I can't believe this much griping is being made over a game that hasn't even been officially released in the US yet. This is ridiculous. How about we wait until the damn game is made available to people that aren't going to import it from Japan before we make judgments like this. Pretty sure that lady or whoever was trying to exaggerate how much work is being put into FF XIII's graphical detail to try and show off. But even if she isn't exaggerating, I think we can still safely assume that there are other people on the project besides her alone. I seriously doubt they all got together and said "hey guys, let's make a BAD decision and make a terrible game that's only redeeming qualities are graphics and a good battle system".

I'll admit that I'm not like mega excited about this game, but I seriously doubt it's going to be a "terrible" experience or anything. Keep in mind that this is SE we're talking about here. Although they've made some questionable decisions lately in terms of their games, I'd hardly call them "stupid". If they're making some bold changes from a traditional RPG, then they're probably banking on other qualities for good reasons. Of course, there's a chance this could all flop, but it seems to be having acceptable success in Japan, so it'll probably do fine here too. Let's wait to see it for ourselves before we jump on the "oh my god, I can't believe they did THAT" bandwagon.