In all of my many years as a games journalist I never had the opportunity to write about Final Fantasy VII. I was primarily covering Xbox most of the time, after all, but even prior to that I was just 4-years too late so there wasn't any point. I did definitely play it, though. And I did definitely like it. Read more and watch some good ol' early game Final Fantasy VII (on Xbox One, no less!) gameplay.
Final Fantasy VII is funny in a lot of ways just in how people react to it. It was some folks' first real RPG, so they unconditionally love it with rose tinted nostalgia. For other people, usually OLD people, they're bitter that Final Fantasy VII was the first RPG to really take off in the mainstream, so they're bitter about its success and try to pretend like it isn't any good. They're kind of gatekeeping goalpost moving A-Holes.
Me? I think FF7 is just fine. It wasn't my first JRPG. And it isn't my favorite JRPG. But I do at least acknowledge that it is good and was very important for gaming. I first played it in about 2001-ish or so, so I was a bit late. I will say one thing that I am bitter about, though - I wish JRPGs would go back to SNES-style sprites. Give me a new Square Enix 16-bit RPG in 2020 and I'd be far happier than with yet another bloated CGI-cutscene crap fest that cost hundreds of millions of dollars and took 10-years to make. Screw that.
One other thing I want to say is that the remasters / ports of FF7,8, and 9 on PS4, Xbox One, and Switch are definitely the best way to play the games these days because you don't actually have to play them. Ha! Turning on instant limit breaks and automatic full health, plus speeding up the game itself, makes them so much more enjoyable to play. I can't go back to playing these games any other way, to be honest. Now, I don't think people should do this on their virgin playthrough, but if you've already seen it and know how everything works, screw playing normally. I put in my time 20-years ago, now I just want to bang through the games ASAP and see the fun stuff I remember and move on.
Also, I named the characters funny names in this video. REALLY funny.
