There's not much information on Final Fantasy XIII so far, but I've taken to piecing together every bit of information I could find onto this page and looking at every screenshot, so I can make a prediction: Will this be another Square Enix failure? Or will it take rivalry up there with X, VII, IX, VI...? Let's have a look.
Setting
There are two parts of the world in Final Fantasy XIII - Cocoon (air-borne) and Pulse (the planet). Cocoon is a haven from humans, inhabited by "crystals", beings far superior to humans. Cocoon itself is a highly advanced society, protected and maintained by a Crystal, residing in pulse. Cocoon's holy government is working to prosecute anyone involving in, or believed to be influencing Pulse.
Pulse on the other hand, contrasts to the technology of Cocoon, with it's nature. So the world itself blends both modern and medieval aesthetics. The majority of the areas shown in the trailers and screenshots look decent, but there are glimpses of some tacky designs.
Cocoon is thought to have plans to destroy Pulse, and Pulse organizes an assault in the beginning of the game.
There's also rumours of somesort of "war of the gods".
Plot
An exile is banished from the floating kingdom of Cocoon to the lower world, and finds herself caught up in a plot to take the sky domain down.
So as far as the plot goes, there's some essence of VII, with the midgar plot, and some essence of VI with the war of the espers. So the plot has a potential to be strong, but it could also be weak, since the setting sounds very political, like in XII - which is one thing I don't want to see again - a shallow, confusing political plot that I lost interest in.
Characters
The main character is a girl codenamed Lightning - reluctant to talk about herself, or her past (she's the girl banished from the floating kingdom of Cocoon to the lower world). She can manipulate gravity in battle and her weapon is a gun-blade.
There's also a hawt guy seen in trailers, who looks a lot like a slash between Siefer Almasy and Irvine Kinneas, and he also incidentally uses a gun.
Battle System
XIII drifts away from your usual Final Fantasy battle system. The camera goes all over the place whilst you see your characters make loads of pretty moves. Though the battle system isn't too much of a departure - you've got the usual ATB gauge. Different abilities (including magic*) cost varying amounts of ATB. There's also a new overclock mode - once the gauge is filled, everything goes into slowmo, and you can use special character-specific abilities.
Music
So far I've heard a snippet of the battle theme on the very short TGS demo, which sounds *very* X2-esque styled.
I've also heard another track, which was featured on the Cloud DVD trailer, and starts of with metal, progressing to an orchestral symphonic sound, picking up the beat and a metal undertone occasionally. There's also a brief symphonic piece on a Sony commercial, which sounds quite nice. I can't really judge from three tracks, but the soundtrack is likely to be good, as what I've heard is amazing, and certainly Final Fantasy-like.
Versus XIII
As part of the "Fabula Nova Crystallis" project, Versus XIII will be released alongside XIII, an independent storyline with different characters, taking place in a world which looks to be similar to ours (but according to SE, it's the same universe) - the two games are not directly related (it's not a prequel or sequel, but more a spin-off, and likely to take place in the future of the same world). It's apparently going to have elements of an FPS. There's been a few very fancy trailers and whatnot, but information, like XIII, is sparse.
"the game focuses on a mysterious protagonist, the last heir of a dynasty ruling over the only remaining city in the world to control crystals. Under unforeseen circumstances, he is forced to make a stand when his kingdom, people, and its crystals come under attack from marauders seeking to conquer the city and take the crystals as their own"
So all in all, things are looking sweet, though it's hard at this point to tell how the game is going to turn out. Once some lengthy in-game footage emerges, I'll make a decision whether to blow cash on a PS3. I recommend checking out the trailers if you're interested. Unfortunately you've got another year or so to wait.
Notable Screenshots
Source, Digg
