Final Fantasy VII: Overrated?

[Bolivar]

^ good input, Rase, but I disagree a little with the customization.

FFI, II, III, V, and essentially VI before it all let you make your characters and subsequently your party into anything you wanted them to be. The only real difference between VI and VII was that you had to wait for your limit bar to fill up in order to use their character-specific abilities, rather than being able to spam them every turn.

In VII, not every character is good at attacking and not every character is good at using magic. Cait Sith makes great use of materia like D.Blow due to his high luck (I think). With materia, you can make very character specific roles. It's basically the job system broken down into smaller pieces, and that's something I like about VII that it inherited from the classic FF's, something which alot of American fans who never played the Japanese releases get confused about.

[Egami]

The only real difference between VI and VII was that you had to wait for your limit bar to fill up in order to use their character-specific abilities, rather than being able to spam them every turn.

Thats a nice way of looking at it

[Roto13]

I beat Sephiroth using only Knights of the Round over and over and over again. There's spamming to be done in VII.

[Momiji]

If you use a Hyper on Cloud, he'll be able to spam Omnislash rather frequently.

[Egami]

Hehe...you can kill Emerald weapon in a few minutes by using Omnislash and having Mime + Counter. You first use Omnislash and then when Emerald attacks...it is all over...Cloud will counter with Omnislash about 8 times and kill it.

Of course, you need several of each materia in master to do that, something which can be a bit time consuming (see).

[Lawr]

Or just plain abuse!

[Egami]

Well, that is a known bug. The person who did it surely spent a LOT of time playing the game to get it to kill Emerald with one hit.

[Karellen]

The difference between games like FFV and games like FFVII is that while FFV lets you learn everything it puts severe limitations on the amount of abilities you can equip at any one time. FFVII sort of tried to restrict you somewhat by separating black magic into fire/ice/thunder magic, white magic into cure/de-curse magic etc. but FFVII is so generally unchallenging that you only need one type of black magic and white magic anyway.

The result is that very early on everyone is a good spell caster, everyone is a good support character and everyone has a powerful summon. There is no real challenge because no matter how circumstances change during battle the character who's turn is up will almost always have the capacity to deal with it more then efficiently. Materia only gets more plentiful and more overpowered as the game goes on to the point where you start getting things like 2/4x cut, attack/all and high-level HP plus materia, at which point the game is an absolute joke.

[Egami]

The difference between games like FFV and games like FFVII is that while FFV lets you learn everything it puts severe limitations on the amount of abilities you can equip at any one time. FFVII sort of tried to restrict you somewhat by separating black magic into fire/ice/thunder magic, white magic into cure/de-curse magic etc. but FFVII is so generally unchallenging that you only need one type of black magic and white magic anyway.

The result is that very early on everyone is a good spell caster, everyone is a good support character and everyone has a powerful summon. There is no real challenge because no matter how circumstances change during battle the character who's turn is up will almost always have the capacity to deal with it more then efficiently. Materia only gets more plentiful and more overpowered as the game goes on to the point where you start getting things like 2/4x cut, attack/all and high-level HP plus materia, at which point the game is an absolute joke.

While it is true that VII is rather easy, the things you are pointing out about the materia system such as 4x cut, quadra magic and the like are found in games like V and VI. See for instance this battle with X-Death in V:

YouTube - Final Fantasy V Final Boss Battle Exdeath - SNES

Multiple hits and casting holy multiple times in a single turn. Also see this one from VI where Kefka is killed in one turn by a single character by doing the same multiple hit attack (8 hits in total):

YouTube - Kefka one hit kill (Final Fantasy VI)

In both V and VI magic and abilities become "more plentiful and more overpowered as the game goes on" to the point where you get things like the ones you see on the videos among others. So, I don't really think we can single out VII on this issue.

[Karellen]

Oh, I don't mean to just single out FFVII on the issue. As I mention in the FFVI thread, most of the bad trends with game balanced started with that game and if you want to get technical were also seen way back in FFII (although FFII's ridiculous mechanics make that game insane anyway). FFVII isn't the pinicle of broken gameplay in FF games either; that dubious distinction would probably go to FFVIII.

