Final Fantasy VII: Overrated?

[Bolivar]

Getting jobs in FFV isn’t the exact equivalent of getting powerful material in FFVII. Most of them have to be leveled up significantly to get their best abilities and some that have cool abilities are pretty useless in and of themselves (hunter, for example).

Actually, the Hunter's ability to use swords and !Aim makes him one of the few good candidates for the Blood Sword, which is insane once you figure out how to get it working.

VII was a step back for me from that. I felt like there was no difference between the characters, and the one person who truly stood out, was killed. It's my biggest problem with the game, and will always be my biggest problem with the game. I felt the battle system was a step back from VI.

Man I disagree completely, especially on the VII to VI comparison.

First off, the differences between characters in VII was limit breaks, statistics, and weapon classes, which are the only real divisions in VI. VI's character abilities were basically the same as limit breaks, except you could spam them every turn, completely removing strategy or variation, so I have to say if anything VII improved upon VI, not the adverse. And alot of the weapon classes in VI overlapped, so the characters aren't really as unique as you're making them out to be.

The Esper system in VI has to be probably the worst the series has ever seen. Every character can permanently learn every spell, and because of the time you spend, you may as well have them all learn the most powerful spells - completely annihilating uniqueness - basically every character is a mage, only a handful of the large cast get enough unique equipment to make them more than that. Not to mention that the statistic effects are so minimal, that it's really only at the end of the game (and that's if you did a considerable amount of the sidequests/grinding) that it really has any impact.

VII's statistic impact was immediate and noticeable. Loading a character with magic spells will diminish their physical attack, but give them a huge edge magically. But you still have to think with it, because loading up Barret or Cid will never make effective mages as it would Cloud or Red XIII.

The strategy is there, and as with all other FF's, the most effective battle plan is to capitalize on each character's strengths, even if it means further compromising their weaknesses - this has been all throughout the series. But the best part about VII is that you can ignore it and just have fun if you want to, rendering this entire discussion pointless.

That's yet another reason why VII brought so many mainstream/casual gamers into the RPG fold - it wasn't nearly as dreadfully monotonous as RPGs had been up to that point. And I know because I played alot of them and still do.