Board 8 > anyone else here kind of disappointed with FF7R so far?

(+) Yeah! (+)

I'm only getting started but it just feels... sub-par to me so far. There's only a few things that I can pinpoint and they may seem nitpicky... but Midgar feels lifeless and dull to me. The pre-rendered backgrounds of the original felt like they jumped off the screen with every single inch of the visible surface having had a ton of care put into it. The backgrounds in this one seem copy pasted on a small budget without a high attention to detail.

And everything feels clunky to me. Maybe games like Breath of the Wild and MGSV have spoiled me, but moving Cloud around feels so... well, not intuitive. And the dialogue is just... it's not tight or sharp. Some of it feels so weird.

I do really enjoy the battle system, for the boss fights anyway. For everything else it seems kind of repetitive. Maybe that'll change the further I get but who knows.

Anyone else feeling this way?

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nope it's great
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I will say that I praise the way they decided to get us invested in the people of the Sector 7 slums. Gonna make it hurt all that much more when you know what happens

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LeonhartFour posted...

nope it's great

what am I missing then? Admittedly I'm not very far and it could probably pick up from here.

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ExThaNemesis posted...

There's only a few things that I can pinpoint and they may seem nitpicky... but Midgar feels lifeless and dull to me.

I could not imagine thinking that compared to the original game.

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Maybe I'm just crazy. Idk.

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how far in are you? Because I was really feeling the same way (and posted as much in in transcience's topic yesterday) but as of my playing today have really started to love it. Don't want to give chapter number for unfair expectations but just hang in there...

Oh I'll be seeing this through don't worry.

No gettin offa this train, etc


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Yeah, not at all. The game was fantastic and I enjoyed almost every aspect of it.

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ExThaNemesis posted...

I will say that I praise the way they decided to get us invested in the people of the Sector 7 slums. Gonna make it hurt all that much more when you know what happens

how does this jive with Midgar feeling lifeless and dull, because that seems to be the exact opposite

The sidequests and towns kick ass and the sheer scope of being able to look up at the pillars and plate is nuts

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I 100% expected a RKO as soon I opened this topic.

I'm loving every minute of it. It continously gets better and I have a stupid little smile on my face the entire time.

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Thought I'd hate it because of the changes but I'm loving it. Way better than I expected.

I'd actually say I feel the exact opposite of all your points in those first 2 paragraphs

HeroDelTiempo17 posted...

how does this jive with Midgar feeling lifeless and dull, because that seems to be the exact opposite

I don't know how to explain it other than just... looking at the backgrounds used, they feel copy pasted. The factory and streets all look the same and yes there are <i>people</i> there but none of them are actually doing anything but standing around and waiting for you to interact with them.

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I will die on the clunky controls hill, especially considering Breath of the Wild was what I played through prior to this. The way everything handles in that game is so far and away superior to this. Battle is probably a bit more varied in FF7R, but it still doesn't handle as tight as in BOTW.

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i'm playing ffvii original for the first time, and movement in the prerendered map is one of the worst parts of it to me
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Nope. The original is unplayable to me now. I bought it on Xbox last year to get back into it and i couldnt. FF8 will always be the better PS1 FF game for me. I just got into that whole Seeds School atmosphere more than the slums.

Anyway the Remake is infinitely better. I have no desire to ever play the original.

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There are plenty of gripes, at least early on, here's a list of mine (through reactor 5)

-Illusion of freedom/so many empty hallways
-Immediately thrusting you into major story elements, I can't imagine the reaction of someone who never played the original playing this and wondering "wtf is going on" at least 20 times in the first two chapters alone... but maybe that's just me
-Felt incredibly awkward with Sector 7 being fleshed out, like nagging at the back of my mind knowing what happens
-In the course of fleshing out the game, so much of it really feels like unnecessary padding
-Roche was terrible
-unlockable doors and, on at least two occasions I've seen materia that is physically impossible to get, thinking I could get it if I proceeded onwards, and then never got a chance to return (summon materia in giant fan in Sector 4 platforms, and I swear I saw a yellow materia in Aeris's church in a cutscene but wasn't able to return...)
-story stuff I can't get into here (this may be disregarded if it doesn't play out the way I'm thinking it does but it's feeling pretty telegraphed)
-NEVER ENOUGH MATERIA SLOTS FOR EVERYTHING YOU HAVE ACCESS TO THIS IS GETTING RIDICULOUS.

