Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Locked thread
Elentor
Dec 14, 2004

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS



What is Final Fantasy VII?

I think everyone and their mother have heard of Final Fantasy VII. Released in 1997, the RPG quickly became an overwhelming success. Some people believe FF7 is the reason the PSX succeeded [citation needed]. Although it wasn't the first J-RPG for the Playstation, the game redefined the genre as it was and the companies quickly jumped on the bandwagon. It was the golden era of J-RPGs and a great time to be a gamer, but then the PS2 came and Square started taking, let's say, controversial decisions.

But FF7 is not without controversies. The game was huge on its release and still has a considerable fanbase - maybe the largest of any Final Fantasy, given how Square-Enix likes to milk the franchise dry, its hands holding the teats so strongly that they leak more blood than milk. However, despite of or because of its success, FF7 is considered one of the most overrated games of all time. This isn't helped by the fact the spin-offs (for the most part) suck, the game had less than sub-par translation and every 13 years old kid wanted to name their Diablo character or ICQ Nickname as a variation of _-~SepHiROTH~-_.


Regardless, the game is very well-made and like all other PS-era Final Fantasies, extremely detailed. The characters got a bit distorted over time in the spin-offs, but when not being racist FF7 features some great dialogues and attempts to do some very creative things.


So what is the game about?

Final Fantasy VII is set in a dystopian "modern" fantasy world with a heavy Cyberpunk theme. The game is also different from other Final Fantasies or J-RPGs (and closer to W-RPGs) in the sense that it's not afraid of talking about sexuality and featuring less than subtle gay undertones. The game also features themes that are much closer to issues from our real world like consequences from screwing up with the environment, unresolved love triangles, poverty and social issues, etc. It's by no means a treatise on those subjects but it's a nice human touch.

It was also the first Final Fantasy to feature a modern world. While usually in previous games the theme was medieval, in FF7 there are cars, guns, helicopters and technology that is similar to ours. It was also the culmination of the series trend to make progressively darker games, a trend that ended somewhat on FF9. Also, like FF6 it mixes different genres, periods and cultures instead of going full-D&D. Hence you have a modern world with magic and swords and all sorts of crazy shenanigans.

LP Rules

* Boss fights will include a video because hey, why not?
* NO SPOILERS. I met two people this year who had just started playing FF7 and did not actually know anything, even the major events everyone knows about. So it's possible there will be one or two readers who don't know either. Don't talk about anything beyond what we've seen.
* Again, NO SPOILERS. This includes fake spoilers, wink-winking about spoilers, or eliminating possibilities about which we can't draw a conclusion yet.
* I'm gonna break this game's combat mechanics horribly, without glitches, the "way the developers intended". You're not gonna get a raw experience when it comes to boss fights, or see me struggling. But the thing is, most of the boss fights in this game are completely irrelevant to the plot and the bosses are just stuff that happen to be in your way. Most of the fights result in the boss dying without doing anything and I do it in many, many different ways. If you enjoy seeing the game's battle system being exploited, molested and otherwise broken, you're gonna enjoy watching the videos. If you have never played the game, I still explain everything that is combat-related.

Thread Rules
* NO EU TALK.
* Don't talk about which FF is better/worse.
* THIS GAME IS NOT POLITICALLY CORRECT. From the beginning to the end, it's a roller-coaster of things that are just downright wrong. It's negative, morbid and depressive. It has humor of questionable taste. It assumes that you're an adult and can judge correctly what is going on. You're free to point out how a character is an rear end in a top hat but don't go meta and argue about how the game is not being sensitive. If you're sensitive to these things, this might not be the game for you.
* Talking about other Final Fantasies or even J-RPGs is allowed. You can go OT as long as it's not about something incredibly stupid.
* Do not talk about other posts. Like "People need to stop discussing X". As long as it's not a terrible nitpick debates, you can go crazy on tangents.
* About FF7, you can talk about everything mentioned in the manual (like that other characters such as Cid exist) as long as you don't spoil anything about them. Similarly, you can talk about battle mechanics as long as it doesn't spoil anything, and most of the time it doesn't. So don't spoiler-tag spell names, it's not a spoiler that we get a spell called Fire 3 or that you fight Goblins.


So without further ado, let's start shall we?


Content:

