Finally! The Seventh Fantasy (I)

I identify with this wild-haired youth.

As mentioned on this very site just last month, I have never played Final Fantasy VII in its entirety, and I consider it a shamefully significant gap in my personal video game history. The game has engendered such frightening adoration and torrid debate that basing my impressions on popular opinion and the scattered segments I witnessed at friends' houses in the late nineties seems horribly inadequate. Quite simply, it is a game that I, arrogant video game snob that I am, must play. It's too important to the medium to ignore.

Fortunately, Square Enix released a slightly updated version yesterday. This edition looks like it should make the game a bit more functional on modern computers than the original, without any changes to how the game plays. The story and characters which are still inspiring embarrassing fan-fiction and anime convention costumes to this day should be completely intact, and I am ready to judge them with my modern, jaded perspective.

Here's the plan: I'm going to play this whole game, and I'm going to record my thoughts from start to finish. Recaps, criticism, video with commentary, drawings - anything is fair game. Each time I play, I will also, in some way, document my experience, until I discover that I was on Earth all along, or whatever happens at the end of Final Fantasy VII.

Read previous installments of Finally! The Seventh Fantasy