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[Lady Bird]

Currently just got to chapter 12, and I agree that 9/ Wall Market was the highest point in the game so far, and 10-11 the lowest. The sewers and the train graveyard were still mildly enjoyable, but they should have both been shorter areas (and both a single chapter) with no ghost side-plot. It really messed up with the story's pace and tone.

 

[PanzerAzel]

Yeah, unfortunate to say, I think I'm about done.

I was initially enjoying this and agreed that taking this direction was the right call when I first saw how much more realized and fleshed-out the world was. It was breathtaking and very impressive at first play. That was until the wow factor wore off and the game began throwing mundane, meaningless, needless filler in my way immediately hitting the slums that destroyed the pacing and has never ceased since. All subsequent chapters I've played since suffer pacing fluctuation that appears to stem from taking a very tight, cohesive narrative and partitioning it into segments that are separated by chunks of content largely irrelevant to that narrative. Much of it adds nothing but time. I keep playing feeling that I want all this tacked on shit gone so I can just enjoy Final Fantasy VII to modern standards. And when I actually get to, I love it.....but it inevitably never lasts.

Personally, in a game so reliant on its narrative, I think SE should've striven for a far more strict 1:1 recreation of the original story and instead placed the main effort into overhauling all aspects ancillary to it that are now far past technologically obsolete. Things such as fully realizing the old pre-rendered backgrounds into 3D, keeping and evolving a turn based combat system, orchestrating the score, but also taking liberties at points to expand upon character and narrative development, yet always holding within very close proximity to the source material. Because this remake only had so much of that material to draw from, which comprised around 4-5 hours originally. After having played into it to a good extent I'm finding the decision to stretch that out into a 30-40 hour experience was a bad call, and if they insist on breaking a perfectly paced and structured narrative into chunks to only fill what is between them with "Go kill the were-rats!" and "Would you collect my kitties for me mister SOLDIER?" for the remaining episodes instead of utilizing that time and space to far more effective and meaningful ends actually pertinent to a more fleshed-out and fulfilling experience, then yeah....I'm sorry to say that I'll not be around for them.

I was looking forward to a FFVII Remake, not a FFVII Remake with bloat. Which is surprising, as SE said they needed this episodic format to fully envision Midgar, yet then they go and pad it will irrelevant shit to do that accomplishes nothing so well as to drag it through the mud. It's not like Square's at want for content, VII is a massive game. Ah well, for those who love the universe I'm happy for them, for me, perhaps I'm not a big enough fan to slog through the padding to find the actual game underneath it.

 

[SantaC]

I don't remember Cloud being quite this much of a wet blanket sourpuss. Wish I were enjoying it more, but mostly it's a chore to get through, and the combat mechanics and progression systems don’t satisfy.

It’s a breath of fresh air to see attractive female character designs after purple hair woke western game Shrek overload, but sometimes FF7R comes off more like a harem dating sim with all these girls fawning over Cloud 24/7 while the threadbare plot advances glacially.

Wall Market has been cool at least.

Funny how people hated on Squall for the same reason.

 

[Lethal01]

On Chapter 16, during my time being rightfully banned (apologies boss man @EviLore won't happen again!)

I've been really analysing this game and taking it all in and I can safely say this is one of my favourite games this generation, it has everything I look for, expansive RPG upgrade elements, fun but challenging combat, bombastic boss battles, epic stories and characters and a true cinematic nature to it all.

This game for me has delivered so far, atm I'm grinding combat simulations so I can get to level 50 as hard difficulty doesn't sound like it's for me so I wanna stretch out this normal playthrough as much as possible.

My only massive problem with this game are some of the truly lazy visual choices this game took with its rendering or lack thereof.

Now the texture bugs are bad but they're bugs so I can't fault that unless it remains unpatched, I'm talking the absolutely jarring JPG level backgrounds in this game.

Now I understand that they may not have been able to render the city below, but surely there was a better option than this? Especially when some cutscenes focus on the backgrounds and allow them to take the entire shot which just cheapens the feeling of certain big moments as the world for me loses its immersion and starts to turn into some set from an 80's Sci-fi show.

I would have at least upped the quality of the backgrounds and if necessary added some thin layers of fog or something like that to obscure it as in some scenes it's impossible to ignore.

My only other fault of the game is the sidequests and how they just feel so cheap and the way the chapters interweave them makes me feel like Square just copied and pasted them in to stretch out the runtime.

For every 2 interesting side quests there are 5/6 filler quests that if it wasn't for me loving the world and playing this long awaited game I wouldn't have touched.

I'm not saying it's gotta be Witcher 3 level but you'd think with 5 years development time they could have done a bit more with it surely?

Overall I'm adoring this game and aside from some minor ish issues it's been a near flawless ride, I'm just hoping the game doesn't fall apart in the latter chapters.

I feel like criticisms like "I would have made X better " is kind of silly without saying what you would cut to make it happen. Perhaps upping that quality would have led to a less consistent framerate/image quality.

