The ShinRa building is cool because it isn't a dungeon in the traditional sense. It's more a true puzzle game where you are solving the problem through interacting with other NPCs, etc. Kind of like the infiltration of Don Corneo's mansion or a whole lot of FFVIII side-quests (how I loved that game for that). It may be a dungeon by strict definition (you fight battles in it), but for the most part, it was a puzzling section. Which isn't something you really had in the earlier FFs. You did have them in Chrono Trigger though (Chrono Trigger was awesome).

I also disagree with Versus XIII falling into the same development trap as XIII. Nomura might be ambitious in what he wants for the game, but he has clear goals as to what he wants. He wants a world map - ambitious, but definable and a clear goal to work at. He wants the game to look like a movie - ambitious, but definable and a clear goal to work at. And I think the most striking difference is that Nomura seems to have the idea of the game all worked out in his head already. It might have taken a long time to get there, maybe because it was ambitious, maybe because they were called in to work on XIII, but they have everything in place.

XIII had a lot of ideas and I can see that the story had a lot of elements they wanted to include, but they just didn't have the vision to weave everything together effectively. Too many ideas and not enough clear vision.

XIII's cast might have been melodramatic and Hope, in particular, might have been a whiney brat, and the game may have been too linear and the battle system may not have provided an option for more complex battles and the ending might have been WTF and there is no worthwhile equipment system - but on the whole, it was good fun. Do I want more puzzle elements and NPC-driven side-quests. YES, I do. But that's from the PSone era, not the SNES era? Do I want characters and stories that are more believable and less over-the-top? YES, I do. But that's from FFXII.