is still a brand name with great nostalgia for many in the west, but it is by the only JRPG that ever does well over here, and that's been the case for over a decade now.

And not just JRPGs either - it doesn't matter if they produce decent games like Vanquish or Bayonetta (not as good as the critics say, but certainly not a bad game), because westeners just aren't interested. The industry has been fixated on modern world shooters like Call of Duty et al, and very western themed Sci-fi operas like Halo, Gears and Mass Effect.

The japs have no answer to this. Their own market despises all those games, and their staff don't understand how to write characters in a way that appeals to western audiences. Whenever they try, it fails - badly.

And the same is true of systems. When they try to copy the trends that are apparent in modern games (i.e faster, more accessible, simple to pick up and play, easy progress with constant rewards etc), they get pillioried for it, despite western games doing these things all the time. The brutal truth is that until Japan releases a truly groundbreaking title (in any genre), that is genuinely mould breaking and visionary, this trend will continue. Just putting together charts and graphs on what tests well with western audiences, isn't getting the job done.

Just look at all the recent cancellations of games over here, and you see the Jaoanese arm of the industry is in full retreat in the west. To western gamers, the japanese games developers are becoming increasingly irrelevant. All the big titles are from western developers now.

In that sort of climate, FF13 was always going to struggle. I still maintain that its a good game, but it wasn't a visionary game, it wasn't a classic game. And it certainly wasn't the game to bring the series back to prominance. With its alienation of the fans (in the west anyway - the Japanese fans consider it one of the best in the series), this has been a difficult time for them.

Not least because the numbers still make for good reading on the surface. FF13 sold by the boat load. But the word of mouth has been terrible, so underneat those rosy sales figures, I think Square know they have a hell of a lot of work to do in the next installment.

I rather liked FFXIII due to the excellent battle system. Hope was annoying, as was Snow, as was Vanille. Admittedly, characterwise, the game could have used some work. But the plot on the whole wasn't bad, perse. Certainly made more sense than FFX.

I dug the art style and the futuristic asthetics, too.

As for Square's bad word of mouth on XIII, I have this to say:

Square, remake Xenogears. And do it right- add on all the stuff that got cut at the last minute, do a fresh translation, and a re-balancing of the difficulty. Instant classic game.

vrykolas,there are a lot of people who simply love fps games.
Kids these days seem to want to just turn on a game and play in fps mode online rather than an rpg which takes time to develop.

I also noticed that american rpgs seem to be gaining more popularity,because people seem to prefer choice over following a linear path.
Some people(like you and i) are used to it and like these kind of games as well,but others prefer a more open ended choice.
Each one of course has its weakness.

I'm not really saying that its wrong, and people are free to play and like whatever they want. I just think its sad that all games inevitably get dumbed down (or 'streamlined' to use industry speak), as they try to make any and all games into action games, because action games are the most popular and sell the most copies.

It wasn't so much of a problem at first, but as time's gone on, its getting harder and harder to find 'proper' RPGs, and many genres like Survival Horror and Space Combat Sims have practically died out, or exist in such dumbed down fashion, that they are essentially just straight action games now. No horror in the former, no sim in the latter etc etc.

No one cared "less about graphics" back in the 90s. They used what they had. And I agree with Vrykolas, things have just been dumbed down although I still disagree to an extent as to why. It isn't that people play more dumbed down games. It's just that great games aren't being made.

As for RPGS, things have to change and evolve as time goes on. What you may consider to be a "proper RPG" is not necessarily what a "good RPG" is now. And I mean good as in good, not good as in popular. Simply put, we look for wonderful stories with wonderful casts and worlds in RPGS nowadays and those are rare and few in between.

I think Mass Effect is a good example of the evolution of a RPG that's evolved into something that we would normally never consider an RPG. Again, not saying its the perfect game, but it is a good example of how character/weapon customization can work with choice based storytelling in an action oriented gameplay. RPGS need to evolve. They evolved from pen and paper to the game systems, and now they have to go one step further since we now have the tools to better immerse players into the game.

To give an example, I loved Kingdom hearts 1, and I beat it like 5 times. I tried to play it recently and I thought it was the most boring game I have ever played in my life. Trust me, I didn't dumb down my expectations. Rather, I think I raised them. An RPG now, needs to be able to throw me into an exciting, action filled, properly atmospheric game without overwhelming me. It's a rather fine balance.

