2009/10/31



Action Button dot net - Final Fantasy VII Final Fantasy VII takes a lot of flack from the gaming community. (Note: for the purposes of this article, we will consider a fractured group of finger-pointing, name-calling jerks a “community”.) The game has a lot of problems! Therefore, detractors reason, its popularity can only be for two reasons: Final Fantasy VII’s fans are imbeciles. Prior to playing Final Fantasy VII, its fans hadn’t played another RPG. (The implicit assertion being that, of course, RPGs older than Final Fantasy VII are necessarily good.) The most eloquent, expletive-free propounding of these propositions I’ve found is Jeremy Parish’s review over at Toastyfrog. Now, before those of you reading dutifully sneer in Mr. Parish’s general direction, let me say that I quite like his writing and his site —- I check it out more or less every day, as a matter of fact! —- and I think that that his combination of off-the-cuff humor and clarity of thought is remarkable. However, I believe that the imbecile-slash-n00b theory doesn’t adequately account for Final Fantasy VII’s ongoing popularity. I offer a second theory: that Final Fantasy VII struck a chord with so many players because it is possibly the only Final Fantasy game (and one of the very few video games) which is actually about something.

Action Button dot net - Final Fantasy VII

Final Fantasy VII takes a lot of flack from the gaming community. (Note: for the purposes of this article, we will consider a fractured group of finger-pointing, name-calling jerks a “community”.) The game has a lot of problems! Therefore, detractors reason, its popularity can only be for two reasons:

  1. Final Fantasy VII’s fans are imbeciles.
  2. Prior to playing Final Fantasy VII, its fans hadn’t played another RPG. (The implicit assertion being that, of course, RPGs older than Final Fantasy VII are necessarily good.)

The most eloquent, expletive-free propounding of these propositions I’ve found is Jeremy Parish’s review over at Toastyfrog. Now, before those of you reading dutifully sneer in Mr. Parish’s general direction, let me say that I quite like his writing and his site —- I check it out more or less every day, as a matter of fact! —- and I think that that his combination of off-the-cuff humor and clarity of thought is remarkable.

However, I believe that the imbecile-slash-n00b theory doesn’t adequately account for Final Fantasy VII’s ongoing popularity. I offer a second theory: that Final Fantasy VII struck a chord with so many players because it is possibly the only Final Fantasy game (and one of the very few video games) which is actually about something.

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