Final Fantasy XIII (PS3) Review

Fight your fate.

 

The Final Fantasy XIII trilogy has a reputation of being among the least-loved entries in Square Enix's prestigious Final Fantasy franchise over the years. The first game was pretty successful in 2010 to warrant two sequels over the years, Final Fantasy XIII-2 and Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII. Interestingly, it was even set to release on the PS2 back when it was revealed in 2006, before shifting development to PS3 and Xbox 360. Following the journey of an unlikely group who must save their world from impending doom, I've read lots of good and bad (mostly bad) about the game over the years, which made me curious to play it. So after finally dedicating time to play it, is Final Fantasy XIII any good?

 For years, the high-tech floating land of Cocoon and the primitive lowerworld of Pulse have long been fighting as sworn enemies. Both lands are ruled by "Fal'Cie", magical beings that govern the lands while providing protection and nourishment for their people. They mark humans as "l'Cie", who become instruments to do their bidding. Should they achieve their "Focus" (their mission, essentially), they turn into a crystal and given eternal life. Should they fail... they turn into "Cieth" monsters who are cursed to roam the world. We follow Lighting, a stoic Cocoon solider who--along other civilians-- such as the pessimistic old man Sazh; timid young boy Hope; brash freedom fighter Snow; cheery free-spirit Vanille; and feisty warrior Fang, all get caught up in the conflict when they're turned into l'Cie. Now, they must figure their focus while saving Cocoon before risk turning into Cieth. 

 I found concepts of defying one's fate and forging their own is cool though the story was confusing initially with various terminologies thrown around, which thankfully the in-game glossary addresses. It did get nonsensical by the end, as I got confused with the party's ever changing goals. Things ended on a memorable note too as I liked the ending a lot. I didn't like any of the cast at first, but I quickly grew fond of them over the adventure. Sazh, Hope, and Vanille's arcs were the ones I enjoyed the most. The villains were OK, nothing special aside from being the bad guys that you need to defeat.

Lightning and company are in for a wild ride.

 Final Fantasy XIII is an action-RPG where you control the party as they battle enemies, explore the world, and unlock new abilities and weapons. You control up to three members though only one character is fully playable-- with the others being controlled by the AI. The main mechanic is the "Paradigm Shift" where you form load-outs of character-specific classes and switch between them during combat. For example, you can create a balanced load-out with Lightning as an attacker with Snow a defender and Vanille a healer. Or you can go all-out and have everyone as physical or magical attackers, so there's a lot of room for experimentation and flexibility when changing a character's role.

 That said, you can't just rush enemies since the Active Time Battle (ATB) gauge must be full for you to act-- which fortunately increases over time. As you damage enemies and chain attacks, you'll increase their stagger meter, which leaves them in a weakened state where you can pummel them with attacks before they recover. There's no traditional levelling system and instead, you obtain "Crystarium Points" after beating enemies that allows you to unlock magic or attack points, new skills, and accessories for characters by spending them in the Crystarium-- a grid-like structure for each class. Think of it like the Sphere Grid if you've played Final Fantasy X.

The gameplay was fun, strategic, and challenging.

 Summons or "Eidolons" make a return and they're powerful beings that you can summon in battles for an extra layer of muscle, offering strong physical and elemental attacks. Each character has their own unique summon and they're fun to use when things get tough, though I wished that there was an option to skip their animations. What severely holds FFXIII back is its linear nature. A good chunk of it is spent with you superficially exploring the world in narrow hallways and when things finally open-up, it's by the final hours of the game. While FFX-- a favorite of mine-- is also linear, it still offered villages, side-quests, shops, mini-games, and NPCs to chat with, all of which are lacking here. 

 It took 46 hours to complete the game, with me thoroughly exploring the world, upgrading my gear, expanding the Crystarium, and doing some of the Cieth missions and Chocobo treasure hunts. There's some post-game content to tackle with optional boss fights, new missions, and final-stage Crystarium upgrades to get, so it'll last you a while if you're aiming to 100% the game.

 Visually, the game looks fantastic with bright colors, expressive character models, and beautiful backgrounds to boot. Locales such as Oerba, Gran Pulse, Bresha Lake, and Edenhall were all stunning to look at. As you'd expect from Square Enix, the pre-rendered cut-scenes are gorgeous and hold up amazingly well 13 years later. Granted, there's a few issues with some of textures looking low-res and the frame-rate dipping in heavier fights. Voice-work is good with the English performances all being solid and the soundtrack is good. It isn't on the levels of previous games but I liked the opening theme, battle theme, Oerba's theme, and the ending theme.

The game still looks as amazing as it did back then.

 Even if it didn't reach the heights of the more popular FF games, I'm glad that I got around to playing Final Fantasy XIII. The characters were charming, the story (while bonkers) was neat, the gameplay was both strategic and challenging, and the presentation was stellar. Despite its flaws, I enjoyed the adventure and found that it didn't deserve most of the backlash. I'm excited to see where the Lightning's story picks up next so I'll be looking forward to the sequels.