CD 1
Chapter 1 - In which we put rose-tinted glasses
Chapter 2 - A Tribute to Joss Wheddon
Chapter 3 - Who's Bad?
Chapter 4 - In which we talk about limits
Chapter 5 - A Naming of Stoners
Chapter 6 - Mods and the Shinra Mafia
Chapter 7 - In which we finally get to the LP title
Chapter 8 - The Soap Opera Appreciation Station
Chapter 9 - The Wall Market
Chapter 10 - Transgender Megathread
Chapter 11 - [Yahoo Questions] "Am I gay if I like crossdressing?"
Chapter 12 - [E/N] How do I avoid being Friend-Zoned?
Chapter 13 - poo poo Gets Real
Chapter 14 - Flashbacks
Chapter 15 - A Golden Shiny Wire
Chapter 16 - Obligatory Puzzle Dungeon
Chapter 17 - God drat it, Hojo
Chapter 18 - Creepy Korean Horror Movie Hour
Chapter 19 - Out of Darkness, Out of Mind
Chapter 20 - A minute of chillaxation
Chapter 21 - Major Plot Exposition Time
Chapter 22 - Let's drink the whole whiskey bottle
Chapter 23 - In which we side-quest
Chapter 24 - In which we do more side-quests
Chapter 25 - A Parade... of Mini-Games
Chapter 26 - Trip-Hop City
Chapter 27 - It's a Boat time
Chapter 28 - It's a Bossa time
Chapter 29 - Life's a beach
Chapter 30 - VEGAS, BABE!
Chapter 31 - It's Funday Sunday!
Chapter 32 - A Desert Tale
Chapter 33 - The Terrible Secrets of Chocobo Racing
Chapter 34 - Of Side and Games
Chapter 35 - Gon Ga Ga
Chapter 36 - A Star Wars Holiday Special
Chapter 37 - The Sealed Cave that wants to kill you
Chapter 38 - Vincent, Part I
Chapter 39 - Vincent, Part II
Chapter 40 - Mount Piņata
Chapter 41 - Rocket Town, Part I
Chapter 42 - Rocket Town, Part II
Chapter 43 - Wutai
Chapter 44 - Smoke and Mirrors
Chapter 45 - Damsel
Chapter 46 - Unfinished Business
Chapter 47 - The Calm
Chapter 48 - Exposition
Chapter 49 - Do you wanna date my Avatar?
Chapter 50 - [Temple of the Ancients]
Chapter 51 - Wherein the plot finally starts
Chapter 52 - Nothing else materias
Chapter 53 - Distress
Chapter 54 - The Storm

CD 2
Chapter 55 - Onward
Chapter 56 - Cold Exposition, Part I
Chapter 57 - Cold Exposition, Part II
Chapter 58 - Holzoff Ice
Chapter 59 - Iceburn
Chapter 60 - Cool Cool Mountain
Chapter 61 - Upward Slope
Chapter 62 - Paradise Lost
Chapter 63 - Climax
Recap
Chapter 64 - Fade to Black
Chapter 65 - World of Ruin
Chapter 66 - Weapon ex Machina
Chapter 67 - Bad Breath
Chapter 68 - Poppin' and Slappin'
Chapter 69 - Sweet Ride
Chapter 70 - Around the World
Chapter 71 - Searching for Friends
Chapter 72 - Winds of Change
Chapter 73 - Visiting Mideel
Chapter 74 - Preparations
Chapter 75 - Mako Age
Chapter 76 - Visiting Cloud
Chapter 77 - A Cloud to the Past
Chapter 78 - Revelations
Chapter 79 - Status Quo
Chapter 80 - Zephyr
Chapter 81 - Update de Chocobo
Chapter 82 - Capitulo de Chocobo
Chapter 83 - Digging the Past, Part I
Chapter 84 - Digging the Past, Part II
Chapter 85 - Under the Sea
Chapter 86 - Red Submarine
Chapter 87 - Like a Rocket Man
Chapter 88 - Rocket Queen
Chapter 89 - Guidance
Chapter 90 - Secrets of the Deep
Chapter 91 - Redacted
Chapter 92 - Hope
Chapter 93 - Attack on Weapon
Chapter 94 - Crossfire
Chapter 95 - Measures
Chapter 96 - Bungee Oogie Oogie
Chapter 97 - Looting
Chapter 98 - Will it Blend?
Chapter 99 - Choices

CD 3
Chapter 100 - Hide and Seek
Chapter 101 - Jump Puzzles
Chapter 102 - North Crater, Part I
Chapter 103 - North Crater, Part II
Chapter 104 - Weapon
Chapter 105 - Into Light, Part I
Chapter 106 - Into Light, Part II

Bonus - A bit more into Japanese Horror and Tokusatsu Villains
Bonus - Tarepanda's Notes

Epilogue, Part I
Epilogue, Part II



Lamprey Cannon presents: Let's Play Final Fantasy VII, Famicom Edition!

Part 1 - Untitled Document
Part 2 - Remember when we were blue, Cloud?
Part 3 - Just because he aren't sick doesn't mean he are well.
Part 4 - This whole thing's stupid. Let's keep going.
Part 5 - Snake? Snake! SNAAAAAKE!
Part 6 - Geographical Improbabilities
Part 7 - Ho Ho Hooooo!


Orange Fluffy Sheep presents: FFVII Low-Level Run Extreme OCD Edition!

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18



Fan Art

Screaming Idiot:

This is something of beauty:



Screaming idiot on Hojo's crazy breeding schemes:



Sephiroth and Jenova would make a great sitcom:




Pesky Splinter:

That's the question.



Pesky Splinter reveals what Scarlet is doing with the military fund:



Pesky Splinter decides to show Hojo's secret to dating hot girls:



Pesky Splinter infuses me with horrible, horrible nightmares:



I have no words to describe this, you have to see for yourself:



Faraday Cage:

Faraday Cage found the successful algorithm for condensing the maximum amount of IP hype in a single image, and disguised it as a joke fanart.



