I liked the steampunk direction 6 and 7 went in. They kind of lost me at 8, too much emo, pink and purple lol. 9...was GREAT. It was the best of everything that JRPG's do so well. I especially liked that they went back to a non-all-human cast, and all the characters were really likeable. It was a breath of fresh air after 6/7/8 to have a protagonist who wasn't a moody, quiet teenager. Zidane was just an all around good guy and I liked that. My single biggest problem with every one since X has been the new combat systems. I hate them, I like menu driven combat for my RPGs. The only concession I'll make is for XII. Building your party's AI and watching how your battle plans unfolded was pretty Damned cool. If they make a remake of that one is be right on board.