Topic: Unpopular Gaming Opinions

@FishyS Everyone I've seen talking about it says nothing but negative things- at least unless I go onto reddit and go to the community specific for the remakes. A good chunk of friends I have and people in the latest article's comment section were going on and on about how bad the remakes were.

@VoidofLight I'm not a big FF guy and I'm especially not a big remakes guy, but I do appreciate the FF7 remakes aren't just 1-1 glossier versions and are just doing their own thing within that framework as well the fact that they've kept the OG readily available.

@N00BiSH Exactly. The original is still there, and this is meant to be something new. I wish more game studios would do more interesting things with the frameworks of their original games rather than just outright remaking them. Make the originals available, and then make sequels or alternate takes.

@VoidofLight I love them — at time of release, I considered Remake to be my favourite game in the series...and now I consider Rebirth to be my favourite. But tbh I'm not the biggest fan of the original FF7 to begin with, although not sure how that factors into the equation really.

I think the battle system is phenomenal (probably the best of any RPG I've played, tbh), and the worldbuilding excellent. The characters are also incredibly well-realised — much moreso than the source material for sure.

My main criticism with Rebirth in particular is the over-abundance of minigames which are frankly pretty bad for the most part and negatively influence the pace of the game. Otherwise I can see people's issues with the way they've changed the story...but personally I don't find these changes to be a big deal and it doesn't seem like they're affecting the story as much as people thought they might. Also — as you say — the original still exists if you're that much of a purist.

Just popping in here for a second, but what’s the best way to experience FF7 if you’re new to the series as a whole? It’s always been something I’ve been interested in but the sheer volume of games confuses me. I’m okay with investing large amounts of time into games but I want to make sure it’s time well spent.

@Xenoblade-Fan The original game is the best way to experience it. Remake is good, but it assumes you know everything else before you play it.

I would start with the OG FF7 and then play Crisis Core if you're interested in that. After Crisis Core you should be good on being able to play Remake and Rebirth if you want. Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus can be skipped pretty much. Advent Children adds nothing and was only an excuse to get Sephiroth and Cloud to fight in a movie- and Dirge of Cerberus never got a remaster and probably never will.

@Xenoblade-Fan

So as far as the mainline Final Fantasy 7 games go, there's really just the original PS1 release and the currently unfinished Remake trilogy. There are plenty of spinoffs (though most of them aren't especially great), but you definitely shouldn't play any of them until you've at least experienced the main story.

The original Final Fantasy 7 is the story in its purest form and is probably the most efficient way to get to know the universe and characters, but it is a more traditional turn-based RPG from the 90s. If you're fine with that, I'd personally recommend starting with it since it's available everywhere, it's pretty cheap, and you can beat it in around 30-40 hours.

Remake and Rebirth are an expanded retelling of the original game with the occasional plot deviation, with a real-time battle system and higher production values. While certain plot points are probably more effective if you've played the original, a lot of people were introduced to FF7 with the remakes so I think it's a valid starting point if you want a more modern RPG experience. That being said, keep in mind the third entry still hasn't released and both Remake and Rebirth will take a lot longer to go through than the original.

@StarryCiel I personally wouldn't play Rebirth before playing through the original and Crisis Core. There's a lot of stuff that happens there that doesn't make sense or have much impact on the player if they don't know the original narrative at the very least.

Especially given the remakes aren't really remakes.

tbh, that's my biggest complaint of the entire final franchise series.

I didn't mind the mini-games in rebirth, but that seemed like a common complaint. Especially for trophy hunters.

@Xenoblade-Fan I'm gonna go against the grain and say skip the original - I think the storytelling is poor by modern standards and there's a good chance you'll be underwhelmed. It's true that some things in the remake trilogy won't make so much sense to someone naive to the story (in particular, the whispers), but I don't feel this is too important in the grand scheme of things (just know that certain things happen in the original timeline and the remake trilogy likes to play with this a little).

@FishyS yeah I agree tbh. But I really feel like Rebirth took it to another level.

@Buizel I wouldn't skip the original. It isn't the greatest thing ever, but it's still a decent game. Plus people now are saying "the changes don't mean much on the grand scheme," but we still don't have the third part yet. The one that'll end the story and where most of the changes will probably come into play on a grand scale. We already know Zack is alive in other timelines and will probably change the story heavily by the time that Northern Crater happens. We know that Sephiroth already knows the events of the original story, and has been working on undoing Aerith's hold on meteor by killing her in multiple parts of the lifestream. There's a high chance Cloud killed Aerith this time, and is in denial given how he blocked out her funeral and still thinks she's alive and well. Then there's the war with Wutai starting up as well. Things are most likely going to get further and further away from how the original game ended.

I like Final Fantasy 8 way much better than any FF 7 games.

@Anti-Matter That's actually a fairly common opinion among Final Fantasy fans. A lot of people love FF8.

@VoidofLight I see your point, but I would still argue that even if the story is altered the story of the Remake trilogy is able to stand alone in its on right, and I would argue that the story telling is to a much higher standard than that in the original (although caveat that we only know 2/3 of it at this point).

Idk, tbh my recommendation is mostly coloured by my (probably unpopular) opinion that the original ff7 has not aged well at all - and I am very much against recommending slogging through hours of content "until it gets good" as often seems to be the case with game (and other) recommendations.

That said, the original is relatively cheap and accessible as mentioned. Maybe it is worth a try for that alone. My point ultimately is that I think playing the original is by no means necessary to pick up Remake etc.

@Buizel Ehh, I don't think the Original was bad by any means honestly. Then again, my tastes in games are rather unorthodox and I like things like Drakengard 3 and Pokemon Scarlet and Violet.

I feel like if anything really aged poorly in the original FF7, it's probably how Barret was portrayed- along with how the english localization uses slurs (due to a bad script at the time). I don't think the game aged poorly though. The only FF games I believe did were FF2 and FF8- and those were already rough at launch due to how they messed around with the combat systems.

@Purgatorium
I also heard some peoples dislike FF 8 for the Junction System and treat the Magic spells like usable items that limited by number quantity.
Paper Mario Sticker Star & Color Splash used similar things from FF 8 (using stickers to unleash the commands, if you don't have the sticker you can't attack the enemy) even the 3D objects summon spell on Sticker Star felt like Ra and Ga Final Fantasy magic spell (Blizzard, Blizzara, Blizzaga)

@Anti-Matter Yeah, people who dislike FF8 usually dislike it for that reason. Liking the Junction System might be an unpopular opinion. In my experience, people who like FF8 like the story, world and characters.

The junction system took something as simple as materia and made it overly complicated for genuinely no reason at all. If they remake FF8 at any point in the future, I hope they completely change the junctioning system.

The broken junction system was part of why I loved FF8. Last thing I want is for them to “fix” it