It was the end of January, and Final Fantasy XIII-2 was coming out very very soon, and what better to celebrate the launch of this than having discounts on the Playstation Network on pretty much all the Final Fantasy games up there. I always had the inclination to purchase the games from there, and so, when the Playstation One era of games (VII, VIII and IX) were discounted to almost half price, I brought them all.
Ever since seeing and hearing that Final Fantasy VII was the best Final Fantasy in terms of story (although some say VI was the best), I wanted to play it, missed out purchasing it back in the day so I'm glad to have this second chance. Anyway, I've just finished playing it after two weeks of started, and I'm surprised at the long length of it, forty hours, and with plenty of content still left. Sadly, you can't finish the game and continue on, instead, you have to use a save from before the final battle.
Now that I have finished it, I did not think the story was all that great, I personally prefer the story and background of IV and V more, back when it was more fantasy and less futuristic. The story of VII never really captured me, and it didn't help that I kept having the expectation that it was really good from what everyone has been saying about it. Some scenes were good, but more often than not, I found myself plowing through the story just so I can say I've finished it.
What they have achieved though, when compared to back in the day, is amazing, from the pre-rendered scenes and background to the in depth battle system. It really gave off a Final Fantasy feel that I only now just realized, that the more recent ones lacked. That said, I found the battle system to be somewhat boring at times, since it was so slow, I never really got onto it. I personally didn't like the use of such detailed pre-rendered backgrounds because more often than not, it was too detailed and I found it hard to see where to leave, where the interactive objects were (such as chests), and where my character was.
All in all, it was pretty good, but I just don't have the nostalgia like a lot of fans, that see this as the best Final Fantasy game ever (I'll probably get a lot of flack for this though). Still, I'm immensely happy I've played it.
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