HotAndColdAF:

HotAndColdAF uncovers the truth of Sephiroth's arrival at Costa Del Sol:







Orange Fluffy Sheep:

OFS decides to follow today's trends to make everything dark and gritty:



OFS shows what every woman knows - five Enemy Skills are better than four.



OFS knows how to teach about health hazards better than his parents ever did.




L5 Death:

L5 Death shows that a year long routine of bad puns and screenshots can become an addictive combination.



ArchWizard:

ArchWizard reveals Tifa's sudden change of career. The bar just wasn't working for her.



MarquiseMindfang:

MarquiseMindfang shows Dr. Octavius has got nothing on Barret.



Macaluso:

Macaluso shows that there's no limit to FF fans when it comes down to bizarre crossovers.



Ropnolc:

Ropnolc shows the softer, almost gelatinous side of Cloud's heart.




Frogisis:



We're all cheering for your escape, Tifa.



Frogisis makes EponymousMrYar's vision come true, and Hojo's fantasies come truer.



Even Lightning wouldn't return from the iceburns.




Zeikier:

Zeikier reveals what truly happened to Meteor after the game's ending.

Elentor fucked around with this message at 15:38 on Mar 14, 2016

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Elentor
Dec 14, 2004

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS
Chapter 1 - In which we put rose-tinted glasses



Squaresoft was a great company, shame it ended.



And this is the first thing we see.

Back in '97 I remember my friends going apeshit that you could have characters done in CGI now.







Who names their bar "Goblin's Bar"?



And so our adventure begins.
I think it's pretty neat that for once we're starting in a big city instead of running away from a small one.



This is Midgar. Don't worry, it looks much bigger from the inside, once you get past the fact there's a building the size of Mt. Everest in it.



This opening has everything, even trains.



I like this shot. You can come back to it later and you'll see a lot of the pre-rendered areas in it.

All in all it's a good opening. Square did a version of it for the PS3, which is pretty neat and I recommend for everyone to watch:

It's also the closest thing we'll ever have to a remake because FF7 fans can't ever have nice things.



A bunch of people wearing bandanas jump off the train and kick some of the guards.



And this is our protagonist doing his first action in the game: Stealing a potion off a knocked guard.

Unfortunately our protagonist doesn't believe in all this alternative medicine stuff so he's just gathering them to sell later, possibly on eBay.



The guards don't like that he's stealing their drinks.



This is the first battle, in which we learn our protagonist is an Ex-SOLDIER. He also wears a huge sword. It's a pretty effective intro if you think about it, FF7 is the closest thing to a ROOOLLING STAAART that we have on J-RPGs.

Also, the OST starts out awesome. Around 1:10 is when the opening music ends. The music keeps playing even during battles, which is pretty neat.



For the most part, FF7 is a really easy game. You can see that the enemy barely scratches you and although this is the first fight of the game, it never gets much harder than this.

You can break this game hilariously as a result, although not as hilariously as you can break FF8 if you set your heart to it.



We win the fight and move on.



Jessie: "SOLDIER? Aren't they the enemy? What's he doing with us in AVALANCHE?"
Biggs: "Hold it, Jessie. He WAS in SOLDIER. He quit them and now is one of us."

And with that the Caps Lock Brigade concludes the expository dialogue.



Biggs is the guy who looks like a skinny Rambo. The chick trying to open the door is Jessie. The fat dude on the corner is Wedge.

When I was a kid I never realized Jessie was a chick, the polygons didn't reveal much and my English wasn't good enough to deduct.



And this is our protagonist, Mr. Cloud.



drat, son.



"Our target's the North Mako Reactor. We'll meet on the bridge in front of it."

You can see that these folks are up to no good but whatever their plan is they clearly don't have much experience doing it.



Jaime Lannister, I want you to be my royal guard.



FF7 is a show of potentially offensive racial stereotypes and man, Barret is the king of them. I think they modelled Barret on Mr.T. Barret is the leader of AVALANCHE.



Cloud: What the HELL are you talking about?





I love these backgrounds. The sign alternates between "WARNING" and "INTRUDER" so the whole place knows we're here already.

An interesting bit of trivia is that FF7 had backgrounds rendered in slightly higher resolution than FF8, because of disc space.



The Reactor bridge. You can see the whole thing is floating and there's a lot of buildings down there. Pretty unsettling scenery.



Once you get inside the reactor, this music starts playing. It's very fitting.







Mako as we know is the planet's blood. The concept of Mako as the world's energy was reused in the Final Fantasy movie (Spirits Within) and to an extent in FF9 and FF10/10-2. It's not original to FF7, however, but it's too early for us to talk about it.



Cloud being delicate as usual.

What we know is that our band of heroes are actually off to do, well, things that are not so heroic.

After that Barret decides he'll follow you around to keep a close eye. Jessie and Biggs are 1337 h4x0rs and crack the code to open the doors in a CSI fashion.

Exploring a bit the reactor we find a Phoenix Down. These are used to revive fallen members. They kinda come in handy as they're expensive items and you don't find many of them around.