When I look back, games like FF7, FF9, and FF10, did the same things in the beginning. FF13's intro was awesome to me. Sadly, I didn't like the pacing or the interaction with the world in FF13 but RPGs have evolved and the successful ones have many of the same core elements (such as intro/pacing) that older RPGs had with regards to player immersion.

I agree with you about the dubious quality of games being released these days. That is actually what I was saying - that the games being made have been dumbed down in reaction to perceived shortening attention spans, which further reinforces it, making it a self fulfilling prophecy.

But I think that RPGs of all kinds are in a difficult place. As modern gamers who played the old RPGs, we want these games to be long, look great, handle wonderfully, tell us new stories we haven't heard, have great characters and voice acting, never repeat content etc etc.

But as Final Fantasy 13, Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age 2 show, you can't have all these things in the same game, because its just too expensive. If you want your game to look great and play smoothly, that comes at the expense of content. FF13 and ME2 both have a small number of different locations and characters for instance, but the ones they have all look really nice and the controls have little to no bugs, slowdown etc.

Dragon Age 2 meanwhile, doesn't look as nice, repeats locations etc endlessly, but has significantly more content. More quests, loot, playing time, customisation etc. (In FF13 and ME2, the 'customisation' is really just 'Do you want to power up your gear... or not?) Mass Effect 1 and Dragon Age: Origins remain my favourite Bioware titles, and they also reuses maps endlessly, but that's the price you have to pay for more content.

I also find it strange that you don't like Kingdom Hearts for that reason. I never really liked KH, but that was mostly down to the drab story (especially the second one, with that neverendingly slow intro... urrgh!) I always thought the action in both games was pretty good though.

Still, I agree with most of what you're saying.

You're right about mass effect 2 in that regard. My friends and I have a running joke about the final upgrade on Shredder (or whatever ammo) Ammo final upgrade is "Shredder SQUAD Ammo".

"HEY BRO, LOOK I SPENT 20 HRS TRAINING AND MY ULTIMATE IS ME BUYING AMMO FOR YOU GUYS TOO!" YAY!

I meant the story in KH1. I tried replaying it and when she told me to find coconuts after what felt like 2 hrs in, I was like "nty i pass."

Again, I think a great RPG is possible, we just need that genius developer to do it. Surprisingly, and I don't know if this is nostalgia kicking in...but a game like Chrono Cross looks fantastic to me graphically and plays smoothly, and all my friends who I recommended it to (who couldn't play FF13 or DA2 or whatever) was able to play it and LOVE it. I wonder why? They don't have the nostalgia factor that I'm biased with. I tried asking them but they don't talk about it like I do, and responded with "it's just that good I guess."

Well, I think it probably would take a genius, and a well funded one at that. Its a great feat just to have a game that looks and play great these days, due to the sheer cost of producing current gen graphics, the manpower and equipment needed etc. Unless you have money on tap, that means a short game with little to no frills.

I mean, look at the recent Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Average graphics that just about still cut it, a bit more freedom than the average action game, but still nothing like what they were promising. Low amount of quests, functional and fairly joyless combat... It seemed to be a game that compromised on just about level - acceptable graphics, acceptable stealth, acceptable story, acceptable combat.

But no one aspect was great. Such are the low standards nowadays though, it was heralded as some kind of masterpiece - despite simply being at its core, a collection of ruggedly average components that made a generally above average product. Because its wasn't obviously bad in any one area, that was enough to get it the 10/10 nod, apparently.

If that's what passes for a classic game these days, I'll pass.

And the squad ammo thing - lol!

[QUOTE=Vrykolas;1816904]Well, I think it probably would take a genius, and a well funded one at that. Its a great feat just to have a game that looks and play great these days, due to the sheer cost of producing current gen graphics, the manpower and equipment needed etc. Unless you have money on tap, that means a short game with little to no frills.

I prefer a game that has great gameplay and story over one that has top notch graphics with no gameplay and terrible story and character development.I personally don-t give a shit about graphics.