I agree the sidequest could have been better but it's safe to say that improving them would take time away from other areas of the game. I think it's clear that while they had 5 years of dev time it was focused on areas they found more important and I think it payed off.

Hopefully since they have the engine and main gameplay done they can focus a little more time in these areas for the next game.

 

[ZehDon]

...Because this remake only had so much of that material to draw from, which comprised around 4-5 hours originally. After having played into it to a good extent I'm finding the decision to stretch that out into a 30-40 hour experience was a bad call, and if they insist on breaking a perfectly paced and structured narrative into chunks to only fill what is between them with "Go kill the were-rats!" and "Would you collect my kitties for me mister SOLDIER?" for the remaining episodes instead of utilizing that time and space to far more effective and meaningful ends actually pertinent to a more fleshed-out and fulfilling experience, then yeah....I'm sorry to say that I'll not be around for them...

This right here.
The opening hours, spending more time with the Avalanche crew and getting to know them, was the type of expansion I was absolutely onboard with. I loved it all - and it made me sad, knowing I wouldn’t get the whole story played out in such quality for years to come. Brilliant stuff.
Now, I’m fifteen hours in, just started Wall Market, and I’m absolutely struggling to continue. The amount of unnecessary, low quality, bottom of the barrel bloat is mind blowing. The pacing is destroyed, all air is sucked out of the plot. They clearly didn’t have enough content for this to be a standalone game, and boy does it show.
I’ve even started to notice the quality of side assets degrade as I’ve played longer. The first two hours, absolutely everything is utterly pristine - best visuals of this generation. Now, half wayevery other building, wall, or NPC looks like a PS2 asset upscale.

This is “The Hobbit” of video games. Butter, spread thin over too much bread. A fucking shame.

 

[Lethal01]

This right here.
The opening hours, spending more time with the Avalanche crew and getting to know them, was the type of expansion I was absolutely onboard with. I loved it all - and it made me sad, knowing I wouldn’t get the whole story played out in such quality for years to come. Brilliant stuff.
Now, I’m fifteen hours in, just started Wall Market, and I’m absolutely struggling to continue. The amount of unnecessary, low quality, bottom of the barrel bloat is mind blowing. The pacing is destroyed, all air is sucked out of the plot. They clearly didn’t have enough content for this to be a standalone game, and boy does it show.
I’ve even started to notice the quality of side assets degrade as I’ve played longer. The first two hours, absolutely everything is utterly pristine - best visuals of this generation. Now, half wayevery other building, wall, or NPC looks like a PS2 asset upscale.

This is “The Hobbit” of video games. Butter, spread thin over too much bread. A fucking shame.

I loved the pacing but maybe loving the combat helps.
I don't mind if some parts are light on the important story since I enjoy killing a rat due to how fun the combat is.

I find wallmarket as beautiful as the first chapter from a visual standpoint, graphical resources are clearly spread thinner though.

 

[GenericUser]

Butter, spread thin over too much bread. A fucking shame.

the butter:

the bread:

In chapter 8 now and I have to force myself to continue. NONE of the new content is any fun. The new music sucks, only the rearrangements of the old tracks are good. The whole world looks so generic and nothing like the real final fantasy 7. Who thought that it was a good idea to make the ff7r slums look like real world slums? Have they even played the original? There is SO MUCH ROOM for artistic freedom within the ff7 universe and yet they settled with the most boring generic real world look they could come up with. And Kupo is a fucking kid in a kupo costume? Why not add a real kupo to the game? Is that too much fantasy in my final fantasy? Nomura is an asshole!

 

[psorcerer]

1) There are very few attacks that 1 shot from even half-HP levels in my experience. Bosses have 1-shot level of attacks from maybe around half health levels, but many of them are avoidable as well due to them telecasting the attack. The only fights I had where it actually felt like there were lots of dumb 1 shots is the tonberry fight, but I mean, that's the point of tonberry so I'm not going to bitch about it. The times where I got overwhelmed and died due to lack of ATB were almost always attributable to me ignoring healing for too long to begin with. If you wait to heal until your screen turns panic-red colors you're gonna have a bad time.

2) Guarding is ineffective if you don't use guard materia. As a side note I don't know if I got lucky or what but the Rude and Reno fights were totally enjoyable and I never felt like I was getting cheesed. If you want to dodge attack use Tifa more during those fights, she can run around like a roadrunner to dodge most stuff. Can basically kite enemies with her who depend on melee. It's truly Reno has that pounce attack that seems unavoidable, but as soon as that happened I switched to a different character and built up ATB to heal. You should not expect to avoid every attack, as this is an action-RPG, not an action game. I also never use guard materia and have guarded very little throughout my normal playthrough. Switching characters is more advisable than blocking with one you already control hoping to mitigate an attack.

