I thought Larsa was a girl, too. They don't refer to him with a gender specific pronoun until after you already know he is Larsa, so I was suprised. When Vaan like, put his arm on him before they entered the Lhusu mines and said something like, 'I don't know what's in there but we'll protect you' (my memory is bad but something like that), and then Balthier and Basch looked at him as if to say "what a duchebag", I thought Vaan was hitting on him, confirming in my mind that it was a girl. That was a wierd scene.
Anyway, this game is so good. I am reading stuff people wrote here and elsewhere and it sounds like it's really hard for everyone to put this game down. I have never wanted to play any FF for more than like 3 or 4 hours in a sitting, but XII has become my primary activity. Somehow they've made developing your characters endlessly fun. I'm just amazed. And when I'm not playing it (like now when I am at stupid skool) I'm still thinking about it. That's crazy to me.
Soundtrack is awesome. I absolutely love it.
Balthier is insanely hot. He is always my party leader because I love looking at him. Basch very hot, too.
Battle system is awesome. I don't know how I lived with traditional old styled battles for so long.
Voice acting is really good. Basch specifically is excellent, but what's with some of the npc's voices- it's like they try to sneak in a Scottish accent wherever they can.
Does the story actually make sense? I'm assuming it does, but I'm not getting it. I don't mind at all, though.
I LOVE the bestiary. That's probably the single dorkiest sentence I've ever written, but the bestiary is really well written- the detailed information and lore add some delightful character to the game and remind me of Tactics.