I did not like the whole thing for getting items by upgrading em instead of finding em or buying some.
I personally don-t like the fight system in FFXIII.I kept skipping most of the cutscenes because i was bored to death,and even then i was still bored to death because the game offered so little for me to be interested in.I tried,but i had never been so disinterested in a game since ff8 came out,and that game really bored me to death.I don-t know what to say,i guess i simply didn-t care for it at all as a game and found it to be one long interactive movie with little gameplay,and the story didn-t catch my interest.

Graphics matter in this day and age. If you dont have good graphics that means your team is slacking in that department. Anyone can come out with a 2D game. Who is that gonna impress.

I think it's more important for the Graphics to be more attractive rather than technologically advanced. Many games these days show that.

They're technologically superb, but they're not necesarily attractive or effective at it's purpose.

An excellent point there Top, and my sentiments exactly. Good art sense and style are more important than technical proficiency. But that's just a personal opinion of course - DragonC isn't wrong that for truly mass appeal, most games need to have some seriously beefy graphics these days. The trouble is that the cost is so huge that a lot of developers just can't afford it.

Attractive graphics are still good graphics imo. Dark souls isnt necessarily "great graphics" but its pretty attractive.

An excellent point there Top, and my sentiments exactly. Good art sense and style are more important than technical proficiency. But that's just a personal opinion of course - DragonC isn't wrong that for truly mass appeal, most games need to have some seriously beefy graphics these days. The trouble is that the cost is so huge that a lot of developers just can't afford it.

High tech graphics has little to do with a game being good,in fact:I feel that there is less being concentrated on in the story and character development and gameplay.In the 80's and 90's graphics were minimum and it was more important to have a good story than pretty graphics.I also feel that this is why games have gone downhill.Also:I feel that the lack of controll of the characters is a bad thing in FFXIII.

I feel that in some fights i could have won if i had controll to make every character hit the same enemy instead of my character acting randomly.

Character didn't start becoming truly important until the mid point of the series - the early characters have hardly any personality or unique skills etc. And I would strongly protest that FF13 doesn't have strong character development - the game's first 9 chapters are all about character development!

And you can make the characters target the same enemy - if you select 'Relentless Assault' Paradigm, they all attack your selected enemy.

I don't feel like the characters really grow all that much as much as characters in the past did.
I was a little interested in the relation towards the end between hope and snow,because he was going to kill him,and sazh,cause i felt sorry for him.

I didn't really like the characters much at all,i find them pretty forgettable overall.

Well surely you can agree that Lightning changes? At the start, she has to be physically restrained and pleaded with before she'll even give Sazh the time of day. By the end, she's concerned for everyone's safety and leading the effort to keep everyone together. Vanille and Fang give up on their mission to destroy Coccoon and actually help save it, Hope grows from a scared young boy into a determined young man, Snow accepts his failings etc etc.

That's plenty more character development than anyone from FF3 for example. And more than several characters from the 'golden age' of FF as well (or do characters like Freya and Lulu have tons of character development that I somehow missed?)

If you didn't like the characters though, well that's fine. Everyone's entitled to their opinion after all (and I concede that FF13 has not got one of the better parties, but I don't think its one of the worst either).

I found the characters to be very predictable and overall:Not interesting.

In the past games,i actually cared about the characters.

In ff6 and ff9 as you so called,i actually liked more characters,but in FFXIII,i simply don't care for the most part.

Also:This really really pisses me off:

Why the fuck did they put the exp egg so far up the line? its practically useless by then and asks me to already be maxed out
By the time i get the exp egg,i will be maxed out.Quest number 12 gave me 10k xp alone.

I can't agree about the Growth Egg - its essential for late game grinding. Try maxing out the 5th stage of the Crystarium without it - I nearly went insane with the amount of grinding it took as it was! Maxing out stage 4 takes a hell of a lot more exp than 10K, because the 3 disciplines that aren't favoured by each character cost so much.

Indeed, late game grinding even with the Growth Egg is extremely taxing, as nowhere gives you enough. The Faultwarrens are the best place, but even that doesn't give enough Exp when you get late into Stage 5 of the Crystarium.

And as for FF6, I don't really care about any of the characters in that game. They barely have personalities at all, let alone good ones. They do have unique skills which helps to distinguish them, but other than that, I can take or leave all of them. And FF9's party... just no.

