(Tagged Remake Spoilers) OG Frustration Thread/Double Standards

[Cat on Mars]

For better or worse, FFVII was not a hard game.

It's the easiest JRPG I've ever played. The materia system is broken, period.

My inner nerd likes to look at stats for fun. That's how I learnt that Tifa was the second strongest member of the party and why she was that good at stealing (her base accuracy rate was high af). I used Cloud as meat shield to tear through everything, Aerith to destroy everything with magic and giving everybody HP boosters and Tifa to steal stuff and balance the team (she had the Enemy Skill materia so she was my Jack-of-all-trades in the OG).
When I play JRPGs I use to inspect every location very thoroughly so I always end up with more EXP than needed.

 

[Odysseus]

Should try doing a no materia run some time. I'm sure the character's individual stat differences would shine more then, though Aerith would be pretty useless.

 

[Stiggie]

Should try doing a no materia run some time. I'm sure the character's individual stat differences would shine more then, though Aerith would be pretty useless.

Meh, that always happens in special runs, you always have to find that one specific tactic that breaks the entire thing.

 

[ForceStealer]

I find claims that the materia system is broken rather spurious. FFVII is an easy game, but not because materia is broken, the enemies just aren't that tough.
The system CAN be broken, but I don't think that's the same thing as BEING broken, imo. Otherwise even the most basic leveling system is "broken" because you could grind to obscene power levels if you were so deranged inclined.
VIII's junction system I generally am more inclined to colloquially refer to as broken, although even that might not be the case. But that system seems to actively encourage you to break it simply to efficiently get through the game. VII you have to do a little work to break.

Should try doing a no materia run some time. I'm sure the character's individual stat differences would shine more then, though Aerith would be pretty useless.

The Striking Staff pretty much puts her on par with other attackers through Cosmo Canyon.

 

[Cat on Mars]

The system CAN be broken, but I don't think that's the same thing as BEING broken, imo.

I dunno, it looks pretty broken to me.

VIII's junction system I generally am more inclined to colloquially refer to as broken, although even that might not be the case. But that system seems to actively encourage you to break it simply to efficiently get through the game. VII you have to do a little work to break.

VIII's was my favourite (read: hated) system. It was designed to be broken, which is the same as saying it was broken from the start.
They knew they fucked up and tried to somewhat balance the game making monsters level up and stuff. Spoiler: it was a very useless idea and it never worked as intended, it just made random battles longer and more boring.

@Jairus why do you hate me? (ಥ﹏ಥ)

 

[Shademp]

In the original FFVII, I never felt like I had to work particularly hard to become overpowered. This is great for accessibility (and probably made OG more successful than it otherwise would have been) but because I can so easily achieve my power fantasy I don't feel a motivation to explore combat deeper. Plenty of people most certainly have explored its potential depth (there is every possible letter combination out there for self-imposed FFVII challenge runs) but I doubt how much of this depth was intentional.

FFVIIR makes you put in the work by mastering the characters in combat, adapting to each situation and learning (sometimes the really hard way) how to best go about battles. Simply having the best equipment or going up a few levels isn't gonna cut it, similar to how getting to Lv99 in Dissidia was only the beginning of the journey. The game offers the best of both worlds by both having the easy- and hard(er) modes. The learning curve is long and steady, making you feel that you really earn the right to play hard mode.

I love that Square went the action-RPG route for FFVIIR. Recommending the OG to people is a nightmare in my experience because most of them quit after the first few minutes because the gameplay isn't engaging enough...assuming they weren't already scared away by ye olde PS1 graphics. It's just so much easier to sell FFVIIR to a wider audience.

I also feel that fan-made mods of the original game got it covered already on how to expand the original gameplay while still existing within the turn-based paradigm. It makes me happy that FFVIIR doesn't feel like "just another FFVII mod except it's official".

 

[Odysseus]

Recommending the OG to people is a nightmare in my experience because most of them quit after the first few minutes because the gameplay isn't engaging enough...assuming they weren't already scared away by ye olde PS1 graphics.

But you see, those people are cowards and charlatans.

 

[Prism]

I had that reaction when some of my friends who got into 7 through the Remake. When they said they were gonna try the OG because of the cliffhanger in Remake, I felt the need to add a bunch of caveats like “don’t worry, the combat gets interesting when you get more materia” or “the graphics grow on you after a while”

I was pleasantly surprised when they didn’t have any issues at all and loved it.

 

[Shademp]

But you see, those people are cowards and charlatans.

Let us form a high-brow FFVII critic club and make a point how others should WISH they could see the true depth of this literal GAME-CHANGING piece of GAME ART

Acquire clothes and poses to match, as such:

"Hmm, yes. I see it now. The duality of Jenova and the Lifestream."

/jk

 

[Stiggie]

after the first few minutes because the gameplay isn't engaging enough...assuming they weren't already scared away by ye olde PS1 graphics. It's just so much easier to sell FFVIIR to a wider audience.

