Final Fantasy VII

Here is a review of Final Fantasy VII. Nope, no good introduction for this blog post. After years of not having written about games, or even anything outside of work, it has been really hard to get back into this. But I’ve already broken my golden rule…twice. After I finished Final Fantasy VII, I should have immediately written my review. Thoughts, analysis, dissection, whatever this has become. Yet I had difficulties putting my feelings into words, for reasons that will be apparent down below. Aggravated I couldn’t express things clearly, I moved on to Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII.

I’m not sure if I would call it karma, but soon thereafter my PSP went to shit. I wasn’t very far into Crisis Core, thankfully, but I no longer had a way to continue that game. Thinking about writing my blog post about Final Fantasy VII, again I couldn’t write. Months went by while I played other games, though it kept nagging at me. I mean how could it not? I set out in January 2013 to beat every Final Fantasy game in chronological order, writing a blog post after each one. Just under halfway done, while even at the worst pace imaginable, it was still happening!

Side note here. Having lost the ability to play Crisis Core, I later realized that things worked out for the best. Technically I wasn’t supposed to play Crisis Core after Final Fantasy VII. First off it’s a prequel, so I would have already messed up my order. Playing it afterwards was intentional. Yet I set out to play all the games in chronologically released order. So I actually shouldn’t be playing Crisis Core until after Final Fantasy XII but before Final Fantasy XIII. Which while odd, does make sense. With the future releases of games between Final Fantasy VII and Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, technology changed, development teams changed, and ideas of what a Final Fantasy game “should” be drastically changed. While I shouldn’t call it evolution (even though I use that word often in these posts), yes, there has been an evolution to the series between the two games that needs to be analyzed before I can dive into and experience Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII.

Moving on…I was about to get into how after a handful more months, I broke my rule again and started Final Fantasy VIII. It was the temptation of the release of Final Fantasy VIII Remastered that pushed me over the edge. The updated graphics looked great, but it was probably the 3X speed addition that got me to play it. And beat it. So now I’m two posts behind, and really eager to play Final Fantasy IX. Having played Final Fantasy IX in high school I remember how much I enjoyed the game. And Final Fantasy IX was one of the games in the series that was driving me to beat prior games, so it’s taking quite a bit of restraint not to start it.

So here I am, forcing myself to write this post about Final Fantasy VII. I cannot let myself get further behind. Already I have forgotten a great deal about the game, which is a real bummer, because I had, let’s say, many choice words about my experience. Also a couple months have passed since finishing Final Fantasy VIII, and I’m beginning to forget things about that game as well. To be cliché, not all is lost- literally, not all my thoughts are lost. I did manage to write down some notes about Final Fantasy VII. When I had written the notes, I don’t know. Could have been while I was playing the game, could have been after I finished. Both are likely true. All I know is that the last date saved on the document is in February 2018. This document will be the basis of my thoughts, a refresher, and hopefully I’ll be able to extrapolate on these ideas.

So let’s finally begin. First off, I played this on PlayStation 3. This was the updated version of Final Fantasy VII that I believe was released on PC, with slightly better graphics than the original. Not the Remastered version with even clearer textures and models or 3X speed. And obviously not Final Fantasy VII Remake, which wasn’t even out when I played the game. I would like to play Remake though, I’m very curious to see what has changed, and it obviously looks gorgeous. Maybe by the time I finish the series, probably around Final fantasy XVI, they’ll have released all of the Final Fantasy VII Remake chapters and I can play them as a “whole” game. We’ll look back on this post one day and laugh…at my accuracy.

Anyways, back to Final Fantasy VII. Honest thoughts- I didn’t really enjoy the game. I know, blasphemy! I just felt like the game never really clicked for me. The story, the characters, the gameplay, the music, they all just felt…meh. Final Fantasy VII fans will think I’m crazy, and would probably tear into me about how amazing the story is, how revolutionary it was for the time, how great the graphics were at the time, and “oh my the material system! How amazing is THAT!” But really, I don’t think it holds up over time. Yes, I agree it probably was revolutionary for its time. I will give it that. I believe Final Fantasy VII, along with a couple other role-playing games, pioneered the way forward for the genre, especially on the Japanese side. Is that statement based on fact? Probably not, but they’re my beliefs.

I think one of my big issues is that the game has had so much praise over the years, I knew going in that it wasn’t going to live up to that standard. This is personal, anecdotal evidence, so take it how you want. But often when I read articles or comments online, the majority of people who believe Final Fantasy VII is the best RPG (and game, occasionally) had experienced Final Fantasy VII as their first RPG. I personally believe that the game has more biased fans than any other game out there. This is a bold statement, as gaming groups stand fervently behind certain games. There’s just so much nostalgia playing into people’s thoughts, and honestly, I question if people have really gone back and played it, and compared it to other games both within and out of the series, and within and out of the genre as well- it’s hard to define what a RPG is anymore.

