He Frag, She Frag

Hello all! I am Mike’s equally better half, Jasmine. I don’t really do bad puns, so I will spare you any pathetic attempts made by me. This is my first dive into the world of gaming blogs and I will admit I am nervous. I’m not as zealous about games as Mike is; I often go in cycles where I don’t play much, but I will try to be as active as possible here.

Now my first order of gaming business is to let you know what I’ve been playing recently. To answer said question is: Final Fantasy 7. Some may groan, some may cheer and some could care as much about that as Britney taking a dump, but I digress. It was one of my first adventures into the world of JRPG’s (Japanese Role-Playing Games, for those internet illiterate) and so is nostalgic, despite the Popeye look of the characters and 2D backgrounds.

I’m not really sure exactly what lures me back to this game time and time again. I argue that it is a great game, but I have yet to eloquently put my finger on why. Is it the long hours of gameplay? The mini-games? Chocobo racing? The fateful twist of Aeris? Sephiroth? Cloud? I don’t know. Looking back on the game when I played it in 1997, I was 13 and I was so enthralled with the characters that I was borderline obsessive. Now, however, I’m starting to see how wooden and static each character really is. The storyline is actually quite good with little plot twists hiding at every turn, but I’m finding myself hard to identify with each character the older I get.

So if not the characters, the graphics, the long hours of gameplay then what is it? Well, at this point I have to compare it to other games I like of similar genre. One of those is Oblivion. Now, aside from nostalgia, Oblivion far outranks Final Fantasy 7 in every way on my list. It is arguably a whole other world in which I can immerse myself, and there are very few games out there that can over-ride my neurosis and make me forget about life, at least for a few hours. Final Fantasy 7 has that same effect on me. I can get lost in that world for hours: Fighting monsters and listening to the same MIDI’s repeatedly. Breeding Chocobos and then racing them. Blowing my money at the Gold Saucer. I also have many happy memories playing Final Fantasy 7 with my father, which I think now contributes to the +7 Happiness factor I get when I play it.

For all its shortcomings, I still think Final Fantasy 7 is a solid game worth owning and replaying every few years. Besides, where else can you breed Chocobos and exploit them for GP at the races?