The best way to play the original Final Fantasy VII
3.3.2024
Translation: Katherine Martin
Don’t have a PS5 so can’t play Final Fantasy VII Rebirth? Too bad. Luckily for you, the original’s available on various platforms. Here’s my favourite way to play the 28-year-old Final Fantasy VII.
It’s been just over four years since I last played Final Fantasy VII. It was the Switch version – my favourite version at the time. The small screen in handheld mode was perfect for the old-style graphics. Certain quality-of-life features, such as 3x speed, made the game much more enjoyable. Even so, I was jealous of everyone who was playing the game on the PC. Thankfully, there were numerous mods out there to give the game a renewed splendour.
If you have a Steam Deck, you’ll get the best of both worlds: a small screen like you’d get on the Switch, as well as the option to play with mods. Here’s how.
Here’s what you need
As well as a Steam Deck (or PC, but this involves a different process), you need Final Fantasy VII in your Steam library and a mod manager. I use 7th Deck, a Steam Deck version of 7th Heaven, the mod manager named after Tifa’s bar in the game.
7th Deck makes the installation process simple. You’re best off following the instructions created by dotAXiS, who’s responsible for the customised mod manager. Here’s the link to the download and instructions. Alternatively, there’s a video tutorial:
I hadn’t yet installed Proton 7 or SteamLinuxRuntime 2.0 on my Steam Deck, the environments needed for the mod manager to work. If you follow dotAXiS’s installation instructions, Steam will open automatically and the environments will be installed. However, you’ll need to reboot your Steam Deck after installation and restart the 7th Deck installation process.
Once you’ve done that, you’ll be able to use the manager to install various mods.
My mods
The mods you install and the order you boot them in is important. They’ll boot in the same sequence you line them up in the list. I spent some time experimenting with various mods and instructions, which made the game unstable at times. In the end, I took my cue from Final Fantasy YouTuber BltzZ, who shows viewers his settings in one of his videos. If you’re going to install 7th Heaven on your PC, it’s best to follow his tutorial in full.
These days, not all the mods BltzZ uses are available anymore. Or rather, they’ve been integrated into others. This is despite his tutorial being scarcely more than a year old. The Final Fantasy VII modding scene is still very active. Echo-S, for instance, was released at the beginning of 2023. It’s a complete voice-over mod voiced by fans – some of whom are professional actors. It’s seriously good.
You can see the names of the mods I’ve installed and in which order in the next screenshot. The game runs smoothly on my Steam Deck and looks wonderful. If you can’t do without the Chibi character models from the original, there’s also a Ninostyle Chibi mod. This allows you to retain the style of the original while using high-resolution models.
Source: Kevin Hofer
In addition to visual and acoustic mods, there are also mods with quality-of-life features. There’s one that speeds up gameplay, for example. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work in combination with the 60 FPS mod. I, however, prefer the higher frame rate – the original only runs at 15 FPS in battles.
The New Threat 2.0 mod, on the other hand, offers new enemies in addition to the old ones. Not only that, but the existing ones have new moves. It also increases the level of difficulty. I’m still deciding whether to play through the mod again.
Some snapshots of the game
Now that I’ve gone into the ins and outs of the mods and their merits, I’d like to wrap up by showing you how they look. For comparison, here are two sets of images of combat and the dungeon.
Kevin Hofer
Senior Editor
kevin.hofer@digitecgalaxus.chFrom big data to big brother, Cyborgs to Sci-Fi. All aspects of technology and society fascinate me.
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