Yea, I like Vanille aswell, but maybe that's because I played the japanese version as most complains about her seemed to be about her voice. Later in the game I didn't use her in battles anymore though, as Hope just seemed to be more useful (but as a character in the story I despised him).

I thought FFXII was pretty decent, although I couldn't really get into the story. The cut scenes were beautiful, but they just didn't manage to create an atmosphere in my opinion (same with FF13). Still I had quite a lot of fun with exploring the world and hunting mobs etc.

Maybe the story of FF13 left me unimpressed because I wasn't good at reading japanese back when I played it (understanding the voiced parts wasn't difficult though) so I didn't have the information provided in the data log.

@Panama, The majority doesnt hate FF13 though. Its just that the one who disliked it are a very vocal minority, as seen with other popular game like COD.

I appreciate it, though I think you may be raking leaves in a windstorm, as it were

Well I played the game in english just a couple of months ago (bought the PS3 only for this game) and Vanille didn't sound annoying as the people said it was. In fact I was angry at the description of vanille in Gamespot (seriously, why the hell they sustract points in a game for an "annoying" characters) but that aside, I think it was a great character. Every main character in XIII was very well designed and I liked them (Except the stupid Snow) even Hope and Lightning :)

Well X-2 isn't that much better, but at least the combat system is fun, it reminded me of FF I/V with the different jobs and skills.

A game having a great story or not isn't something one "realizes". One "realizes" a truth, not a subjective measurement.

I beat it, was the only one of my group of friends to do so, in fact.  Everyone else hated it so they didn't bother finishing it.  I always held out that hope that it would get better.  Never did. 

As for the rest of your post, I'm aware there's a bit of customization, I know all about the weapon/accessory upgrades, I know all about everything you mentioned, doesn't change the fact that t he game is linear to a fault and has virtually no customization (virtually doesn't mean literally, means "more or less", and the customnization options were so limited they might as well have not been there. 

Currently on Chapter 11 after a two year hiatus. The game is still a chore, but the battle system is still fun. And at least at this point in the game, Lightning and Hope are no longer douchebags (Or maybe they're just taking a break until the last two chapters....).

What's up with all those grammar nazi's?

It's always fun to watch people praise XIII but criticize XII, especially over the combat system.

XII had the gambit system, which allowed you to program your characters to act certain specific ways in specific situations, assigning priority. If you didn't like the gambit system you could avoid it completely to control each and every one of your characters individually (there was an option to pause the game when looking through menus). all SIX of your team mates needed to die to give you a game over, and you could control any character at a whim.

XIII had the paradigm system, in which you were allowed to chose the jobs for each character and nothing more. You control the party leader, getting a game over if that person dies, and you have no ability to control or guide the other two members of your party. due to the speed and pace of the battles, it's unrealistic to expect to be able to control your character manually, resulting in 95% of the game having you press "auto-battle". The only real command you have is to change paradigms, everything else is automatic. this is a horrible dumbing down of what could have been an awesome battle system. a few small tweaks and it would have been fine (control your party members, manual gameplay, NOT dying when the party leader falls, better AI). Instead we get an incredibly restrictive, boring, repetitive battle system.

At least with XII you had the option to turn it off, and the battle system was, for all intents and purposes, identical to FF1-9, just with the ability to actually move. and again, at least the gambit system was deep and nuanced, giving you complete control over your characters and their actions, FFXIII had no such system.