Final Fantasy XIII: Linear… ?


Vanille’s name is pronounced “Vaneel” in English and not “Vanilla 「ヴァニラ」. o_O
 

I’m sure anyone who’s bothered to look up some initial reactions to this game will know that (vocal) Japanese gamers have criticized it for being too linear and not playing like an RPG. Somehow, promoting that thought quickly became the “cool thing” to do by people who haven’t even played the game themselves. Well I wasn’t the least bit fazed by those concerns and was intent on finding out first-hand if it’s even a problem.

More “editorial-like” discussion after the jump… ** No Spoilers **

Final Fantasy XIII: Overall Thoughts


Lightning strikes much more than twice.
 

Introduction

Had my shipment arrived during the Christmas break like I was hoping, I would’ve probably blogged Final Fantasy XIII from start to finish like any other anime series here. I was ready to shell out $250 for an HD PVR just to do so too. Ever since the NES days, Final Fantasy has been about the story first and foremost to me, with improvements to the gameplay mechanics and graphics just adding to the overall experience. For that reason, it seems like it would’ve been a worthwhile blogging venture, especially when a lot of people imported the game with little-to-no understanding of Japanese.

When I was younger, I played a lot of Japanese games with much less understanding of the language than I have now, and found that a lot of the experience/enjoyment was simply lost in translation. As such, I thought I’d supplement what I didn’t have during the pre-Internet era, but the opportunity slipped by since I was late arriving to the FFXIII party. In lieu of chapter-by-chapter coverage, I figured some spoiler-free hands-on impressions would suffice, or at least, that’s what our resident site owner has been insisting that I do ever since I told him I preordered it.

More after the jump…