I already said my piece about XIII in
another post. Simply put, it is the worst FF game and one of the worst RPGs in general I have ever played. I am replaying XII at the moment and looking at XIII as the follow up to that game it is amazing how much XIII fails at every level and I wonder what SE were thinking when they made it. The two follow up games were SE basically backpedaling and being defensive due to the criticisms XIII received.
So, XIII-2 gave you a bit more freedom to jump around the different areas, gave you a bit more to do than just running forward in narrow corridors fighting monsters, included npcs, made some adjustments to the battle system such as you being gable to change the party leader (which XII had already implemented years before and XIII took away for no reason), etc. But it still inherited a lot of the things that made XIII bad and added a few of it's own bad things along the way.
LR gave you a more open world feel (again in response to criticism and the demand for such among gamers and again which XII had already done years before and XIII took away for no reason) and more customization with it's schema system; but then it mitigates against the exploration of said world with it's time limit/mechanic making you feel rushed and cutting you off from certain areas at different times of the day. It also has what is perhaps the most annoying aspect in a FF game done no less by who is probably the most annoying character in FF history: Hope. I hate games that treat me as if I am too stupid to figure things out or as if I have a ridiculously short attention span. Hope is nearly always pointing out the obvious or is constantly reminding you of things you already know and he does this over and over again to the point where it becomes annoying and distracting. I already KNOW I will be teleported back at 6:00, I KNOW there is a ladder there I can use or that I only need another number for the passcode, so pretty please...with sugar on top...shut the hell up. It is as if the game doesn't trusts the capability of the player to figure things out on his own and goes out of it's way to hand hold you in a rather abrasive manner. It is really distracting and immersion breaking.
I probably could expand some more on what I said about XIII-2 and LR but I really don't feel up to it and I don't want to ruin the good mood I am in
. All in all I think the XIII saga is a massive disappointment that really shouldn't have been the way it was in the first place. Going by what we have seen so far, XV actually seems more like a proper follow up to XII and what SE should have done with XIII in the first place.