That being said, while there are certainly easy enough to break FFV if you learn all the right abilities (even more so then what that video showed) you still have to put more thought into coming up with the best combination when you only have one job and one class ability to work with. Such planing is absent in FFVII because you can equip so much powerful materia at once, with a lot of said powerful materia being practically handed to you as the game progresses.

[Egami]

Such planing is absent in FFVII because you can equip so much powerful materia at once, with a lot of said powerful materia being practically handed to you as the game progresses.

Actually, you cannot just spam your characters with materia like crazy. For instance, green (Magic) and red (Summon) materias come with trade offs and bonuses on your stats. The more of these materia you equip on a character, the lower it's HP and strenght goes. So you need to balance things out and think about the way you distribute your materia across your characters. There is also the way you pair materias with one another and the weapon you put them on to think about. Weapons can have a single, double, triple or no growth at all. The materia system involves a lot of planning and strategy and allows a lot of possibilities and experimentation.

As far as how one obtains materia, they are handed to you very much in the same way that magic was handed to you in earilier FFs. Just as you could purchase many spells on shops and others you found in other places, so too it is in VII with materias. The most powerful materias are not handed to you and involve doing sidequests that are not part of the main game.

And with spells and other abilities of materias, you obtain them as you level up, very much as you obtain magic from Espers in VI or learn new abilities of a specific job in V as your characters win experience.

[Karellen]

Actually, you cannot just spam your characters with materia like crazy. For instance, green (Magic) and red (Summon) materias come with trade offs and bonuses on your stats. The more of these materia you equip on a character, the lower it's HP and strenght goes. So you need to balance things out and think about the way you distribute your materia across your characters. There is also the way you pair materias with one another and the weapon you put them on to think about. Weapons can have a single, double, triple or no growth at all. The materia system involves a lot of planning and strategy and allows a lot of possibilities and experimentation.

I found the stat bonuses to be mostly insignificant. If they had been a 10 or 20% increase/decrease each then it may have had an effect but as it stood I didn't feel dissuaded with loading any of my characters up with any sort of magic. Similarly I only ever used the double/tripple EXP weapons while they were the most powerful as well, since there is no real need to level anything up quickly due to aforementioned lack of challenge within the game. The only materia I remember spending a significant amount of cash on was HP Plus.

As far as how one obtains materia, they are handed to you very much in the same way that magic was handed to you in earilier FFs. Just as you could purchase many spells on shops and others you found in other places, so too it is in VII with materias. The most powerful materias are not handed to you and involve doing sidequests that are not part of the main game.

I bought the vast minority of my materia. Most of it was quite literally lying on the ground. The REALLY powerful ones like KOTOR and Mime require lengthy sidequests, yes, but there are plenty of relatively broken materia like the ones I mentioned such that you don't have to touch those to obliterate everything beyond the game's uber bosses.

And with spells and other abilities of materias, you obtain them as you level up, very much as you obtain magic from Espers in VI or learn new abilities of a specific job in V as your characters win experience.

I didn't comment on that at all.

[Egami]

I found the stat bonuses to be mostly insignificant. If they had been a 10 or 20% increase/decrease each then it may have had an effect but as it stood I didn't feel dissuaded with loading any of my characters up with any sort of magic.

The point is that they have an impact on your status and the more magic and summons you load on a character, the weaker it gets. You also have a limited number of slots for materia per character, something that prevents you from overloading a character with all magic and summons.

Compare that with how things are on the two previous games, where you can have a character with all the white and black magic and even summons available at any time without suffering any penalties. Want to have Sabin with Ultima, Flare, Meteo, all Cures, Fires, Bolts, Ice, etc in VI? Just get him to learn it from the Espers and he can carry as much magic as you want him to without this detracting from his stats. Not mention that after he learns the spells from the Espers he does not needs to keep it but can pass it along and still retain as many spells as you want him to. Unlike in VII where you must keep the materia on the character despite the fact that you have mastered it.