Now after the Sector 7 nagging, locked doors and the irretrievable materia I learned about "oh btw you can replay chapters after you beat the game" on the loading screen, so that's nice. But still.

But after today's playing, man... I think I'm on board. We're rocketing up the love charts here.

'only getting started'

complains.

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MartinFF7 posted...

There are plenty of gripes, at least early on, here's a list of mine (through reactor 5)

-unlockable doors and, on at least two occasions I've seen materia that is physically impossible to get, thinking I could get it if I proceeded onwards, and then never got a chance to return (summon materia in giant fan in Sector 4 platforms, and I swear I saw a yellow materia in Aeris's church in a cutscene but wasn't able to return...)

The thing in spoilers isn't really valid. One of the things the game physically prompts you 'Hey, didn't you see this? Do you want to go get it before you proceed?' and the other one you can immediately run back and get after the next plot point when quests open up and it's a duplicate materia anyway. They should have made it snaggable on the way but it wasn't unobtainable afterwards.

The summon materia it prompts you when you try get on the lift that you should go get it before proceeding and is pretty much a straight shot run for it to turn off the fan. The other one is Chakra materia and you can get after you get to Aerith's house.

Damn. I thought that prompting was for the other materia they pointed out earlier in which I got. I swear when Barret said that I really doubled back and saw no way to even physically get to the fan... I also swear I tried going back to the church at every opportunity and was prevented, and then are physically unable to... oh well, end game chapter selection time I guess! I feel better knowing it's my own incompetence rather than bad game design.

I can't really fathom saying this feels lifeless or clunky compared to the original unless you're outright trying to be blinded by nostalgia.

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What I will say is that some of the stuff feels like unnecessary busy work that only serves to extend the time to get from A to B without really adding anything

Some of the fights have shitty ass camera angles whilst others can be punishing if you have to use revive. There's been a few times where I've had to revive someone and they instantly get instantly killed due to damage or getting locked in place before doing anything.

The rate that teammates generate ATB gauge is also pretty crappy. It's so slow compared to the character you play as. It should be faster and with a way of telling them what to do when they get gauge rather than a lot of fights basically feeling like solo affairs where you occasionally tell teammates to do something.

Absolutely love it. I am almost done the game I think, and so far all the wild changes people were complaining about have not happened or barely happened and had pretty good excuses for why they happened.

I am confused ... about Wedge not being dead after a block fell right on him. I very much doubt when it fell and broke the hole to the lab, that none of that killed him. But ... okay? Maybe he lived in the original and we just never see or mention him again.

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Its complicated. Some aspects are amazing, some are not. I feel like my hype was for something a little different. So I have to reconfigure my thoughts before hopping back in - just weird huh

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StealThisSheen posted...

I can't really fathom saying this feels lifeless or clunky compared to the original unless you're outright trying to be blinded by nostalgia.

ding ding ding

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I'm at Chapter 12 or 13 and I'm very, VERY impressed with this game.

I was worried that they weren't gonna get the original, that they were gonna emowash the story, setting, and cast and suck away all the zaniness of the original game. Glad to see that they knew better.

Also very glad to see they finally learned the lessons that the past decade taught them. The problem with FFXIII wasn't that it was linear, and the answer wasn't just to blow up the map size like with XV. The problem was that the game made 0 attempt to engross in the world and the story and made them do nothing but hold up and fight. The squats, the dancing, the crane shit, that stuff might all sound trite but it goes a loooong way in actually investing you in the setting, to say nothing of the amazing job they did with the hub areas in the slums.

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The only time I really tried FF7 before was on an emulator many years ago. I think I got to the market before quitting, but it felt really dry and unmemorable. All the streets looked exactly the same, all the same night time scene. This feels way more alive and charming, day and night scenes, unique NPCs. Some of the environments don't have too much graphical detail but it's still an improvement over the original renders. Animations and voices are all awesome. Things like reactor 8 having a green color grading and 5 a blue one. Pretty basic but it made them feel really different. Can't really imagine where it feels lifeless, unless you're comparing to your childhood imagination/nostalgia.

Controls are kinda clunky but they work really well in practice and feel rewarding. I'll take that any day over the hyper polished MGSV and BOTW style controls that have smoothed out all the dimensions and play. This one feels like there's a difficulty curve and some mastery involved, which feels really nice. Worst things are non-combat controls like the huge turning radius, or the janky triangle interactions.

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i beat it a few days ago. There are some problems, and the story might be going in a questionable direction, but I thought it was pretty fun for the most part

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foolm0r0n posted...

The only time I really tried FF7 before was on an emulator many years ago. I think I got to the market before quitting, but it felt really dry and unmemorable. All the streets looked exactly the same, all the same night time scene. This feels way more alive and charming, day and night scenes, unique NPCs. Some of the environments don't have too much graphical detail but it's still an improvement over the original renders. Animations and voices are all awesome. Things like reactor 8 having a green color grading and 5 a blue one. Pretty basic but it made them feel really different. Can't really imagine where it feels lifeless, unless you're comparing to your childhood imagination/nostalgia.

Controls are kinda clunky but they work really well in practice and feel rewarding. I'll take that any day over the hyper polished MGSV and BOTW style controls that have smoothed out all the dimensions and play. This one feels like there's a difficulty curve and some mastery involved, which feels really nice. Worst things are non-combat controls like the huge turning radius, or the janky triangle interactions.

There was one time I was dumbfounded by the lack of graphical detail but otherwise haven't noticed it too much. They make Aerith's house look so pretty and then inexplicably when they show you close up to the flowers, the flowers are really bad graphics. Like how could they not make the flowers look nice? Or if they were going to do that, then why zoom you in close to them where the bad graphics are super noticeable.

ExThaNemesis posted...

I will die on the clunky controls hill, especially considering Breath of the Wild was what I played through prior to this. The way everything handles in that game is so far and away superior to this. Battle is probably a bit more varied in FF7R, but it still doesn't handle as tight as in BOTW.

This reminds me of when I first watched Guardians of the Galaxy 2. I didn't like it since at the time I was binging Game of Thrones and was invested in that type of tone. So switching to a very light-hearted and cartoony movie was like a thematic shock to me. I was constantly expecting these goofy characters to be stabbed through the face or blown to bits by space bombs. Rest assured after giving GotG2 a second chance with a new perspective I loved it.

My point is don't compare FF7R with BotW. Completely different games. The latter is an open world game with an emphasis on control. But now you're dealing with a remake of an old RPG that had even worse movement controls.

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MartinFF7 posted...

-Immediately thrusting you into major story elements, I can't imagine the reaction of someone who never played the original playing this and wondering "wtf is going on" at least 20 times in the first two chapters alone... but maybe that's just me

I never knew the details of the story and it all seems super straightforward to me already. It could definitely go way faster without being confusing.

But in general the pacing and the way they incorporated side quests is really genius. The game still has the original linear structure to drive it, but they can insert side missions in between the story beats. It's probably the best solution to padding the story's length possible. If they tried to add global side missions like in XV, it wouldn't work at all with the story, and so these limited, intimate side missions are the only option. And it makes for much more interesting missions full of narrative context, and really good accessibility things like "are you sure you want to leave without finishing the side stuff?" to eliminate missables anxiety. It's absolutely the solution to the "series of corridors" (which is actually a great way to structure an RPG) and I really hope more RPGs do it now instead of ruining their whole pacing with open world design.

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ShatteredElysium posted...

There was one time I was dumbfounded by the lack of graphical detail but otherwise haven't noticed it too much. They make Aerith's house look so pretty and then inexplicably when they show you close up to the flowers, the flowers are really bad graphics. Like how could they not make the flowers look nice? Or if they were going to do that, then why zoom you in close to them where the bad graphics are super noticeable.

