--- Summary, Full Review + Trophy experience ---
๐งพ Summary:
This is my introduction into FF series and overall i had a great experience. Many of my views should be viewed from the eyes of a complete new comer. The game has the making of a near perfect game but stumbles heavily with its overly padded and boring levels at various parts of the game. The padding is so blatant that it reminds us that too much of a good thing, is still too much! Though so much time was spent on this game and its combat, its sorely lacking competent AI or AI programming that games like Tales of Arise have. FF7 is chalk full of things that are great, like its presentation, perfect looking character models (TIfa ๐ ), perfect cut scenes, voice acting, crazy boss battles and mini boss battles, and more,. I think its definitely worth playing. I wish they shortened the game and focused on the memorable parts! Lets dive in.
๐ Full Review:
๐ฎ Platform: PS5
โ Time to finish - 33h ( main game + 24 side quests + DLC + some challenges)
๐Trophy completion - 50% - This is absolutely a game I went in wanting to 100% and then realized that its horrible to 100%. There are difficulty trophies, many trophies are unlocked after MULTIPLE playthroughs of the same chapters. The chapter select always puts you at the start of a chapter and you cannot jump to mid chapter beats. You can't access combat simulators for those trophies without actually playing the chapter all over again. In addition the game is very boring at times, and Cloud moves deliberately slowly, and you have to put up with all that again and again. No thanks! Unless you are crazy about this game, I do not recommend a plat. I guarantee plat this game would drop this score to a 2.5/5.
๐คฌDifficulty - The game is generally fair in its difficulty. However, hard difficulty is very hard. You need to swap out gems, and have certain gear like Gotterdammerung to make hard manageable for regular skilled people. If you love a good challenge you will like hard. I don't want to spend that much time in a game getting good at it. I just need to get past hard for a platinum. :)
๐Graphics โ A+
The cut scenes in this game are absolutely amazing and perfect. I could just watch it over and over again. The graphics are great as well but you can only see post apocalyptic slums so long. The battle animations are excellent as well.
๐ฆ Atmosphere/Music โ A+
Amazing score. There are so many tracks that I never felt anything was repetitive.
๐ Main Story / Characters โ B
The story was fine. There is so much to say about it. It starts of about eco-terrorism. Not really a hook for me. Starts introducing supernatural elements and Sephiroth. Huh? Moves into full on genetic experimentation or something. Ends with boss after boss battles and an ancient race of beings introduced along with aliens. I didn't realize Shinra was an energy company, a military company, a genetics company, and more.
I really liked how fleshed out all the main characters were and they were all likeable. But they are all cliche characters. Of course the least interesting is the main character, as expected in rpgs, is well Cloud. Is this a rpg staple that the main char has to be the most boring one? and also reject women swooning over him for no reason?
I liked everyone else although. Barrett was your cliche tank brute with a soft spot for his daughter, Aerith was overly cute helpless girl, Tifa was sexy badass, wedge was your pudgie funny comic relief. Everyone just fits into the common tropes. I have a huge crush on Tifa!!
Reading others reviews there are some reveals at the end that are geared towards people who know the lore. I had no clue what these reveals meant and had to look it up. Still didnโt understand the implications. So some of the content is geared towards longtime fans.
๐คบ Combat โ B+
Trash mob combat - spam your square button. Not very interesting but flashy fast and fun.
Mini boss battles - hell house was a stand out. The mini bosses like Reno, Rude, hell house, roche, and more were so cool. I really liked all those fights!
Boss battles/vr - super fun!
I enjoyed playing with the materia setup. But some are just way more useful than others.
Overall my main gripe with combat is that you have to micro manage everything because there is no good AI or AI programming for your partners. AI also fill up their guages soooooo slowly... why?!?! Only char I did not like using was Aerith. Rest were fun! Towards the end i got tired of so much micro management, i just switched to easy come ch 15 or so.
๐งญ Side Activities / Exploration โ C
Boring side activities. Collect cats, kids, go kill a monster, which you already have done a 1000 times. Some activities are very tedious like pull up challenge. Box challenge was fun. There is soooo much to do in this game. Unfortunately lot of it is hit or miss.
The levels are also not very interesating. After a while you see hallways after hallways. And puzzles thrown in simply to slow your movement through them. The game deliberately pads its length. The worst offender is chapter 14. One of the main badasses loses a KEY to a sewer rat and you go on a 1.5 hr chase to get this key back. Are you kidding me?
๐ Movement/Physics โ D
I absolutely HATE how the game forces cloud to slow down his walking speed. This must have added at least an hour or more to the game and the big reason why I said forget 100% this game.
๐ฃ Voice acting โ A+
Excellent. The script however suffers from your classic JRPG tropes of a female throwing herself at a guy who is playing hard to get/acts like he doesnt care but does, and she is not self respecting enough to move on. So annoying! Can we get past the tennage angsty jprg scripts please.
๐ฅ Best thing about the game - Tifa and the cut scenes. The presentation and the boss battles.
๐ Worst thing about the game - Cloud's movement and padded gameplay.
๐๐๐ Trophy Tips ๐๐๐
Don't bother, but if you want to make sure you are lvl 50, fully leveled your materia (hp + MP + heal + synergy+more), and have gotten a Gotterdammerung .
