In my effort to make good with my resolutions, I decided to post some updates on the blog giving my thoughts of what was the best game of all time 15 years later. Final Fantasy VII was a groundbreaking success when it came out in 1997 and redesigned the RPG genre since. Although they're have been critics that doubt that the Final Fantasy franchise is nothing more than just a lame emo-complexed love story, but I think they're engaging and yeah, they're confusing to hell with some of their story, it's still captivating. But so far, let me just breeze though this to get to my main goal. It's been a long way coming and I am determined now more than ever to finish that damn game before the end of this year.
Of course to do so, I took the initiative and started playing it about 3 weeks ago, with a little time set aside to obtain my goal. Also I'm going to try to get though this based off of memory alone, no GameFAQs, no outside saves to get me to the end, not even my old strategy guide from Brady Games. It's all a la BootLeG from this point forward. Here's my progress so far. I'll give it to you in text form for now, still planning on recording my progress to video, another one of the many things I need to get going on.
So far I'm 21 hours into the game. I'm in awe with getting my base characters revisiting them all. Cloud, my swordsman with apparently more of a mysterious past than the meat in Wendy's chili. Barrett, who all I can think of at this point in the story is a gung-ho hippie with a machine gun. So he's spreading his message with fire power instead of flower power. Tifa, who's along for the ride because she new Cloud before he became a member of SOLDIER and a complete tool, wanting revenge for her father's death. Aeris (not Aerith, because dammit I'm playing it the way it was developed not how it was actually in the story) is the lovable Ancient who is the last of her kind trying to live a simple life. Red XIII, who is a mysterious creature that wants nothing more than to just go home to his grandfather. And last (but not least, so far in my game) is Cait Sith, a fortune telling cat riding on an overweight mog.
The game took me (as in they took Cloud) to blow up a reactor with a rebel group full of disposable characters as well as Barrett and Tifa; and eventually led them to their death. Along the way Cloud meets up with Aeris rescuing her from a tyrannical militant group subcontracted by the government, which is run by a major energy sucking corporation. All I can say at this point is "how very pre-post apocalyptic this sounds." Later to find out this super powered being killed the president and the rebel group is caught in the middle. They escape and flee from the home city and is on a quest to track down Sephiroth, the main antagonist from bringing the end of the world because he thinks he's an Ancient that is bent on purging the humans from existence bringing a peace to his kind only genocide could provide. In the mean time, my team is being man-hunted all across God's green earth trying to find the sunnuvabitch that is actually trying to kill everyone. It's like if they made The Fugitive into an emo, semi-steam punk-ish RPG.
They go to a near by place called Kalm where Cloud eventually tells his side of the story and why he needs to bring Sephiroth to justice; being that he on a mission burnt down his and Tifa's home town of Nibel and killed her father in nothing short of a powertrip thinking that he was an Ancient because he read a book with his mother's name in it. That, and he hears voices too. From there they start going near and far tracking Sephiroth's path to no avail. They find themselves in a place where Barrett's story start to unravel on how he caused so much trouble to his home town of Corel to the point where he was banished.
Along the way we meet with Cait Sith who is just wanting to tag along because he read the future and doubts his own abilites to tell such and want to see it though. We get captured and thrown in jail only to be whored out as chocobo jockeys for our freedom. Yeah, because prison is totally like that. Barrett meets another person with a gunhand that wants nothing more than to just die. So he kills him. I'm certain the story could've developed that more but it's all backstory for a secondary character and that doesn't mean a damn for later on in the game.
Later on, we go to Red XIII's home and he has to make the decision to whether he should stay home and be a complete pussy whining about his parental issues, or continue to fight with us. His grandfather (which is practically a hybrid of Modok and Bob Barker) tells him to go and continue to fight. Why was this so important, because everyone needs a fuckin' backstory, that's why.
Now I'm currently in Nibelhelm, where it looks completely normal, outside of half the population is in black cloaks with tattoos based off of which one drank Sephiroth's Kool-Aid first. Cloud's shocked that everything isn't burnt to a crisp and is starting to doubt his own recounts of what happened a few years prior. They start their trek to the Mako reactor at the top of the mountain to see what the hell is going on.
And that's where I'm stopping at this point. Join me next month for what I've done for all of January in playing and eventually beating Final Fantasy VII. In the mean time, a normal post for next week.
BootLeG sampler.. signing out...
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