most people that played FF games tend to enjoy the expansive world and secrets to discover
FF13 felt like i was running down a straight corridor fighting enemies, there wasnt that feeling of exploration etc
in FF7 as you explore the world map you could find Vincents love and the Mother to Sephiroth, as you travel you can find a giant snake impaled on a tree by Sephiroth, secret bosses and actual fun mini games, etc,
FF8 you had a guardian system that allowed for alot of customization to characters, a far more interesting weapon upgrade system, again secret locations and bosses, and special scenes. you had two lead characters with very different approaches to how they delt with problems, with a bunch of twists and turns.
FF9 was even more so like the above
FF10 was alright best character was Auron, drunken swordsmen for the win but regardless series went a bit backwards, no more world map to explore just a single path to follow around for the most part to locations, no real secret locations,
FF 13 linear and stale, captured nothing of the older games appeal, out of some 20 friends wit the game, none of them bothered to finish, i borrowed it before i sold my PS3 to play it through and did not enjoy it, as of now no one has FF13 anymore all got traded in, bought other games. I can see how others like it, but i actually have an attention span that lasts awhile, so being spoon fed things and running down a straight corridor kinda kills the aspect of an RPG, aka Role Play Game, I dont feel like im playing a role it felt more like controlling a boring movie. that felt like it would never end.
If SquareEnix was to remake any games, FF 7 8 9 would be a good start but Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross would be far more worthy of remakes