The way the game started was absolutely mind blowing — the train pulled into the station the exact same way it did in Final Fantasy VII — for a moment, I felt like I was back into the days of my youth. At the start of the game, I was playing Zack and was almost immediately engaged in battle with a handful of Shinra soldiers. The battle was very fast paced but not completely real-time as there was definitely a break between each move. I can control Zack’s movement freely with the D-Pad and/or Analog Stick, and since the battle pacing was so much faster than previous versions, and with ability to “Guard” and “Evade”, the game almost felt a little like God of War as far as melee combat goes.

The quality of the cinematic cut-scenes are on par with Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, and in-game graphic and sound have both exceeded my expectation. Character animations are very smooth and I love how when they talk, their mouth movements would match what they were saying perfectly. So far I am very impressed with this game, and I can’t wait to play more of it.

Despite all of its awesomeness, Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII is not without its shortcomings. The very first thing I noticed and I think would bother me throughout the entire game, is the English voices for the characters. I am a big fan of Japanese anime, and I always watch them with Japanese voice and English subtitles — the same way I watched Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children — because I think the English voices are insufficient in expressing the emotion of the characters. Having watched Last Order: Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, I know exactly what Zack and Sephiroth should sound like, and man they sounded horrible in English. I’m glad that so far everything else seems perfect so I hope the characters’ bad English won’t spoil too much of my fun.