Final Fantasy XIII review

You lose a battle if your main character falls, but you can restart from where you were and either fight the enemy again or avoid them. Because of this, Square has made some of the battles in this game ridiculously tough–learning the ins and outs of the Paradigm system, as well as the strengths and weaknesses of each role, is a must.

Besides basic attacks and the Paradigm system, you also have the use of summons. Each character will pair up with a different Eidolon throughout the quest–these are very powerful when used correctly, and are fun just to watch. Unlike some previous FF’s though, the cutscenes (A) are not unbearably long and (B) can be skipped(!). They are worth watching, but if you use Odin every couple of battles, you may not want to watch it all over, and over, and over, so the option is there if you want to skip.

As for leveling, you use the “Crystarium”, which is somewhat like FFX’s leveling system. Each character has a certain number of roles unlocked, so Lightning is Commando/Ravager at first. She later unlocks Medic, and even later, everyone has every role at their disposal, but you will want to focus on the 2-3 that you start with in order to make the most powerful characters by the end of the game. You earn Crystarium Points (CP) from each battle, and these can be invested into the Crystarium in order to improve your statistics. You want Lightning to be a more powerful Commando? Open the Crystarium, go to Commando, and invest in the first few options to gain bonuses to strength, magic, hit points, and to unlock new abilities that only a Commando can use. There are 10 stages to the Crystarium, the last of which won’t even be unlocked until you complete the story–that last stage is to build your party’s stats high enough to compete in the post-game challenges, which are both lengthy and, as you would expect, challenging.

Towns are gone in Final Fantasy XIII–you buy items and weapons from vendors on your path that also act as save points and upgrade stations. Upgrading your items seems daunting at first, but it makes a lot of sense. You know the complaint about how, when traversing the world of an RPG, you always find more powerful weapons at the next town? That’s not a problem in FFXIII, as every weapon in the game is around the same base level when you acquire it. You won’t see much of a difference at all between the weapons were you to avoid upgrading throughout the adventure, as the main differences are in their other abilities. You may have  a sword with lower attack power for Lightning but higher magic, or a staff for Vanille that doesn’t cause much damage but helps you to lock the stagger bar at a set position more, or a lance for Fang that helps her counter attacks as a Sentinel better. Basically, you figure out what kind of fighter you want each character to be, and select your weapon of choice from there.

Upgrading also allows you to create new weapons. Each weapon upgrades twice–get Lightning’s sword to level 26, and it converts into a lower level (but nearly as powerful) sword. Get that to level 61, and you have the ability to upgrade it once more into her ultimate weapon, which can be upgraded to level 100. This is a considerable undertaking, and will require you focus resources on a single weapon for each character, but when used correctly the system is very effective. You can turn a weapon that was good for +20 strength when you found it into a ridiculous +550 or more weapon with lots of time and lots of resources.

As far as resources go, you don’t earn money from battles anymore. You find it in the field, or you sell your weapons and accessories or items, or you earn it from selling valuable items you pick up, such as Credit Chips, Incentive Chips, Perfumes, Gold Nuggets, etc. That means money is at a premium for much of the adventure, but you also don’t have to spend a lot of money on Phoenix Downs or healing potions, as your health and status reset to 100 percent after each battle (one more reason that the difficulty level has been increased). Be careful about selling weapons and accessories though, as you can often upgrade them into more powerful pieces of equipment that have more utility than their base form, or can even dismantle them to get brand new accessories and items you may not have acquired via drops or in chests.

Graphically, this is the most gorgeous RPG you have played. The cutscenes are beautiful (and for once, all necessary to plot development rather than just something you have to sit through) and the worlds are impressively rendered. The art direction of the game is of the caliber you would expect from Square, and it improves as the game moves on and opens up. Here is your new standard bearer for graphics on a current-gen RPG.

The game is not without its faults–battles are excellent, but sometimes that’s all there is to do. There isn’t much for puzzles at all, and though I’m glad that there isn’t anything like a blitzball game in sight, some fans are sure to be disappointed. The game opens up after about 20-25 hours and allows you to do what you want, but for some that sense of sudden freedom may be suffocating, as they were just thrown into the wilds and told to go crazy. You may not be sure just how much you have to fight when this occurs either, as there’s a little more grinding to do once the game opens up, though it’s never at the point where I want to actually call it level grinding–you just need to make sure you don’t start skipping battles once you have an easier chance of doing so. The upgrade system is excellent once you get the hang of it, but it’s a lot of trial and error because the game doesn’t explain it very well relative to its other tutorials. There are also times where this feels like an entirely new IP and not a Final Fantasy title, but a lot of that occurs early on–as the characters and story develop and you learn more abilities and pick up more items, the game will feel much more at home with other Final Fantasy titles.

One last note–if you own both systems, buy it on the PS3. It’s visually superior, and not just in the way console fanboys like to make up in order to feel better about their console of choice. It runs and looks better on the PS3. There’s nothing wrong with it on the 360, if that’s your lone console, but if you own both, get the PS3 version (which, by the way, is on one disc, while the 360 has multiple ones, if that’s the sort of thing that bothers you). There are areas and moments in this game that are visually stunning, and you will want it firing on all cylinders if you have that option.

Blast Factor: Final Fantasy XIII was worth the wait, and is one of this generation’s best role-playing games, Japanese or otherwise. While there are those who will continue to bash the game for being linear (or for being a Final Fantasy game), Square Enix took many of the criticisms of XII and the genre in general and created something brand new and fresh that will hopefully influence other developers. If you’re on the fence about the latest entry in the series, know that it’s more worthy of the Final Fantasy moniker than some of the franchises other titles, despite some of the massive changes.

Final Fantasy XIII is available on the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360, and retails for $59.99. A copy of this game was given to us by the publisher for reviewing purposes.