Story: You are Tidus, a sort of weird looking guy with a weirder name. Tidus lives in a technological utopia called Zanarkand. But one day, a strange being known only as "Sin" comes to Zanarkand. Tidus is thrown 1,000 years forward in time to a mysterious land known as Spira. His quest to make it back to his own time continues from there. The story is pretty unbelievable and the twists that happen in the story will amaze you. I'd even watch this as a movie. The story loses points because of little character depth...in other FF's, you'd usually find out more about characters when they had their own little missions, as in Eiko going to her hometown in FF9. You learn little to nothing about Wakka and Lulu, and that makes it less interesting. 18/20
Graphics: Concerning RPG's, FFX's graphics are superior to all others. The cutscenes are basically flawless. The detail put into these graphics still amaze me, and it can only get better in the sequel to this game. Even facial expressions on characters match their personalities. The only thing that I could pick up that is faulty about the graphics are that the mouths of the characters don't always match the words that they are speaking. That's seriously about it. 19/20
Sound: The sound is pretty good. Most of the time, you don't even notice it, but there are some tracks that definitely stand out and fit the mood of the scene perfectly. The battle music was OK. Much of the time, an RPG's sound is judged on the overworld theme that it has. In this case, there is no overworld, so it comes down to some cool tracks that are in it. And it lives up. 19/20
Gameplay: This is probably the most important part of an RPG. FFX makes some major changes in its usual gameplay format, and I think they came out well. Most people, including me, were skeptical when they heard that there would be no leveling up in FFX. But when I started playing the game and used the new Sphere Grid, I realized how much fun it is. In the end, it turned out to be as good as leveling up, and even better if you like to have a lot of control over what your characters do. The battle system is also different from normal FF's. Instead of ATB, it uses a turn-based battle system. If you like strategy, you'll like this battle system better. Also, the menu is easy to navigate. Overall, the gameplay is excellent. 20/20
Fun: Obviously, the most important part of a game is the fun factor. This one is great. The story plus all of the things you can do while playing such as the sport Blitzball are also entertaining. Trust me, this game is fun. The only complaint I'd have would be its linearity--with no world map, you pretty much follow a set path until you get the Airship, which is late in the game. But the game is so great, you really dont care about its linearity. Still, many people do not like the linearity of FFX. 18/20
FINAL SCORE: 94/100
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