Originally posted on 12/4/10
Final Fantasy XIII - PS3 Game Review
As far as my experience of playing RPG's goes, it's not wonderful. It's only ever been Pokemon for me, and lets be fair, a Game Boy screen isn't exactly the same as a next-gen console, and in terms of credability, there's quite a difference. Pokemon is a franchise that spawned just about every form of media (one of the films was on channel 2 the other day, fuck me, so awful), while Final Fantasy is one of the more socially questionable things to enjoy, going by what I hear from them. I've never played one before, being put off by the concept of there being more than one game that by the name states the first should be the last, but as it was the only thing to rent, I decided to give #13 a go.
From the moment I put the disc in I knew it was a bad idea. The game starting in some strange floating planet that's got fighting, with some wee twerp with blue hair, another twerp with hair that looked like fire and a crappy body warmer all led by an 8 ft tall guy in a trench coat with this irritating wee bit of hair between his eyes hanging from his bandana that whatever the circumstances never seems to move. This big chap is of course Snow, someone whose cheeky confidence you're supposed to warm to throughout. Alrighty then.
On to another story thread (with no warning) and we have a burd who's apparently a soldier, although the hot-pants she had on made me slightly suspicious as to which army she was with. Add to this the fact her name is Lightning and that she looks like Kimi Raikkonen, you know she's going to be someone that you can admire. She was paired with the token black guy, who is completely in no way a racial stereotype and will not die at any point in the game (none of them do I don't think), but he may as well be wearing the "I-die-or-turn-evil-t-shirt." You can imagine the kind of awful lines he's going to hit out with too. Don't forget that a small bird lives in his afro that he frequently talks to.
If you thought these 3 were bad, then it gets worse. Snow decides to get a rag-tag bunch of misfits together to fight the evil oppression (don't even ask, i'll come back to that later) and in the process, some burd (who we later find out is called Nora, rather hilariously) dies. That would be fine, were she not the mother of the saddest, most pathetic example of a human being I have ever come across both in gaming and in real life. Rather horribly, he's called Hope. Despite being so pathetic he probably cries if he steps in a puddle, he is still able, like all the characters, to pull a boomerang out his arse (literally) and fight stuff ranging from giant robotic bulbasaurs to something called a "Ushumgal Subjugator" without a moments thought, then going back to being weedy, un-fit and pathetic. Fantastic consistency.
There is hope for.... Hope however, as he's accompanied by a small ginger burd called Vanille, who like everyone has questionable clothing. Her lack of clothing however is made up for by the fact that she is the most ridiculously over-the-top enternally optimistic little freak to ever have been imagined by human kind. I am honestly at a loss for how to describe her, she's so.... irritating it beggars belief, and with her Australian accent (christ knows how we get Australian accents here) it just gets worse as the game goes on. Not to mention that any time this burd isn't speaking she's making horrible little giggly moans and groans, and you start to think that this game is designed by the kind of oddballs who normally make people like this with tentacles going up her vagina.
The opening sequences of the game don't exactly fill you with much hope if you were expecting something good, going down some very linear and very samey corridors fighting indentical enemies all the way through is rather boring, and it lasts for quite a while. In fairness, this never really changed throughout the game, only the scenery really changes, granted there's a few ridiculous bossfights as I mentioned earlier, but there's not much variety. This is apt however, as there's not much variety in the fighting system. It's turn based, and like good ole Pokemon, you start out with a few moves, and as you defeat more and better enemies you get more and better attacks. The only problem with this is the agonising wait for your hit meter to fill up so you can use them again, while whatever you're fighting with is beating the shit out you with attacks that would normally make a human disintegrate. There are things you can do, such as discern the attributes of your enemies (yawn) or use items, like potions, to re-fill you health.
This awful fighting system is buoyed slightly with the introduction of "Paradigm Shifting," where you can change what type of attacks your party members will carry out. This can get quite annoyinh when you've only got two people (see Lightning/Hope) and you have to change non-stop in order to keep yourself alive while still putting up a decent fight. In one boss battle where I only had Lightning and Hope, it took me 21 minutes to finish, only to be told rather smugly that the recommended time was 8. Unless I was missing something quite drastic, the game was talking out its arse, which does get quite wearing after a while. It is slightly more bearable when you can go up to 3 fighting party members, but this is even more irritating as you can't choose who you control, nor who else fights with you at any given moment. This means that all the upgrades you put into a character to make them your (only) really good medic are wasted if they're not fighting. That and the leveling up system is absurd, winning battles gets you points to put towards upgrades, but the upgrading takes place in this weird thing called the Crystarium (or something, I never payed much attention to it) which looks like a cross between the movie Tron and a pack of pastel-coloured crayons. It's utterly pointless as well, simply a few drop-down menus would have done the exact same job and made you want to vomit less.
On the subject of looks, one thing that the makers can be commended for is imagination. While the majority of the game takes place in what are essentially giant corridors, the background to these is spectacular if ridiculous. You shift from lush green grass lands to war-torn cities to giant blue forests to a crystalised ocean. For some odd reason you get flashbacks everynow and then which take you to "The Seaside City of Bodhum" where you get to learn about the characters (BORING) backstories, even getting to play Snow as he runs after his poor fiance once she's found out she is a l'Cie.
What now follows is an attempt at making sense of the uttely awful story into something that could provide reasons for anything that 've so far witnessed:
There are two worlds, Pulse with one floating aboive it called Cocoon
Cocoon is inhabited by big robots called Fal'Cie
Fal'Cie's can turn people into l'Cie's by giving them a mark
If they l'Cie complete their focus (even though they don't know what it is), they gain eternal life
Makes sense, sort of. Only problem is that everyone in Cocoon hates people from Pulse, particularly l'Cie, they have a guerrila corps army specifically designed to deal with them. I think that's everything, the only problem is that none of this is clearly explained, Even the flashbacks explain buggar all, and only set out to make the characters more annoying and less identifiable with. Honestly, even with my playtime (which I think was around 14 hours), I didn't give a rats arse about anyone, the entire world of Cocoon (I think that's where it is) could blow up and I wouldn't even be pissed that the ending was crap, only happy there was one.
Whatever the end result of all of that is I don't know (I think i'm just past halfway), but I do have some praise for Final Fantasy 13. Despite all of its glaring failures, facepalm moments and dialogue that will make you ashamed language was invented.... I grew to like it. I don't quite know what it was, be it simply a desire to finish, a desire to see how bad it got or a begrudging admiration for it... but I would consider buying it. Although my experience in the field is limited, it does seem like a good example of a JRPG, and i'd quite like to finish it, so you could say I enjoyed it. Maybe even liked it.
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