A day late perhaps, but as they say, it’s better than never. The last two entries in my Winterscape Countdown have been from the Nintendo team, but what Riddlethosian list would be complete without at least one rep from the illustrious Final Fantasy series?
I’ll begin with the obligatory statement that I love Final Fantasy VII. Stereotypical as this may sound, it is and will likely remain my favorite Final Fantasy game, and one of my all-time favorite RPGs.
However, at this point you may be thinking to yourself, “why the hell is he including an environment from a decidedly shit-looking PSX RPG?” A just question, because Final Fantasy VII does, indeed, look like shit. Even by today’s standards, the Phendrana Drifts and Snowhead are pleasant to look at. The Great Glacier and Gaea’s cliff? Notsomuch. But like the first two on the list, GG and GC made the list on account of the atmosphere they set. And, additionally, for the significance of what takes place there.
Barret occasionally has something semi-profound to say.
A few short hours after the murder of Aeris, the broken party finds themselves in the snowy wastelands of the Great Glacier, doggedly on the trail of the elusive Sephiroth. Needless to say, a depressing tone takes over the game at this point. A friend is dead, the weather is shit, and Sephiroth is literally just ahead of them – you can feel a showdown approaching.
After scaling the treacherous Gaea’s Cliff, Cloud and friends finally meet Sephiroth face-to-face… and the rest, as they say, is history. Cloud’s true “identity” is revealed in one of the most shocking plot twists in gaming, and… all hell breaks loose, essentially. It’s moments like this that made Final Fantasy VII such an impacting experience for me all those years ago, and it’s yet another example of snow-laden gaming locales that will forever remain in my memory.
Oh, the power of snow.
Tags: Final Fantasy VII, Winterscapes
Well FFVII’s character models look shit, but it’s pre-rendered backdrops can be enjoyed as much as any other prerendered backdrops. Infact I think FFVII has a better quality of prerendered backdrop than FFVIII, as the ones in FFVIII seem to have a hard time blending different shades of the same character together, and as a result look more than a little patchy.
True enough, but the character models are shitty enough to qualify the graphics as shitty. But I agree that the pre-rendered stuff can be great looking, and that is what really make up the locales.