Personally, I feel this game is definetly targeted towards the "old-school" fans. I personally love it, especially for that very reason. I love the fact that the game has broken several of the modern RPG cliche's (Oh my god! A strong-willed female lead that isn't afraid to get her hands dirty!) The world reeks of in-jokes and I'm happy to be able to summon the Lucavi from FFT.
The game overall, just has so much more thought put into it. It's a new FF for the fans that have been here since the beginning. It's more mature and relies on it's excellent story telling and it's deep rich world to draw you in. FF has always been about change and FFXII delivers in a good way. I remember having this debate with other FF fans ever since FFVII was released, and I'm certain we'll be debating about it when FFXIII comes out (With complaints like "It's too futuristic", or even possibly we'll here people whine about it being too much like an action game... who knows?)
I really like FFXII so far, and unless it pulls off some dumbass plot twist that makes no sense and ruins the point of the story for me (I'm looking at you VII and IX
) I can honestly say it's the first FF I've really loved since IV - VI. Hell, this game has already reminded me of why I really like the series (I may even find it in my heart to forgive SE for FFX-2... probably not but it came close...)