PlayStation Nation |OT| Playing Astro Bot on the Horizon Until Dawn

[BraLoD]

Otter said:

BraLoD said:

But I still can't understand how 13 is so hated for things 10 did before and that one is so beloved.

10 is as much if not more limiting than 13, it has a lot of corridor maps.

I personally don't mind it, but it puzzles me why so many people are selective with 13 to pick up on it for that, but not on 10.

But nearly everything on 13 is better than 10, and 10 has some pretty bad choices too.

It has a separated language you have to "learn" bit by bit, and it expects you to go back to places you forgot many moons ago so you can read a part of a text you couldn't and try to figure it out, and I'll be honest that I don't even remember what you learn when you do, but I do remember not liking having to go back to do it.

This is a crazy take to me lol. I think there are very clear differences between X and XIII which makes X more favoured,

1.Pacing.

Both of gameplay mechanics and story wise, 10 just opens up a lot quicker. By the time you're in Besaid you're exploring the world, finding hidden items, collecting new weapons, understanding your parties very different abilities, engaging with puzzles to unlock summons, exploring interesting dynamics between characters and the motive going forward is well set out.

2. Simple RPG mechanics.

XIII removes the micromanagement of the early game without replacing it with any strategic depth. There are very few ailments to fend against or utilise like blind, silence etc. Character skillsets are not very unique, almost all attacks are from a shared skillset. X is relatively basic but that tried and tested formula works over just having the swap between 2 paradigms and not worry about much else for 30hours.

2.World Building.

There's not a single area in XIII that feels genuinely lived in or inhabited. Even if we view the wilderness of pulse as something which is suppsed to feel "uninhabited" you don't get a broader sense of the world from exploring it, interacting with ruins, wildlife etc. Much of its lore is left to datalogs whereas everything in FFX is based on you engaging in the world & characters including the tedious bits like learning al-bed or going back to places you've already been to unlock hidden summons/weapns, new dialogue etc

4. Story.
10 is simply a better story with more interesting characters.

I enjoyed XIII and played through it twice, but it was very unbalanced and poorly paced experience. Both are relatively linear but 10 had way more diverging paths and organic level design which broke from "corridor" criticism that was thrown at XIII. Like one of the very first things you do as Tidus is try and find flint in order to start a fire. In XIII's 40hour runtime I can't remember a single instance of having to be observant outside of battle.

Exploring the world in FF10 is really... meh.

By the time you get access to the airship, specially coming from PS1 FFs, it gets even more "meh". The airship is just a list to teleport to other places. Even that is restrictive compared to prior games. And when you are in a map, most of them are just corridors like in 13, there are 2 to 4 corridors going in some directions, but they are still just corridors. I don't personally have a problem with it, but I really can't understand people only pointing to 13 and not to 10.

You are 100% right that 13 has its world and even a lot of story building delivered as text, even so, the story on 13 is considerably better than 10. 10 still have quite the convoluted story, just like 7, for the sake of trying to be misterious, and is not particularly well delivered, so even if 13 relies on a lot of text, the actual story is quite better, IMO.

FF 10 do have some good characters, Yuna is great, and you'll forgive me but I forgot the names of many of the other chars, so I googled it, but the cool older guy (Auron) and the mage (Lulu) are great too. I don't really care for Tidus that much tbh, and Rikku was deceny. I don't like Wakka tho. Seymour is really bad as a "rival" as well.

FF 13 has Lightning, Fang and Serah, I even like Vanille too. I remember 13 characters easier and I actually played 13 (and 13-2) before 10.

I don't think 13 is that much better, I do preffer 13 over 10, but I think it has a lot of shortcomings as well, specially regarding the weapons progression. But IMO it does have a better story, a really cool battle system (I like 10's as well tho), I like the different kind of music it has, so yeah, even as it's not THAT better than 10 I have a really hard time finding many things 10 has over 13.

Oh, and 13 doesn't have Blitzball, very important point going on for it! XD

I enjoyed 10-2 more than 10, it was a lot sillier and overall more fun, IMO, but I also enjoyed 13-2 more than 13, it fixes some stuff from 13, Noel is decent but a big downgrade from Lightning, but we have Serah shining there, and Caius as a "rival" was really cool. Also you could have different "pet" monsters on your party and that was a really fun change.

Last edited by BraLoD - on 02 February 2026