3) There is materia designed to explicitly manage ATB growth. ATB Boost materia. ATB stagger materia. ATB assist materia. First Strike materia. Steadfast Block Materia (which gives ATB boost while blocking, and buffs blocking itself, killing both your #2 and #3 assertion). Refocus limit break + Clarity Pendant fills 3 ATBs. Whistlewind Scarf gives you ATB boost when entering battle. Barrets triangle attack is 1 automatic ATB charge. That combined with his distance allows him to generate ATB rapidly.

4) You need to start watching for enemy weaknesses and utilizing elemental materia + the weakness. Tifa with this combo and her fast attacks +buffs can quickly pressure and stagger enemies. Exploiting enemy weakness puts them into pressured mode, which basically leaves them helpless, which you can then stagger. Exploiting elemental or weapon weakness can make or break even generic fights against enemies let alone bosses.

1. There are a lot of attacks that one-shot from half-hp. Like every second one in big fights. And keeping everyone above 50% is spending at least 50% of ATB on healing alone. My characters almost never in the red zone.
2. Reno was pretty easy when alone, counters worked wonders. Rude was full of unaviodable and unguardable stuff. Like anything he did, apart from normal attacks which he did never, was unavoidable and tracking on the whole map. Most of my problems come from Aerith/Cloud parts, parts with Tifa are pretty ok (cheesy, but ok).
3. These all are not main quest. You need to do side quests and detours for this. If the game relies on that to win main boss fights...
4. I'm not sure I need a lesson in theory. I know it well enough. It doesn't work. Because half of the time is spent on healing. And other half of the time on items that support healing (ether) and attacks to build ATB. There is almost no ATB left to do actual damage in any big fight. Not to mention that in hell house battle for example the game expects your characters to have all 4 elemental magics on them. Seriously, any battle where you need to die to win it second time is a bad game design.

 

[ZehDon]

I loved the pacing but maybe loving the combat helps. I don't mind if some parts are light on the important story since I enjoy killing a rat due to how fun the combat is...

I have to disagree here, sorry. I find the combat a step back from the original, if I'm being completely honest. Initially, it feels great. It's quick, responsive, tactile - everything FFXV should've been, but ultimately wasn't. After a few hours with it, however, it's clear this lacks real depth or strategy. It feels great to slash around, but it's just so bloody mindless. In the original, every team member could be built up into to a core component of your three person team, with roles to play and a strategy, both for everyone as individuals, and also as part of your group. It's beloved to this day for a reason - it offered a pretty good amount of depth, even if the player could break it with creative materia use. With the new system, everyone is kinda... just support for Cloud. Their ATB bars filling up at a fraction compared to when the player is in control is a huge design mistake. Half their ATB is healing, the other half is just throwing the correct element spells at them, while you slash away. The materia system as implemented here is fundamentally broken: it is still designed around it opening up later into the game... except that there isn't any more game for the materia system to open up in. The game is going to end before these systems really start. I've seen zero reason to equip anything other than the base elements, for additional damage, and bog-standard healing materia. Throw on some basic ATB materia because you've got spare slots, and that's it. That's entire the system.
The other issue I have is the same as the rest of the game - it's all so damn elongated. Battles - especially boss battles - take so much longer than they should... but you're just running around, spamming slash or dodge, waiting for the ATB bars to fill.

 

[slade]

I never played the original FFVII and for the last 20 odd years have somehow managed to steer clear of all spoilers. This is my first introduction to this world and I'm both enjoying it immensely and dreading the end because I know this is just going to be the first bit of a longer story.

Just met Aerith again at the Church. Going slow because I don't want to rush through the game. Liking the combat systems. Especially love Cloud's parry. It's been my go to move for the one on one fights.

 

[Malakhov]

I force myself to only play 2-3 hours daily because I don't want this to end.

On the other hand I can't wait to see what the ending that have some people want to kill themselves...

 

[Koutsoubas]

So I guess no day 1 patch right? I will have to wait until PS5 then to enjoy 4k assets. I did the same with FFXV, waited until the PC Version and the image quality was so much better!

 

[Woodchipper]

Ok, so Chapter 8 started off amazing, then became a drag, then got sorta cool again towards the end, and now I’m at the beginning of Chapter 9 and completely in love again.

I’m having some difficulty with the combat and really need to do some research. Tips are welcome.

 

[TTOOLL]

Ok, so Chapter 8 started off amazing, then became a drag, then got sorta cool again towards the end, and now I’m at the beginning of Chapter 9 and completely in love again.

I’m having some difficulty with the combat and really need to do some research. Tips are welcome.

I agree. I still haven't finished it but the middle part hasn't been great. It is also the worst part of the game graphically speaking so far, except for Aeris' house but event there some natural textures are just low quality. It's really distracting.

 

[Radical Dreamer]

I never played the original FFVII and for the last 20 odd years have somehow managed to steer clear of all spoilers. This is my first introduction to this world and I'm both enjoying it immensely and dreading the end because I know this is just going to be the first bit of a longer story.

Just met Aerith again at the Church. Going slow because I don't want to rush through the game. Liking the combat systems. Especially love Cloud's parry. It's been my go to move for the one on one fights.

