i always like rpgs with lots of cutscenes.

As long as the video is mesmerising.. sure why not.. I can stare at advent children for hrs...

Hopefully the game isnt "lost in translation"...

If that was the case you'd know that Final Fantasy 1 wasn't about the story... or as you've mentioned.... FInal Fantasy 3.

Gameplay WAS the big attraction In Final Fantasy 1,2,3 and 5.  (Though the gameplay in 2 ended up sucking.)

For someone who is a dedicated Final Fantasy fan you've made quite the error in base statement.  (Final Fantasy was never about the gameplay.)

Did you not play those games on their original format or something?  Anyone who's got a copy of FF1 sitting around can tell you it wasn't about the story.

It's still a quite strange post to make if you've played through it all and already have seen the story, no matter what you thought the cutscenes were.  Since... you've already played it.

After expierenced... length is pretty much meaningless since you already know the story.  Additionally, and i'll emphasize this again.  More story doesn't = better.  Even more of a better story doesn't = better.  Story is a thing that is judged not on time but quality, coherency and lack of plot holes.

I mean do I care that a movie I love is 3 hours long vs 1/2 hours long? Hell no.

lol, funny to hear people complaining about this. Looks like this is the complaint era. What did you expect from an FF game? At least you can skip em now if you want. In the old ps1 FFs and FFX, cutscenes were unskippable. I used to use the disc open trick.

People complaining about the current state of Jrpg's may have a point. But saying they need to evolve while complaining about the lack of an epic story is utter bull... Give stories like Xenogears' and all will be fine...
So >>> back to basics i say!

Yeah, I never really got the "evolution" thing.

I think it's just a byproduct that for most people... JRPGs aren't peoples favorite genres.

When more ARPGS and other genres incoporated RPGs people started thinking "Wait i can have the level building aspects of an RPG AND I don't need turn based battles?  Awesome!  Why the hell do they still have turn based battles?"

The "evolution" of JRPGs actually needs something else completly.  The evolution of story... as every game pretty much seems to tell the same story... which is even worse in SRPG form.  (Hey we're mercenaries fighten the evil empire, ho!)

There are so many other plot paths that could be used.   How about a good RPG where your  a cog in the empire... and your pretty much forced to be that way... but that's it.  No heroic turn around... ever.  etc.

So many untold stories.

Yup, only reason i've been dissapointed so many times the last few years is not because of gameplay...

The thing is too... the gameplay DOES evolve.  It's just not seen as evolving because it doesn't change from turn based.

I mean heck, I could think of dozens and dozens of different ways turn based RPGs play... dating back to the NES to a game that let you attack with either hand, either foot or you head.

I Love FF Cutscenes!