It was 3 years in the making, and subject to more holy-traded rumour, speculation and gossip than any pervious games in Japan, but Square finally returned to its most popular and successful series with Final Fantasy VII.

A large part of the delay was due to changing formats - Square felt it had done as much as they could with the SNES, and wanted to start developing for one of the next generation of consoles. Of course, giving the companies long term partnership with Nintendo, everyone was expecting it to plump for the N64. Square, however, the only way to create the kind of games they wanted was to use the massive storage space of the CD-ROM, and once it became clear that the Nintendo's wonder machine was going to stick to the cartage format, the company looked for another console. In one of the most significant endorsements of Sony's game machine ever, Square announced that Final Fantasy VII was to be released on Playstation.

Cloud Strife's struggle with the oppressive Shin-Ra corporation and his own mysterious past were an astonishing achievement, and both the game's techno-magical world and main characters have become icons for Playstation, rivalling such stars as Lara Croft and Crash bandicoot. Until the release of Final Fantasy VIII it was probably the most stunning game on Sony's little grey-box of tricks, with all 3 discs packed to the gills with sumptuous graphics, intricate plotting and ridiculously addictive game play. Even given the Playstation's 32-bit architecture and much-framed 3D capabilities, no-one ever expected an RPG to look this good. If you still haven't got a copy, you really should slap yourself about for being such a fool and rush out immediately and buy one - you've no excuse not to sacrifice months of your free time now, especially since it's available as a platinum BARGAIN.