Why Final Fantasy VII Needs To Stay in the Vault…. Sorry, No Remakes Needed

Now before you light a bag of dog poo on fire and get ready to fling it at me. Keep in mind that I used to be a huge fan of Final Fantasy VII, and that’s a good part of the reason why I don’t think the game should be remade.

But Final Fantasy VII was when Square-Enix (formaly Square-soft) actually made “quality” games!

Sorry to burst your bubble, but graphics aside, Final Fantasy VII was glitchy at best, timers continually failed (lookin’ at you fortress defense). Darkness only affected only a few attacks and was essentially useless. Heck there is even a glitch that makes the Diamond Weapon disappear thus preventing you from progressing any further in the game. Then the renowed w-item glitch that lets you duplicate items.

A list of glitches on various Final Fantasy games can be found here: http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Bugs_and_Glitches

So lets face it… from a technical standpoint, Final Fantasy VII fails horribly.

That being said I’d still say, that given its age it is still a solid game, but these types of glitches wouldn’t be acceptable in today’s market. Sure they could be addressed but really would Final Fantasy VII be the same without the W-Item glitch? or the overflow damage glitch? No, face it, you loved ’em. Also keep in mind that in 1997 gaming was still in its infancy.. or maybe just coming out of it, and the competition around a game like FFVII was slim pickings at best, that is not the case today.

The Storyline and Characters were of epic proportions.

Actually… I don’t think the story or characters would get very far if they were thought of today.  I’ll overview it as a whole and say: there are racial and gender stereotyping issues and the characters and story are wrought with continuity inconsistencies that wouldn’t make it past the cutting room of a D-rate direct to Netflix movie… ok, it’s not THAT bad, but between poor translation and massive inconsistencies between the original game, subsequent spin off games, and movies… there are a lot of gaping plot holes and unanswered questions.

Now they don’t necessarily have to be fixed but they still do factor in and we’re more sensitive to racial and gender stereotyping now than we were when FFVII first released. And social media has made it more easily for people to voice their opinions on these sorts of controversial subjects.

Nothing quite beats the old JRPG Battle system!

Really?.. Let’s take a look at it. Final Fantasy X does a brilliant job at the JRPG turn based system. You flip in characters, use the right abilities or elements to take out specific monsters and are rewarded with fairly easy fights if you play your cards right.  Final Fantasy VII, on the other hand, is just a lot of hitting X. Attack, Attack… Cure, Attack, Attack… victory fanfare.

Very few battles require you to do little else than attack the monster with normal attacks and cure when needed. Not to mention the entire magic defense stat in armor is useless since it was never factored into the calculation of damage… wow, this isn’t really as epic as I remember.

Overly Romanced – The number 1 reason why Final Fantasy VII should never be remade.

When it comes down to it, we have overly romantic feelings for this great game. Will a remake honestly live up to your expectations of it?

How many times have you heard or said something like how the only way to salvage the franchise is to remake Final Fantasy VII? Maybe something more along the lines of how epic, awesome, stellar, great, etc a remake would be.

Could Square-Enix actually produce a remake that would be as awesome as what everyone is expecting of it? Simply put, no they can’t. I’m sure they could make a wonderful remake of the game, however we all know there is going to be a section of very vocal die-hard fans that could never be appeased. Not only that, but what if it doesn’t live up to what even the average person thought it would be in today’s modern market? It would effectively ruin the Final Fantasy brand more than any failure (or those titles perceived as such) could ever do.

Let’s just face the facts. Final Fantasy VII is what it is and let’s just leave it at that.