Hello guys. Yesterday I suddenly felt the urge to dust off FF7 after who knows how many years, and when on a whim I stumbled upon this unexpectedly prolific modding scene I knew I had to give it a try. So, after scavenging the forum a bit and discovering bootleg (amazing work btw, PitBrat, if it weren't for this not-so-little jewel I would probably have settled with just some basic texture/video replacements) I went straight to the grunt work of downloading everything needed for a first try to take a look at the various options and get a feeling of what exactly I prefer.
Everything went fine, however there are some options I'm unsure of and there seems to be little information about, either for bootleg setups and for specific components behaviour: the very same threads of the original mods/compilations are sometimes a bit lacking in that department, with details buried inside the discussions. I might have missed some obvious tutorial somewhere, in which case I beg your and everyone's pardon: hope you don't mind me asking some general information about a couple of specific components even though they're not your "responsibility", it just makes more sense to me to keep these probably dumb newbish questions in one place where they could be useful to others too instead of cluttering several single threads. As the process of a full installation is quite long, I hope this can save a bit of time compared to pure trial and error.
So, following BFE's order, here are my doubts:
1 - Soundtrack: defaults to finalfantim OGG, while in your "PitBrat" and the full preset they are set to "bootleg". I've read the .ogg format is supposed to be the best choice for it supports looping. However, does the bootleg option mix & match content from the various options to a result you judged the best/most stable/whatever and/or has it more content? Tl;dr: is it best to choose the bootleg option or the OGG one is supposed to be the most advisable?
2 - Game modes/difficulty: These can be installed all together and switched on the fly, so trial and error is actually really feasible, but since I'm already here shouldn't hurt to ask. While the hardcore mod seems to be the most popular, and the short description itself inside bootleg points at it probably being the best modification of the kind, I'm not really sure I'm up for the frustration it can deliver later on. The remastered gameplay from the remix sparks my interest as a possible way to replay the game with some surprises without having to tear my hair off, but I couldn't find any details: as I've seen you state several times the remix itself is seriously outdated, should I expect this option in the bootleg too to be potentially bug ridden/unbalanced? I would hate to choose this just to find several hours in that I have to revert to another gameplay to be able to play without cursing several real and fictional gods in the process...
2b- Aeris: Not really sure if I want her anyway, while I liked her I always thought the very choice of killing off a major character like her was one of the main things that made FF7's plot so poignant and memorable. Aaaanyway, from the mod thread I see it's supposed to be incompatible with the remix and the hardcore mods, but I guess you found a workaround to put her in this compilation. Should I expect any issues and should I refrain from using either hardcore/remastered gameplay in conjuction with the Aeris mod?
On a less relevant - but definitely not out of disrespect towards the author - note, would it be even worth it in your opinion (aka, is there some actual relevant content, or is it mostly little more than an old character hack to have her active but pretty much a novelty apart from a couple of lines)? I know it's not really polite of me to ask about it here, but again the original mod thread has little to no info about it in the opening post(s), so if it actually has the potential of messing things up with other mods I'd find an informed opinion about its intrinsic value helpful in making my choice.
3 - Field Textures: I understand the "bootlegged" option here mixes content from the various different required mods. However, what's then the difference between it and, for instance, the "BlackFan+SL1982+Facepalmer" option? Is it some sort of "light" selection, while the latter installs everything at the potential expense of stability? As I'm reasonably confident in my system's ability to handle it, I wouldn't mind a couple of scenes with some lighting glitches if it means having everything else at the best available resolution.
4 - Menu Overhaul: From my first test run I saw it installs two times, one for the normal gameplay, one for the hardcore setting (on a mode switching install, of course). Both it and the opengl plugin share the 9999 break tweak. From your very last post I get both options should be turned off if I don't want it, but if I do, should both be activated, only one of them, or it doesn't actually matter as long either one is? So, if for example I want the 9999 break activated when I switch to the hardcore mod but deactivated if I'm playing with another choice, do I have to make the relevant choice during the Menu Overhaul two installs, while leaving the opengl cfg option off?
That should be it. Thanks in advance for your patience, and kudos again for this awesome project!
