Final Fantasy VII on PS1: A Retrospective Review

This is a source-attributed retrospective, not a first-hand playtest: nobody on this project has replayed Final Fantasy VII for this piece, so what follows draws on documented release context and contemporary coverage, attributed to where it came from.

Combat and materia

Final Fantasy VII (Japan, January 1997; North America, September 1997) uses a turn-based Active Time Battle system layered with the Materia system, which lets characters equip spheres that grant spells and abilities, decoupling magic from fixed character classes in a way earlier entries in the series hadn't.

Story, without major spoilers

The game follows Cloud Strife and the resistance group Avalanche opposing the Shinra corporation, told through pre-rendered backgrounds and full-motion-video cutscenes that were unusually ambitious for a role-playing game at the time.

Presentation

The disparity between the low-polygon character models and the detailed pre-rendered backgrounds was a defining, and sometimes criticized, visual signature of the 1997 release, a direct product of PS1-era hardware limits rather than a stylistic choice made freely.

Modern accessibility

Square Enix's marketing campaign for the North American release reportedly ran to around $100 million, an unusually large push for a role-playing game at the time, and is generally credited with bringing the genre a much wider Western audience than earlier Final Fantasy entries had reached.