Sorry im gonna have to go with Nomura. Im a History major and im minoring in English lit. I enjoy Politics and a good book but I struggled through FFXII's storyline. I hardly consider FF7, 8 and 10 vapid or childish. If all you noticed were the love stories then you didnt pay attention basically.

As for the character designs, Nomura still kicks ass. XII's designs were ok, but Nomura still has the cool factor. Granted the main character in versus looks like a rough draft of Cloud, but the others look excellent.