This is perhaps the main reason why I wanted a faithful remake, people say that "the OG will never go away", but in a way it does, I can't get anyone really to play that. They're willing to play remake though, so I king of did want something capable or replacing it. I don't mind the sequel idea, if we'd had a real remake earlier, like in 2005 or something just so that there was SOME faithful version of FFVII that was still palpable for newer players.

But I guess I'll never get that now :S

 

[Clement Rage]

Any system can be broken if you choose to break it. If [thing A] makes the game too easy for your tastes, then don't do it.

 

[Erotic Materia]

The solution is simple-ish: mod the OG to play like the remake. With a graphics mod. Oh, and voice acting. And improved cutsce- yeah, that would never work.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

Let us form a high-brow FFVII critic club and make a point how others should WISH they could see the true depth of this literal GAME-CHANGING piece of GAME ART

Acquire clothes and poses to match, as such:

"Hmm, yes. I see it now. The duality of Jenova and the Lifestream."

/jk

This sounds like the club for me!

 

[Odysseus]

The solution is simple-ish: mod the OG to play like the remake. With a graphics mod. Oh, and voice acting. And improved cutsce- yeah, that would never work.

There actually was a voice acting mod on the works over on Qhimm ages ago. I don't think they ever finished though, and I have no idea how they were going to implement the voices anyway.

 

[Ite]

This is perhaps the main reason why I wanted a faithful remake, people say that "the OG will never go away", but in a way it does, I can't get anyone really to play that. They're willing to play remake though, so I king of did want something capable or replacing it. I don't mind the sequel idea, if we'd had a real remake earlier, like in 2005 or something just so that there was SOME faithful version of FFVII that was still palpable for newer players.

But I guess I'll never get that now :S

This sums up my entire mental breakdown over the last three months. I’m just gutted.

 

[Rydeen]

I know I’ve said it before but I am just the hugest fangirl of the remake’s battle system.

I totally understand why people don’t want to play the OG, unfortunately. I don’t even game much anymore but I find myself unable to play any games with random encounters anymore (especially those with a high rate of them). I was recently trying to play Xenogears for the first time, for example, and I just couldn’t (the stupid janky jumping mechanic didn’t help either). I was trying so hard to enjoy the 90s mechanics I used to have no problem with and I just couldn’t, and it breaks my heart a little. So many of these games were amazing but just became too much of a combat slog once I played games with more complex (and harder), modern systems. I can still do turn based thankfully, but I’m picky now. The mechanics need to be original (and not easy/simplistic) and I want to see the enemies on the map/level.

 

[Odysseus]

I know I’ve said it before but I am just the hugest fangirl of the remake’s battle system.

I totally understand why people don’t want to play the OG, unfortunately. I don’t even game much anymore but I find myself unable to play any games with random encounters anymore (especially those with a high rate of them). I was recently trying to play Xenogears for the first time, for example, and I just couldn’t (the stupid janky jumping mechanic didn’t help either). I was trying so hard to enjoy the 90s mechanics I used to have no problem with and I just couldn’t, and it breaks my heart a little. So many of these games were amazing but just became too much of a combat slog once I played games with more complex (and harder), modern systems. I can still do turn based thankfully, but I’m picky now. The mechanics need to be original (and not easy/simplistic) and I want to see the enemies on the map/level.

I agree. The remake just feels so good to play for me, I don't think I've ever enjoyed an RPG battle system so much, and it still retains a lot of the things that defined VII'a combat.

I still love me some turn based gameplay in the right context, but it can be a chore too.

 

[Erotic Materia]

Let us form a high-brow FFVII critic club and make a point how others should WISH they could see the true depth of this literal GAME-CHANGING piece of GAME ART

Acquire clothes and poses to match, as such:

"Hmm, yes. I see it now. The duality of Jenova and the Lifestream."

/jk

Spoiler: My god, its beauty is almost too much to bear

 

[Stiggie]

I honestly mostly LOVE fighting with Tifa atm, it feels so satisfying. I do really like that each has their own specialty, finding out something is great to counter with Cloud is really nice, and creating a set-up for Barret where he's basically indestructible and can slowly make sure I always win is also great (and of course just nuking people with magic). But most feel so reactionary while Tifa feels so proactive. With Cloud I am almost always waiting for the enemy to make a move, with Barret I am just constantly on the defensive, and with Aerith I am just too afraid I'll die or run out of MP.

But with Tifa I can just high speed slaughter my way through everything relying on skill and it's glorious. Do really want some aerial abilities though. Hate Aerial combat atm.

I do hope that the characters don't lose too much of their uniqueness when we get more of them.

 

[Prism]

As someone who loves the OG system and still can dig turn based combat (even random encounters - Xenogear’s is really fun to me), I do appreciate the depth of the Remake combat. I feel like I’ve only scratched the surface of what it has to offer - watching those friends of mine master and optimize Remake’s combat has been really fulfilling. I learn more about the game as time goes on. It’s often easy for live action combat, as exciting as it is, to turn into mindless mashing - but Remake avoids that totally.