I disagree about ff6:

Edgar:great personality.A ladies man of a king and flirts with women.He took on the job as king and works hard on it.
Sabim:A free spirit.He left a life of royalty for a free roaming life.
Cyan:An honorable soldier,he lost his friends and family and felt hopeless.He was probably one of the worse off of the main characters

Also:What i meant about the exp egg,was that they could have put it a little lower on the list of items from quest to maybe:20 instead of 55?
I could really use it right about now,because when i start working on the alternate stats,it will start going from 10 or 12k-16 or 20k per stat,maybe more.

I just don't find the earlier FFs to be very good with regard to character. They just don't do anything or say anything for the most part. I can't remember any moments where any of the characters you mentioned actually *do* anything.

And if you're having trouble finding people to grind, just kill a few of those adamantoises on Pulse or the one outside Edenhall. Use Eidolons to knock their legs out, curse them and then spam Death on them until they die. Nets you a huge bounty of Exp, and is fairly risk free. You have to take on a few other fights from time to time (to recoup your TPs for the Eidolon summon), and it doesn't always work, but its still worth it. Big exp, and great item drops (either a Platinum Ingot or material to synth each character's ultimate weapons).

I just don't find the earlier FFs to be very good with regard to character. They just don't do anything or say anything for the most part. I can't remember any moments where any of the characters you mentioned actually *do* anything.

The characters are very well liked and the music fits the moments.

Instead of using cutscenes,the story is told through text and events that happen little by little.
Its not the best story ever and characters,but i still think its still really well done for what it was.Best characters overall in a rpg that i've seen so far,is dragon age origins.Its the first game that i know of,that had the balls to make a bisexual character,and boy was i surprised.Half of the jrpgs i see nowadays,are very shallow and predictable.I played blue lagoon and knew what was going to happen before it happened.

And if you're having trouble finding people to grind, just kill a few of those adamantoises on Pulse or the one outside Edenhall. Use Eidolons to knock their legs out, curse them and then spam Death on them until they die. Nets you a huge bounty of Exp, and is fairly risk free. You have to take on a few other fights from time to time (to recoup your TPs for the Eidolon summon), and it doesn't always work, but its still worth it. Big exp, and great item drops (either a Platinum Ingot or material to synth each character's ultimate weapons).

I don't have death spell yet,but i will soon get it i think.
Its not like i'm weak or anything,i mean i got level 4 roles already.

Its absolutely awesome. Get Haste up, equip her Sabotage aiding staff (upgraded to at least the second version), put Curse on the enemy and just cast away until you get 'em. Even when it doesn't KO, it still inflicts heavy damage, and if an enemy is vulnerable, you *will* get them eventually.

It doesn't work on the more elite Adamantoises (the Long and Shaolong Guis), but it does work against the Adamanchelid and Admanatoise (like I say, if in doubt, it definately does work against the one tramping about outside Edenhall).

Is death rank 5? because i don't even see it on the list of spells to get.
I'm guessing that the spell is acquired after killing the final boss.

Also:I saw a video of someone killing shaolong guis with the damage from death spell.(999.999 damage)

No, its level 4 I believe. You get that level of the Crystarium after defeating Chapter 11's boss if I remember. Its the skill she gets instead of the Limit Break style skills that the others get (like Army of One, Cold Blood etc), but IMO its better than all of those anyway.

Don't worry about completing chapters and moving away from Pulse. You get the option to come back to Pulse in Chapter 13 (at any time, so you can come back and spend as much time as you like grinding before finally going back to defeat Orphan). There is nothing that is lost forever if you don't get it in Chapter 11 - Pulse stays exactly as you left it when you return in Chapter 13.

So progress onwards, finish Chapter 11 (unless you already have of course, in which case, just look in Vanille's Saboteur Crystarium and you'll find it near the top), safe in the knowledge that you can come back and grind away to your heart's content later, but with the seriously sexy Death spell in your arsenal.

I got almost all the main stats maxed,and soon i will go for chapter 11 quest.
When i finish chapter 11 boss,i will come back to try and level up some more.If what you say is true,then there is another boss on the way to the hometown of vanille? And this boss gives the crystarium to get death spell?

Without knowing exactly where you are, that could be difficult (Chapter 11 is extremely long).