I’m sure you the reader are thinking wow, he’s really laying in hard against the fan base. But that’s the thing, I think the fan base is a big part of the problem. Very rarely do I hear about problems with the game, any criticisms whatsoever. And honestly that should raise eyebrows. No game is perfect. Before I get into my own criticisms of the game (and it’s not all bad, I mean it’s a good game), let’s turn the finger back on myself. Let’s talk about the nostalgia factor. What’s the first RPG I ever played? Okay so it’s actually Super Mario RPG, but I only played a few hours of it. The answer should be Chrono Trigger. But the point I’m making still stands. My favorite game, a RPG, happens to be the first RPG I ever played. So yes, I’m biased too, and I understand how nostalgia can play into loving a game. I praise it whenever possible, and nod my head in agreement when I see it near the top of “Best RPG” lists. The difference is I understand that again, no game is perfect. For example, I find that some ages in Chrono Trigger aren’t as fleshed out or enjoyable as they could be, like 2300AD. I think that certain attacks are borderline pointless in most fights, such as those that hit enemies in a line; you cannot actively move your character or enemies. I think Magus is interesting, but I don’t enjoy using him in battles. Marle is annoying, period. The cause and effect changes between time periods are cool, but used too sparingly. The music is amazing, I’ll fight you on that one.

It may seem I have gone off on a tangent, but I’m trying to give my thoughts and get the point across, that I don’t see enough criticisms of Final Fantasy VII, and that bugs me. It irks me that it gets massive praise, so much praise that fans screamed for years for a Remake, until Square Enix caved in and understood it’s easy money (but in all seriousness a lot of time and work went into the Remake). Chrono Trigger does not need a remake, nor do other great games. Why does a great game need a remake? What does that say about the original? Why are the most ardent fans not asking these questions?

Okay. I’m done with…that. I think I just gave substance and meaning to the title of my blog. And here I thought writing this would be difficult. The feelings I mentioned came back. *Sigh* Look it’s a good game, I just couldn’t get into it. I have issues with multiple things.

Let’s get something out of the way. This game looks like crap. I’m sorry (am I?), I’m not seeing what it did for its time. The backgrounds look pretty good usually, but I’m not expecting much because they’re rarely animated, nor do they have 3D modeling. So I’m going to judge what is actually animated and moves, which is the characters and enemies. And the characters look like junk. Do you know what characters and enemies look better? Those from Aidyn Chronicles: The First Mage. Yeah that’s right, low blow. Sure, there were four years between the releases of the two games, so I’ll give Squaresoft that. And by then both Final Fantasy VIII and Final Fantasy IX were out, and had much better character models. So it’s really actually a blow against Aidyn Chronicles (deserved), but I’m going to stand behind my joke. Cloud’s arms should break like twigs. Barret doesn’t have an arm cannon, he has a block arm that shoots things. The FMV scenes were great. But that’s not gameplay. The updated character models on the remastered version of the game look good though.

Speaking of character models, let’s talk about the characters themselves. This could be a large reason why I didn’t enjoy the game as much as the previous entries. I didn’t enjoy playing as any characters. Cloud is annoying and lacks character, even after finishing the whole game and understanding his story. Tifa is smart, but cares for Cloud too much and can be whiny. Barrett is sort of annoying- I honestly only played with him at the start of the game, and dropped him after that. That’s on me. Aerith has a personality I know nothing of, and is gone anyways. Red XIII, I like. He has more backstory than most characters. But still pretty boring as his story is minimal and only in two sections of the game. Yuffie is neat with her longer backstory, but written perhaps to be too childish. Cait Sith is sort of interesting, but I found their attacks a bit unconventional so I didn’t use them enough to uncover more of their story. I enjoyed their twist however. And Vincent’s story felt underdeveloped, unfinished. I do intend to play Dirge of Cerberus to learn more about him, but I shouldn’t have to. No really, I shouldn’t play it.