You and me both. Playing for the first time ff7. Just ended up with aerith She's such a bae (and tifa ). Jessie is kinda annoying though..
Fight with this red headed twat in church was strange.I didn't know how to hit him or evade his stun. Rolling/dodge didn't work, or was I doing something wrong?

 

[Malakhov]

I’m having some difficulty with the combat and really need to do some research. Tips are welcome.

In tougher fights have Aerith cast ward with your first atb point so shell be able to cast double spells in the same turn. Always pay attention to atb between your characters and always make sure to use them. Use focused thrust with cloud when ennemies are pressured to stagger them.

So far it's been working pretty well for me with this

Also don't worry too much about stats for armor, sometimes lesser stats armor have linked materia once paired with elemental can give you an edge in armor with a materia to give you resist or with a weapon to give you elemental weakness. I used this on 2nd try against Shiva and slaughtered her

 

[Woodchipper]

In tougher fights have Aerith cast ward with your first atb point so shell be able to cast double spells in the same turn. Always pay attention to atb between your characters and always make sure to use them. Use focused thrust with cloud when ennemies are pressured to stagger them.

So far it's been working pretty well for me with this

Also don't worry too much about stats for armor, sometimes lesser stats armor have linked materia once paired with elemental can give you an edge in armor with a materia to give you resist or with a weapon to give you elemental weakness. I used this on 2nd try against Shiva and slaughtered her

Thanks a bunch! Can’t wait to get home from work now.

Oh, and the thing about elemental materia is... I don’t have it, lol.

 

[Kev Kev]

Ok, so Chapter 8 started off amazing, then became a drag, then got sorta cool again towards the end, and now I’m at the beginning of Chapter 9 and completely in love again.

I’m having some difficulty with the combat and really need to do some research. Tips are welcome.

i was too! i will quote another poster who addressed my concerns a couple pages back. and ill had a few notes myself...

so, the first tip he gives about blocking. he means, just hold block and let the enemies attack you while blocked. that way, you dont have to stop the combat to and you can check out enemy attacks and movements. now, if while youre blocking, youre taking too much damage, then look into adding on a counterattack upgrade (counter attack is either a weapon upgrade or materia i cant remember)

that being said...

I tried that strategy and I think it can work fine once you get the hang of it, and have benefits. however, especially at first, i like to hit assess at the beginning of every fight. this stops the action immediately and lets me check for weaknesses/resistances. from there I will go to the command screen (action is still stopped), and I pick a command that makes sense, let it rip, the immediately switch to another charcter and go to heir command screen (in total, there may be like 2-3 seconds going from action being paused, to inputting command like attack or magic or whatever, to the next characters command screen and action being paused again). i then continue to do this through pretty much the entire match: action stops, select command, action resumes, switch char, action stops... rinse, repeat. only catch is, at times youll have to thrown in some basic square mashing attacks to fill your ATB, then go right back to the command screen to pause again

doing that helped me to stop, breathe, be strategic, unload attack and stop again to plan. i do use the shortcut commands, but only if im pretty comfortable with how the battle is going to go (like if ive fought dozens of them and i know how to take them out quick), but for the most part, the battle moves too quickly and i have to hit assess button or go to the command screen to slow things down.

essentialy, what im sayin is that im constantly stopping and starting the battle... which can be tedious, and not as fun, but it will help you get a handle on battle and then you can start throwing in shortcuts (massively helpful and essential for fluid combat) and stuff once you start getting more comfortable. but they key to battle in this game, i think, is to slow it the fuck down and take control, even though that means starting and stopping constantly (at first)

anyway... check it this other users tips, they really helped me out. good luck!

The battle system is really good and I think it just hasn't clicked for you just yet. The focus is on team management and watching the enemy rather than spamming attacks.

First off - Be a bit more defensive. Watching enemy movements and blocking can go a long way in this game as it'll help prevent your combat from being interrupted. If you're finding enemy (melee) attacks overwhelming then utilise Cloud's parry/counterattack mechanic (go into Punisher mode and press block - R1). Expect to take a lot of damage in every fight.

Secondly, be efficient with ATB usage and take your time with it. Once you know an enemy's weakness, just spend a bit of time gaining ATB and using the best attack for that enemy as much as you can. Don't sit on the same character for ages, use the ATB meters in other characters when they become full. I like to switch to Barret after I've told Cloud to use a lengthy attack, as Barret's Overcharge (triange attack) is not only powerful but a great way to quickly gain another ATB bar.

Following on from the previous point - Team Management is important! Make sure atleast two of your party have healing materia to keep your health up and have the cleansing Materia / items around to get rid of status ailements. You need to be watching your team as a lot - keeping an eye on their health, keeping an eye on their ATB bars.

Lastly, a top tip to get you through the bigger battles - Learn what makes an enemy stagger and how to increase that bar quickly. The team has certain attacks that increase stagger, such as Cloud's Focus Thrust, but enemies are also weak to magic etc that can make them stagger. Once staggered, you can increase the stagger bonus and deal even more damage, like using Tifa's triangle attacks - which can bring the stagger bonus to crazy numbers like 300%.

