Final Fantasy VII

What the review sites say

Read directly from each source rather than aggregated from a third party, for the PlayStation (1997 original) version. Sample sizes differ by orders of magnitude between critics and players, which matters more than the gap in the scores.

Aggregators, individual outlets and players are answering different questions. Critics score a game at launch on a review build. Player scores accumulate for years and absorb every patch, price change and server outage, which is why the two diverge most on live-service releases. Read every number next to its sample size.

Method. Scores are read from each source page by a named editor, on a stated date, for the platform named above. They are not pulled from an API and not aggregated from another site. Third-party review platforms block automated collection, so each figure is re-checked by hand before publication rather than trusted from an old file. Last read by Automated fetch from first-party APIs on 2026-08-30.

What players actually argue about

Retrospective discussion is warm but not uncritical. The systems and story are defended firmly, while the presentation and the official ports are treated as a missed opportunity.

73% of 1,671 Steam reviewers recommend it. Mostly Positive, 1,225 positive of 1,671. That is a far larger sample than any critic aggregate, and it reflects the game as it is now rather than as it launched. Read them on Steam.

What individual players say

The most-helpful review on each side, as voted by other players. Excerpts only, each linking to the full review. Hours played is shown because a complaint from someone with 400 hours in a game is a different kind of complaint.

Citations pending. The two lists above are our editor's summary of themes that recur across community discussion. They are characterisations, not quotes, and nothing here is attributed to any individual. Before publishing, add the specific threads you read to community.threads with their URL, score and the date you read them, so a reader can check the summary against the source.

Method. We read the largest discussion threads on the game's main subreddit and note themes that appear repeatedly across independent threads, not single strong opinions. Upvotes measure agreement among people who are already engaged enough to post, which is not the same as agreement among everyone who played. We never quote an individual without linking the thread.

Where to buy and what it costs

Disclosure. Some links below are affiliate links, marked in the table. If you buy through one we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Affiliate arrangements never influence a score, a ranking, or which stores appear here. Official first-party stores carry no affiliate programme and are listed anyway.

MSRP is the publisher list price in the United States and does not change. The current column is filled from a live price check and is empty until one has run.

Stores marked as key resellers sell activation keys rather than the game itself. Prices are usually lower. Regional key restrictions, no publisher support, and limited recourse if a key fails are the trade-off, so weigh the saving against that.

No live prices yet. MSRP above is the publisher list price and is accurate, but almost nobody pays list after launch year. Run npm run prices with an IsThereAnyDeal API key to fill the current column, or set pricing.offers[].price and pricing.checkedOn by hand. We leave it blank rather than show a stale number as if it were current.

Method. MSRP is the publisher list price in the United States, excluding tax, and does not change. The current column is a live price read from each store and is only shown with a check date attached. Regional pricing differs substantially. We list official first-party stores whether or not they pay us, and we mark every affiliate link and every key reseller. No live price check has run for this entry. Full pricing methodology.

Where it sits on the grid

Price history

No history yet. This chart fills itself once the hourly price check has been running. Each run appends one point, so the graph becomes useful after a few days and genuinely informative after a sale cycle. Run npm run prices with an IsThereAnyDeal key, or npm run prices -- --demo to preview the chart with clearly-labelled synthetic data.

Trailers and gameplay

No videos embedded. Add the YouTube ID for each trailer to videos[].youtubeId and they render here. Embed from the publisher's own channel only: embedding is what YouTube's player is for and the channel owner can revoke it, whereas re-uploading someone else's trailer is infringement. Embeds use youtube-nocookie.com so no tracking cookie is set until the reader presses play.

How it was made, and what it cost to make

Square publicly moved the series from Nintendo to Sony in 1996 over cartridge storage limits, a decision widely regarded as one of the most consequential in console history.

The team was around 100 people at a time when 20 was typical, and Square backed it with a marketing spend reported at the time to rival the development cost itself.

Timeline

1. 1 January 1996First teasedAnnounced publicly, usually with no gameplay
2. 1 August 1996Gameplay revealedFirst look at how it actually plays
3. 31 January 1997ReleasedFirst platform release

On budgets. We list a budget only when a primary source stated one: a regulatory filing, a court document, an executive on the record, or a published post-mortem. Most figures circulating for big-budget games are estimates repeated until they read as fact. Where nobody credible has said a number, this field stays undisclosed rather than carrying a guess.

How many people bought it

No sales figures recorded. Publishers announce these irregularly, in press releases, quarterly filings and milestone posts, and the wording differs every time. Add each announcement to sales.milestones with its date, who said it and a source URL, and this section renders a chart of the run-up. We do not estimate sales, and we do not repeat a figure we cannot link.

Method. Sales figures come from publisher announcements, quarterly filings or platform milestone posts. They are claims by an interested party, not audited numbers, and the wording matters: "sold" can mean units shipped to retail rather than units bought by players, and "players" counts anyone who launched the game including on a subscription.

Recent news

No news items yet. Add dated entries to news[] with a source and URL. Keep each one to a couple of sentences in your own words with a link out. Republishing another outlet's article in full is both a copyright problem and a scraped-content problem under AdSense, and a link plus your own summary is worth more to a reader anyway.