I guess we've really been saying the same thing, just at different extremes and at this point it doesn't really matter where it comes down.

I'm with you on a lot of these devs not being able to match SE when it comes to characters and animation. In a lot of Western RPGs, the characters look like they're standing still even when they're moving, and Crysis 2's character animations were like "really?" in a lot of places. In general, there's a lot of things I missed about Japanese game design this generation, especially in RPGs, and I'd hope to see them come back this time around. I'd love to get another FFXII or Dragon Quest VIII and show all these new gamers how an open world is really supposed to be done.

FYI Bioware is behind Mass Effect and Ubisoft Montreal is behind Far Cry 3.