Article on how the next released FF should be...

[Yrusama]

SPOILER WARNING! My post contains some spoilers about previous FFs.
Most of what he described also matches XIII's description, ironically. I think my biggest agreements with this are:

• The need for area contrast. All areas should be beautifully crafted, but we need mundane areas to contrast the stylized disco raves at endgame. XIV seems to be doing well enough about this, but as an MMO it needs fairly basic towns.
• The need for more FF themes and allusions. XIII had a lot of subtle ones, like the Fal'Cie are all named with FF allusions in mind, but when you take away ALL of the iconic songs (except the Chocobo Them), and make Moogles an afterthought, it makes it easy to forget that it's FF. The Main Theme is a proud anthem that practically inspires patriotism among fans - even FFVIII included it, in spite of its stylistic contrast from almost everything before it. XIII didn't have any of that, and Theatrhythm makes it very clear how drastically different XIII and XII are musically from the rest of the series. XIV is doing a wonderful job of this.
• A good villain is necessary. I can't think of one villain in FFXIII that I really gave a damn about. The evil Pope guy was only cool in his transformed state, but I forgot all about him between his scenes. In fact I had to struggle to remember he even existed, whereas Kefka, Ultimecia, Exdeath, and Seymour all come to mind immediately when you think of their corresponding games, and that's not to mention the ever-popular Sephiroth. XIV has Gaius Van Baelsar, and Nael Van Darnus before him, so I think we have it covered

So yeah. This person is blind if they don't see how much of what they listed are present in XIII.

Edit: on second thought, most of the villains I listed were present in Dissidia, which makes them so memorable. Seymour was a good villain, too (even if you hate his voice, at least he's memorable), as was Caius Ballad, and both would make fine additions to Dissidia. That should be the means for how they come up with FF villains: how well would they fit in Dissidia. The only exception in Dissidia's cast is Cloud of Darkness from FF3: she may be the manifestation of Light's conceptual antipode, but Xande is a villain with much more character.
A villain should, at a glance, be on par with the playable cast, maybe slightly stronger or older. Dysley was an old man, a politician, and later a god. None of that looks even close to any of the FFXIII cast. There's a reason I kept thinking of Cid Raines as XIII's main villain - even though he's only temporarily an enemy, he's a l'Cie just like the playable party. Gaius Van Baelsar in XIII may be a major military force for the Empire, but he's clearly no less human than any of us adventurers.