Ben, on facebook, you said that your girlfriend was making you quit videogames or something. Or that you were getting too old for them. And then you post a rant on FFXIII? I am getting mixed messages.

To make the graphics look so good, they have to spend a lot of time on them.  That goes for character models, enemy models, textures, environments, animations, etc.  That means they have less time for other things, so stuff starts getting left out.

I like your rant cause it channel most of what I think ... FFXIII made me cry .:sniff:.

The story and characters are just terrible. So much melodrama and the character development is ridiculous.

With that said the games growing on me a bit as I progress. I'm on chapter 10 I think and the combat system, which I hated at first, is becoming a lot of fun. Still wish this game opened up like 5 hours ago.

It is defiantly getting better as I progress and its already better then XII so that's something.

While we're ranting. I'm on chapter 5 and so far Lighting has been pissing me off too much with her attitude. I wanna bitch slap her. Worse leading character ever (behind Cloud). Well done SE!

P.S. I have mix feelings on the battle system. I hate it and I love it. It's dumb down for newbs yet its fast and thrilling. F-U SE!!

I don't view this game as much of an RPG like FF9, but it's still a decent game.

The battle system is awesome, but the story is subpar and it was far too linear.

But, look at GTA, RAGE, Borderlands, fallout oblivion, mass effect, etc, they all look great and are open. FF13 has flat textures and almost no lighting effects, they only this they excel at are charecter textures and FPS.

What about cut scenes?  I would guess that SE had to spend a lot of time and money on those.

I dunno, I loved the battle system, as it was like Persona 3,4, only a lot better in my opinion.

to each his own I guess. If you want a game to have something in it and it doesn't have it. It will most likely make you hate it more than how it actually is. As I've felt that way about games before.  Such as MGS3 not being in corridors/halways/tankers/whatever as in 1 and 2

But if you don't like it you don't like it, and my tastes seem to be backwards than everyone here that's okay :P

I thought Square had their own department dedicated to making the FMV cut scenes in what was Square Pictures, they could produce sequences that rival anything now 5 years ago. That is besides the point though, back when we had 7, 8 and 9, they were pushing for great graphics from the technology and hardware they had to use yet we still go lots of different enemies, each unique to the location. Same thing happened in 12 (and 10 as well thinking about it).

Guess it's easier to create things from a model you already have then create a new one again. Just make you feel like you've not moved on in the game.