I would advise that in order for the combat to feel slower, you need to make yourself "slower". Spend more analysing the battlefield and take your time with attacks. There is only so much you can do to plan ahead, you need to spend most of your time reacting to what is throw at you by the enemy. Don't let them dictate the fight.

 

[NeoLed]

Y

Now that the world looks much more photorealistic, it is very hilarious how Cloud walks around with a sword as big as he is strapped to his back and literally no one in the civilian populace around you seems to notice or care. Also no one seems to notice Barret has a gatling gun for a hand either. All the civilians looks like normal people and here we are just walking around armed to the teeth and everyone doesn't blink an eye. Okay.

Your game is bugged. In mine, I keep hearing the npc comments at Cloud's sword. Some even flinch when Cloud passed by

Or maybe you're not paying attention

 

[GymWolf]

Was reading GameSpot's guide to missable Materia, luckily based on that guide I've got everything...

...Except a revive materia you can get on chapter 4. Did i seriously miss the only revive materia in the game?

where is this revive materia? i don't wanna miss it.

 

[JORMBO]

Pretty sure you can buy revive materia from shops. Almost positive that's how I got mine.

 

[bravoguy]

Still struggling for a Physical copy as I don’t like digital.

 

[Boneless]

This right here.
The opening hours, spending more time with the Avalanche crew and getting to know them, was the type of expansion I was absolutely onboard with. I loved it all - and it made me sad, knowing I wouldn’t get the whole story played out in such quality for years to come. Brilliant stuff.
Now, I’m fifteen hours in, just started Wall Market, and I’m absolutely struggling to continue. The amount of unnecessary, low quality, bottom of the barrel bloat is mind blowing. The pacing is destroyed, all air is sucked out of the plot. They clearly didn’t have enough content for this to be a standalone game, and boy does it show.
I’ve even started to notice the quality of side assets degrade as I’ve played longer. The first two hours, absolutely everything is utterly pristine - best visuals of this generation. Now, half wayevery other building, wall, or NPC looks like a PS2 asset upscale.

This is “The Hobbit” of video games. Butter, spread thin over too much bread. A fucking shame.

You´re in luck, because the wall market is an absolutely amazing chapter for both gameplay and story.

Agree that there are weaker chapters, train graveyard felt a bit misplaced for me.

Definitely thinking of replaying the OG after finishing this.

 

[chitzy]

Still struggling for a Physical copy as I don’t like digital.

If you're in the states I'll sell you mine, $40 shipped. PM me if interested.

 

[Psykodad]

Pretty sure you can buy revive materia from shops. Almost positive that's how I got mine.

You can, at least from that Materia research kid.

Anyway, was thinking about going for the platinum trophy as I really love this Remake, but going through the trophy list, I realized that I don't love games enough to go through the trouble. Lol

 

[Nickolaidas]

You and me both. Playing for the first time ff7. Just ended up with aerith She's such a bae (and tifa ). Jessie is kinda annoying though..
Fight with this red headed twat in church was strange.I didn't know how to hit him or evade his stun. Rolling/dodge didn't work, or was I doing something wrong?

You need to have your Punisher stance and hold block whenever Reno is about to attack - that way you counter and hit him hard (you can also manage to sneak in a solid Braver to end the combo with a bang). Once you do this 4-5 times, Reno uses his EMP balls. You can evade these (and should avoid them for they stun you on hit, which gives him the green light to do massive damage on you) and you can also attack them with sword attacks (destroying one with a 1-2 basic combos) or attack them with magic. Get ready to roll away whenever Reno is about to throw energy attacks at you, and use your Punisher stance on Defense when he's running towards you to parry him.

At some point you'll be definitely be saving up your limit break - use to end a combo, don't use it on its own, for Reno will likely dodge it.

 

[chitzy]

You need to have your Punisher stance and hold block whenever Reno is about to attack - that way you counter and hit him hard (you can also manage to sneak in a solid Braver to end the combo with a bang). Once you do this 4-5 times, Reno uses his EMP balls. You can evade these (and should avoid them for they stun you on hit, which gives him the green light to do massive damage on you) and you can also attack them with sword attacks (destroying one with a 1-2 basic combos) or attack them with magic. Get ready to roll away whenever Reno is about to throw energy attacks at you, and use your Punisher stance on Defense when he's running towards you to parry him.

At some point you'll be definitely be saving up your limit break - use to end a combo, don't use it on its own, for Reno will likely dodge it.

You don't even need Punisher. Just block his attacks and you'll immediately put him into Pressured. Pretty sure he's weak to an element too but I forget which. Maybe Thunder.

Side note, Reno is a walking pile of cringe.

 

[DryPancakes]

Who is to say the original ending still won't be the end?

Who cares? With how messy the changes are, getting to the same conclusion is meaningless. You want to eat the cake by pouring gas on it, you can still eat it but is not going to taste good.