God drat it Cloud.

So we learn that Barret is a huge hippie gone wild. You can kinda understand Cloud here. I mean, he probably thinks that Barret's new age talk is complete bullshit and he probably thinks these guys are crazy too. You have to be pretty crazy to think the powerplants are draining mystical energy from the planet that keeps it alive.







Cloud starts with two spells - Bolt and Ice. Machines are typically weak to Electricity, so they take double damage from Bolt.

At the party menu we can access "Magic" but we can't do anything about it now. All we know is that Cloud is not just an elite mercenary, he's also a wizard.



And down we go further in the reactor.



WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?



We find yet another potion lying around. Why would someone working in a reactor bring a potion though? Why not some soda, or water? Maybe the working conditions are really bad and you get hurt all the time. I'll go with that.

At any rate Cloud takes it to sell later because he ain't drinking anything.



Our first Save-Point. While a Save-Point doesn't always indicate that there's an incoming boss, the opposite is true - there's always a Save-Point before a boss. Well, mostly, but it doesn't hurt to get ourselves ready.





See that pink bar that turned green? That's the Limit Bar. Every time you get punched by an enemy you fill a bit of it. When the bar is full your Attack Command is replaced by Limit, which is a special attack. Each character has different limits.

With some exceptions, each character has 7 unique limits that you unlock over time. There are 4 sets of limits, so for example if you're locked to the first set you can choose between the first and second limits whenever the command pops up, etc. Most of the time Limits are just special attacks that do much more damage than usual.

The rate at which your limit bar increases also changes depending on which limit set your character is locked into. At the first set this is very low, around 45% of your maximum HP for Cloud and Barret, so you're bound to see at least four limits between them before you die unless you screw up horribly.

Barret's first limit 'Big Shot' is slightly more powerful than Cloud's, but in practice they deal similar damage at our current level.

With that in mind, we fight some more enemies to fill our Limit Bar.



On the bridge to plant the bomb we find something on the ground. We can't do anything about it yet though, we'll find more about it later.



I really ought to play the Japanese version to see if I feel sorry or anger towards the translation team, but I'll give them the benefit of doubt.



There's a Zero Wing joke here somewhere.



Woah.



Apparently our main character is hearing voices.

"What's wrong?"
"Huh?"


BOSS TIME - Guard Scorpion

Our first boss fight comes out of nowhere, the Guard Scorpion.



Before attacking, Guard Scorpion will do a "Search Scope" movement to lock himself a target. The next move will be an attack to that target, then it will move on to Search Scope again.



As you may have noticed we have the Limit Breaks still active from last battle. You can do that - as long as you don't use them, that bar will remain active for as long as you want. We also haven't healed prior to the battle because healing is for sissies.



FF7 has a lot of bosses, mind that. A LOT. And most of them come out of nowhere too.





This is Guard Scorpion's gimmick - After two turns it will rise up its tail. During that, it will have increased defense but it won't do anything, so you have some turns to heal up. On the other hand if you attack it will counter-attack with Tail Laser, which inflicts massive amounts of damage.

The only real danger is if you queue up two attacks while Guard Scorpion has its Tail movement queued up already. The boss will get into counter-attack mode before your attacks go out and you'll take two tail lasers in a row, which is about half of your maximum HP and a potential Game Over.

The other danger comes from the script. The full script is "Barret, be careful. Attack while it's tail's up. It's gonna counterattack with its laser." which is pretty stupid because it can lead you to think you should actually ATTACK while the tail is up, which is never a good idea.

There's not much you can do wrong though. It's the first boss fight in the game and your choice of commands are very limited.



We beat him in a most humiliating way.



Our loot is a new gun for Barret. Yay~!





Oh crap.



The counter keeps running everywhere - in the field, in battles, even in the menu.



Oh look, it's Jessie. Hi Jessie!

At this point I decide to run away from battles. HP is very low so it's a little risky.



As it turns out, you can't leave the place without talking to Jessie :argh:



I think Jessie is gonna be a love interest to Cloud. I mean, they work together, she is a geek, and we already have the cliché of him risking himself to save her :unsmith:



I remember to equip the Assault Gun we just got.



The cool thing about the weapons is that they all have their own individual graphics that change in battle. The official artworks are pretty cool too. For example, this is the gattling gun:



And this is the Assault Gun:



Most Barret weapons are long-range so you can attack enemies on the back-row and do the same amount damage. Non-Long-Range weapons would only do half. Alternatively, you can also choose to put your characters in the back row and take only half physical damage. It's incredibly powerful if you're focusing on magic.



We manage to run out with 2 minutes left. It's pretty hard to run out of time unless you miss Jessie and can't really find her.



BOOOOOM.







And Jessie blows up the exit. Mission successful!

AVALANCHE 1 x SHINRA 0




NEXT TIME:

More Love Interests! Reactors! Flowers! Flashbacks! Slums! Paychecks!





