I'll start with the positives first:
This game is absolutely gorgeous. It's hard to imagine this releasing on the 360/PS3 and looking this damn good. I was floored by some of the cutscenes, and the different environments + biomes that you find yourself are all incredible to see.
The combat, while at times frustrating, is largely a lot of fun. I quickly realized that I couldn't just mash my way through this game, and that I would need to be smart about which paradigms I chose to get through some of the tougher boss fights. I also loved the Crystarium--it's a unique way of raising your stats that made the process a lot of fun.
The story--although it definitely gets muddled toward the end, I thought the story was fairly strong overall. I love a complex story, and this one was definitely complex enough to keep me interested, and the themes of fate + blind worship are pretty interesting. I'm curious to see how the game builds on the lore in the sequels.
Now for the negatives, the biggest one being the enemies in this game. Towards the end of the game I found myself avoiding most if not all combat encounters because the enemies had way too much HP. It would take me 3-4 minutes to get through an encounter because normal enemies would have upwards of a million HP. It made the game drag on so much more than it needed to, and I got so frustrated with trying to get through these that I had to put the game down several times. The bosses are another thing entirely--they have absolutely absurd amounts of HP that made the fights take ages, especially if my team wiped and I had to start over after fighting for 10 minutes.
The characters were sort of a mixed bag for me. I appreciated the way they grow and develop over the game, but as individuals I couldn't stand a lot of them. I felt like I wasn't as invested in their journey because they all felt sort of flat, with the exception of Vanille, she was wonderful.
All in all, this was a good game that had a solid plot, fun combat and gorgeous graphics that overstayed it's welcome with spongy enemies that dragged the game on far too long for me. Excited to see what XIII-2 has in store!
This game is absolutely gorgeous. It's hard to imagine this releasing on the 360/PS3 and looking this damn good. I was floored by some of the cutscenes, and the different environments + biomes that you find yourself are all incredible to see.
The combat, while at times frustrating, is largely a lot of fun. I quickly realized that I couldn't just mash my way through this game, and that I would need to be smart about which paradigms I chose to get through some of the tougher boss fights. I also loved the Crystarium--it's a unique way of raising your stats that made the process a lot of fun.
The story--although it definitely gets muddled toward the end, I thought the story was fairly strong overall. I love a complex story, and this one was definitely complex enough to keep me interested, and the themes of fate + blind worship are pretty interesting. I'm curious to see how the game builds on the lore in the sequels.
Now for the negatives, the biggest one being the enemies in this game. Towards the end of the game I found myself avoiding most if not all combat encounters because the enemies had way too much HP. It would take me 3-4 minutes to get through an encounter because normal enemies would have upwards of a million HP. It made the game drag on so much more than it needed to, and I got so frustrated with trying to get through these that I had to put the game down several times. The bosses are another thing entirely--they have absolutely absurd amounts of HP that made the fights take ages, especially if my team wiped and I had to start over after fighting for 10 minutes.
The characters were sort of a mixed bag for me. I appreciated the way they grow and develop over the game, but as individuals I couldn't stand a lot of them. I felt like I wasn't as invested in their journey because they all felt sort of flat, with the exception of Vanille, she was wonderful.
All in all, this was a good game that had a solid plot, fun combat and gorgeous graphics that overstayed it's welcome with spongy enemies that dragged the game on far too long for me. Excited to see what XIII-2 has in store!