Sorry, I am too embarrassed to make my own thread so like, I just thought I would use this thread as an opportunity to show what I was thinking myself in a similar vain/manner. So like, I figured that Midgar would be an over-exaggerated depiction of a gentrified city in real life, and all of the cities on that continent would be, with like a lower level underneath that is kind of run down and poverty stricken but they would still have jobs and stuff, but I felt like their currency would be degraded compared to the upper levels. The upper levels would seemingly be perfect on the outside, and kind of ritzy looking. I figured their reliance on Mako would become sort of addictive like a "drug" and it would have this peculiar effect if used for mass consumption like in a city, would cause a strange effect on the society at large. Nothing really extreme, but it would make the populace fall sort of into a state of passivity and a trance, and make them sort of euphoric. Mako is sort of treated like a miracle answer to all kinds of fields, including science and health. It's considered a renewable and environmentally form of energy (which it is) and has ushered in a new age of prosperity. The only thing is that, it's more environmentally destructive, but in a way that's not obvious or easily scientifically understand (like, look wtf? the earth as a spirit? THAT IS NOT SCIENTIFIC)
So like, much of the upper classes of the world who live in wealth and comfort, are kind of oblivious to all of the problems happening in the "real world" it has also kind of caused "vast deserts" all over where Mako is widely used, and has seemingly drained the areas ability to rejuvenate; but the problem is the world was already ravaged by a great and long war with Wutai not very long ago, on a continuous basis until recently Shinra won.
Which is how individuals like Sephiroth gained notoriety and fame. Sephiroth became sort of a national hero and celebrity for some weird reason, and after the war was like featured on billboards and merchandising deals and movies were made about him and was touted as like some kind of hero or something to young boys (like Cloud) and it was also to tout how great Shinra is and sell the idea of Mako as well (well, because Shinra is like a dictatorship like Russia I guess or something lol)
Avalanche is part of an underground network of alliances, and resistance movement/forces that want to stop Shinra all together and save the planet from Mako energy. (and some of the disastrous effects which were hidden and kept secret, like mutations, experiments, etc) and instead of just blowing up reactors, they seriously want to overthrow Shinra I guess and cause a revolution or something, which is their main motive.)
But anyway, yeah. I also imagined that they would have "force field" type things, like how in the game their is "shell" and "protect" and that's what all the magic users would use all of the time, and somehow it would stop most gunfire and thus due to this, they started fighting with melee weapons and swords again on and off, but still using guns. Normal grunts and stuff would just use guns. Using magic would be really difficult and it would be hard to find individuals who are adept and capable at it.