Final Fantasy XIII

Reviewed by Jason Venter (March 20, 2010)

The multi-faceted nature of combat means that in Final Fantasy XIII, nearly every battle is a fresh adventure. That's not evident in the first few hours, where you're still learning new techniques and simply mashing the 'X' button allows you to slaughter most enemies that you encounter. The dynamic changes abruptly once you've been playing for a few hours, however, and you're suddenly going up against monsters so powerful that they can smash tanks, or you're fighting so many at once that they can overwhelm you almost before the fight begins unless you truly understand how to get the most out of your party members.

Reviewed by Rob Hamilton (February 24, 2012)

At least the fighting was fun — after the game had decided I'd done well enough with the remedial classes and gave me access to everything. Each character can take on a number of roles. Ravagers blitz foes with attack magic, while Commandos deliver powerful melee attacks. Other roles are more specialized, doing things like buffing party members, debuffing foes, casting healing spells and serving as tanks to protect the more frail from powerful assaults. As the game progresses, each character learns new roles, making them more versatile. With a click of a button, you can switch from a set-up with two Ravagers and a Commando to one designed to quickly heal the wounded.

Reviewed by Fedule (May 08, 2010)

Final Fantasy XIII is a game that would like nothing more in the world than for you to believe you enjoy playing it. Its simple list of wants does not extend as far as actually being enjoyable; it is content to pretend, to lie about a lie.

Reviewed by holdthephone (January 01, 2013)

Final Fantasy XIII stands as a new kind of JRPG that rewards varieties of intelligent play and players who think on their feet.

Reviewed by jerec (July 01, 2010)

Square-Enix would love to create masterpieces of storytelling, if only the player and the whole gameplay aspect would stop getting in the way, which is why they are taking such drastic steps to phase them out. Final Fantasy XIII isn’t a roleplaying game, and perhaps calling it a game is stretching the definition too far.

Reviewed by Nightmare (May 11, 2010)

If I were to base my opinion of Final Fantasy XIII solely on the reviews of others, I never would have played it. Like many, I’ve been a fan of the series since FF VII, played every installment, and come to appreciate certain ideas—those of which are now missing, shifted or minuscule.

Reviewed by Suskie (May 01, 2010)

Final Fantasy XIII director Motomu Toriyama once defended the game’s much-publicized (and much-criticized) linearity by stating that his team was going for an FPS vibe, an action-centric experience in which the entirety of the design, barring a few exceptions, moves players from one encounter to the next and little else. This excuses nothing but explains a lot: FFXIII has caught a lot of flak for ditching a number of valued JRPG conventions, and this was done to make the game’s bat...

Reviewed by zippdementia (March 19, 2010)

Is it good? That's what everyone has been asking in tremulous voices when the subject of Square Enix's most expensive addition to the Final Fantasy line up comes up.