For a lot of American players, Final Fantasy VII was their first big RPG they delved into. With 3 discs of state of the art battle segments, cutscenes, memorable music, personal characters, and a film-esque touch, it's hard not to know of this game.

The summon segments & Limit Break segments are fun to watch (Bahamut ZERO, Leviathan, Omnislash, Chaos, Highwind).

The cutscenes contained some of THE best graphics of its time. Then, the final cutscene was like watching a movie.

The soundtrack for Final Fantasy VII is probably Nobuo Uematsu's best work. "Fighting," the regular battle theme, never gets old and is surprisingly catchy considering its strange time signature (7/8). "FFVII Main Theme" is one of the best pieces from a video game. So many moods exhibited in such a lengthily track, yet it doesn't feel too long at all. I found myself leaving the menu screen on just to listen to it. & of course, the most discussed Final Fantasy composition, "One Winged Angel." I like it, but I prefer other pieces from the OST.

For the first time playing a video game up until '97, I was legitimately interested in the plot and characters of a video game. A lot of traditionalists, and FFVI fans detest Cloud & Sephiroth, but I actually like them. Cloud is a confused, caring, eventually strong character. I thought he had a lot of depth, and you rarely see this much depth in a character in a video game... let alone Final Fantasy games. Sephiroth was an interesting villain. He wanted to be a god, and his mysterious side to him worked well for the game. Sephiroth is one of the favorite villains from a video game. The best part of the game is when you enter Cloud's mind and truly see the truth. How many games do that? The one complaint I do have is how the game just shifts their focus from Shinra as the enemy to Sephiroth as the enemy. I have no problem with them shifting focus, but the transition was simply non-existent.

And this game played like a film. Although it might be dated, I still think of it as a classic and a must play in the RPG repertoire.