Basically, Chapter 11 starts out when you arrive on Pulse. Lots of enemies of various shapes and sizes as you know, but no bosses in the immediate area. Go underground, through Sulyya Springs and still no bosses. Then you have the Tower of Taejin which has a couple of mandatory Mark hunts, followed by a proper boss fight at the top of the tower.

Now I can't remember exactly if he gives you the 4th expansion, or whether its the next boss (its one of the 2 anyway). Because after you beat him, you go down to Oerba Village and up onto the ruined highway. At the end of this highway is the final boss of Chapter 11, and your ride back to Coccoon and the start of Chapter 12.

So its either the boss at the top of the Tower or the one at the end of the Highway (most likely its the latter one, but as I say, I can't remember).

I beat the eidolon of vanille already,and am moving through further through some sort of open land.

WTF? so cid raines was alive after i beat him? And that son of a bitch barthandalus appeared in oerba and this time came with curse attacks.
GAH!! he casts loads of debuffs and also debuffs your buffs,what a pain in the ass.

OH yeah! i now have access to the death spell.

Barthandelus isn't as hard second time round, because you are much harder because of your time on Pulse, and you know what to expect from him this time. And don't be too hard on Cid - he didn't know he would be revived, and honestly thought it was the end for him when you beat him on The Fifth Ark. Its just that Barthandelous has thought of everything - he's been alive basically forever, so he's put some thought into his scheme!

But now you have the Death spell, you can really rock and roll. Its not something you'll use all the time (as you need Vanille to be the party leader for one), but it makes a large number of fairly taxing boss and large enemy fights into complete walkovers. Neochu being a good example - now go get that Growth Egg!

I just killed my first adamantoise and got a platinum ingot worth 150k.I summoned as you said and my eidolon knocked it down and i spammed death till i eventually got one down.

Yup, that's the magic formula - the Eidolon attack always KOs the legs, then you just Curse, Haste and cast, cast, cast until it croaks and gives up 20,000 CP (40,000 with the Egg), and hopefully either an Ingot or some Trapezehedron (keep at it, they give it up eventually).

Once you get a bit of Trapez, use it to make Fang's ultimate weapon (Kain's Lance). Upgrade that to level 99, then dismantle it. You get 3 bits of Trapez! Takes a bit of effort to craft that high, but its way cheaper than buying 3 bits of Trapez, and much easier than waiting for Adamntoises to give you 3 (there is only a 1% chance of them dropping it).

Vanille soars from Zero to Hero!

Yup, that's the magic formula - the Eidolon attack always KOs the legs, then you just Curse, Haste and cast, cast, cast until it croaks and gives up 20,000 CP (40,000 with the Egg), and hopefully either an Ingot or some Trapezehedron (keep at it, they give it up eventually).

Once you get a bit of Trapez, use it to make Fang's ultimate weapon (Kain's Lance). Upgrade that to level 99, then dismantle it. You get 3 bits of Trapez! Takes a bit of effort to craft that high, but its way cheaper than buying 3 bits of Trapez, and much easier than waiting for Adamntoises to give you 3 (there is only a 1% chance of them dropping it).

Vanille soars from Zero to Hero!


The only problem is:getting enough money to upgrade those weapons to level 99.
Right now,i got 3k gil from upgrading weapons,and got 3 out of 6 weapons on level 2.

My strongest characters:

Sazh:over 1900 strength
Fang over 1700 strength
Lightning:well over 1.5k strength

Magic:Hope:This fucking kid has so many upgrades in magic that it isn't even funny.He is borderline high magic.I got about 1.6k magic with him,and that is without upgrading to level 2 weapon.I just checked,1721 magic on him.

Vanille:over 1600 magic.

Right now,my weakest character is:Snow,and snow isn't even weak with a staggering:9600 hp of natural health.(Have enough fucking health snow? I mean:Cmon!! get some strength and magic stats.)

Snow is my optimum choice for party leader - its absolutely impossible for enemies to take that guy out when you reach Stages 4-5 of the Crystarium. Hope has the highest ending Magic stat and is IMO a must for any serious team.

