This was my first Final Fantasy as a kid, so maybe I'm biased, but you know what? Fuck it, I love this game, and I'll die on that hill despite everyone else hating it. I remember crying at the ending when I first finished it, so that says something.

I fully accept that a lot of the criticism for Final Fantasy XIII is valid and understandable, but I maintain that a lot of it isn't - it became 'cool' to hate on XIII because everyone did back then, it was something you ragged on for Reddit upvotes, and the more it happened the less anyone was inclined to even give it a fair chance. They'll point to characters being insufferable with a complete lack of empathy - I remember the absolute brigade of loathing for Hope, a grieving child who just watched his mother die in front of him, and people calling him immature and annoying like the entire point of his arc wasn't to show him growing and healing past that. If I'd seen my mother violently killed in front of me at 14 years old, I highly doubt I'd have been as collected and capable as Hope is. I also remember everyone dragging Vanille's Australian accent and calling it fake, despite her VA being Australian.

The graphics are gorgeous, the character designs are excellent (which includes the background NPCs - have you seen Yuj?), the soundtrack is beautiful. I don't find the story convoluted or hard to follow at all, and honestly I don't fully understand where that criticism comes from; I actively enjoyed going through all the datalog entries and seeing how they changed and updated as I progressed the plot, but I didn't feel that I needed to read them in order to follow the basic events happening in front of me. As for the linearity, sure, it's linear - but linear doesn't mean bad, and it's no more linear than Final Fantasy X was. The only difference is that FFXIII doesn't disguise it. If you're the average FF fan who worships FFX as the "last great mainline title" but dismisses FFXIII as a "hallway simulator"... well, I don't know where I was going with that sentence, but I disagree with you.

The characters are perfectly likeable to me. My personal favourites were Sazh (I could talk for hours about how genuine and funny and paternal he is, and how much I love where his story goes throughout the game - that one scene with Vanille was chilling, even as I rationally knew he couldn't have done it), Snow (yes, I found his heroic bluster endearing), and Vanille (I think she's sweet and surprisingly complex). Another shoutout to Yuj, too - it may mostly be his character design that caught my eye, but I always enjoyed him popping up through the story. I love Serah, too, but that's mostly based on sequels, so I'll leave my thoughts on her for when I get to reviewing those.

My only real criticisms of the game are the lack of hub towns and the inability to choose your own party members for the first portion of the story (I forget how many chapters it takes to unlock).

As minor side notes, I love how the Crystarium level up screens look, and the sound design is great - I love the way your footsteps sound as you run across the crystal surface of Lake Bresha.

Favourite Female Character(s): Vanille
Favourite Male Character(s): Sazh, Snow
First Character I Liked: Sazh
Favourite Character Design: Yuj, Jihl
Favourite OST: The Promise, Somnus
Favourite Scene: The return to Cocoon / crashing the Grand Prix
Least Favourite Character: Would Barthandelus be a cop-out answer?