Again, this ISN'T the original. That still exists! /faceplate.

This has always been such a ridiculous excuse, if the original still exists why make a remake at ALL? If you're going to change so much why not make an entirely new game?

you should 't have purchased the game because they said there would be from the beginning.

Do you think we should pay more attention to interviews than the actual subtitle of the game plastered all over the place? Not everyone is a "true fan" and follows every interview or cares about media outlets, Interiews shouldn't be the main source of information about what your game is going to be, what about if you put that in the name of the game? oh wait it's called remake? I guess it's a remake then, silly me, I thought it was going to be a reboot, thanks for calling it remake and letting me know.

I at least embrace change.

That doesn't make you any better than anyone else, change can be bad too.

AGAIN, changes are not the problem, changes are to be expected, BAD changes are the problem. If you're going to make changes at least make them comprehensible and make sense. This is fanfiction just for the sake of change, no problem tho because you'll embrace it no questions asked.

 

[Nickolaidas]

This has always been such a ridiculous excuse, if the original still exists why make a remake at ALL? If you're going to change so much why not make an entirely new game?

Because some of us applaud those changes.

 

[Neff]

In tougher fights have Aerith cast ward with your first atb point so shell be able to cast double spells in the same turn.

I love how each character is subtly OP in their own unique way, but this one really does bust the game. It's great.

Plus, other characters can use the ward too.

 

[Psykodad]

This has always been such a ridiculous excuse, if the original still exists why make a remake at ALL? If you're going to change so much why not make an entirely new game?

Nomura (or was it Kitase?) literally said that Remake was going to be a re-imagining.
Meaning the FF VII they want to make in this day and age, if it would've been released for the first time right now.

Obviously a large part of the game was going to get a complete make-over, given that the industry moved on from 1997.

They also literally stated that it wouldn't be just a visual touch-up and if that's what people wanted, they suggested to play the remastered version on PSN.

 

[Birdo]

And the Honeybee Inn scene is handsdown the most awesome gayest section in gaming.

I don't mean to sound like Polygon, but I thought it was kind of awful and tropey.

The old stereotypical flamboyant gay hitting on the straight guy and acting like a creep.

This game seems to have gotten away with it scott free, so more power to it I guess.

 

[chitzy]

Was there ever any confirmation that save files would carry over to the next installment? Seems doubtful to me but idk.

 

[Psykodad]

I don't mean to sound like Polygon, but I thought it was kind of awful and tropey.

The old stereotypical flamboyant gay hitting on the straight guy and acting like a creep.

This game seems to have gotten away with it scott free, so more power to it I guess.

It shouldn't have been any other way though.

 

[chitzy]

I don't mean to sound like Polygon, but I thought it was kind of awful and tropey.

The old stereotypical flamboyant gay hitting on the straight guy and acting like a creep.

This game seems to have gotten away with it scott free, so more power to it I guess.

Jesus christ

 

[Birdo]

Jesus christ

Do you have anything to add to this discussion? What does that post even mean?

 

[Airbus Jr]

Do you have anything to add to this discussion? What does that post even mean?

 

[chitzy]

Do you have anything to add to this discussion? What does that post even mean?

It means your take on Honeybee Inn is so laughably bad that I needed to invoke the power of Christ in order to not flatline after reading it.

 

[Birdo]

It means your take on Honeybee Inn is so laughably bad that I needed to invoke the power of Christ in order to not flatline after reading it.

Can you explain what you think was bad about my opinion, so maybe we can discuss it?

 

[LordKasual]

I agree with much of your post. However, what is the point of the roll mechanic then? I've essentially given up using it beyond its apparently one single use of having the roll materia equipped, but even that doesn't seem particularly worth it. While it's fine to say damage mitigation has to be through ATB, blocking, and buffs, giving the player the ability to roll is fairly deceptive if it serves no real purpose.

Alot of moves can be dodged though, you just can't i-frame them.

50% of the spells in this game (Aero, Blizzard) actually don't dump their damage on the initial hit -- you have to stand still after blocking in order to actually take 90% of the damage. It's generally hard/impossible to dodge magic on this game unless you're REALLY far away (so risky) but you can always just block Fire/Thunder and Block > roll Aero/Blizzard to avoid getting hit and it works 100% of the time.

And of course, if you see an enemy about to swing at you while attacking something else, you can cancel your assault with a dodge roll. Basically....it has all the usual uses of a dodge roll.....you just can't i-frame with it. Which makes sense, since the game isn't designed for you to pick one character and Ungabunga through the whole game with I-frames and perfect blocks.

The main problem I have is not that I'm expecting FF7R to try to be more of an action game than it actually is, but due to its attention on actiony elements, it's less of an RPG than it deserves (and I'd argue needs) to be.

What i was saying is that the game does know exactly what it wants to be, and it does it extremely well. I guess it's not for everyone though.

