A genuine question of curiosity if I may?

With Final Fantasy VII now being over fourteen years old and with many of having played it when it first burst onto the scene (with lots of those many experiencing a Final Fantasy game for the first time), does it still actually have it’s appeal? I know I was only a puppy when I first experienced the FF VII and looking back I am actually asking myself why the hell there was such an appeal. Maybe it was those gloops of bacteria or materia or whatever they are called. You know, different coloured shiny things?

In all seriousness though, as a legitimate and serious question – does the game still maintain its charmful hold on you and what actually made it so appealing?

I remember being amazed by certain camera shots, like when they crane up to look at the pillar holding Sector 7. There was a sense of grandeur in the scale of the world, and with a game spread across multiple CDs, and with the greater verisimilitude in the sound of the instruments on the soundtrack.

People also probably related to it more than previous Final Fantasies, because the primary audience was made up of teenagers and it was a darker-looking and darker-themed game.

As far as playing it now, I did so just a couple months ago, which was the first time I’d played it since it came out. And it was fun, but the dialogue, polygonal graphics, sound quality, story pacing, and difficulty hadn’t aged well. I clicked through the dialogue as quickly as possible.

(My first post on this forum site)

I was 13 or 14 when this game came out and apart from Sonic the Hedgehog from my real youth, this game is the only one I look back on and miss soo mutch.
Like Arthurgolden i have played this game within the last year or so. I have actually owned about 4 copys over the years (thanks to eBay and other old games sellers), and like Arthergolden I agree that unfortunately its graphics haven’t aged very well.
However i do find that i can play a 10 or 15 hours of it without getting bored. I usually get up to the golden saucer or where my beloved Aeris dies (damn you Sephiroth). Its only a shame that this game wasnt made when Square had advanced to FFVIII graphics as i have found that they have ages much better than FFVII.

I also miss the feel of this RPG. I have found that (to me) the more recent FF games have lacked the feeling that this game as well as 8, 9, 10 and 10-2, gave me. By this i dont mean that it gave me any specific feeling, more that the old FF games seemed to have a certain feel to them that they all contianed. Cant explain it very well, so im not sure if you understand what i mean.

Anyway, back to the question. Yes it still has its charm to me.

I picked up it around a year and a half ago and I thought the gameplay was pretty fast-paced. The dialogue was ok at best though, but some of Cid and Barret’s lines made me lol (Sit your ass down in that chair and drink your goddamn tea! Where its fucking head?), and the graphics blew horribly. It hadn’t aged well but I still liked playing it. I really liked some of the music, especially the main battle theme, the primary boss theme, and J-E-N-O-V-A but i still don’t see how One Winged Angel garnered so much love… it’s just a mess of nothing and I honestly don’t like it one bit.

I’ve played it semi-recently, and to me, its still a great game. Playing FF7 and FF8 again (which I’m doing at the moment), I just get reminded of how much ambition and energy the series had back then. Being beloved by mainstream fans and critics is short lived, but it does give companies a real boost, like they’re literally leaping out of bed each morning, jogging to work and singing happily, because they’re doing something that matters to so many people.

The story still stands up as one of the most consistently engaging FF installments. Many RPGs fall away in the second half, but FF7 manages to juggle the end of the world plot, with the need to keep using all of the cast, not just a few favourites who eclipse the others into bystander roles. FF7 is one of the best RPGs ever at avoiding that.

My only real complaint is one that I’ve always had – that the final dungeon (the Crater) is really boring and dull to look at, at least until you get to the very, very bottom. And the lack of dialogue from Sephiroth in the final encounter is very disappointing – suddenly he has nothing to say?!

But this is still one of my favourite JRPGs, and *probably* my favourite FF. I go through patches where I think FF8 or FF12 are the best, but they are always my Top 3, regardless of which order I have them in, on any given day.

It’s safe to say, that most well done games, don’t tend to lose their "feel". The atmosphere is still the same today as it was back then. If you can’t look past the graphics, well sucks for you in that case. You won’t hear me saying that FF7 is the bestest game ever. But the argument stands. I still enjoy the OST and the mood that it sets. Yes the graphics are dated, but the backgrounds and atmosphere and little details still retain their value.

I still like FFVII, as it was the second PSX game I ever purchased and I did enjoy it. Over the years though, my fondness for this game has waned considerably… and not due to the game itself. The prequels/sequels and the incessant fanboys/girls who have gone on and on and on about it have soured this game for me, and I know that may seem like a shallow reason etc, but after hearing for the umpteenth time that "FFVII is the bestest RPG eva!" or "No other RPG comes close to the greatness that is FFVII, but it’d be better remade etc"…

It’s not the game (the original) I hate, it’s the fanbase.

No, it doesn’t.

It was nothing special when it was released – minus the 3D FF/JRPG aspect of it – and it’s nothing terribly special now.