Getting money can be a pain, because its just so hard to get a regular supply coming in. Why couldn't they have given you some money for each fight, even if only just a little? Best way is to go after Platinum ingots and identify enemies that drop items like Perfume etc. Insquistorixs (those women who do all the buffs) have things like that, as do Sacrfices (you meet loads of these in the last 2 chapters).

It is hard to upgrade to lvl 99, but buying Trapez in the shop is absurdly expensive (its like 2 million or something for one piece) and you want to use the bulk of your money for buying Ultracompact Reactors from the R+D Depot shop. Ultracompact Reactors are the best crafting components, and *far* outstrip everything else. Just hammer away at buying those and blow them all on making Kain's Lance in one go when you have enough.

You *really* want the Ultimate weapons for your characters. Not only are they much more powerful, they give you a free ATB segment as well.

I just killed ochu and piccachu enemies and got the exp egg.

I literally skipped like 12-15 quests,because i got stuck on some of them and couldn't beat them.

Some of those quests past quest 40,are downright impossible.I thought i was going to go insane in beating ochu quest number 55,because i kept dying to those pet things,and ochu itself can take off 50% of vanille's health in 1 hit.

I don't know how much hp they expect you to have,but some of those enemies hit far too hard for their own good.
Those little enemies in a group really beat you up good.

Oh yeah:I got 5 stars on ochu quest.

Its only hard because you really aren't supposed to be doing all this stuff yet. The early Mark quests are fine, but for most of the Marks, you should wait until you have Lvl 5 Crystarium. I mean you've only just entered into Crystarium level 4, so your party is in no kind of shape to stand up to even most fo the mid level Marks. Canny use of Paradigms and little tricks like Death spam mean that you can stay in contention if you put your mind to it, but its a lot of effort for not much reward.

Because you get loads of Exp anyway by doing Chapter 12-13, and by putting off doing them, you're just delaying getting Lvl 5 of the Crystarium (and as I say, the final chapters offer a lot more enemies with cash than Pulse ever does). If you go away, finish the game and then come back to Pulse, the curve is much gentler.

Finishing the Mark quests at this stage (some of them anyway - you *cannot* succeed against the later ones without deep progression into Crystarium Lvl 5), makes no real sense. You are given more than adequate opportunites to grind in Chapter 13 final dungeon (its one of the best places to grind actually). So staying around to do the Mark missions now, is really just making things harder on yourself for no real reason.

You have the Growth Egg, so I really would suggest you move on to the last Chapters now. There simply isn't any point to struggling on like this - you will eventually reach enemies that you flat out cannot beat even if you max out Crystarium Level 4).

I got the 4th level crystarium maxed out in speciality,i'm working now on the alternate ones.

The reason i haven't beaten chapter 13,is because i want to maxed out so i can deal some serious damage to the final boss.

People get too worked up about the final boss - he's not that hard. The main area in which he can trip you up is something you can't really avoid 100% (he has an instant death spell which he can cast on your leader, and even 3 Seraph's crowns still leave a chance of it working). And I'm always maxed when I meet him anyway, because like I say, there is loads of Exp to be had in Orphan's Cradle (Chapter 13).

Was this game as bad as the fans say?

No/Yes.

No/Yes.

I think the game has some problems:

The game is a big dungeon crawler,that much is true.You can basically only go around leveling up killing stuff and upgrading weapons at the savepoints and also do quests.

I think the open world is slightly better,because it gives you a whole lot more to do than just follow the story.I think the story itself isn't enough to keep me going,but there is a lot of grinding.I kinda like grinding,so i don't mind this much.

I find there is a lack of gil to be had from battles,and this can get extremely frustrating.I killed several of those big ugly adamantoise,and yet to see a single trapohezedron drop.Also:The drop rate would be fine if the cash rate were slightly higher,especially considering that platinum ingots don't always drop.

I personally wish there was more to do in the open world,because i don't think that the quest to get the 64 quests done and the last crystagen will keep me that busy.

Overall:I personally would probably give it a 6 out of 10.

The graphics are good,but there are literally moments where i literally want to skip the story because i'm bored.

I think 6/10 is a fair score. I enjoyed it more than most here, but even I would struggle to give it much more than 7/10. I don't however see that you can accuse the game of having too little to do. My current save which still has 2 trophies left to get (Treasure Hunter and L'Cie Paragon), clocks in at around 90 hours. That's not bad value for money in anyone's book.

