According to GAMESPOT , Final Fantasy XIII delivers role-playing game fans a beautiful setting to work through, explore and enjoy. The setting of Final Fantasy XIII is an original world and it gives RPG fans the high-tech attributes fans have come to expect from this series. There are two distinct worlds in Final Fantasy XII. The gorgeous, soothing, beautifully designed world of Cocoon which floats above a dangerous underworld called Pulse. Cocoon glistens with fabulous crystalline structures merging both organic and synthetic qualities seamlessly. Refined machinery and superbly built buildings are plentiful in the urban backgrounds and every little thing looks as if meticulously painstaking care went into the makings of it. Final Fantasy XIII has such fantastic attention to every detail of the settings you journey through that there is always something memorable in every screen shot. The design of the setting definitely has a quality artistic characteristic to it whether it’s the well-designed pipe-work or patterns on a wall it’s stunning and varied; however the technical graphics artwork has a consistency to it which makes the screen shots flow flawlessly along throughout the journey.
The Final Fantasy XIII cast of characters are diverse, likable and actually really believable to the point that they can become very real to you. Like many other Final Fantasy games, the characters feel like old friends and their story is believable. The most compelling character of Final Fantasy XII is actually Lightning, a likable, determined beauty on a journey to save her sister. You will meet Lightning and her companion, Sazh, during the first moments of the game. Sazh is a sweet, likable pilot who has an afro which serves as a home for a chocobo chick. Eventually, Lightning and Sazh are joined by four more characters drawn together by events, pasts and their common goal. There is the hero, Snow, the spiritual leader of the group; Hope, who is a young man who consistently lets revenge cloud his judgment; Vanille, a young girl with a child-like innocence who can be compassionate, but she can also be stubborn; and Oerba, a dark-haired woman who wears a traditional Indian Sari.
The Final Fantasy XIII gaming itself takes a single-track nature without any divergent tasks, mini-games, puzzles nor populated towns to investigate. The story line is maintained in the first half, gets somewhat muddy in the middle, but then returns to the fast pace it initially provided at the end of the journey. The combat is menu-driven and you only control one persona. Plus, each persona maintains its roles be it medic, commando, saboteur and etc. Maintaining the roles is critical to winning battles in the second half of the game. In Final Fantasy XIII, paradigms are created such as combat clinic or perpetual magic. So, if you have a particular need for defeating a beast, you can go into a paradigm for your necessities. At the final part of the journey, various make-ups of beasts will have you in one paradigm and out to another while you attempt to figure out how to defeat them. Of course the boss fights are fun, engaging, and difficult and will take different persona groups and paradigm layouts before you win. Overall, Final Fantasy XIII is a game that almost any RPG fan can successfully escape into.