The story was pretty good? It felt disjointed. The player spends a good amount of time in Midgar (at least a new player does), and while the story starts slow, it feels good. Things happen, the plot gains traction, the player finally gets to leave Midgar. And at that point the player, myself, thinks wow, and that was just Midgar. I have this whole map to explore, and I know I’m going to return to Midgar at some point. Hours later I find myself bored, going from town to town, pushing the story forward without any big surprises. It felt like I was going to new towns because I had to, just to push the plot along. Every time I went off to explore somewhere new just because I could, I didn’t find anything interesting. This is coming from someone who acquired all of the summons in the game. They didn’t really feel like side quests, they felt like random extra bosses with a neat and helpful reward. That’s not to say prior Final Fantasy games didn’t do this, almost all of them are guilty of the extra bosses and super bosses that feel like they were thrown in post-production (I mean obviously not in this case, the summons are integral to the material system). But coming off of Final Fantasy VI, where every side quest felt almost mandatory, that missing a character felt like missing part of the game? It seemed like Final Fantasy VII had the plot in place and was telling a somewhat intriguing story about Cloud, Soldier, Shinra, Sephiroth, Aerith, what materia actually is, etc. But then lacking the cohesion to push the player forward besides “we’ll find what we need in that town, let’s head there!” followed by “this town is no longer safe, let’s move on.” The past three Final Fantasy games had something to drive the plot and make the player want to continue. Final Fantasy IV was basically “Everyone in your party is sacrificing themselves and the world is about to go to shit, what are you going to do about it?” Final Fantasy V was basically “The world is literally tearing reality apart and your friends are dying, what are you going to do about it?” Final Fantasy VI was basically “The world has been decimated. We’re lucky to be alive but things are only going to get worse. We have to end this.” Final Fantasy VII, on the other hand, felt like “So there’s a meteor about to crash into and destroy Earth. It’s imminent, buuut we don’t know how imminent. You should probably go kill those guys, so Earth can stop the meteor. What? No, you can’t stop the meteor. You need to stop those guys. Stop staring at the meteor. Also Cloud is having another identity crisis.”

Enough about the story, let’s talk about the music. There are a couple good tracks, but otherwise forgettable. I cannot remember any off the top of my head that stand out, unlike most Final Fantasy games that came before it. I became annoyed by the overworld song in the second half of the game, heard it too often. One-Winged Angel is good, but not amazing like people make it out to be. Unless I’m forgetting something, it’s only played once. It’s like saying how great the final battle music is in Final Fantasy X against Jecht. A good song, but you don’t hear people raving about it years later. I really don’t have anything else to say about the music. Good, but not great. Forgettable.

Having wrecked analyzed the overhead, visual, and auditory portions of the game, let’s turn inwards to the gameplay. Specifically the materia, the differentiating factor setting itself apart from other Final Fantasy games. This is another large portion of my lack of enjoyment of this game, and at times goes in hand with the lack of character development. At the beginning of the game, the materia system seems too convoluted for what should be simple. It doesn’t start to click until the player obtains other types of materia, and tries using them together to see what happens. At this point, it’s no longer confusing but, in my opinion, boring. I know some people strongly disagree with this sentiment, and will go on about how great combining materia is, leveling it up, splitting it at max level, doubling, tripling, quadrupling its effects… That’s great, but leads to really boring characters. Everyone can do everything, only limited by what they can equip and how many slots it has. Sounds a lot like older Final Fantasy games, except without jobs and classes. In Final Fantasy III and V, the player could level all classes on all characters, but would have to choose a class for a time, and stick with it to level it and learn the abilities. Abilities that would tie to that one character. Over time the class could be mastered, and another chosen to level. Materia can be used to figuratively create a class, but it’s never tied to the particular character or a class. All the materia can be swapped from one character to another. Someone who loves this game will cry “Freedom!”, while I shrug my shoulders and say “characters lacking personality”. Having higher or lower stats and individual Limit Breaks does not do enough to give the characters individuality. I like having the option to fool around with game mechanics and try different combinations. It’s better than games like Final Fantasy IV, with written-in-stone character classes. But I want the choices for leveling characters to have consequences.

At this point, I don’t think I have much else to say about Final Fantasy VII. This isn’t so much about not having more opinions on the game; it’s just that I have forgotten so much of the details. There could be reason to argue that maybe my thoughts on the game stem from this, but I would disagree. These feelings of discontent with the game I remember often while playing. I want to stress, I don’t think Final Fantasy VII is a bad game. I just found myself bored with much of the game. Those I talk to about the game may be able to convince me of its merits in certain categories, but they won’t be able to convince me that I wasn’t bored. My rants and harsh criticisms would be less likely to be voiced if it weren’t for, what I feel, this game receiving a free pass on most fronts for its flaws. Perhaps one day, after I finish playing all of the games in the Final Fantasy series, I’ll go back and play a few of those I found to be the best or worst and see if my thoughts remain the same.

So where does this put Final Fantasy VII in my rankings? Obviously not near the top, but I still had trouble determining where to put it in relation to some others. After much consideration, here are my current rankings, likely to continue to change:

Final Fantasy VI

Final Fantasy V

Final Fantasy II

Final Fantasy IV

Final Fantasy VII

Final Fantasy III

Final Fantasy

I wish I could go back and have this written as soon as the credits ran. My criticisms and boredom would still be apparent, but I’m sure I could have presented better points with more detail. I will do my best in the future (after the Final Fantasy VIII post) to complete my writing and post as soon as possible.