I just checked what the Genshin community was up to on YouTube and…

good lord.

Today I'm gonna play: Final Fantasy 7 Ever Crisis

This is a game I've been waiting for from Square, getting to know about Sephiroth's origins more is always a welcome treat! I am wary of it still as Square hasn't exactly had much success in F2P mobile games and they're often gacha reliant, but let's see what this has to offer.

Based on the trailers and the actual game, the presentation is more faithful to the original FF7, using chibi style models with detailed 3d static backgrounds. However the battle screen is more like the remake, modern and action-filled. Ever Crisis (will call it EC now) also takes its own spin on presentation by including visual novel elements during story segments with portraits popping up. But they only use one sprite per character, which is a shame.

The game also seems to be split into 3 parts: FF7,FF7 Crisis Core (CC), and FF7 The First Soldier (will call it TFS). The first two were originally on the PS1 and PSP respectively, and then remade/remastered for modern consoles and PC, while TFS was mobile exclusive which shut down. As far as I know, it was a battle royale, so I'm not sure about the plot but young sephiroth is depicted in the key visual for that part so this is probably the highlight of the game.

There isn't much to say about the combat. I've played Nier: Reincarnation (haven't played any other Nier game apart from this) and that was completely automated that I didn't have to do anything at all, which was extremely boring. Ever Crisis on the other hand shows slight improvement with giving you the choice to select some abilities based on yout ATB gauge and switch between an offensive or defensive stance for tactical purposes. There are also elements and weaknesses in play to use to your advantage, as well as staggering which now seems to be a mainstay since 13, which is nice. Auto is now an option instead, and it does all the right attacks for you. But none of this compares to other gacha games, or other FF titles. In fact, other FF mobile games are much more active in its combat even if it's turn based.

If there's another improvement I can note, it's the UI. Compared to the other FF mobile games, EC is less cluttered and more minimal. It feels a lot more friendly to play this way. There's still a lot of buttons around, as well as some strange navigation, such as the lack of getting to change party members within the same screen. But I'll accept the minimum provided here.

There are some friendly rates when it comes to pulling, and the game offers a lot of content such as enhancing equipment and materia, grinding various dungeons for materials, EXP, and other rewards, missions, and live co-op battles that also reward you. The co-op is a great addition that relies a little more of your participation compared to the solo segments, and there's been no sense of lag so far. However at some point, the game does block you often with high requirements that require you to either excessively grind, or pay your way through. I assume the goal is to get players to do the latter. There were also early pop-ups that were frequent in wanting you to buy packages, which felt predatory but typical of gacha anyways. But even then I haven't seen something like this pulled by other games like Genshin Impact or Honkai Star Rail (even if it's the same company) and yet those games rake in millions. This is the same issue I've seen in the other FF mobile titles where they pop up so much that it takes a good minute to close all the windows before you can even begin playing.

Overall the game has potential, with some improvements showing in terms of user experience. But Square really needs to take note from more successful gachas that provide a more streamlined, friendly and slightly less predatory experience. As far as I know, Kingdom Hearts Missing Link is their next project. The lack of news is worrying but I hope that game improves their portfolio.

Terms exclusive to this game: ATB (Active Time Battle) - A gauge that fills over time when idle, that allows you to select particular abitiies to attack in turn based combat Staggering - A phase where bonus damage is dealt to the enemy if the player manages to interrupt their attack