This has been a common thing throughout the game. Bad textures on really important objects that take up a lot of screen space. There must have been some weird bug or other development issue that caused it because they definitely knew about it and still shipped. Maybe they'll fix it later.

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yeah and let's not act like original FF7 midgar wasn't also a series of corridors in terms of structure, but from an isometric perspective

Some of the dungeons go on for a bit too long for how boring and samey they look (fuck the sewer level tbqh) but if you want more of the battle system, which is great, there isn't really a way to do that without "padding."

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I was about to make a topic about how when you're in an environment and have to tap triangle to open a door or chest, that can sometimes take upwards of 10-15 seconds to line up. It is frankly baffling how on the nose you have to be to hit those and how completely unprepared the engine is to handle that. You have to walk away and then realign yourself like a truck in some case.

The actual combat and broader movement feels good, though.

Also just on a funny note, the doors to Cloud and Tifa's room won't load in.

Not like it takes a while during cutscenes, as in it has been a couple hours and the door textures just won't load in, cutscene or otherwise, like that file is missing from my download.

Yeah staring at the solid grey block that was their doors was honestly the worst thing about the game for me so far. The changes with the shadows and stuff are weird but idk well see where they go with it. Overall loving it so far personally

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i had little interest in this but after watching a good chunk of a streamers playthrough i am thoroughly on board with what this game is doing

i plan to play through the Steam FF7 before actually diving into this though

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Only control complaint I have is sometimes not being able to press triangle to open stuff unless I'm in like EXACTLY the right place. That needed refinement I think. But mostly it's fun even though I started to feel a little bored with the sector 5 bombing mission, since so much of it was the aforementioned empty corridors. Also Roche. Yikes.

But mostly good.

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foolm0r0n posted...

. Worst things are non-combat controls like the huge turning radius, or the janky triangle interactions.

This was what I meant as far as clunky. Outside of battle it just doesn't feel smooth.

I put about seven hours into it tonight and I really enjoyed myself so it's turning around. I plan on playing the original on my switch when I'm done with this so we'll see how they compare.

I can't say I see this having as much replayability as the original


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It's not a good game but it's not bad either. It's close to the Square average quality this gen.

LeonhartFour posted...

nope it's great

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HeroDelTiempo17 posted...

The sidequests and towns kick ass and the sheer scope of being able to look up at the pillars and plate is nuts

I kept panning the camera up or down in every new environment and saying, "wow, the plates/slums/shinra building are really there", like I was continually in awe the entire time.

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Only played the demo so far but the entire opening scene leading to Cloud jumping off the train literally gave me goosebumps.

I'm pretty sure I'm gonna love it.

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I was not hooked by the demo at all, and even the beginning of the game was shaky for me, but by Mako Reactor 5 I was pretty thoroughly hooked.

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FFDragon posted...

I was not hooked by the demo at all, and even the beginning of the game was shaky for me, but by Mako Reactor 5 I was pretty thoroughly hooked.

This is what is happening with me I think

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I agree on the clunky movement and hit-or-miss dialogue, although OG FFVII was much, much worse in both departments. The poor localization of the original was charming in a way, but let's be honest, it's objectively bad.

I disagree on the backgrounds being a problem, with a couple of exceptions. I can't deny that there's some copy-paste, but it didn't seem especially prevalent to me. On the other hand, every time I look up and see the plates looming above me, oppressively... I'm in awe.

The battle system might be the best ever for FF as a series, although they're obviously holding back for the sequels.

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All the battle system really needs is for partners to gain ATB faster when they are off control

Also, man they hand out a LOT of materia you cannot possibly use (or would want to use)

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i didn't buy- only played the demo.

there was something plodding about the combat that i didn't like- both in movement and the combo system.

i'll play it someday, but i expect i'll be doing so in spite of the gameplay, rather than because of it

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Whiskey_Nick posted...

Also, man they hand out a LOT of materia you cannot possibly use (or would want to use)

Optimizing this game is gonna be fun

Yeah I am looking forward to my trophy clean up and mastering everything before my run on hard with all these and see what works

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