I was gona post something to see if my account was still active on Destructoid. Still trying to figure that out. Meanwhile I'll write something inflammatory.
And I'm sorry if all of this is old hat and none of it is new, I'm not claiming to be original in this rant...
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So FFXIII.
Whats the deal? How do you take a franchise known for its depth, strong character development, and solid gameplay, and suck all the life out of it in one fell swoop? FFXIII will be the Spirits Within of one of the most prolific and genre defining RPG series ever. Square shot itself in the foot on the big screen, now Squenix will blow out its F-ing brains with a game that watches better than it plays.
But what could I possibly be talking about? FFXIII got rave reviews outside of those irreverent, punk-ass purists who couldn't take their bloated heads out of their bottomless behinds for long enough to realize the most recent sequel's glorious simplification, its gorgeous visuals, and seamless transitions. Approximately 450,000 units sold in North America for a total of 775,000 world wide on its post-Japan launch. And by May of last year, Destructoid's own Jim Sterling reported that the title broke 5.5 million sales. No bad for such a niche genre title.
So seriously, what am I talking about.
Game Informer's Joe Juba praised the mythic publisher/developer, "Square Enix has overhauled the concept of battle, focusing more on guiding the tactical flow of the fight rather than each character’s specific actions on a turn-by-turn basis. The result is a kinetic, fast-paced system that stands out as my favorite in the series."
While others panned the game mercilessly, with Kotaku listing it as one of 2010's biggest disappointments, and Wired's Chris Kohler politely noting that, "Final Fantasy XIII isn’t an RPG; it’s something less."
Unfortunately Chris, if it were something less, it would at least be something. As it is, XIII feels closer to a centerless void of shiny visuals that do their best to distract from the flat battles and tired dungeons. Imagine if, in addition to the paradigm system, it also had FFXII's gambit commands. I'd actually be able to have paradigms shift by themselves as battles unfolded without want for my skill or attention. Rather than a video game, it would be more accurate to call FXIII a movie that abruptly stops annoyingly often. And I'm not even gona go into the whole slipping in and out of Australian accents, abundance of perky titted females, or gun wielding black guy with a chocobo that lives in his afro (and he's the best part of the game!)
In all seriousness though, I originally picked up FFXIII last March after a long gaming hiatus (minus random encounters with Call of Duty and Wii multiplayers). Two hours in, feeling the frigid indifference of shit on a stick characters that had been polished over with beautiful backgrounds filled with houses I'd never get to barge in on and NPCs whose mindless dialogue I'd never get a chance to read, I stopped...hit power...and went on my way.
Then, after graduating into this bumble F&#$ economy, I picked the title back up in my spare time and started working through it. Like a long lost friend who was always there for me, I owed the series that much. Oh how wrong I was!
About halfway through completion, my mind may yet be changed, but for now it looks like the JRPG will need to do some deep soul searching while its FF mother ship tries to scramble for any last semblance of street cred with hardcore/old school gamers*. Seriously, does anyone out there have any examples they want to throw my way? I'd love to sink my teeth into a thick piece of JRPG goodness, but the field seems laden with over-hyped, under-deliverers like FFXIII, or lackluster splooge-fests filled with stiff mechanics plastered over by quirky anime visuals.
Is the JRPG dead? Was FFXIII final nail in the coffin? Am I a latecomer to this debate?
Yes, yes, and YES!
So what. Let's reopen that can of worms. Movies like Brick recast the best elements of film noir in a fresh, mind-blowningly modern way. Can the JRPG revived as well?
*I'm not sure how you personally would define either of those categories, but I think I can safely say I fall into at least one of them.