Did XIII Ruin Final Fantasy?

People are talking about Final Fantasy XIII again. A vaguely worded Square Enix post on Twitter has fans discussing the possibility of a remake. But is it a trilogy that even needs a major revisit?

XIII was an important game to me, for a variety of reasons some too personal to get into. But it was the first Final Fantasy game I’d covered as press. I was surprised people were so vehemently against it at the time, and especially because I’d disliked XII quite a lot.

But even pre-release it was extremely clear that this wasn’t going to be a much-loved entry in the franchise. I wrote an article for NonsenseGamer – “Will XIII be our Final Fantasy” – exploring the issues with the leap to HD, and about how the things we loved about the franchise up to that point couldn’t be easily recreated. It’s a problem Square didn’t fully solve until Final Fantasy XVI and Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth.

X got by on a fantastic battle system, voice acting, brilliant visuals and a deep, gripping story. XII opened up the RPG elements, and many fans enjoyed it enough. Neither one fully captured what had made the PS1 games so popular. And yet it was XIII where people started to notice the polish had gone.

The decision to use Advent Children fight scenes as an influence put style over depth in the battle system. The meme that all you had to do was press one button to win every fight wasn’t exactly true, but was close enough that it did some real damage. The narrow passageways that made up most maps grew stale after not very long.

And then there were the characters. Defined more by their annoying flaws than positives, the crew failed to inspire the devotion that previous games had boasted.

XIII – Not The Final Fantasy

These are all still problems today. And yet, removed from the pressure of being the latest in a long running franchise, XIII deserves some reassessment. It’s still absolutely gorgeous, and the story has its highlights (read about them in the menus). No longer are people up in arms about a Final Fantasy game being on Xbox. We can look at it for what it is. Yes, warts and all.

Square have been pretty hesitant in re-releasing this one. Xbox fans win out with a tremendous package within the BC program, and those willing to mod on PC can make the original game really shine. And yet official releases on PlayStation and Switch have yet to happen. As far as official work is concerned, Final Fantasy XIII is stuck in 2009.

That’s a real shame. Because while this was the first modern stumble in a legendary franchise, the game itself wasn’t actually the issue. Whatever XIII was would have been divisive. It was the start of a butterfly-like metamorphosis that would take nearly 15 years to complete.

And so while this tweet is in no way confirmation of anything, the discussion around a remaster or remake of XIII is good. It’s long overdue its chance at redemption.