But yes, I think 6 or 7 out of 10 is about what this game deserves.

I think 6/10 is a fair score. I enjoyed it more than most here, but even I would struggle to give it much more than 7/10. I don't however see that you can accuse the game of having too little to do. My current save which still has 2 trophies left to get (Treasure Hunter and L'Cie Paragon), clocks in at around 90 hours. That's not bad value for money in anyone's book.

But yes, I think 6 or 7 out of 10 is about what this game deserves.

I don't find it to have much replay value.All this grinding and sitting through all those videos leaves little desire to replay it.

You can get the trophies if you wan,but some of them might be impossible as you might have to beat the game again,and get 5 stars on every single boss.

I'd give ff7 about:a 7.5 out of 10.

Its a decent game,a better game than FFXIII.
There is:

A whole bunch of materia to max out
Chocobo racing to aim for gold chocobo for items
Hidden materia
2 secret characters
2 hidden bosses
A sunken ship that is also hidden,and carries a fight a boss there that ties to the story

Its also shorter,but much of the time is exploring town.

I liked the old days,because you explored the world to uncover the truth,and also while revealing the info yourself and getting text and even reading panphlets,you had a minimum amount of cutscenes with trivial shit.

I also think:up until the open world,where there is more shit to do,i'd give the game a:WOOF!! thats a 0.
Actually:i think 6 is too high.
Considering i was bored with the story,didn't like the overly long cutscenes and don't like the characters that much,i'l give it a 4.

Well, for a game to be worth 4/10, it really has to be bad. I mean, like the kind of games you see in the shops that you have never heard of and look utterly awful. Consider all the time you have spent on FF13, and I would argue that no game that is 4/10 bad can keep your interest for that long. You just wouldn't do it.

With all the games out there with wonky controls, bad camera, truly offensively bad handling, glitches, bugs, terrible graphics etc, I would argue very strong that FF13 is not to be lumped in with those kinds of games (because games with too much of any of the above are 3 or 4/10 games IMO - 0, 1 and 2 are ridiculously low scores for any game, and I would only go there if the game actually didn't work etc).

But then, I disagree mightily with your score of 7.5/10 for FF7. That is an outrageously low score. And yet I'd take real issue with the idea that there is more to do in FF7. After the first two land masses, thar are filled with locations, the remainder of the map is fairly empty. There are no bonus dungeons and little in the way of genuine side quests. Even the WEAPONS were extra content, added to the North American and European versions.

FF13 is very far from being the best of the series. But 4/10 is an offensively low score. If you think that little of it, then why are you even bothering to play it? Just buy something else!

FFXIII is barely keeping my interest,and for now,its the main quests that keep my interest.
I skipped over a lot of video,and found a lot of the story and characters extremely predictable,so its nothing special.
The only difference,is that its slightly less clich� than games like:Eternal blue was it? or blue lagoon? It was one of those that i played,and i found at the intro a long haired japo character,with your typical personality of the criminal trying to escape.

The art style in FFXIII is far less clich�,but the story is so predictable,and there is nearly no villain or no villain at all during most of the game.
The main villains,are mostly your pulse soldiers,then it becomes barthandalus an cid raines as the pawn.

I also have FF8 to play and have to force myself to play.I have trouble forcing myself to play ff8,so i guess i'd give ff8 a 2 out of 10.

And as for ff7:Its my opinion deal with it.I think that its a good game,but nowhere near as godly as it is portrayed.
I like zack more than cloud,and i seem to find sephiroth more likeable than cloud as well.I felt sympathetic for sephiroth,but not cloud,and that is not a good thing,because the game designers want you to hate him.As i said:I don't think its nearly as godly as some people claim.

Also:there are worse games than FFXIII.Far far worse games:

Eternal quest:One of the worse rpgs i've played.I think its not even a real rpg and lacks a story at all.
Secret of the stars:Terrible script,just plain terrible.The villain is called homncruise.I mean:How original is that? it sounds like the name of a boat.

Also:Count yourself lucky,i would have given ff7 a lower rating due to the fanboys who won't shut up about it,but i chose not to because its still a good game.Its just overrated by the fanboys who won't shut the hell up about it,and square enix stop milking it.