Edit: some are saying this is purely a complain by my part, my intention is not to complain in the OP is to allow someone that has not gotten the game yet to see what the game is about, at the end there is a zero punctuation video is very nasty towards the game, dont see if you think those videos are missleading

Hour 0:30 : a CGI and the main characters are presented, the texture have a very high resolution and the animetion is very fluid, music is classic Final fantasy.

Hour 1:  party members have been picked for me, i cant use magic yet, i havent been able to updgrade weapons or lvl up.

hour 5: i am, finally allowed to lvl up, and "use" magic, i can change the abilities available for the characters during battle, but i can make no other choice about my party, i can only buy at save spots. i cant really decide what should happen in battles i only change the general strategy and if leader dies is game over, but , you can restart the battle without needing to reload the latest save after you die.

hour 10: My party have been splited several times since hour 5 time is two teams of 2 and a lone character, the teams of were paired with one strong character and a weak one, i never see the lone character until hour 20 or so, they are taking two path to reach the same place and i havent been able to use more than two characters in my party most of the time, this is the reason this game is long and the fact that there are no vehicles and characters walk slow.

hour 14: i have arrive to my first town but i cant talk to people really, even here there is only one path to take, i cant go into building.

hour 16: i entered another town with the other members of the party the whent the other way, this is more like a classic jrpg town, i have played a mini game, the first in the entire game it lasted a couple of minutes but i cant repeat it.

hour 16:30: am out of the town, and never see another again

hour 18: until now i have allways reached the lvl cap, will grind a little

hour 18:40: reached lvl cap

hour 20: most party members are together but i still cant pick party members to fight. new character added and the lone character i lost at hour 5 is back.

 hour 26: finally the nemesis of this game is revealed, but i still dont have any idea what his motives are.

hour 28: all roles have oppened to all characters, this means it will take very long to cap levels again i can chaenge party member and can pick who will figth, finally.

hour 30: i have reached a place that is open, like world of warcraft, until now the game had a long path.

hour 31: a few side missions available,i grind a little and reached original lvl cap.

hour 32: back to linear path, i haven been able to get more than 20,000 gil yet i need around 500,000 to take my  current weapon to its max lvl, that is for 1 character.

hour 33: played a mini game and just got 550,000 gils and xp to max 2 waepons, this game cant be repeated yet.

********** from now on is a matter of opinion*********************

hour 34: something must be wrong with this game so i search the internet for info on side quest etc.

hour 34:30:  found out most side quest are available after you finish the game and so are chocobos and that am 1 or 2 hours away from ending the game.

hour 35: i sold the game.

in this 35 hour of game, i have no idea why i was doing what i was doing, if it really is the stupid reason gived at hour 4, this is most stupid final fantasy ever.

if this is what westernization means is the end of Final fantasy, there are more RPG elements in GTA san andres than in this game,  there are more RPG elements in MW multi player than in this game, this game is as linear a uncharted or gears of war, so is this the direction square is taking with Final fantasy by making it more western?

I think its the best one...

hum! what would you say if GT5 ends up been a photo shoot game where you only take pictures or the cars, or if MW 3 is documentary?
im just curious

Haha, fair enough, I can see why people don't like it.  I thought it was excellent though (even if the first 6 hours was utter crap)

oh i thought it was the best FF, well i wouldn't think of FF XIII as a jrpg as compared to other FF's.

I liked it alot. 3rd best one.

2nd best one for me.

lol your outnumbered here radha. I really don't understand any of your complaints.

Not to mention a lot of your OP is misleading, most missions aren't available after you finish the game, I believe you can play all if not most before leaving Chapter 11, then chcocobo's are available before the game ends too.

Please tell me which mini game got you 550K gil, I really want to know. If Its chocobo digging, it can be repeated.

I'm all for this direction that FF is going in.

I mostly agree. I haven't followed the story at all, it all seems very pointless. All i do is push forward on the analog stick and hit x every once in awhile. I've upgraded a weapon to near max, and it really made no difference on the battles, so i swapped the character out for someone else with a level 1 weapon. There are too many "cie's" and too many pointless characters they keep showing and expecting me to care about them when they've had a total of 20 seconds screen time to build their character. I'll do the "missions" but they are pretty lame.. go here and kill bad guy, now go here and kill bad guy, now walk all the way back over there and kill that bad guy... now repeat like 50 times. Probably one of my least favorites so far.

I think its the worse FF ever. I agree with you about the pacing, but my biggest complaint is the writing. God does the dialogue suck, straight B movie bad. The characters are boring, two dimensional, and the plot is a slow mess. Don't tell me this is the story telling style of Jrpgs because that is frankly bull shit. While Jrpgs have their own set of cliches, I have played plenty of Jrpgs that offer writing far better then FFXIII. The story and character development in Lost Odyssey runs fucking circles around FFXIII. I play rpgs for the story and characters and thats why FFXIII is one of the worse rpgs I have ever played.

While Lost Odyssey is a good game in its own rite. It definitely does not have better characters.