Hello. I found this mod a while ago, did three playthroughs (two of Type A and one of Type B), didn't have a Qhimm profile before, but I knew I had to create one just to leave at least one comment about your awesome mod.
The short version is: Thank you so much for having created this mod. It really feels like a "Final Mix" version of
Final Fantasy VII. I played the vanilla game dozens of time, and discovered your mod at a perfect moment - years after my last playthrough, when nostalgia was motivating me to return to FFVII's universe once more. Revisiting the story with an improved translation and discovering all the little things you added here and there had been a pleasure.
Now, to elaborate a little.
As far as gameplay is concerned, I'm a casual player. I played through the vanilla game dozens of time, but never bothered with the Gold Saucer minigames or the Chocobo sidequest, and I never tried to find the Materia combos and weapons that can one-shot the secret bosses - which outside of Ultimate Weapon I never tried beating either. And I played this mod on the Normal difficulty. I mention that to say that, from a casual player's standpoint, the difficulty and balancing of the game are pitch perfect. (And I realized I've played for the longest time with a rather old version - 2.0991 - so I suppose it's been even more polished now.)
I appreciate that you gave enemies and bosses new abilities (or changed the effects of some of their abilities) to make them more challenging, without becoming overpowered. The boss fights feel like a decent challenge, but one that can be overcome as long as the player knows what they're doing, and remembers that buffs, micro-managing the healer, and good character builds are the key to win. In that regards, Jenova-DEATH is my favorite fight. Among the non-optional non-final bosses, it's the one which gave me the most trouble; but once I figured out its gimmick, it became my favorite boss fight. I just love how this fight put to the test my knowledge of the game's mechanics and my strategy, what with it being an endurance match. I have a save file just before it to be able to do it at will... The fights with the TURKs are also great moments. It really feels like I'm fighting versatile opponents with a wide array of techniques (thanks to some details such as them using Turk Antidote if I try to poison them, or Rude using Turk Heal when low on health to also cast fury, which changes a bit the strategy of the fight). Bottom line, the mod's goal was to reach a midcore difficulty, and as far as I'm concerned, it's a success.
I love the way the mod changed the Materia and Weapons to allow for more customization. It took me a little time to adjust to the system, but after I did, I had a great time finding good combinations and assigning roles to my party members. The rebalancing and changes of the abilities are good, and so is the idea to add new Materia.
Little anecdote, I rarely bother with self-imposed challenge, but this mod managed to motivate me to do one. On my third playthrough, I tried stealing and morphing all the bosses. It gave the fights a slightly different edge, and it was a ton of fun.
All the quality of life changes - the possibility to skip some long flashbacks, receiving the Enemy Away Materia early, the NPC that spawns every time there's a new Fort Condor battle,
the possibility to have a way to get a Gold Chocobo without doing the tedious breeding sidequest
, and so forth - are appreciated.
The main appeal of this mod to me was the improvement of the translation and the additional content. And boy did it deliver!
I won't pinpoint all the instances of you clarifying or improving the dialogues, or else this comment might turn into an essay. I'm just going to say that it was a real blast to revisit the story with a clearer version. It's often little details, but for instance the mere fact the dialogues clearly explain
everything about the Reunion and the fact Jenova is impersonating Sephiroth
make the experience better. I also like how you took the liberty to tweak some dialogues to slightly change the meaning of some events, but while retaining the characters' personalities. For instance, I like how Shinra's actions during the Midgar arc are given a slight different meaning because in your version they are aware that Midgar will soon become unsustainable, and their fight against AVALANCHE is also a way for them to divert the citizens' attention so that they have enough time to accomplish the Neo-Midgar project. It gives more sense to their actions at the Sector 7 pillar. Your way of writing is also good in that it stays true to the characters' personalities - especially when it comes to Aeris' dialogues.
To me, the biggest asset of the mod is the additional content. Once more, I won't pinpoint all the specific examples I liked, I will just say that discovering all of these additions was my greatest pleasure when playing through the mod. Bosses and mini-bosses have been added at perfect moments. The Guard Scorpion becoming a recurring boss and running gag was cool. When playing the vanilla game, I remember sometimes thinking it would have been cool to have boss fights at some key moments of the game (Floor 59 of Shinra building, end of Mythril Mines, at the end of the Junon Weapon Raid in front of the Highwind), and this mod gave it to me.
