I dunno about the competition, but I say that the main problem is that Square can do any crap, put some beautiful graphics and the name "Final Fantasy" in it and it will sell.

Back when they had competition, and when FF name wasn't so huge (Until FF6 that is the game that made Final Fantasy famous) they had to make good games... And all the old-school FFs were at least good for their time, and all of them had new stuff.

Now even the innovations are always the same... They change the learning system, put some different minigames, change a little the battle system... They are not really creating new stuff, they are only reusing some old ideas and concepts.

But I'll tell you this: At least the graphics are beautiful.