LIGHTNING RETURNS™: FINAL FANTASY® XIII Reviews

It is currently 09:18 pm on 02/24/25 as of writing this very review and before i start my review of final fantasy 13 lightning returns i just want to preface it by saying ive never played any of the final fantasy games whatsoever. i literally just installed this very game at 07:03 pm on 02/24/25 and it finished downloading at 07:11 pm on 02/24/25 shoutout to my parents for buying a quick internet plan and literally just watched the opening cinematic which took 3 minutes and had it running for 2 hours straight while i was on the settings menu or else the video wouldve looped. i basically afk'ed for 2 hours while watching youtube videos on my ipad pro just so i could earn enough play time to buy the myth and lightning backgrounds in the item shop. im guessing steam has it where you have to own the game and play it for 2 hours before being able to buy point shops items for it to prevent people from buying the game, point shop items, then refunding. im not a fan of artficially increasing my playtime but it doesnt matter at the end of the day. final fantasy and thousands of other games are in my backlog and i plan to get to them eventually whether its days or years. lightning is so beautiful though. im glad i was able to buy the item shop backgrounds. ill be uninstalling now and itll be in my steam library until i decide to play it again. at least i wont have to write a review because i already wrote this one! i wonder why youre reading final fantasy 13 lightning returns steam reviews in 2025 hmm what a strange life you live. did i break the 4th wall for you? haha. yeah go play final fantasy 13. i know i will some day. lightning is so beautiful. until next time, this is JNORJT, signing off! - JNORJT p.s. this review was completed at 09:23 pm on 02/24/25

A fantastic experience. I loved FF13 and 13-2 years ago, but didnt have a console when 13 LR came out, and honestly forgot about it until i saw it on a sale on steam. I really enjoyed going back and getting that closure from how 13-2 left you hanging. This one pivoted a lot more into exploring the depth of human emotions, and I really liked to see lightning evolve from the cardboard cutout so many FF characters are into a real person. It was less 'I need 5 squirrel tails for dinner' and more 'I'm still trying to come to terms with the death of my spouse, if you could find a keepsake from their remains I might be able to start moving on'. The ending was super extra, but frankly its a Final Fantasy game. Idk if they invented the whole 'start off killing rodents end up killing gods' trope, but they're definitely the face of it. Also the ending cutscene was fantastically animated, honestly mindblowing compared to the game preceding it, which even then wasn't a slouch. The time limit put me off, so I used the Nova Chrysalia launcher to manage that. I get that the idea was to limit how much the player could get done to reward multiple playthroughs, but I dont replay RPGS so I wanted to do everything I could in one run. I just cannot stand to replay a story, I dont think I did the whole dragon shit more than the first run on Skyrim. The mix of main quests, side quests, and canvas quests was pretty interesting. I thought the whole 'Last One' mechanic was super cool. And the schema switching was a fun way to handle the loss of paradigms from mostly having 1 party member. While some things weren't perfect for me personally, I cant think of anything I'd change for the audience as a whole!

A timer. So i'm being told not to take my time with this game? or to enjoy all the work that went into making it? and instead stress through what exact moves to make, and when, and to know where things are without searching for them? all on a time limit. from the very beginning of the game. no.

The final series of the FFXIII trilogy and in my opinion, the one that save the attempt to Trilogy FFXIII. Considering the failed attempt of FFXIII-2, Lightning Returns is a good end to the entire trilogy series and was a lot more concrete in the storyline, storytelling and the consistency in this one makes it clearer. Love playing as Light as she saves the world. However, the grind to complete the secret bosses? nope too old for this and too busy to do this on the PC port.

In Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII, the fun extinguishes the suck. For the franchise, it marks a change from the classic turn-based combat system that has driven the Final Fantasy franchise up to this point, to a more real time, action-oriented, combat system. And it is glorious. I feel exhilarated when I overcome a tough fight. And I love the Last One game mechanic. The first time I saw a pink Reaver galloping across the field towards me, I was scared. I admit it. I also love Lightning. She has quickly become my favorite Final Fantasy protagonist. Sorry, not sorry Celes. Lightning is the gracious savior of our souls, what more can you ask for? I suppose we could ask for a consistently great game like Final Fantasy XV. The game designers of Lightning Returns seemed to experiment with a number of novel game design features. Some of it worked and some of it did not. Some of the novel features have survived to influence the design of Square games that have come out since. This game is rough around the edges, but give it a chance because it is incredibly fun to play. What sucks? The time limit sucks, but not nearly as much as I first imagined. Don't let it be a roadblock to playing this game. I think the reasoning behind it was to prod the player into accepting this idea of multiple playthroughs to experience everything the game has to offer. I like to think of this game in terms of a multiple generation playthrough instead of new game +. The design opens up some interesting possibilities that are unavailable in a single playthrough. Inventory management sucks. And this is one of the few Final Fantasy games that requires players to interact with, or play, the inventory management mini-game. One of the interesting possibilities created through a multiple generation playthrough is the intentional selection and variation of inventory items over multiple generations. In this game, our skills are inventory items, and there is a limit to the inventory. There is more than enough room to accommodate a single playthrough, but in a multiple generation playthrough, we quickly run out of inventory space. And that means we have to engage with the inventory management mini-game. It also means that we have to make decisions about what skills to keep and what skills to extinguish. The player has to choose which skills to keep and upgrade over multiple generations of intentional selection and variation. This process eventually allows the player's character to inherit an impressive set of skills. This experiment, the multiple generation playthrough inventory management mini-game, did not survive past this game, thankfully, but the spirit of the experiment lives on in Final Fantasy XV with managing the inventory of our saved pictures over a multiple generation playthrough. There is more than enough space to save as many pictures as you want in a single playthrough, but in a multiple generation playthrough, we quickly run out of space to save Prompto's auto snaps. Players then have to make careful decisions about what pictures to save and what pictures to delete to make room for more pictures. I witnessed the beauty of this system and the incredible pictures it can produce. And the idea was born in Lightning Returns. What's fun? The combat in Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII is entertaining and it seems to have influenced the direction for the design of combat systems in Square titles that have come out since, not the least of which is Final Fantasy XV. Instead of pushing buttons to choose options from a menu, players now push buttons to attack directly. The system is a lot more engaging than previous turn-based systems. It feels like it has the right amount of button presses per minute (BPPM) whereas a game like FFXIII-2 has too few and a game like Hades has too many. The fighting in this game is satisfying although there is room for improvement (see FFXV). Square has defined an impressive mythology for Final Fantasy XIII. And the expression of the mythology within the game is very well done. I really like the story. There are some really interesting and thought-provoking themes. Like many modern video games, Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII transcends being just a toy and instead is an interactive work of art. It makes me laugh, it makes me cry, but most importantly, it makes me think. I recommend playing Final Fantasy XIII and XIII-2 before playing Lightning Returns. I'll be honest, I did not like either of those games in my first playthrough. The first one was an emblem of the the things I did not like about the franchise since VII. It was a never ending hallway with very little threat of exploration. The element of progressively opening up the larger world to explore was mostly absent from this game. It's basically, fight fight fight, boss fight, cinematic, inventory management, and repeat. That said, there are good reasons to play it. And there is fun to be had. I think I liked the game more after playing Lightning Returns. The second one kind of reminded me of Chrono Trigger. Although, I hated XIII-2 the first time I played it. And that is partly because I played the second one before playing the first one. I didn't get the story at all and I didn't know any of the characters. It was really hard to get into. I have since played the others and although there are still some things I do not like about the second one, I have come to appreciate it. Instead of a never-ending hallway or train, this game takes a more modular approach to level design. I think the dialog was particularly unimpressive the first time through, but I grant that it was written for a younger demographic and I also admit that a fair amount of meaning is lost in translation between Japanese and English. And that's why I typically give FF a pass for uninspired vapid filler dialog. And in case you are wondering, the acting for the Japanese voice-overs is better than the acting for the English voice-overs, oddly enough. I usually play these three games with Japanese voice-overs and English subtitles. I think that is the best way to experience Final Fantasy XIII. Overall, Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII is fun to play. This game is not perfect, but of the three, the Last One is the best. Also, it has fireworks. This game has more bang for your buck.