It even does this while retaining core aspects of the original system, which is not an easy feat at all. The fact they balanced all of that exceeds expectations I didn’t know I had before Remake came out. Not to gush too much, just wanted to add my two cents as someone who likes both old school and new gameplay design.

 

[kathy202]

I love the remake combat as well. It's the main reason I prefer the remake to the OG at all. With the OG, a lot of grinding and the right materia setup was enough to make the optional weapon bosses easy. This isn't the case with the remake. I've seen a whole range of setups for various bosses, but can't easily pull some them off even with maxed stats and whatnot.

 

[Shademp]

Any system can be broken if you choose to break it. If [thing A] makes the game too easy for your tastes, then don't do it.

@ForceStealer will relate to the above statement.

I think that games should be designed with the awareness that a considerable portion of gamers (especially on their first couple of playthroughs) will take the path of least resistance. Of course, what is considered "resistance" depends on what your goal- and sought-after-reward is.

Whenever I replay the first disc of FF7, I have a choice to make: Get Aqualung and Trine or don't get Aqualung and Trine.
My goal is to clear battles as quickly as possible, unless I'm specifically stalling battles to grind some limit breaks or steal items.
Aqualung and Trine are overpowered and not too punishing in terms of MP consumption (the latter especially so). If I spam Trine/Aqualung, battles will be over in less than a minute. If I don't spam Trine/Aqualung, battles may last 2-5 minutes.

As the playthrough progresses that's a lot of battles with a looooot of needlessly wasted time if I DON'T spam Trine or Aqualung.


But if your goal is to create your own fun, rather than to simply clear battles and gain EXP like the designers intended, then you will abstain from using Trine and Aqualung. You may even abstain from the Enemy Skill materia altogether. Some gamers have more of this mindset that it's up to them to build and create the fun, rather than following a path of least resistance to success.


The psychology is of course a bit more complicated than this. If my goal was to simply clear a game with as little resistance as possible, I would have played FFVIIR on Easy mode. Why didn't I? Because I would feel less pride and reward from clearing it on Easy than I would on Normal. There is this ingrained sense of pride and showing that "you can deal with it" when you select higher difficulties on a game and even skip the lower difficulties altogether. In this example we have the balance between the reward of a challenge and the goal of clearing the full game.

In the case of OG though, I feel no pride and no reward from skipping out on the Enemy Skill materia, especially if I didn't set out with this challenge in mind from the very beginning. I am going to speed through battles (for lack of a fast-forward button in case you are playing on the PS1) with Trine, fully aware that I'm saving time in a battle that'd be easy to clear anyway. If the game punished me for using Trine, then I'd stop using it and start looking for other strategies.

For the same reason I never play Fort Condor without the easy-to-win glitch. There's simply nothing stopping me from doing that exploit. Extending the battle has no reward in it, especially after all these years when I already know that I can clear the battles the intended way.

 

[Rydeen]

For me, if I feel compelled to use OP spells/techs in a game, that is usually a sign that I'm not actually enjoying the battle system. If I'm enjoying the game, I generally want to relish the combat and be challenged. Otherwise, I'll want to break the game to "get it over with" or simply to see if it CAN be broken/test theories (like equipping Deathblow materia on Vincent's sniper).

 

[Clement Rage]

You can use the path of least resistance because you know exactly where to find it in advance, though, which doesn't really apply to most first playthroughs.

"If I play through this in the most optimal way possible, it's easy to complete" applies to every game ever made.

Edit: I don't think the dev's intentions involve a specific playstyle at all. They want individual players to be able to use playstyles whatever way they want and not make the game impossible as a result. Most games are not designed to be played optimally at all (you don't need to get to level 99 to defeat Sephiroth, for instance. You can, if you like, but just because you can doesn't mean it's necessarily the dev's intentions that the player do so.

 

[ForceStealer]

You can use the path of least resistance because you know exactly where to find it in advance, though, which doesn't really apply to most first playthroughs.

This. I feel like a lot of us forget the degree to which FF7 is not necessarily a cakewalk when you're playing blindly. It's still not a hard game or anything, but I've given the game to friends and check in later to find them in late disc 2 with like Bolt3 and every other spell is at first level and mismatched equipment and everything. Especially if you don't even have the context of FF/other JRPGs. VII's relative easiness is probably exactly why it acted as a gateway to JRPGs for so many people.

This is perhaps the main reason why I wanted a faithful remake, people say that "the OG will never go away", but in a way it does, I can't get anyone really to play that. They're willing to play remake though, so I king of did want something capable or replacing it. I don't mind the sequel idea, if we'd had a real remake earlier, like in 2005 or something just so that there was SOME faithful version of FFVII that was still palpable for newer players.

But I guess I'll never get that now :S

Amusingly, my girlfriend played N64 back in the day and hasn't really played games since. So when seeing both she was more drawn to play the original because it was more in line with how she perceived video games