Chapter 1 Bugs & Bytes:

Immediately after you start the game, right before the first battle, if you open the menu and check you'll see that Cloud is on Level 6, has 610 experience and needs 645 experience to Level 7, so 35 more. This is a bug that is auto-corrected on the first battle, when you see that Cloud needs in fact just 6 points to Level 7.



Cool Music we listened to in this Chapter:

FF6,7,8 and 9 are all games with most excellent OSTs. Although which has the best is pointless to argue, FF7 has a great soundtrack that greatly adds to the mood of the game.

Opening Theme + Bombing Mission - The game intro which jumps straight into the Rolling Start music.
Mako Reactor - The music we listen to during the reactor level.

Elentor fucked around with this message at 16:06 on Jun 3, 2011

the sex ghost
Sep 6, 2009
The first time I saw this game in a shop I decided to buy Ape Escape instead. I maintain I made the correct decision

idonotlikepeas
May 29, 2010

This reasoning is possible for forums user idonotlikepeas!
I love how Barret asks Cloud whether he knows about Mako reactors and then, when Cloud says yes, completely ignores him and gives the expository dialogue anyway.

So, how many of the irritating side quests are you doing?

AntiPseudonym
Apr 1, 2007
I EAT BABIES

:dukedog:
I'm one of those weird people that's never played FF7, as I never had a PS1 at all. So many people talk about it all the loving time though, so I'm gonna be following this and trying to figure out what all the fuss is about.

Axle_Stukov
Feb 26, 2011

Stylin'
Oh here we go!
I say FF7 is still a good game, it's just tarnished by it's fanbase and every retarded sequel, spin-off, and movie.

Lotus Aura
Aug 16, 2009

KNEEL BEFORE THE WICKED KING!

SteadfastMeat posted:

The first time I saw this game in a shop I decided to buy Ape Escape instead. I maintain I made the correct decision

I got this for like Ģ4 second hand, and it was pretty good. I wouldn't have wanted to buy it for full price or anything but for how cheap it was I'm not gonna complain too badly. It might not be anywhere near as amazing as the insane fans make it out to be, but it's not terrible either.

...Okay, most of the good bits are the music and the combat but some of the sidequests are decent too. I wouldn't want to grind Cloud and Barret to the max level in the Mako Reactor or anything, but I do have part of a perfect file that I should finish at some point (if the actual gameplay wasn't decent I wouldn't even think of trying this... in hindsight, I probably wouldn't either). gently caress getting natural max HP and/or MP though; that poo poo's way too goddamn tedious.

KataraniSword
Apr 22, 2008

but at least I don't have
a MLP or MSPA avatar.
I am my own man.

I will argue to my grave that Final Fantasy 7 would have been a fantastic novel but is an absolutely terrible game. I myself have never been able to stomach it much further than the first time the party actually manages to leave Midgar.

All the minigame and gimmicky padding early on, and all the hints that there will be more later, and then you end up in the Golden Saucer which is basically OCD Gamer's Hell and and and :psyboom:

You better believe I'm keeping my eye on this.

Koorisch
Mar 29, 2009

KataraniSword posted:

I will argue to my grave that Final Fantasy 7 would have been a fantastic novel but is an absolutely terrible game. I myself have never been able to stomach it much further than the first time the party actually manages to leave Midgar.

The Midgar sequence IS the best part in My opinion. :colbert:

an_mutt
Sep 29, 2010

I was,
I am,
and I remain a soldier!

Sworn to dedicate my heart and soul to the restoration of human kind!

AntiPseudonym posted:

I'm one of those weird people that's never played FF7
Ditto; I'm awaiting some sort of remake, preferably along the lines of the III/IV remakes for the DS. I don't own a PSX and emulation isn't really my bag, so I'll be following this!

LordAndrew
Jul 13, 2009

Walking death machine equipped with the knowledge of Nuclear.
I had this game but I dropped the disc one day and it shattered. It was the first disc. :negative:

Looking forward to this!

niebezimienny
Dec 29, 2008
I played this game over 20 times and only recently did I realise that in the lift, the floors are marked with greek letters, in addition to numbers



Here you can see the letter mu, but when you use the elevator it changes to zeta IIRC. There's a couple more in other lifts in the game (spoilers, there are other lifts in the game).

eating only apples
Dec 12, 2009

Shall we dance?
Cool!

I like many others know this game like the back of my hand, so it'll be interesting to see what you do with it. Let's hope you can get it finished!

eating only apples fucked around with this message at 21:27 on Apr 10, 2014

Captainsalami
Apr 16, 2010

I told you you'd pay!
For the record, the way limit breaks works had always mystified me until I went to gamefaqs. Seems if you're crazy enough you can cap them at low level, since I think its something like...use one 10 times, and kill a buncha enemies, but I no longer remember right.

RoeCocoa
Oct 23, 2010

If you're going with an "absolutely no spoilers whatsoever" policy, you should probably re-upload the intro video with a different title, different tags, and comments disabled, and keep doing that for all subsequent videos. Otherwise, Youtube hands out a massive spoiler the moment the video ends.

Looking forward to the rest of this!