In V things are quite similar, a Mimic can use all the white and black spells you have learned and the summons you have at any time. Or if you use the Suppin (normal) class, you can access all the abilities of your mastered classes at any time and even a couple of skills, again without significant penalties to your stats.

I would say that the materia system in VII puts on you more limitations than the system in VI and about the same if not more than the system in V. That the enemies are less challenging is besides the point and quite frankly, something that not everyone would agree with.

I bought the vast minority of my materia. Most of it was quite literally lying on the ground. The REALLY powerful ones like KOTOR and Mime require lengthy sidequests, yes, but there are plenty of relatively broken materia like the ones I mentioned such that you don't have to touch those to obliterate everything beyond the game's uber bosses.

Some are on the ground in several places, others require defeating bosses (i.e. Bahamut, Shiva) and other require doing side quests (i.e. Leviatan) or completing certain missions within specific parameters (i.e. Ultima, Phoenix). That is hardly different from the way you find Espers in VI and Jobs in V, the latter of which you get from crystals, something that you must obtain to advance the plot.

I didn't comment on that at all.

But I did and the point is to compare and contrast the systems of each.

[Goldenboko]

Stat bonuses are completely worthless in FFVII anyway :P

Any severe HP drop can be fixed with a simple "HP Plus" for those unwilling to level. My file was a clear example of "Materia fixes everything." FFV required lots of leveling and thought of perfect combinations. FFVII not as much. I was way too underleveled to beat Emerald and Ruby but by stacking up on HP Pluses, Mimic, and KOTR the entire thing was effortless. Many strong summons didn't require that kind of work. I remember quite a lot of materia (Bahamut ZERO anyone?) being in easily obtained places as long as you paid attention. Worse yet these summons didn't require leveling to be strong at all.

FFV the summons weren't as powerful, yet in most cases (let's exclude KOTR) where just as difficult if not more so to find (without a strategy guides help I would've never found Ramuh a summon that isn't even worth much). The real strengths came in leveling your classes, (Ranger, Monk, Magic Swordsman) which required time, thought for combinations, and when it comes down to it, either knowledge of the game already so you know what you get when you level, or a guide of some sort.

In FFVII you where rewarded for just, paying, attention. As for VI, I found that game broken, but not until the World of Ruin, and even then everything required some sort of work. Even Altima weapon because you had to level it by killing monsters (Offer+Genji Glove+Altima Weapon+2nd most powerful weapon=Win).

[Wolf Kanno]

^ good input, Rase, but I disagree a little with the customization.

FFI, II, III, V, and essentially VI before it all let you make your characters and subsequently your party into anything you wanted them to be. The only real difference between VI and VII was that you had to wait for your limit bar to fill up in order to use their character-specific abilities, rather than being able to spam them every turn.

In VII, not every character is good at attacking and not every character is good at using magic. Cait Sith makes great use of materia like D.Blow due to his high luck (I think). With materia, you can make very character specific roles. It's basically the job system broken down into smaller pieces, and that's something I like about VII that it inherited from the classic FF's, something which alot of American fans who never played the Japanese releases get confused about.

I disagree, in my playthroughs, I've found that Cloud and Aerith are the only characters with significant stats changes (Aerith is a mage, and Cloud is just plain broken) hell even the official strategy guide doesn't hide the fact that the characters are all basically the same.

As for the Limit Breaks adding individuality, I agree and disagree. I'll agree their Level 1 and 2 limit breaks are different and unique and makes choosing your party important. Once they reach level 3 almost all the limit breaks devolve into "different animation, same affect: damage" The only difference being the amount of times the attack hits. Strategy and individuality disappears at this point. I'm not saying previous or even later games don't have these issues but lets be honest here. You basically have Cloud, Aerith, and everyone else. Though at least the game does have some distinctions.