[ if you liked the review throw me a like! โค๏ธ ]
๐งพ Summary:
This is my introduction into FF series and overall i had a great experience. Many of my views should be viewed from the eyes of a complete new comer. The game has the making of a near perfect game but stumbles heavily with its overly padded and boring levels at various parts of the game. The padding is so blatant that it reminds us that too much of a good thing, is still too much! Though so much time was spent on this game and its combat, its sorely lacking competent AI or AI programming that games like Tales of Arise have. FF7 is chalk full of things that are great, like its presentation, perfect looking character models (TIfa ๐ ), perfect cut scenes, voice acting, crazy boss battles and mini boss battles, and more,. I think its definitely worth playing. I wish they shortened the game and focused on the memorable parts! Lets dive in.
๐ Full Review:
๐ฎ Platform: PS5
โ Time to finish - 33h ( main game + 24 side quests + DLC + some challenges)
๐Trophy completion - 50% - This is absolutely a game I went in wanting to 100% and then realized that its horrible to 100%. There are difficulty trophies, many trophies are unlocked after MULTIPLE playthroughs of the same chapters. The chapter select always puts you at the start of a chapter and you cannot jump to mid chapter beats. You can't access combat simulators for those trophies without actually playing the chapter all over again. In addition the game is very boring at times, and Cloud moves deliberately slowly, and you have to put up with all that again and again. No thanks! Unless you are crazy about this game, I do not recommend a plat. I guarantee plat this game would drop this score to a 2.5/5.
๐คฌDifficulty - The game is generally fair in its difficulty. However, hard difficulty is very hard. You need to swap out gems, and have certain gear like Gotterdammerung to make hard manageable for regular skilled people. If you love a good challenge you will like hard. I don't want to spend that much time in a game getting good at it. I just need to get past hard for a platinum. :)
๐Graphics โ A+
The cut scenes in this game are absolutely amazing and perfect. I could just watch it over and over again. The graphics are great as well but you can only see post apocalyptic slums so long. The battle animations are excellent as well.
๐ฆ Atmosphere/Music โ A+
Amazing score. There are so many tracks that I never felt anything was repetitive.
๐ Main Story / Characters โ B
The story was fine. There is so much to say about it. It starts of about eco-terrorism. Not really a hook for me. Starts introducing supernatural elements and Sephiroth. Huh? Moves into full on genetic experimentation or something. Ends with boss after boss battles and an ancient race of beings introduced along with aliens. I didn't realize Shinra was an energy company, a military company, a genetics company, and more.
I really liked how fleshed out all the main characters were and they were all likeable. But they are all cliche characters. Of course the least interesting is the main character, as expected in rpgs, is well Cloud. Is this a rpg staple that the main char has to be the most boring one? and also reject women swooning over him for no reason?
I liked everyone else although. Barrett was your cliche tank brute with a soft spot for his daughter, Aerith was overly cute helpless girl, Tifa was sexy badass, wedge was your pudgie funny comic relief. Everyone just fits into the common tropes. I have a huge crush on Tifa!!
Reading others reviews there are some reveals at the end that are geared towards people who know the lore. I had no clue what these reveals meant and had to look it up. Still didnโt understand the implications. So some of the content is geared towards longtime fans.
๐คบ Combat โ B+
Trash mob combat - spam your square button. Not very interesting but flashy fast and fun.
Mini boss battles - hell house was a stand out. The mini bosses like Reno, Rude, hell house, roche, and more were so cool. I really liked all those fights!
Boss battles/vr - super fun!
I enjoyed playing with the materia setup. But some are just way more useful than others.
Overall my main gripe with combat is that you have to micro manage everything because there is no good AI or AI programming for your partners. AI also fill up their guages soooooo slowly... why?!?! Only char I did not like using was Aerith. Rest were fun! Towards the end i got tired of so much micro management, i just switched to easy come ch 15 or so.
๐งญ Side Activities / Exploration โ C
Boring side activities. Collect cats, kids, go kill a monster, which you already have done a 1000 times. Some activities are very tedious like pull up challenge. Box challenge was fun. There is soooo much to do in this game. Unfortunately lot of it is hit or miss.
The levels are also not very interesating. After a while you see hallways after hallways. And puzzles thrown in simply to slow your movement through them. The game deliberately pads its length. The worst offender is chapter 14. One of the main badasses loses a KEY to a sewer rat and you go on a 1.5 hr chase to get this key back. Are you kidding me?
๐ Movement/Physics โ D
I absolutely HATE how the game forces cloud to slow down his walking speed. This must have added at least an hour or more to the game and the big reason why I said forget 100% this game.
๐ฃ Voice acting โ A+
Excellent. The script however suffers from your classic JRPG tropes of a female throwing herself at a guy who is playing hard to get/acts like he doesnt care but does, and she is not self respecting enough to move on. So annoying! Can we get past the tennage angsty jprg scripts please.
๐ฅ Best thing about the game - Tifa and the cut scenes. The presentation and the boss battles.
๐ Worst thing about the game - Cloud's movement and padded gameplay.
๐๐๐ Trophy Tips ๐๐๐
Don't bother, but if you want to make sure you are lvl 50, fully leveled your materia (hp + MP + heal + synergy+more), and have gotten a Gotterdammerung .
[ if you liked the review throw me a like! โค๏ธ ]