After consuming 17 years worth of hallucinogenic frog jerky, my memory of playing Final Fantasy 7 has mostly been Firmly Forgotten 7 (your imagination is required to make this joke work). I recalled it being a great game that I vastly enjoyed, for reasons I couldn't actually recall at all. So 17 years later, I finally decided to replay it. ... Mistake.
I forgive games for being old, much like I forgive Burger King for making America cool. The graphics are a bit... polygon'y. And the mechanics are a bit... stupid. Yet, I Kevin Costner'ed on and went through the game, one pixel at a time. I tried to re-repress certain scenes, such as the human sex slave trafficking, and the almost-rape-scene(s). As I made my way through the game, I slowly realized yet another unspeakable truth... the writing is "Cars 2" level of stupid.
So as my former self could not deduct, this game's story is basically about chasing a mass murderer who refuses to mass murder you because reasons, and wants to become the meat in a planetary sandwich explosion because more reasons. Along the way, you encounter SUPER SERIOUS scenes of human struggle and self identity. Like the scene where the super bad guy tries to tell you that you're a clone of him, and your character deflects his 'mean guy' ray by simply saying, "I wasn't listening." And the fight scene with an old man that spanks himself in your direction. ... All I needed was him to turn into Lloyd Bridges and ask me if I've "ever seen a grown man naked" to put me into a state of perpetual distress and fear.
I could not believe how bad the writing is for this game after replaying it. I'm not sure if the Japanese forgot to hire translators that spoke human, or if they forgot to hire writers that weren't Japanese. The values are defcon 1 retarded, almost every giant boss looks like a Godzilla rip-off, and an old man spanked himself at me... I can't unsee that for a second time in my life. Now I need therapy in all the wrong places.