It's weird they call it the grand finale of the XIII trilogy when the story so far hasn't set up anything at all, and all you're doing are errands and chores for random people. I'm sure they'll come up with something convoluted and dumb eventually, but the first two games were interesting because they threw all the confusing bullshit at you from the start. That's my problem with this game, it doesn't do anything interesting that makes me want to play it. They have simultaneously expanded on the world of FFXIII and killed it by having the game take place a week before the world ends. The game starts by having Lighting personally tasked by GOD to save the world and you see her fighting Evil Darkness Snow. That sounds interesting! But then the evil child blocks a door and the story does a one-eighty and now you teleport and take trains all over the place just to do side quests. Judging from the screenshots and trailers, there will be a goofy FF story where people come back from the dead and stuff, but why does the beginning of the game have to be a chore? The gameplay though? It's pretty cool. XIII had 3 party members, XIII-2 had 2, and now the third game has 1 party member. Are you seeing the pattern? Square Enix wants to cut your stomach open and rip out your guts. But I will admit, you do get a lot of customisation. You're basically playing infinity nikki when you are progressing your character. And hey the stupid ATB queue system is gone, you actually press buttons to do stuff now. And you actually get to explore now, the world is a shithole though because it's gonna end and all that, but hey, you get to walk around and be depressed! That's better than walking in straight lines like in FFXIII, and better than the empty landscapes of FFXIII-2. The time mechanic sucks though. As a plot device it's fine, but taking it into gameplay just sucks the fun out of the game. You're already just doing chores, wouldn't it be awesome if there was a global timer ticking down every second? I genuinely encourage commenting on this review if you think there is anything good the time mechanic does for the gameplay. From my perspective it is literally just a gimmick, and the only reason it's there is because they wanted to try something new. Everything the time mechanic does could be executed without it. The plot could still have a time limit. You could still limit areas to certain times of day by actually planning out the route for the player, instead of making the game open world and full of roadblocks. I'm still gonna attempt to play this game. But after FFXIII pissed in my mouth, and FFXIII-2 shitted in my mouth, why would I swallow the cum of this game? I don't know, there is just something so tedious trying to play through a trilogy that never needed more than one game in the first place. But hey it's cheap and it runs fine so try it out, flawed games can still be enjoyable.

I've played this game over a dozen times on ps3 and now over a dozen on pc. It's a good game, may not talk to everyone's tastes, but it does so to mine. FF13 is something I grew up with so I can't possibly harbor grueling hate against it. The game could've used a lot of quality of life changes though.

A fitting end for Final Fantasy XIII trilogy for fans of this Fabula Nova Crystallis series. Overall plot and story is good. Can get better with time after not playing for a long time and revisiting back. FFXIII-1 > FFXIII-2 > FFXIII-3 (Lightning Returns). This game have a good soundtrack not a joke. Can recommend get on sale for FFXIII trilogy.

Lightning Returns has some genuinely great ideas as far as modern RPGs are concerned, and despite being let down by a shoddy story and some graphical issues, it remains a shining example of how dynamic battle systems and thoughtful character customisation can save an otherwise trite, lifeless game. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3424200961

Several things to consider: 1. You'll need a controller because this game does not support Mouse, and playing with only a keyboard is a nightmare. 2. There is only one playable character (Lightning), and you'll fight most battles alone. In certain situations, you might have a companion or receive help from another character. 3. Some Garbs, Weapons, Shields, and Materials are only available on Hard mode. 4. You can only upgrade Weapons, Shields, and Accessories in New Game+ (I personally really don't like this one). 5. There is no leveling system, fighting monsters does not earn EXP. The only way for Lightning to increase her stats is by completing main and side quests. 6. Some quests are time-sensitive, they only appear or can only be completed at specific times. 7. The time limit, is the ultimate complained-about aspects of this game.