It really is though.

The music was great, the Triple Triad card game actually was fun and had depth, card and item crafting was excellent, the draw system required a totally different approach to battles, it had a unique atmosphere, an open world map that actually had secrets to explore and not just an illusion of freedom to frame the story, interesting unique characters compared to most RPGs… I could go on.

I made so many Reddit comments on threads where everyone was falling over themselves to talk about VII and IX, got routinely ignored, but never doubted VIII was worth defending.

I guess FFVIII hit at the right time for me, it was always my favorite, and I’ve come back to it many times over the years. It’s so calming to play, and the side quests and games can keep you distracted from the main plot for days or weeks.

The fan site in question: https://ff8isthe.best/

FFVIII was the first mainline FF game I played after exposing myself to the franchise with Tactics. I was new to turn based systems, so I never picked up on the criticism. I was blown away by the presentation, fantasy and adventure of it all. The gunblade was about the coolest thing a kid of my age could have been exposed to at that time as well. Right now I’m big into VII for obvious reasons, but I really want to replay VIII.

I’m not a fan of ff7. I actually love 8, and a few of the older ones but 7 never pulled me in. So to me it’s kinda crazy to see like a dozen games released based on ff7 alone, when there are a dozen+ other final Fantasy worlds out there to explore.

I tried the ff7 remake and didn’t like it either, so I wish they’d move on from ff7 already and work on expanding on the rest of the series.

I’m very happy they’re finally moving on to an ff8 remake.

Final fantasy 8 is the best…

There’s a lot to be said for missing the weirdness and personality of the early internet. There’s a nostalgia for that which I’m seeing frequently in the fediverse. It almost makes me want to find my niche and begin my own weird little website.