Sylphosaurus
Sep 6, 2007

Axle_Stukov posted:

Oh here we go!
I say FF7 is still a good game, it's just tarnished by it's fanbase and every retarded sequel, spin-off, and movie.
You pretty much nailed my own opinion regarding this game. I would have prefered a proper remake, rather than all the spinoffs that just served to tarnish the original game.

Tengames
Oct 29, 2008


Which version are you playing, the ps1 or pc version?

I actually had the pc version given to me a long time ago and its apparently got a ton of mods though(most of them are terrible)

One really awesome mod for those who love the soundtrack: get the ff7music mod for the pc version , and download the remastered ost.

Hell if you're just playing the psx version and love the music give the remastered ost a try. you can really hear a difference.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8NGDsnv34M
regular version
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqdjKCKjNjY
remastered

Elentor
Dec 14, 2004

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

Tengames posted:

Which version are you playing, the ps1 or pc version?

I actually had the pc version given to me a long time ago and its apparently got a ton of mods though(most of them are terrible)

One really awesome mod for those who love the soundtrack: get the ff7music mod for the pc version , and download the remastered ost.

Hell if you're just playing the psx version and love the music give the remastered ost a try. you can really hear a difference.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8NGDsnv34M
regular version
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqdjKCKjNjY
remastered

I'm playing the PSX. I'm planning on talking about the mods on a future update.

It's actually possible to import a lot of the PC mods on the PS version, although it requires a lot of work.

RoeCocoa posted:

If you're going with an "absolutely no spoilers whatsoever" policy, you should probably re-upload the intro video with a different title, different tags, and comments disabled, and keep doing that for all subsequent videos. Otherwise, Youtube hands out a massive spoiler the moment the video ends.

Looking forward to the rest of this!

Weird, I saw the videos and didn't see any spoilers. I'll double check.

Elentor fucked around with this message at 16:58 on May 29, 2011

Simply Simon
Nov 6, 2010

📡scanning🛰️ for good game 🎮design🦔🦔🦔
Nice, just as FF9 finished!

As I missed the opportunity for that game, but wanted to play it anyway and a friend has a PSX to lend...I'll be playing along, I think. Never did play 7, so this is going to be a nice experience. You can show me how much stuff I missed after I did a segment, yay!

The Dark Id
Aug 13, 2005

Why
you
know
I
LOVE
THIS SHIT !!!!
[citation needed]

Elentor posted:

Weird, I saw the videos and didn't see any spoilers. I'll double check.

The related links on Youtube videos update with people making comments and where it is clicked from and assorted poo poo. It's best to just give uploaded videos some generic name and search parameters a bunch of rubbish with comments disabled, or else you'll get links to "BEST PART OF THE GAME: WEDGE MURDERS CLOUD AND STAGES A COUP ON SHINRA!"

X_countryguy
Dec 31, 2007

Whatscha holdup, Tron? If you don't hurry up there's not gonna be any pizza left!
I still like FF7 even if I never need to play it again. I know you posted that this game is hugely racist. I found the game stupidly sexist. Oh, no! Jessie got her foot stuck! Helpless until Cloud helps out. See also supporting (and main) characters that appear later.

resurgam40
Jul 22, 2007

Battler, the literal stupidest man on earth. Why are you even here, Battler, why did you come back to this place so you could fuck literally everything up?
And right on the heels of FF9 comes the other big game hunting for the PSX Final Fantasys! I like this game. Despite the damage doned by the fans and spinoffs, I still believe it is a good game. It tried to do something new and different with the fantastic setting (a sort of steampunk and magical setting- fantasy-punk, if you will), had some fairly good characterizations, and in 1997, the CGI looked quite cool. Yes the translation was a bit... off, and Japanese stereotypes are RAMPANT, but drat it, it was a fun experience which opened to me the wonders of Playstation graphics and gaming!

...You can stop laughing now, you jaded fucks.

Distant Chicken
Aug 15, 2007
In a way, I'm glad they're never gonna remake this game. I could see Square shoehorning in all that extra garbage from the sequels and prequels they've churned out.

Mr Muggy
Mar 30, 2010

I'm just gonna do this for about two minutes, okay?

Tengames posted:

Which version are you playing, the ps1 or pc version?

I actually had the pc version given to me a long time ago and its apparently got a ton of mods though(most of them are terrible)

One really awesome mod for those who love the soundtrack: get the ff7music mod for the pc version , and download the remastered ost.

Hell if you're just playing the psx version and love the music give the remastered ost a try. you can really hear a difference.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8NGDsnv34M
regular version
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqdjKCKjNjY
remastered

I just listened to a few of the remastered on youtube. I'm amazed I didn't know this existed, because these songs are pretty drat good. Kinda wish I had the PC version now to play these along with the game.

hell astro course
Dec 10, 2009

pizza sucks

I still think FF7 was a good game, and one of the better Final Fantasy games in the line up, though it becomes hard to defend with the spinoffs and legions of scary fans. I've always wondered why Square chose to shift from Amano's art to Nomura's in FF7. Is there more of a story behind it than Square wanting to shake things up?