I still like FFVII, as it was the second PSX game I ever purchased and I did enjoy it. Over the years though, my fondness for this game has waned considerably… and not due to the game itself. The prequels/sequels and the incessant fanboys/girls who have gone on and on and on about it have soured this game for me, and I know that may seem like a shallow reason etc, but after hearing for the umpteenth time that "FFVII is the bestest RPG eva!" or "No other RPG comes close to the greatness that is FFVII, but it’d be better remade etc"…

It’s not the game (the original) I hate, it’s the fanbase.Don’t forget about the people that constantly berate cloud for being an emo androgynous wimp…

No, it doesn’t.

It was nothing special when it was released – minus the 3D FF/JRPG aspect of it – and it’s nothing terribly special now.

At the time though, FFVII is credited as "the game that sold the PlayStation", as well as allowing console role-playing games to find a place in markets outside Japan, and (as measured in copies sold) remains the most popular title in the series.

Still… after all this time, the game is showing it’s age (it’s fourteen years old this year).

Don’t forget about the people that constantly berate cloud for being an emo androgynous wimp…

People will berate any character solely for the simple reason they don’t like him/her… kinda sad really.

I absolutely reject the ‘it was nothing special’ accusation.

With a party that includes several terrorists, scenes of suicide, tragic sacrifice and cold blooded mass murder, this was and is a very powerful game. The graphics helped to snare mainstream audiences, but substantial content was most definately there underneath those graphics.

It was (and is) charming, funny, exciting and powerful. The world feels realistic, the journey is suitably epic… what more do you want? Like Revan says, the tide of hysterical people saying its the greatest thing ever with no weaknesses of any kind, have fueled an unfortunate backlash over the years. And no, I don’t think its the greatest ever, but ‘it was nothing special’?

Don’t you think that’s going a bit far?

It wasn’t anything special beyond the graphics, which weren’t as revolutionary as people make them out to be.

FF7 was the first MAINSTREAM (JRPG) home console game with that level of graphics…Nights beat it, same goes for Pazer Dragoon.

It was blessed by three things:
1) It was a FF made by Square-SOFT.
2) Sony needed SOMETHING to sale their new, expensive, hardware that was going against fucking NINTENDO (right after the SNES)
3) Hype, so much hype because of SS’s dominance with Dragon Quest, Chrono Trigger, and Final Fantasy series of games.

The story wasn’t anything new.
The A-Team (hell, even Gundam Wing) (‘terrorists, but not) – complete with a Mr. T.
An Amnesia angst ridden teenager.
A failure of a villain.
"Tragic Sacrifice" (FF2 did it better)
‘Cold Blooded mass murder’ (you mean Kefka?)

FF7 was nothing special beyond the ‘wow’ factor when it first came out and the ‘it was my first FF’ nostalgia people have for it.
The best thing to come out of the FF7-verse was the remixes/remakes of the songs by ‘The Black Mages’.

You don’t consider dropping that plate on a entire section of the city to be cold blooded mass murder? Well, what was it then? Its absurd to say that if something has been done once, then its never acceptable for it to ever be done again. If we stuck to that, nobody would write anything, because Shakespeare pretty much got the drop on us.

And AVALANCHE *are* terrorists – they blow up those Mako reactors and by their own admissions, kill untold innocent people who were just nearby or simply worked there. The people operating the plant don’t make policy – they just turn up, clock in and clock out. But Barret and co murder them, leading Jessie to believe that they probably deserve what happens to them when Shinra finally eradicate them.

Barret’s story revolves around him coming to accept the mistakes he’s made. He committed terrible crimes as the leader of AVALANCHE, and this ended up getting all his friends killed (his team, but also the people who sheltered them in Sector 7). And when he sees the WEAPONS wiping out all life, just to stop people using Mako, he realises that its exactly the same as what he did – blowing up a building/world with everyone in it, guilty or innocent.

And I disagree entirely about tragic sacrifice being done better in FF2! Of all the examples you could have used, you pick FF2?! Over a game that has Aeris being murdered when completely unarmed and praying for salvation, and Dyne commiting suicide rather than have his daughter find out what a monster he had become.

I also very much doubt you’d get much agreement that Sephiroth is a failure of a villain. He manages to do more than most villains do in RPGs – he actually manages to kill one of the main party heroes, which is more than can be said for most FF villains. He’s also frequently the No.1 in people’s ‘Best Video Game Villains’ and is certainly one of the most widely known.

I just don’t understand the backlash toward FF7. I can understand (and agree with) the notion that it isn’t the most incredible game ever, as some people seem to think it is. But to say its only notable for having good graphics is just outrageous.

An Amnesia angst ridden teenager.

Cloud wasn’t a teenager, iirc he was supposed to be 21…

FF7 was nothing special beyond the ‘wow’ factor when it first came out and the ‘it was my first FF’ nostalgia people have for it.
The best thing to come out of the FF7-verse was the remixes/remakes of the songs by ‘The Black Mages’.

Except for those who already knew of the FF series… I agree that the Black Mages remixes were quite good.