People like to complain about what they don't like about the "Action elements", but for just about every single problem I hear, there's more than a few RPG-element solutions within plain grasp that they ignore. That's why i say you're probably just focusing way too much on the action elements without realizing just how much wiggle room you're actually given.

I think you should just stick to Classic mode, as it basically allows you to enjoy fighting without having to really deal with the action parts. You can essentially take all incoming damage as "random" and just ATB accordingly, it's really not much different from classic FF really.

Nice theory. But that's not what I see in practice.

1. You must evade a lot of attacks. There are too many that will one shot a character if you don't (or two-shot).

There are VERY few attacks in this game that will straight one-shot you while blocking, and the ones that do give you like 15 seconds to heal up (or just interrupt it).

There are moves that you don't WANT to block (like fire) but that's about it. And if a move guard-breaks you, then generally you can just dodge it.

2. Guarding is ineffective against a lot of attacks. (the ridiculous fight with Rude, you cannot guard and cannot evade)

.....however Rude/Reno are like one of the few bosses in this game that basically indirectly forces you to swap, especially in his first phase, because you CAN'T dodge their targeted attacks.....but this isn't exactly random or anything because there are plenty of bosses in this game that have unavoidable attacks that grab/seize one of your party members.

For Rude, If you control Aerith and start attacking him, he's going to put her to sleep. If you try to burn him down with Cloud, he's going to start ramming and tossing you around. Basically, once he starts going for one character, just switch to another and tear his back up. Both this fight (and the other Turks fight where you have to fight them both) can get really aggravating until you realize that they're basically trying to force you to abuse character swapping.

The game is pretty strategy based lol

3. You cannot manage ATB growth at all sometimes, if you cannot damage (immune, resistant) an enemy or cannot hit them (too fast moving) your ATB is zero, and you have nothing to do about it. Literally nothing, you need to rely on luck and random generator, which automatically places that battle system on the bottom.

1) Attacking enemies who are immune/resistant still gives you ATB.......what do you mean? It just doesn't deal any damage.

2) The ONLY times you'll ever be completely out of methods of generating ATB is when a boss moves out of range or does a phase attack and your ranged party member is dead. There's nothing luck based about any of that though. Anytime this happens, the game has multiple avenues to building a strategy around it.

And if you are just terrified of that happening...prioritize Speed stat, or equip someone with the ATB Charge materia or something. It's perfect for niche situations like that.

4. You cannot interrupt anybody in this game. Unless you use magic/skill, and then you need ATB, which you cannot have if you get spammed by enemies in the first place. But yes, you get interrupted all the time. Because again: enemies can time their attacks to yours, you - cannot. There is no timer, there is no indication how long any attack will charge, and you cannot interrupt enemies by regular attacks.

Huh? I don't get this. Enemies have a big glowing message over their head when they're about to attack you...you can just block or evade, it wouldn't really make sense if the game expected you to avoid / interrupt EVERY SINGLE MOVE the enemies did against you. This isn't Devil May Cry.


Like, i don't get this complaint...if you can deal with every single situation in the game with just TWO OPTIONS (dodge/block).... what would be the point of all the Materia, gear, and playable characters?

In that situation, it doesn't matter what you did, I-framing/instant blocking attacks would always be the optimal option and attack damage would be the most important stat (like endgame FFXV where everything one-shots you regardless of your defense because Noctis can i-frame every move in the game)

 

[Revolutionary]

Wow, looks like I was way underleveled when I beat Leviathan. I'm watching videos where the party can actually survive Tidal Wave. TW wiped my party every single time until I started to use AOE Shell (or whatever it's called in this game).

 

[TGO]

Don't care what the haters say
This is straight up the best FF game, no
The best Square Enix game I've played in the last 20 years.
This is a Squaresoft game.

 

[psorcerer]

There are VERY few attacks in this game that will straight one-shot you while blocking, and the ones that do give you like 15 seconds to heal up (or just interrupt it).

Essentially there are 3 battles so far that had that problem: Hell house, Mark II flying machines, Frog king.
But all of these have the same problem: unbelievably damaging attacks where there is not time to counter or interrupt.

Basically, once he starts going for one character, just switch to another and tear his back up.

That's one real strategy tip I've got from this whole conversation so far.
Placing characters far from each other and trying to switch aggro by switching characters. Thanks.

Attacking enemies who are immune/resistant still gives you ATB

Because of the "can't hit it" animation the ATB grows is like 10x slower.

The ONLY times you'll ever be completely out of methods of generating ATB is when a boss moves out of range or does a phase attack and your ranged party member is dead

No, any flying creature will stop giving any ATB to melee characters.
Which immediately reduces your interrupt capacity to zero (Aerith casts are slow as hell) if it's Aerith/Cloud combo.
And getting ATB by blocking has problems with magic: full damage. I.e. flying magic casters decimate you in seconds, literally.

Enemies have a big glowing message over their head when they're about to attack you.

And how exactly that helps?
You cannot avoid most of the attacks that matter (see Hell house), and block gives you like 10% damage reduction (or 0% if it's magic).

