I’ve played both Xenogears and the two Xenosaga games that have come out (name a decent RPG since the PS1 generation and I’ve probably played it). I do like the stories of these games, though occasionally the gameplay is somewhat wanting.
Star Ocean III was published in the U.S. by Square-Enix, but it was actually designed by Tri-Ace. Drakengard was made by SE, but likely by a different design team than the FF series.
No, more sales doesn’t necessarily equal a better game, depending on how you define “better.” In my book, more popular does not necessarily equal better, because I think there are certain independent, fairly objective standards by which a game can be judged–and game sales often do not line up with judgements made by these standards. Though I wasn’t really referring to that with my “more fun” reference–that’s more of a personal remark. I don’t deny that many of the marks of quality can be found in FF games. But I often find the overall playing experience of FF games lacking compared to lesser known titles. Don’t forget that two games of, let’s say, equal quality can sell differently simply depending on how aggressively they’re marketed (we can even imagine a parallel universe where the same game is marketed two different ways, and one sells better than the other–is the identical game in the parallel universe that sold better therefore “better” than the other?). So in that regard as well, the number of sales = the “goodness” or quality of the game argument seems to fall through–unless you want to contend that a game gets better the more it’s featured in TV commericals.
In other words, the sales of a game can be an (approximate) indicator of the quality of a game, but it doesn’t define their quality.
[This message has been edited by Dark_Shiki (edited 05-17-2006).]
