well, i finally did it. Final Fantasy VII is hands down the most popular and well known final fantasy, and i've been waiting for the time to be right for me to finally play it. but after a year of playing through every game in the series, i felt it was finally time once i finished FFVI. (and FFIX... okay, so it was a little out of order.) y'know, with it being such a popular title, i almost felt a bit of resentment towards FFVII? like, it's the one that gets ALL of the attention, it completely overshadows the rest of the series in terms of recognition and fan service, it got a huge ass remake that was split across three parts... but after playing it, i can confidently say that it does deserve the credit. it certainly has parts about it im not crazy about, but it's not every day that you voluntarily mainline a 40 hour long game in the span of two weeks. additionally, this is the first game for this site where i took notes on everything i thought about it for the whole game, so this is gonna be a HUGE review. strap in folks.

so, let's start with the elephant in the room. for FFI-VI, there was a clear focus on that "fantasy" part of the title. as mentioned in the FFVI review, some games did include modern technology, or at least stuff close to it, but for FFVII, the first game to not be released for a Nintendo console, the team over at Square decided to make some huge changes. Midgar borders on cyberpunk, and is a complete culture shock to anyone coming hot off the heels of FFVI. the game opens with you bombing a power plant for crying out loud! you've got cars, machines, guns, security robots... i will say, i wasn't a fan of it at first, but i definitely warmed up to it over time. and to be fair, you do settle into a more expected type of world for final fantasy as the game progresses, Midgar only takes up like, 5 hours of the total playtime. and being honest, the atmosphere of Midgar is kind of awesome. i love the music in the Mako Reactors personally, and Aerith's house with all the flowers outside feels so comforting. and not to mention, i absolutely LOVE how every area in this game looks. some standouts are the Nibelhiem Mansion, Cosmo Canyon, the Golden Saucer, and Rocket Town. this was the first FF game to use pre-rendered backgrounds, which would become a mainstay in the series for the whole PS1 era, as well as into the Final Fantasy X duology, and i LOVE the early pre-rendered look here. there's just one issue i've got with it though, sometimes it's REALLY hard to tell where you can and can't walk. i know pressing select lets you have a little cursor showing where all the exits and where Cloud is, but even still that doesn't change the fact that some pathways just do Not look like pathways. at least they thought to add the feature at all... from what i've heard, this was a fan requested thing for the updated version of the game, Final Fantasy VII International. oh, and speaking of game versions...

i played the PS1 original version of this game, simply just because i like playing my stuff on original console. i think it's neat! however, i was not aware that the original translation for the PS1 version was... well, the way it is. 90s era translation and localization work is always gonna be kinda hit or miss, but for FFVII it's a special case. according to a friend of mine, the whole game was translated by one guy in like two weeks. so you end up with unnecessary amounts of punctuation, grawlixes where curse words should be (while still letting a couple slurs slip into the script...), the whole Aeris/Aerith debacle, some frankly bizarre enemy name translations, and general weirdness throughout the script. while a better translation would probably help to enhance the experience, i must admit that there is a cuteness to the shoddy translation, and i've honestly grown quite fond of it. it contributes a lot to the hodge-podgey nature of VII.

that is to say, FFVII is a janky ass game. coming off of FFVI, which is one of the most beautiful SNES-era games ever created, FFVII feels uh... trimmed back. their allergy to textures on models is astounding, it's gradients as far as the eye can see really. additionally, the overworld models are pretty famously cut back, Cloud's forearms look like toasters. i do really love the look of the chibi models, but they can kinda be distracting during certain intense story moments. i also find it REALLY funny how sometimes they decide to use the chibi models in the pre-rendered cutscenes, as if they didn't also have the full CG models, which are also used in the pre-rendered cutscenes sometimes.

one of the few issues i take with FFVII is with its claim to fame, the Materia system. essentially, throughout the game, you may find these little crystals called "Materia." each weapon and armor piece you equip have a number of "slots" for you to put Materia in, and placing a Materia in a character's slot will give them some kind of special ability. for example, this is how you get access to magic like your Fire, Ice and Thunder abilities, the Steal command which is usually exclusive to thieves, Enemy Skill, which is VII's equivalent of Blue Magic, Summons like Ifrit or Bahamut, and tons of other stuff. you can also modify certain spells or abilities by "linking" them with modifier Materia, if your equipment has linked slots. on one hand, this system is really cool, and allows for tons of player expression and freedom. you have a skill you want a specific character to have? give them the Materia! i think this would be an awesome system if you had just three set in stone party members throughout the whole game, it almost gives the same freedom that i really enjoyed in Final Fantasy II, with how you can teach every character any skill in that game. however, on the other hand, it leads to every character sorta blending together in terms of utility. besides limit breaks, there is very little to set each of your party members apart. no exclusive skills, no exclusive magic, and i don't really have a reason to take characters other than the two i've been using the whole game. my party for like 60% of my playtime was Cloud, Cait Sith, and Vincent, with Cloud as my physical attacker/Cure user, Cait Sith as my Enemy Skill user (blue mage) and Vincent as my main spellcaster. before i got either of them my team was Cloud, Aerith and Red XIII, and those two i didn't use at all afterwards. i don't think i used Tifa or Barret outside of the very beginning of the game or the parts where they're required, and Yuffie/Cid got COMPLETELY shafted, especially Yuffie. at least Cid is required as the party leader for like maybe an hour of the game, i don't think i used Yuffie a single time after getting her. it certainly doesn't help that this is the smallest party in any Final Fantasy, with your currently in use team having a max of three slots. three!! i already felt like four wasn't enough in FFVI, and they made it even smaller here! i WANT to use some of the other characters because i really like all of them in terms of personality and design, but in terms of gameplay i never had a reason to.