Like, i don't get this complaint...if you can deal with every single situation in the game with just TWO OPTIONS (dodge/block).... what would be the point of all the Materia, gear, and playable characters?

But it seems like the game relies on you evading stuff. If there was no "evade" option I would consider it fair.
But it's there and it's crucial to not getting killed by avoidable attacks that still do hell of a damage in block.
So essentially for any enemy attack you need some sort of trial and error to find out what to do: evade, defend, counter, interrupt.
And the cost of each error is pretty big. In case of a bosses like Hell House the cost is phoenix dawn in each case.
Multiply it by amount of the various attacks and it looks pretty fucked up to me.

And game really does a poor job explaining that aggro switches to the character you are controlling.
It can be found only indirectly by looking at what "aggro inducing" materia does.

 

[wzy]

Put some weapon points into HP and defense. Actually cast barrier.

 

[Malakhov]

I love how each character is subtly OP in their own unique way, but this one really does bust the game. It's great.

Plus, other characters can use the ward too.

Yeah they have all have their strenghts in unique ways, they nailed this

 

[Cybrwzrd]

Because some of us applaud those changes.

I'll put it like this. A microbrewery releases an awesome IPA and it is no longer available. There are some dwindling stocks of old vintages of it, but they are getting a little stale, as beer loses its flavor over time. Then all of a sudden, the brewery hypes up a new batch of the beer, and how awesome it will be.

They bring it out. It now is a slightly better than Bud Light clone. It now is a bland, mass market beer.

Bud Light, being the most popular beer in the US, gets rave reviews from people who don't like IPA, or may have been too young to drink at the time it was first available. Some people who like IPAs also drink Bud Light, so they drink it because it is objectively better than Bud Light, and the nostalgia is good enough for them. Then there are people who are genuinely pissed because their favorite beer will never be the same.

 

[Lethal01]

I have to disagree here, sorry. I find the combat a step back from the original, if I'm being completely honest. Initially, it feels great. It's quick, responsive, tactile - everything FFXV should've been, but ultimately wasn't. After a few hours with it, however, it's clear this lacks real depth or strategy. It feels great to slash around, but it's just so bloody mindless. In the original, every team member could be built up into to a core component of your three person team, with roles to play and a strategy, both for everyone as individuals, and also as part of your group. It's beloved to this day for a reason - it offered a pretty good amount of depth, even if the player could break it with creative materia use. With the new system, everyone is kinda... just support for Cloud. Their ATB bars filling up at a fraction compared to when the player is in control is a huge design mistake. Half their ATB is healing, the other half is just throwing the correct element spells at them, while you slash away. The materia system as implemented here is fundamentally broken: it is still designed around it opening up later into the game... except that there isn't any more game for the materia system to open up in. The game is going to end before these systems really start. I've seen zero reason to equip anything other than the base elements, for additional damage, and bog-standard healing materia. Throw on some basic ATB materia because you've got spare slots, and that's it. That's entire the system.
The other issue I have is the same as the rest of the game - it's all so damn elongated. Battles - especially boss battles - take so much longer than they should... but you're just running around, spamming slash or dodge, waiting for the ATB bars to fill.

I think having to control the character to fill their ATB is one of the best choices they made for this game. I love that it encourages switch and while I am bothered with the difficulty of the game. Using people besides just Cloud was definitely the smarter choice in my playthough where I made sure to avoid things like items and options that make the game way to easy but that's the same thing I have to do to get a challenge from the original.

I replayed the original again just a while ago and while it has some neat combos the level of strategy required to win is probably even lower than this game, make a few good choices and the method to win is even simpler than this game. So for me this game had more challenge strategically(not saying much) and even when the solution was easy it still felt good to do.

Also playing the game as intended just plain feels good and looks good

 

[Zephir]

Just reached the Wall Market and I have only one thing to say...

Spoiler

I want Madame M in every single game: FF, Kingdom Hearts, The World Ends With You, even not SE games, I don't care, I just want her everywhere

 

[RE2_Apocalypse]

Don't care what the haters say
This is straight up the best FF game, no
The best Square Enix game I've played in the last 20 years.
This is a Squaresoft game.

The haters are mostly a bunch of trolls, the other small majority has such an individualistic mindset, it is all about what I wanted, me me me and if I hate it, and pissed off about it then it is "fanfiction", or "Nomura is a hack...", and so forth.

I still think FFX is my favorite FF, but this game is easily top 3. I loved every second of it and still working to get my platinum.

 

[Nickolaidas]

Some people who like IPAs also drink Bud Light, so they drink it because it is objectively better than Bud Light, and the nostalgia is good enough for them. Then there are people who are genuinely pissed because their favorite beer will never be the same.

But now my sense of taste has evolved to the point that IPA now tastes like piss, while Bud Light's taste becomes better and better with each new brew.

Maybe it's the IPA guys who are victims of nostalgia, not the guys who prefer bud light over IPA after tasting both.