Re: Game Battles: Kingdom Hearts vs Final Fantasy.
Final Fantasy, judging both by their most recent games, but that's hardly fair. Compared to games that came out at the same time, it's fairly even. I prefer KH's aesthetic during that period for the most part, however (only a few monsters like Anima call that into question).
KH.
Depends on the game. KH has been more fun than the most recent FF games though.
FF has sold over five times as many games, but then it also has more games to its name.
However, both FF X and XII sold more copies than KH I and II, with both being sold on the same console. So FF wins.
Both are pretty acclaimed, but some of the FF games went beyond simply being critically acclaimed and became icons. So FF wins.
Depends on which FF you're talking about.
KH has a better story than XIII, but a worse one than Tactics, for example. I'd also argue VIII's story was better, as was IX's and VII's.
Not sure what this means.
Don't know. They're not out yet. I'm not particularly excited for either.
KH is more consistent, but FF's highs are above KH's, and similarly its lows dip far below KH's. So it depends.
Popularity is derived of a lot of elements that are very hard to measure. Dragon Quest VII was launched at the end of the PS1 lifecycle, which could be considered the slow decline of the Silver Era of JRPGs. FFVII happened at the very peak of that era, giving it not only great visibility but also let it to set expectations for the games to come, specially when it came to their visuals. Cloud has become the symbol of those RPGs, because of his simple design and easy to spot looks, however, you can easily list 10 games or so that were better and more fulfilling expériences even back in the day.
So he had a visibility and a pet status of sorts, but that doesn't undo the merits of other franchises. I'd argue that the Saga series is also among the top RPG series SE has launched, but that one has barely grazed the international market, whereas Dragon Quest is quite present on the west, only missing its MMORPG entry.