I liked Vaan. He was the Final Fantasy equivalent of Link. A protagonist who serves the purpose of avatar within the game world. Granted, he was barely developed, and had little importance to the story after Ashe joined the party, but he had an important role beyond just dialogue.

On top of that, stat-wise, he's the best character in the game.

In the interest of the plot however, a part of me wishes Square had stuck with their original plan of Basch being the protagonist. It would have made the rivalry with Gabranth a lot more nuclear to the game's story, and it would have brought back a strong, masculine role to the Final Fantasy hero. Apparently, the development team chose to boot Basch because the last game they designed (Vagrant Story) featured a strong, masculine lead and it sold poorly. Nevermind that just about every gameplay system was ridiculously complex, therefore scaring away 90% of potential buyers. It was definitely the fact that they had a tough guy in the lead role that crushed the game's sales...