I agree with you Reiner. Kudos to you on your politically correctness when discussing the character 'Hope' from FF13, I know it's tough. My fiancee loves FF13 and 13-2. She tells me she'll destroy me if I talk during the cut scenes. I had a friend over one night, and we saw Hope talking in the scene. Keeping silent was excruciating. We actually burst out laughing, but tried hard to hide it first. Talk about the biggest pansy in the history of gaming - Hope makes that FF13-2 moogle look like a bada__. Either the Japanese need a hearty shot of testosterone, or they're trying to lower the bar so far that when the FF7 remake finally comes out that we'll be that much more amazed! Lightning was cool, and beautiful, as was that Australian one in the blue dress (Fang?), but the rest were annoying. The graphics looked incredible, but that's not enough.

This maybe sums up my Final Fantasy philosophy best: I moved out of my mom's house 7 years ago or so now. The room was warrior - devoted to sports, gaming, and in a general state of mess. Now, it's been turned frilly, girly, flowery, and a great place for women to feel right at home. That's what Final Fantasy is to me now. I may go back and visit, but I have long since moved on.

I disagree with turning your back on the series. I have turned my back, grabbed my buster sword, turned back around and omnislashed it. They need to at least attempt making something on par with FF7, or, dare I say, maybe even top FF7?.. Anything is possible. Start by cutting all hundred Final Fantasies in production currently, and devote all resources to the FF7 remake. Take a few cues from Skyrim. Then watch the money pour in and the hardcore fans return in droves.

You don't need to just turn your back on Final Fantasty, you need to expunge every trace of it from your very consciousness and slap yourself everytime you think back to it fondly.  

In my opinion, XIII is pretty good on certain levels. In XIII-2 the story needs HUGE fixings, but it's also pretty good in other points. (Graphics, Battle Systems, Character Design, Cinemetic Action Mode etc. )

I have personally been very defiant to the idea of turning my back on one of my favorite franchises.  I was so excited for XIII-2 to come out and I really believed it would right the wrongs.  Unfortunately, as I saw the end in sight after a paltry 24 hour experience, I finally came to the realization I was trying to avoid:  Unless they do something to fix this, I will never pay for a Final Fantasy again.

I'm working through XIII - 2 right now, and I have to say that I agree with Reiner.

It's by far my leaast favorite Final Fantasy, and I'm not very far into it because it just doesn't draw me back to it like say... seven did.

Skyrim has me addicted, and I still play Halo: Reach quite a bit, but this is the first Final Fantasy that doesn't have me watching the clock at work so I can get home to play it.

The whole effort of the series since FF X just seems... lackluster.  Like they were thrown together too quickly without much thought for the overall story and plot.

The fact of that just makes me feel sad, because I love the Final Fantasy series...

The original Final Fantasy was the first game I knew I was going to buy before it came out. I didn't pre-order games back when I was 10, but I had read and re-read my Nintendo Power strategy guide at least a couple times before the game released.

I actually lost interest sometime around FFX. I did eventually play FFX-2 and later FFXII, but I never really had any interest in those games. However, I just didn't get into FFXIII at all. I beat the game, but really only because I had purchased the strategy guide with the game, something I never do. Since I already had it, I did a speed run using the guide. Then, instead of using the guide to help me find all the hidden goodies like I had planned, I sold both it and the game.

I really have no desire to play FFXIII-2, and with all the great games (especially RPGs) that just released/are releasing this year, I have no time for it anyway. C'est la vie.

just wait untill final fantasy XIII versus comes out...eeeppic

I played FFX, XII, XIII (I didn't finish).. Final Fantasy got me into RPG's.. and now I too am turning my back on it.. :( it makes me sad to say that though.. so many good memories..

OH Well.. Kingdoms of Amalur it is :)

I couldn't agree more. Quite frankly, FFXIII is pretty dull. It seems like they tried to put together an epic story (nothing, IMO will top FFX's story) but just epically failed. I will probably play XIII-2, but not untill the price drops a little bit.

Yes the battle system didn't do it for me in 13, neither has the story. Final Fantasy titles on the Gameboys have been more captivating than anything on the bigger current gen consoles.

I have never play a Final Fantasy games before except for Final Fantasy Tactic Advance and about 2 on the Gameboy.

