I don't mind the cut scenes, even if there are a lot. In fact, those were probably my favorite parts of X. Heh, I keep hearing about how unremarkable XII's story is, that doesn't bode well ...
For battle systems, some interesting things have been going through my mind lately. I really play RPGs for the story and to see characters that I like progress and change, either for good or bad. I'm always rushing through the battles just to get to the next story piece or character interaction, and while I like exploring, the random battles can take away from that. For me, it's a time issue. Many of these RPGs are crazy long, I think I spent almost 90 hours on Suikoden III, for example. I spent about 56 on FFX (only because I used code breaker at the end, probably would have been around 75 otherwise). A lot of time is sapped by random battles that could be avoided in the first place, or turn based battles that take much longer then they should. I thought Fallout 3's system was really intriguing, where you can see enemies and pause to make battle decisions, or it can be done in real time. When I played the FFXII demo I didn't mind the battle system, it was kinda refreshing after doing turn based for 14 years

Also, I figure in the time it takes me to complete one of these games, I could read about 15 to 20 fantasy books, probably with better stories/characters, haha. But we all know it's not the same, right? Or is it? Heh, now I'm rambling, but that concludes my pseudo-rant about this stuff.