You do realize that they stated that at one point there was about 300 people working on this project? One girl taking three days for rock that appears for three seconds may be a bit over-the-top in details, but FFXIII was announced in 2006 (if I recall correctly), so they've been working on it for 3 years, perhaps even a bit longer than that. Three days on a rock doesn't seem like a big deal especially given that at one point there was 300 people working on the whole project. Also, Square Enix has always produced, at least with it's FF series, gorgeous scenes for the given technology.

A way to argue with the review would to be to actually play the game yourself. Unless you are fluent in Japanese or have enough skill to get by, I doubt you imported it. For a game where the reviews have been so across the board and polarized, I think you are being a bit preemptive about declaring it as marking "an end of an era".