Limit Breaks don't really make that huge of a difference either, though that could just be my own damn fault. uh, y'see... geez, in every FF game i play i feel like there's always a key mechanic i don't fully grasp until i'm already in pretty deep. i didn't get the Ability system in FFIX until i'd gotten around 10 hours in, i didn't know you could equip Magicite in FFVI until after the magitek factory, i didn't know the Berserker was the worst class in FFV until i'd already mastered the job... but i think FFVII might be my worst blunder yet. Limit Breaks are abilities that are exclusive to each character, and are usually some form of very powerful attack or a teamwide buff. your Limit bar fills up as you get hit, and once it maxes out you can use your Limit Break. as you use your Limit Breaks more, you unlock new ones that you can switch to in the menu. i'm sure i was told this and did it exactly once directly after being told about it, but i must've immediately forgotten it because i didn't realize you were supposed to switch Limits until i had gotten to Disc 3. y'know, LITERALLY THE VERY END OF THE GAME. i was thinking, "huh, i know i did a sidequest to get Vincent's level 4 Limit, but it's not letting me use the item to give it to him... what gives?" and then i thought, "huh, i don't think i've unlocked a single new Limit Break since like, the beginning of the game." somehow i'd gone the entire game glossing over the "Limit" option in the menu. fuckin... oops! at least my two party members i'd been prioritizing, Cait Sith and Vincent, only has one extra limit and gets his limits very quickly respectively, but for Cloud i was just kinda stuck with his level 1 and 2 limits. oops!

man, speaking of Cloud, what an awesome character. before playing FFVII i had only ever seen Cloud in other media he's appeared in, like Smash or Kingdom Hearts, and after playing FFVII i can confidently say that he is a completely different character ingame than what other portrayals may lead you to believe. he's not just some brooding, badass, strong-yet-silent coolguy with a huge sword, he's got real fears, he's insecure, he goes through some INTENSE stuff over the course of the story, he's vulnerable. he's not exceptionally gifted or a typical "chosen one," but if there's one thing Cloud has, it's tenacity. not to spoil anything, but the flashback segment with Cloud right after you leave Midgar borders on psychological horror, it reminded me a lot of some of the imagery used in the final sections of D2 for Dreamcast. it's not just Cloud though, your whole party in this game is great. one of my favorites is Red XIII, the stuff you see with him in Cosmo Canyon is so fuckin' good, and i like how articulated he is with his speech. Barret feels like a good representation of the everyman, someone who can be a little short-sighted but has strong beliefs and knows himself better than anyone else. i love how, near the beginning of the game, Barret and Cloud are always bickering, but by the end you see they've gained a mutual respect for one another. Tifa and her relationship with Cloud is probably one of the best parts of the story, and i don't want to say anymore as to not spoil anyone who hasn't played the game. Aerith was my favorite character in the game before... well, y'know, the thing with Aerith happens. she's such a sweetheart, but she's not stupid, and she's not to be underestimated. it's such a good take on the typical "flowery girly girl" archetype, especially considering she's the token white mage. she could have easily been made into this damsel in distress, a girl with no agency or personality, but she's confident and outgoing and can fend for herself. which makes it all the more heartbreaking when... aw geez, why am i dancing around this? it's barely a spoiler at this point. if you know anything about Final Fantasy VII, it's that Aerith dies midway through. there is no way to save her, she doesn't get replaced like Galuf in FFV, and everything you've worked towards with her up to that point is gone. it's heartbreaking, not just because a character you like dies, you lose a valuable party member, someone who was on your team, there's a GAMEPLAY aspect to her death. and like, even though i knew it was coming, (i even filmed myself watching the cutscene where it happens and cheering like i was at a baseball game) the moment still made me cry. this is the first moment where you see Cloud truly hurt in real time, he's shaking, he talks over Sephiroth's edgy monologue, he feels like he's been robbed of someone he loved. (it especially hurts if, like me, you had Cloud go on the date with Aerith at the Gold Saucer.) it's not a tough guy type of anger, it's a confused, enraged, panicked kind of anger, like he's a hurt animal. AUGH, FUCK DUDE, CLOUD IS SO GOOD.