Elentor
Dec 14, 2004

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS
Alright I finally got the Aps videos done. I got three updates ready :dance:

idonotlikepeas posted:

I love how Barret asks Cloud whether he knows about Mako reactors and then, when Cloud says yes, completely ignores him and gives the expository dialogue anyway.

So, how many of the irritating side quests are you doing?

I don't intend to get every single thing in the game but I'll cover every major side-quest. There are not many in FF7.

X_countryguy posted:

I still like FF7 even if I never need to play it again. I know you posted that this game is hugely racist. I found the game stupidly sexist. Oh, no! Jessie got her foot stuck! Helpless until Cloud helps out. See also supporting (and main) characters that appear later.

Jessie and Elena aside I think FF7 did pretty well on that aspect compared to other J-RPGs from its time. Example: Star Ocean 2.

The Dark Id posted:

The related links on Youtube videos update with people making comments and where it is clicked from and assorted poo poo. It's best to just give uploaded videos some generic name and search parameters a bunch of rubbish with comments disabled, or else you'll get links to "BEST PART OF THE GAME: WEDGE MURDERS CLOUD AND STAGES A COUP ON SHINRA!"

Yeah I can see how that sucks. But you didn't need to spoil Wedge's betrayal :argh:

Sylphosaurus posted:

You pretty much nailed my own opinion regarding this game. I would have prefered a proper remake, rather than all the spinoffs that just served to tarnish the original game.

In my opinion everything about the spin-offs sucked. AC was cool when it was announced because we could finally see FF7's characters rendered in high-quality CGI, but the plot was mediocre at best. At least there wasn't much of it to complain, so yay for free fan-service?

The spin-off games however were terrible. Crisis Core would be an ok game on its own if it was completely unrelated to FF7, but they really had to shoehorn Gackt in it.

Dirge of Cerberus was just awful and I feel sorry for Dark Id.

Captainsalami posted:

For the record, the way limit breaks works had always mystified me until I went to gamefaqs. Seems if you're crazy enough you can cap them at low level, since I think its something like...use one 10 times, and kill a buncha enemies, but I no longer remember right.

You can't get ALL of them, but enough to break the game until you can. It's just like how in FF8 you can Draw 100 spells in the first area and get ridiculously overpowered.

KataraniSword posted:

I will argue to my grave that Final Fantasy 7 would have been a fantastic novel but is an absolutely terrible game. I myself have never been able to stomach it much further than the first time the party actually manages to leave Midgar.

All the minigame and gimmicky padding early on, and all the hints that there will be more later, and then you end up in the Golden Saucer which is basically OCD Gamer's Hell and and and :psyboom:

You better believe I'm keeping my eye on this.

There are only four major minigames and none of them are particularly hard, I even enjoy some of them, although overall yeah, they detract a bit from the experience.

Still they're much better than FF10's amazing Chocobo minigame.

AntiPseudonym posted:

I'm one of those weird people that's never played FF7, as I never had a PS1 at all. So many people talk about it all the loving time though, so I'm gonna be following this and trying to figure out what all the fuss is about.

FF7 is a great game, although for reasons that are completely unrelated to the fuss people made about.

Elentor fucked around with this message at 18:08 on May 29, 2011

KataraniSword
Apr 22, 2008

but at least I don't have
a MLP or MSPA avatar.
I am my own man.

OatmealRaisin posted:

In a way, I'm glad they're never gonna remake this game. I could see Square shoehorning in all that extra garbage from the sequels and prequels they've churned out.

Part of me believes this is the ENTIRE REASON they haven't and/or will never come out with a remake.

They keep trying to find a way to integrate poo poo like Dirge of Cerberus and Advent Children and Crisis Core into this game's story and then after about five minutes they realize that it just won't work because FF7 actually isn't horribly plotted out.

It also "helps" that the stereotypes that are over-the-top and not really taken seriously in this game's narrative, whereas the spinoffs (Advent Children comes immediately to mind) play them so seriously that it just becomes offensive.

EDIT:

Elentor posted:

There are only four major minigames and none of them are particularly hard, I even enjoy some of them, although overall yeah, they detract a bit from the experience.

Still they're much better than FF10's amazing Chocobo minigame.

I actually think it was the glut of MINOR gimmicks and distractions that really got to me, not the major minigames. The entire first visit to Junon comes to mind.

I could barely get into FF10 at all. Unlike this game, FF10 didn't even have a battle system I enjoyed in order to keep me playing longer.

KataraniSword fucked around with this message at 18:09 on May 29, 2011

Greyscale Skies
Nov 23, 2010

Elentor posted:




Fun fact, which I only recently found out: The Loveless posters scattered around Midgar are actually a cute reference to the famous album. The words "MY BLOODY VALENTINE" are printed vertically across the side. 6/25 is apparently the album's Japanese release date.

OurLivesOnline
Nov 5, 2009

let's be friends
I'm part of the "strange" group of people that never even touched Final Fantasy 7. I know that ONE obvious spoiler that every fan seems to cry about, but otherwise, this is going to be an interesting experience.