I found the stat bonuses to be mostly insignificant. If they had been a 10 or 20% increase/decrease each then it may have had an effect but as it stood I didn't feel dissuaded with loading any of my characters up with any sort of magic.

The point is that they have an impact on your status and the more magic and summons you load on a character, the weaker it gets. You also have a limited number of slots for materia per character, something that prevents you from overloading a character with all magic and summons.

Compare that with how things are on the two previous games, where you can have a character with all the white and black magic and even summons available at any time without suffering any penalties. Want to have Sabin with Ultima, Flare, Meteo, all Cures, Fires, Bolts, Ice, etc in VI? Just get him to learn it from the Espers and he can carry as much magic as you want him to without this detracting from his stats. Not mention that after he learns the spells from the Espers he does not needs to keep it but can pass it along and still retain as many spells as you want him to. Unlike in VII where you must keep the materia on the character despite the fact that you have mastered it.

In V things are quite similar, a Mimic can use all the white and black spells you have learned and the summons you have at any time. Or if you use the Suppin (normal) class, you can access all the abilities of your mastered classes at any time and even a couple of skills, again without significant penalties to your stats.

I would say that the materia system in VII puts on you more limitations than the system in VI and about the same if not more than the system in V. That the enemies are less challenging is besides the point and quite frankly, something that not everyone would agree with.

I disagree, I've never found overloading specific materia on a character to have serious penalties. The only time I ever saw a drastic change was when I gave Vincent almost every Summon Materia I owned. Their was a change in HP and MP but I never noticed any further affects.

You also forget about Master Materia which offers only benefits. All magic on Barret with no consequences. In comparison to your earlier example; sure you can remove the materia and Barret doesn't have them anymore whereas Sabin retains it but lets be serious here... Who uses Sabin as a mage? Hell, I would argue restricting him to magic is a handicap for the player.

Also, one factor that we seem to have overlooked concerning the lack of difficulty in VII comes from Ultimate weapons and the Enemy Skill materia. I know Blue magic has always been a hit or miss... oh I can't even say that lets face it, they've been nerfing it ever since VII. Blue Magic is flat out broken in V,VI, and VII. The thing I've noticed about VII's though, is that in all my games I end up using Enemy Skill materia exclusively and stop using magic all together.

The four elemental spells are easily as strong as their level 3 counterparts and easier to acquire, they cost slightly less. In my current file I just got Time and Barrier materia and I haven't touched them. Why would I neglect such powerful materia? Cause I have Mighty Guard which casts Haste, Shell, and Protect on my whole party in one round. Saving me anywhere from two to four slots. The thing makes magic materia obsolete imo. It also makes the game a joke cause the spells are overpowered as hell.

As for Ultimate weapons, its hard to argue against a weapon being overpowered when it allows your character to do max damage every time. Yes they have rules and allow no Materia growth but Enemy skill materia fixes that problem and who spams summons anyway? Hell once you get mug and 4x cut, you don't need to bother with leveling command materia. As for rules, I've found they are not only easy to maintain but are flexible enough not to bother. Cloud has to lose a third of his health before you start noticing a difference in damage.

A lot of FFs are guilty of being broken, VI basically gives you two of the most broken characters in the game right off the bat. As stated by others, quite a few games allow your party to decimate a group of enemies right off the bat with little consequences (looks at VI) but only a few FFs allow you the chance to have a single character take a boss out in the first round. VI, VII, VIII, and X are all guilty of this gaming sin.

My problem with the battle system overall in VII is that its really cool in the beginning where you are quite restricted. Yet due to overpowered materia, Limit Breaks, and equipment, the whole system falls apart. It offers strategy but the game lacks challenge to ever need to use it as well as overpowered abilities and options that makes forming intricate strategies a waste of time. In order to make the battle system shine, you have to severely restrict your party, at which point I feel that the game designer has failed in his duties.

Now that this topic has gotten more interesting, I may need to post a more thorough discussion on how I feel about VII especially since I reached a revelation about it while playing it a few days ago.