It was kinda a double edged sword. As far as the base storyline went, i was quite pleased. The main chunk of the battle system pwned, and as a general rule i liked all the characters, especially Haschel. dirty old men rule. I just generally enjoyed the whole vibe of the game if you will.

If anything, i'd say that it ripped off Final Fantasy VIII though. what with the (SPOILER)"Main uber evil bad guy" switching from that king (don't remember his name) to loyd and the Winglys to Zeig and back all over again, it was pretty ridiculous. see as... Galbadia to Seifer to Edea to Galbadia garden, to Seifer again to Adel and Ultimacea... yeah. bad guy switching. Also with the whole "you're stuck" part in the last levels, making a huge fuss over high quality FMV, the entire Love it or Hate It public, and a battle system that largely ignores magic in favor of physical attacks. you've also got the "Over Seas is a big secret" thing going on, like Esthar in FFVIII and lets not forget (SPOILER)one of your allys being aligned somewhat with your main enemies Meru = Wingly Shana = soul of the Virage/moon child and Rinoa = Sorceress

Anywho (sorry, long rant) the problem with the game was in the details. Magic was generally useless. other than defense and the (SPOILER)Divine Dragon Dragoon Dragoon attacks and Magic were pretty worthless, thus making MP worthless. the FMVS, though awesome, had the absolute WORST VOICE ACTING EVER RECORDED IN THE HISTORY OF MANKIND, and if I had to hear the story of the Tree of whatever one more time from a "wise old man", i was going to snap.

So really, the base game was incredible. But there were definitely, DEFINITELY many many things to nitpick about, most of which inspiring groans and threats of physical violence when they occured.