The first run is relatively simple to win, setting defense units in back, traps on high traffic paths and offensive units in front. The player is drawn to protect the majestic bird, and I dropped most of my earnings on this mini-game to save the fort and unveil the secret Phoenix materia. Again, the music lulled you into a sense of peace and trust for a community being violated by Shinra. You felt a sense of duty and empathy for these people on their last legs protecting something beautiful. Shinra wants to eradicate the condors and the people living at Fort Condor to obtain the lifestream sucking Mako Reactor’s Giant Materia. Cloud and his team must fund soldiers to protect the poorly defended fort in order to fight Shinra’s military invasion. The team arrives at a fort near Junon to find a giant condor incubating an egg atop a mako reactor. To replay this, visit Wonder Square at Gold Saucer and hop on G-Bike. The cutscene that leads up to this mini-game along with the music, and a grand finale boss fight against Motor Ball is exhilarating. Accelerate, decelerate, right, left maneuvering to smash the assailants with the Buster sword all while keeping an eye on your teammate’s health bars. In attempt to escape Shinra, Cloud smashes through the glass of a building on a Hardy-Daytona motorcycle fleeing pursuers while protecting a low riding turquoise pickup truck carrying the team. These mini-games made the story Midgar Expresswayįinal Fantasy starts off with its first story driven mini-game on the Midgar Expressway. I found that the story flowed much better by using mini-games as a key storytelling ingredient. There were no rewards for mini-games in the initial play through (although going back to the Gold Saucer later might help you get a key piece of gear or materia). The developers made mini-games fun enough that you actually sought them out (with the Gold Saucer being a great example of this). It took the mini-game and integrated it within the story. What did Final Fantasy VII do differently? Mini-games can be found in Metal Gear Solid, Monkey Ball, Animal Crossing, BioShock, Grand Theft Auto…the list goes on. Skyrim had lockpicking, which is repetitive and simple for a game sometimes played over 100 hours.Īnd these are just a few examples. Another popular card game is Gwent from The Witcher.įinal Fantasy X had Blitzball, a sort of underwater water polo. I could sit hours and play cards and neglect my mission. Red Dead Redemption has card games, from Poker to Blackjack. The hacking mini-game from Mass Effect 2. Celeste has a similar arcade game, Celeste Classic Pico-8.įishing is a popular optional mini-game in many titles, from NieR to Legend of Zelda. There are also whole video games inside video games, an example would be J ourney of the Prairie King in Stardew Valley. It’s optional, and becomes a mindless chore after the first few hours of the game. Mass Effect hacking exists for credits, weapons, intel, or prototypes. I’d further define these mini-games as being a smaller game or repetitive task in the form of a game performed in order to acquire something of value. Mini-games as we know themĪ mini-game is defined as any “game within a game”. So how did they get Final Fantasy VII perfect mini-games? Answering this question requires us to consider other mini-games as a point of comparison. They are not designed to trigger OCD tendencies, nor do they feel tedious and mind numbingly boring. These mini-games don’t initially exist for experience, power-ups, or items acquisition they exist to tell a story. As I replayed it, I noticed that the game flow never feels bogged down by repetition and keeps the player thoroughly engrossed with new and interesting mini-games the entire length of the story.īy incorporating mini-games into the actual storyline, Final Fantasy VII changed the monotony of the era’s top down turn-based RPGs. F inal Fantasy VII is renowned as one of the greatest JRPGs of all time (if not the greatest).
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |