This is going to be one of my infrequent nerdy entries. If you're the kind of person who would not enjoy a close reading of a scene from a video game, feel free to skip. (As consolation, here is Hipster Bingo.)

I finished Final Fantasy 7 last night, having borrowed it from my brother. You can tell off the bat I'm a pretty casual gamer, because all the real gamers played it five years ago.

Holy hell, is that game overrated.

Don't get me wrong, it was pretty fun, but the story and characters were... meh.

For all the people who think Sephiroth is this great villain, I just don't see it. He's kind of this generic evil guy that we hear about, and oh he just killed a bunch of people, and now he wants to kill everyone with a giant meteor because he thinks it will save the planet. (Oh and he's got a big sword.) That's not really a satisfactory motivation, and we're never really given any insight, or indeed characterization, at all. He just fits this archetype that, not being a gamer, I don't really have that firm of a grasp on.

And speaking of archetypes... I guess it's a bit much to expect good female characters in a video game, least of all a Japanese video game. There are three female protagonists in the game, and they fit the genre to a T: there's the weak, helpless, pure girl in need of protection, the tough, intimidating girl with large breasts who turns out not to be so tough because she's hopelessly in love with one of the male characters, and the wacky Japanese schoolgirl ninja comic relief. These are more or less the exact same characters from the tenth game in the series.

The male characters match up pretty well with that particular game, too. There's the flawed, confused hero, the jive-talkin' sidekick, the stoic animal, the mysterious undead guy. Few of these characters are given any depth.

The story starts off fairly promising, I'll admit, and the fact that your characters are essentially terrorists gives the game an interesting edge. But an hour or two in you hit the world map, and it's pretty much generic RPG from there on. I guess having one of the female leads die a third of the way through the game was adventurous, but the impact was lessened because I knew it was coming. It's the Citizen Kane curse.

I found the humor to be awkward and sophomoric, and when the game tries to be deep it has a decidedly high-school feel to it. I don't know if these things don't translate well or if it's just a cultural thing.

The game did have one moment early on that impressed me. You're fighting a fellow freedom fighter (Dyne) who has gone crazy and started randomly killing people. After you defeat him, he backs up to the edge of a cliff, to the left of two protruding pieces of metal, each of which form the shape of a cross.

DYNE: ...it wasn't just my arm...... back then...... I lost something

irreplaceable. I don't know where I went wrong...

He stretches his arms out and falls backwards off the cliff, briefly forming the shape of a cross himself. The biblical imagery here is striking - Dyne is the criminal on Christ's left; he has lost his faith in the rebellion.

So for that one moment, they had me. But in a 30-hour game, one moment doesn't really cut it. Maybe I just didn't get it. Characters and situations were introduced with no explanation and little impact on the story. It's possible that you have to be a gamer or a Japanophile to fully appreciate it. Again, it was a pretty good game, but I don't understand why so many people love it so much. I've certainly played better.

So that's how I feel about that game.

I look forward to your flames.