What FC does, (and what I can't seem to see either of you mention, but feel free to correct me if I'm wrong,) is develop the world, as well as the main cast.
I don't think it does this effectively at all, though, or at least it hasn't up to where I'm at. The characters have been -- with the exception of like one scene at the end of Ch. 2 -- really one-dimensional and static. I can describe them in terms of character archetypes but I have a hard time ascribing any sort of actual /personality/ to them. Kloe, Schera, and Oliviert LOOKED like they were going to get interesting, in the little epilogue scenes right before they leave your parties, but, uh, they're gone after that. I'm well aware that they join later and then shit actually happens, presumably, again, in SC, but having the characters show up briefly, note that they're going to be developed later, and then leave does not count as character development.
Also I haven't encountered any worldbuilding more in-depth than BOSE HAS A MALL and ORBMENTS ARE IMPORTANT AND GOVERN EVERYTHING WE DO and OOH LOOK MYSTERIOUS ANCIENT TOWERS. Every JRPG ever has this /at minimum/.
It's like I said in my last post -- the game just introduces stuff and moves on to something completely different before anything can actually be developed.
Just establishing that things exist without going any more in-depth than that is not character development worldbuilding.
(Truth be told I don't care about story all that much, I just don't think the game's mechanically interesting enough/prone to weird glitchiness? to be carried by its gameplay).
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