FFXIII Isn't All Bad

I did not hate Final Fantasy XIII.  My final impressions were how I felt upon completion of the game.  Although I don't think the game is worth the 45 hour commitment, there were still a few things I enjoyed about it.

The best part of the game took place when the whole crew - 6 characters - were divided up into teams of 2 in separate areas.  There are 6 total jobs that the characters can have and they can only equip one at a time.  For this part of the game each character was limited to 3 jobs total and each team had overlap in their jobs.  This meant that in every team there was a job or two completely missing and only 2 jobs could be used at any given time.

Why was this my favorite part of the game?  Because I had to think.  Unlike my overpowered set-ups of 3 people with the perfect jobs in the late game I had to make sacrifices and make do with what the game gave me.  It was much more challenging and involved juggling jobs and set-ups to find something that would work.  Once I found something that would work I would very soon run into a fight where it wouldn't work any longer and have to go back to the drawing board.  This was fun!

When actual combat involves mashing the A button and having the characters automatically do the best action the fun moves away from combat and towards the drawing board.  I got to create, scrape together, barely make it through, and innovate.  I had a blast!

Then the characters met up again.  I could pick anyone with the jobs I wanted and put them into a team of 3 to power my way through the rest of the game.  I quickly grew bored.  I wish FFXIII had continued the trend of not having the right people/jobs all the time.  I would have stayed engaged much longer.