Of course I also enjoyed the additional scenes. My favorite one is
the moment when Yuffie attempts to rob the party
.
The new sidequests and optional bosses were a ton of fun. I almost wish there were more additional dungeons like
the return to the Gi Cave
, or that
the fights between Tifa and Zangan or for Aeris' fourth Limit Break
had been kept. I loved the cameos at the end of the Special Fights of the Battle Arena.
Finally, one additional content I especially liked was the 'talk to party in towns' feature. It doesn't look like much, some may think it's cosmetic, but I think it did SO MUCH to flesh the characters out. I like FF7's characters, but the original game also shows its age when it comes to its way of handling them. After a while, once their arc is resolved, and outside of the occasional key moment, most of the characters disappear into the background, and only briefly show up for group conversations. Your mod's feature allows to feel like they're more present.
A quick word about the Type B scenario. I made the mistake of doing it right after my Type A playthrough. Therefore, I adored the Midgar Arc, and did the rest of the game on autopilot to see the alternate boss roster. Though I'm not reproaching anything - the changes of the Midgar storyline alone are a great thing, and must have needed a ton of work. I confess however that I prefer Type A's approach of keeping the original story's event progression and improving it. Still, the two scenarios are a testimony of how much work has been put into the mod.
I'd like to finish by discussing in more details a very spoilery addition:
I'm of course talking about the possibility of saving Aeris. It's in my opinion one of the best features of the mod, because you took the time to integrate it into the story, and her into the events. It really gives me the impression to play an alternate version of the story. In my opinion, save maybe for one or two details, it's perfectly integrated in the general story and doesn't create plot holes.
If I had one suggestion, it would simply be to expand a little the scene of the aftermath after the events of the Forgotten City, the one when the entire party is gathered in one house with Aeris resting on the bed. In the mod, it's the only part where I think Aeris' inclusion raises a plot-related problem, as nobody asks her what she was trying to do. The idea I propose would be to have Aeris wake up, the other party members are happy, and ask her what she attempted to do, which she explains. (Bottom line, she gives them some of the information she'll also remind them later at Cosmo Canyon. She tried to ask the Planet, they mentioned Holy, but they weren't clear on what it was exactly or how she could cast it. The altar felt like a dead end to her.) Cloud and the others would conclude her attempt was a failure/dead end, since the access is now blocked once again, and Cloud (influenced by the Jenova cells) would therefore impose his idea to go north and kill Sephiroth. However, I don't know if it's feasible. I recall reading one of your comments in which you explained it's very tricky to add new dialogues because of the way text boxes are coded in the original game...
Anyway, minor nitpick aside, your mod is the thing that made me like Aeris and use her in my team. In the vanilla game, I've always felt neutral about her. I thought she was a good character, but far from my favorite, and since I knew she was going to die I never used her in my team. However, since in New Threat there is an alternate story with her surviving, it made me use her as much as possible in Disks 2 and 3, to see all the new content. And I realized just how powerful she could be as a mage... (In the vanilla game, I've always thought she's too specialized for her own good; but since your mod encourages to specialize the party members, she fits like a glove...) Plus, I adore your way of writing her. Like many I think, I cheered widely when she gave Scarlet the chair (loved that reference), and I adored the optional conversation with her after the Zack flashback - the moment in which her writing is the most spot-on. After my first playthrough of New Threat, Aeris barely left my team... To the point I still have to force myself to do a "regular" playthrough of the original story with her perma-death now...
Final random anecdote. I played some parts of the game with my brother in the same room. When Diamond Weapon made a JoJo reference, we went wild.
Just a final example on how little details are the salt of this mod.
To conclude, I'm impressed (and delighted) to see you're still working on the mod in order to add and improve its content. I confess I updated my version yesterday just to play through the Junon Weapon Raid once more. It's one of my favorite moments of the vanilla game, so I loved how you expanded on it. But I probably will do an other full playthrough at some point, because I'm curious to see what is the "secret encounter" which was made unmissable. I have a hard time picturing what it is...
Apologies for the long comment.
I wanted to write it for a long time, so once I started it, there was no stopping me. Once more, thank for this mod and for all of your hard work.
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?' enemy drops it but idk what that is or where it is. I'm currently on Disc 3.