Bonsai Superstar
Jul 22, 2007

HABU A NAISU DEI.
Oh hey, I'm actually replaying this now in Japanese. It's true this thing hasn't aged well at all, but I'm still enjoying it. Cloud and some of the other cast seem to have more unique personalities in the original dialog, so that helps, but the thing I still dig about this game is the magic/ability system. I really liked the variety of stuff you could pull off in this one and VIII, I had more fun in the menus than the actual story, I think.

Also I loved the gently caress out of Shin-Ra. I haven't played an FF since midway through XII when I got bored and gave up, but of the 10 before that I think they were my favorite antagonists of the series.

Blastinus
Feb 28, 2010

Time to try my luck
:rolldice:
Crap.
What I like about FF7's opening sequence compared to most RPG's these days is that it's relatively short. You get the brief CGI sequence at the start with the flyover of Midgar and the train, and then you're off to the first battle. Most RPG's these days don't let you control your character until they've gone through at least five minutes of exposition, maybe followed by an unskippable tutorial and/or a ridiculously lengthy pointless sidequest.

Viola the Mad
Feb 13, 2010

Space-Bird posted:

I still think FF7 was a good game, and one of the better Final Fantasy games in the line up, though it becomes hard to defend with the spinoffs and legions of scary fans. I've always wondered why Square chose to shift from Amano's art to Nomura's in FF7. Is there more of a story behind it than Square wanting to shake things up?

Amano's art is crazy detailed and they thought he would design something too complicated for the engine to handle. Nomura's art for FF7 is pretty simple for ease in modelling, especially when you compare it to his later stuff (BELTSZIPPERS :argh:)

Man, I played this game back when I was a kid and never got beyond the first disk, but I still have fond memories. That drat first boss killed me several times because I thought I was supposed to attack when its tail went up over its head. Was that a mistake in the translation or something?

Viola the Mad fucked around with this message at 18:30 on May 29, 2011

HOT BRITISH SEX
Jun 12, 2007

She's just coming, sir.
I agree with everyone who says that this is a good game that is tarnished by its fanbase. They've never improved on Materia as an RPG concept, if you ask me. :colbert:

I bought it from the PSN, took one look at its graphics on a 37" HDTV and went :stare: . It really hasn't aged well. That said, I'm sure I'll play through it again for old time's sake.

Elentor
Dec 14, 2004

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

Viola the Mad posted:

Amano's art is crazy detailed and they thought he would design something too complicated for the engine to handle. Nomura's art for FF7 is pretty simple for ease in modelling, especially when you compare it to his later stuff (BELTSZIPPERS :argh:)

Man, I played this game back when I was a kid and never got beyond the first disk, but I still have fond memories. That drat first boss killed me several times because I thought I was supposed to attack when its tail went up over its head. Was that a mistake in the translation or something?

Yeah, the idea of the script is "(If you) Attack while itss tail's up, it's gonna counter-attack."

Of course that would be too obvious so the translators decided to troll out the players.

Elentor fucked around with this message at 18:39 on May 29, 2011

Kaboom Dragoon
May 7, 2010

The greatest of feasts

So was I the only person playing who actually got the intended meaning of that line?

Camel Pimp
May 17, 2008

This poster survived LPing Lunar: Dragon Song. Let's give her a hand.
Hey, minor quibble, but if you're going to insert dialogue into the game, please put it in parenthesis. Just so it's clear that said piece isn't actually in the game.

I haven't played this game in a loooooong time. This should be interesting.

Elentor
Dec 14, 2004

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

Camel Pimp posted:

Hey, minor quibble, but if you're going to insert dialogue into the game, please put it in parenthesis. Just so it's clear that said piece isn't actually in the game.

I haven't played this game in a loooooong time. This should be interesting.

I'm putting the real quotes between "", and my made-up crap without. If it's not that obvious I'll italicize then.

some bust on that guy
Jan 21, 2006

This avatar was paid for by the Silent Majority.

Koorisch posted:

The Midgar sequence IS the best part in My opinion. :colbert:

Off course! That's not an opinion. That's a fact.

If the entire game took place in Midgar, it probably would be the greatest Final Fantasy ever. I'm replaying the game now and Midgar is still as amazing as ever.

Midgar actually is one of the few parts that aged well. After playing FF13, it's shocking how so much more real and immersive Midgar feels than every one of FF13's areas

Although it's sad knowing that once you leave Midgar, it's all downhill from there. Midgar is such a tease. Who was the brianiac in Square I wonder that decided to make the first 6 hours unique and different and awesome and have the setting for the rest of the game be generic JRPG?

Blastinus
Feb 28, 2010

Time to try my luck
:rolldice:
Crap.

Kaboom Dragoon posted:

So was I the only person playing who actually got the intended meaning of that line?

No, I understood it too. It helps that the first boss of every FF game since FFIV up to then had the exact same gimmick of changing into a form where you weren't supposed to attack it. I actually just thought that they had left out a comma out, making a sentence along the lines of "Attack while its tail's up, it's gonna counterattack with its laser."

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

The Goog
Aug 6, 2007

It's a Goog Day, yes it is!
Great first update, Elentor. I'll definitely be keeping an eye on this. :)

  • Locked thread