Its also worth pointing out that until Cloud has his meltdown at the Temple of the Ancients, he isn’t angst ridden at all. He’s a cocky, strutting, self confident sword for hire, whose attitude seriously gets on Barret’s wick!

Cloud only goes into ‘crisis of self’ mode when he has every right to – his body was just taken over and used to act against his friends, after all! And later on, when he would be well within his rights to have a complete Heroic Blue Screen (when Aeris dies in front of him, and very nearly by his own hand), he does the exact opposite, and tells the team that regardless of the risks, he’s not going to give up.

If a hero has no reaction at all to stressful or tragic events that befall him, then it doesn’t seem credible at all. A game shouldn’t be a hero moping about in abject gravel through the hair misery for the whole running time either of course, because they have to show some heart!

For me it was simple, though I didn’t realize it at the time. Cloud was a very forgettable character until later on, even though he was the main controllable character, which allowed for you to truly get lost in the game. Achieving this through a 3rd person perspective is very difficult, and for a young child with no friends (most kids that were into RPG’s at the ages of 5-18) this was the ideal game. Aside from the fact that the graphics and gameplay were revolutionary for the time, it was a very generic story in that it had the classic selfless hero and purely destructive villain. The appeal has not been lost for me, reason being that I can appreciate it for what it was in its time, as well as the sentimental value it holds. For all of us who have continued to enjoy 1 Player console RPG’s, the ones that dig up old table top games and DOS RPG’s consisting of nothing but text and your choices as you move through, this game is wonderful and will never lose the magical, whimsical feel.

I actually agree that Cloud is not that great – I was never that interested in him, considering that he is the main character. He ranks behind plenty of the other party members in my favourites of FF7 list.

That said though, I haven’t liked most of the FF main characters, and at least I didn’t hate him like I did with someone like Tidus etc. Be they sullen grumps like Squall, ‘Rent-a-Hero’ templates like Cloud or wildly over exuberant brats like Zidane or Tidus, the FF stable of main heroes is pretty bare IMO.

And to be fair, Square seem to be moving away from the whole idea of having a main character at all, these days. FF12 and FF13 are both ensemble affairs, with the stated main characters not really doing that much more than the other characters (if they even do that much at all, in the case of Vaan).

lol Anyone is better than Vaan

I was under the impression that this was a thread in which we all posted our personal experiences and opinions with Final Fantasy VII. I am not a mod, nor did I begin the thread, but I think for the sake of good form and preventing a wank fest/General FF discussion thread we should stick to the intended subject matter.

chill bro it’s a forum, not everyone takes on-topicness very seriously.

Aside from the fact that the graphics and gameplay were revolutionary for the time, it was a very generic story in that it had the classic selfless hero and purely destructive villain.Everything is generic if you simplify it like that.

I was under the impression that this was a thread in which we all posted our personal experiences and opinions with Final Fantasy VII. I am not a mod, nor did I begin the thread, but I think for the sake of good form and preventing a wank fest/General FF discussion thread we should stick to the intended subject matter.

This kinda thing happens here on a regular basis… threads often get derailed all the time, but they eventually get back on track. It’s been happening here ever since this site went online bout a decade or so ago.

It does. I was always a fan of RPGS that don’t make you "go to the next town over and collect a bounty" and I always found FF7 to be an overall fun atmosphere. The beginning of the game starts off awesome and even the low key moments (sector 7 briefing) is full of funny moments and some decent backstory on Cloud/Tifa and Avalanche. Also I love Cloud’s choices, you can be douchy or really nice which is a great thing. You’re not angsty or emo during that whole time.

IN CONTRAST, FF8’s Squall is emo from the motherfucking getgo, and ruins the mood (at least for me) for any sort of heterosexual activities.

Squall isn’t emo considering most of the "emo" shit is kept in his head… on top of the fact that he has some legitimacy to his personality being like that.

legitimate or not, it was a pain in the ass. I had too many SMH moments when he doesn’t accept blowjobs from quistis. I understand why people may like him, but I couldn’t find one thing relateable to him. Cloud was cocky (I liked that), Zidane was funny and a ladies man (I liked that), Cecil was probably the only character with good intentions that was badass without being a dick (I liked that). Basically my point is that I liked something about these guys. I know Squall had a reason for being fucked up…but I didn’t wanna play as a fucked up, self withdrawn, super serious mode protagonist. If he redeems himself later, that’s good for him. And he didn’t keep that shit in his head, he moped around all day in the beginning of the game, and acted douchy cocky as opposed to funny cocky. If it wasn’t for Irvine, I’d have quit just because of Squall’s early game.

I’m playing through now and first dungeon/Dollet Mission he kept everything in his head.

Yes it keeps the appeal for me. I beat it once on the ps1, ps2, almost 2 times on the psp and now I’m hoping to get the computer version so I can play it and beat it on the pc. The games appeal is the very reason I joined this site. FF7 was overall a great experiance and something I like experiancing over and over.