we don't need spoiler tags

Quote Originally Posted by Vivi22 View Post
I bought the game not long after it came out and was flipping through the Brady Games strategy guide one day, not expecting to find pictures of her being impaled in the FMV contained within the guide. Knowing exactly what happened before I got their kind of killed any emotional impact when I saw it for myself.
Same here. unfortunately, when the game came out everyone and their mother knew that aeris got it at the end of disc 1. All shock that the scene could have had on me was gone, but when it happened I was still able to appreciate one of the most important moments in gaming history, not to sound too cliche.

I think what struck me most about it was how hard the developers went to make it have the qualities of a real death. She did not flash several times and dissappear, her bodied remained there lifeless. When Sephiroth began his whole "cliche-RPG-villain" speech, Cloud told him to shut up. At that moment it was like Square telling developers still stuck in the traditional mode of RPGs to "shut up."

The most emotionally moving part to me was when you watched her (with her eyes closed) sink to the bottom. It was really sad because you figure, like, that could be someone you love, and in the game that was what it was supposed to be.

The entire game is almost Sakaguchi's way of dealing with the death of his mother, and this scene IMO was his way of telling gamers to let go.

edit: and the jenova battle was great, too.