that leaves us with four more party members, and these are... a little more of a mixed bag. i still love all of them, two of them were my staple party members after all, but i wanted to save them for a different paragraph. first off, Cait Sith. i swear, people fuckin' hate this guy, when i was talking to my coworker about FFVII before i started it, i mentioned that Cait Sith has my favorite design of all the party members, and my coworker looked at me with disdain. disdain!! and yes, if you know the thing about Cait Sith, it does feel like a bit of a ripoff. but he provides a different perspective to the party's motives, especially Barret's, and he makes for a really interesting foil to the rest of the cast. plus, i love his design, like i said. he's the most unique of the party members, being a fortune telling machine modeled after the Cait Sith (Stray) summon from FFVI, who also rides a fat moogle-esque creature. his limit break is one of my favorites in the game too, Dice functions like Setzer's Fixed Dice weapon from FFVI, where he tosses a handful of dice that deal set damage based on the numbers they roll. if you get duplicate numbers, the damage gets multiplied by the amount of dupes. as you level it up, you throw more dice, capping out at 5, which can deal some ABSURD numbers if you roll high. Slots isn't too bad either, most of the effects are pretty good, unlike Setzer's Slot command from FFVI. Vincent was my other staple, i'm not usually one for Edgy Coolguys Who Shoot Guns, but Vincent is the exception. what can i say? i like a guy with a cool cloak. he's one of the secret, optional party members, so he doesn't have that much impact on the story, but damn is his design badass. he feels like a combination of Sol Badguy from Guilty Gear and Remy from Street Fighter III. especially Remy, if you know you know. that leaves us with Yuffie and Cid, who are... well... i certainly warmed up to them by the end, but for a while they were my two least favorites. Yuffie has this whole thing where she's this trickster ninja thief who steals your stuff, and during the segment in Wutai i just kept finding myself groaning at her. she's such a dickhead to you there, and i know she has her reasons, but it still had me feeling sick of her very quickly. she does become more lovable later on though, i can't deny that. Cid is the other one, and he's just a thoroughly-cooked dickhead. he has an airship, he hates his wife, and he has one of two weapons in the whole game with triple-rate Materia growth. i like his design, i think he looks cool, but that's about all i can give him. blegh.

alright, i gotta wrap this up, let's talk about some misc stuff i couldn't fit anywhere else. first, holy fuck this game is huge. i wasn't expecting there to be as many minigames as there were, weirdly enough. there's one part where you have to do CPR on a girl and there's a little lung meter you have to fill up and press X at the right time with, you fight dudes on a motorcycle, there's a snowboarding segment that runs at 60fps when basically no other part of the game does (that tracks your best times and high scores..???), there's the entire Golden Saucer which is Pokemon Battle Frontier levels of extra sidegame bullshit, you can breed chocobos to get special colors that can take you to certain places on the map, as well as being able to be entered into chocobo races... oh, and i guess there's an RPG tacked on as well. that last one was something i only found out about when i was at the very end of the game and i was trying to get some of the best Materia, and i found out i needed a green chocobo to access the cave that has the Mime Materia in it. this mechanic is something you need to interact with exactly one time at the very beginning of the game to cross the Midgar Swamp, and never again, and it hid directly under my nose the entire game. it feels almost like Pokemon with the amount of side stuff there is to do, i feel like you could have lived out of FFVII back in the day. it makes me wonder if this amount of variety is what made it such a huge hit to begin with...? also, coming hot off of FFIX, thank GOD the pace in the battles is faster in this one, it's such a nice breath of air. one more thing, the fight with Sephiroth. One Winged Angel has an amazing opening, but the rest of the song is just okay. Super Nova is a fucking absurd attack and has the most over the top RPG attack animation i have ever seen. that shit legit takes like two minutes, and it can happen multiple times a fight. and this was a conscious decision when localizing the game, they made it LONGER for the international releases! the original FFVII in Japan had a way more tame animation for Super Nova, only lasting like 30 seconds. overall, fight is pretty good, but not as good as Kefka or Neo Exdeath.

well, damn man. i have to admit, i was pleasantly surprised by FFVII. it's a landmark title in the world of RPGs for a reason, and i think it deserves its recognition. that just leaves me with... FFVIII and FFX, and then i'm done with my (mainline) Final Fantasy journey... after blasting through FFVI, VII, and IX all so close together, i think i'm gonna take a break from this series for a little while, so don't expect reviews of VIII or X anytime soon.