IMO the battle system in XIII and XIII-2 is overrated. It's not that great it just looks fancy and is very well animated. Also what is that crap about monsters? Are you effin kidding me Square?? WTF! I'd rather have awesome summons like we've always had. Maybe even tweak the summon system a bit where you become your summon (like Caius becoming Bahamut.) and you can directly control a more powerful version of yourself that throws freaking Gigaflares!

Hell, I'd rather have XII's battle system (Gambits, Switching party leaders, having a full party and not just 2 morons and a crappy monster, magic, quickenings, summons, the license system or the zodiac job system, hunting for marks, visiting HUGE cities and open areas without Historia Crux crap, and battling Yiazmat!! Now THAT was awesome gameplay.) mix it with cool animations so that every attack looks like a scene from Advent Children and I don't need anything else, except maybe the rework of the summon system and adding some of the awesome things I've seen on Versus XIII gameplay.

Even Crisis Core had a better battle system IMO.

As for the stories, XIII had a meh storyline, but wow... XIII-2 is the worst thing I've ever seen. As far as story goes nothing tops Crisis Core, VII, X and XII for me.

I think Square should forget XIII, and release Versus XIII which looks far better than XIII and XIII-2. Apparently Type-0 is pretty good too, so just forget XIII and release Versus and Type-0. That way we get better games and then we can move on to a next-gen revival for Final Fantasy.

Am I the only one who wants to see Crisis Core, VII, Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus turned into Final Fantasy VII Remake for PS4/Nextbox? A remake of the whole VII Compilation into a single, epic, legendary RPG of unequal proportions! Now THAT would revive Final Fantasy.

Ironically enough, the next 'final Fantasy' I am most looking forward to is 'The Last Story' made my mistwalker and the original creator of the final fantasy series, up until FFX, Hironobu .

Someone earlier said that Lost Oddyssy was a better FF game than XIII or XIII-2 and I agree. Again, Mistwalker. Now that The last Story is coming to the US, here is hoping!

i dont think ill be buying it nytime soon it story lines seems to much like 10-2 one of the crappiest FF games ever tidus dissapears at the end of the game all of a sudden we get 10-2 yuna knows tidus is still alive and goes to look for him what happened with 13 lighting dissapears at the end and then on 13-2 lightnings sister know she's still alive and she looks for lightning i need a way better story line than this so i pre-ordered tales of graces i know ill have BETTER TIME WITH THAT

i dont think ill be buying it nytime soon it story lines seems to much like 10-2 one of the crappiest FF games ever tidus dissapears at the end of the game all of a sudden we get 10-2 yuna knows tidus is still alive and goes to look for him what happened with 13 lighting dissapears at the end and then on 13-2 lightnings sister know she's still alive and she looks for lightning i need a way better story line than this so i pre-ordered tales of graces i know ill have BETTER TIME WITH THAT

Right on. Final Fantasy VII forever!!!!!!

To me the glory days of Final Fantasy were the titles VI through X. Although I did like Fran and Balthier from XII. But also in retrospect FF IV was a great tile and it showed that the series was starting to take on a life of it's own.  FF XIII brings nothing to the table like those titles did.Not even close. And time travel-- Squaresoft did it a lot better before and a long while ago. Chrono Trigger for the SNES!

SUCH A SHAME! I totally agree. VII and VIII were by far my favorites int the classic RPG sense, but there is 1 more crime against humanity inflicted by Square... They never followed up Final Fantasy Tactics properly!!! Imagine a new, revamped take on that beautifully balanced and incredibly engaging game. I must have beaten that game at least 10 times in middle school. At FFX the cut-scenes became too long for me. That is when I officially stopped the FF thang...

I was nodding my head the entire time while reading this article. After FFX, I haven't felt for any of the characters at all. I never finished FFXIII because I felt no reason to go on after reaching Pulse. I didn't even feel the combat system was agreeable. I always used to say, "Oh, I got a new spell or summon! I can't wait to use it!". Nope. In XIII all I had to do was paradigm shift and auto-battle. No fun at all. And I hate it when people criticize FF fans who say this generation sucks by saying we complain about any small change. No! We complain about BAD changes. FFXIII-2 is the first FF I'm not purchasing. "but right now the love I have for it is nostalgic only. *nods*

I am one of those fortunate enough to have never seriously tried Final Fantasy. Amalur is amazing though.