After some not so great first impressions, I decided to actually sit down and finish this game with a more open mind. And quite honestly, after playing for 30 hours and seeing it to the end, I still don't see the hype. To me, the game felt incredibly limiting compared to other FFs, with the heavy focus on linear progression and lack of exploration and experimentation. The Materia system, while good in concept, effectively and heavily limits the magic the player can use, where FF6 in particular allowed you to teach any skills to anyone and rack up potentially 50+ magic spells on one party member. These limits also limit the potential of creative and strategic bosses, having to account for the lack of spells available for the majority of the game; battles end up feeling far more similar because of the lessened options. Being able to swap around everyone's unique abilities also removes any point in using other party members, as you can simply swap Materia to your favorites and have three all-in-one characters. The world itself attempts to trick the player into thinking it is an expansive world, while in reality the maps tunnel you from beginning to end, with one or two split paths occasionally to remind you of that same facade of a more open world.

These gameplay limitations were put on for a very clear reason, a bigger focus on story, cinematics and spectacle. Maps are replaced with pre-rendered 3D backgrounds, and FMVs are used heavily throughout the game. While these do look nice and are impressive for the time, it should not have been the focus of a Final Fantasy game, and the game itself is significantly less fun to play as a result. The story the game attempted to tell through this begins as a standard resistance plot that eventually turns into a race to save the planet. Although a decent concept, the execution involves dealing with a wide variety of either bland, unlikable or unpleasant characters, with a small number of exceptions. Some points in the story were so poorly done that they ended up being exceedingly frustrating, especially in the middle stretch of the game near the end of disc 1.

While I tried to see the good in this game, and I sat through the entirety of its main story to see what people enjoyed so much, I...didn't find it. What I found was a badly executed and frustrating story with equally unlikable characters, extremely limited gameplay that feels significantly lessened than the other games in the series, and a heavy focus on graphics and FMVs that does not serve the core of the game any justice. To many, this is one of the greatest games of all time; to me, a hollow shell of what could have been just that.