This is Sam's first Final
Fantasy VII Fic and so far it is looking very promising. This contains
four seperate books that will collectively be known as "The Reborn Saga",
the first of which starts off the story with a host of new characters that
fortunately do not over dominate the main members of AVALANCHE, they give
a greater sense that the whole world is affected by the chaos that insues.
Basically, Sephiroth is
"Reborn" with him he brings the "Jenova Cancer" which ultimately turns
the person infected into a living Jenova-Human hybrid. The whole of this
first story sees the group attempting to understand what has happened and
escaping from the Jenova and Sephiroth.
Book Two basically shows
the team dealing with the situation and trying to find the antidote to
the cancer. I'm not going to ruin the entire story but I hope you can see
where I'm going.
There are many plot twists
and a lot of new characters that are worthwhile to the story. Grissom
and Duane are particulary good. The fight scenes are very exciting and
are one of the best parts of the whole story, but the whole story is generally
exciting.
I love the first parts of
the Saga and is genuinelly one of the best fics I've read about our favourite
characters.
Story/Basic Plot:
A lot better than most fics, Sam has written a realistic follow-up to the
game, It starts off a little slow but soon picks up pace and doesn't stop
from then on. The way the Jenova are brought back sounds, at first, to
be a little stupid, but it eventually makes sense with the rest of the
story. The plot in the first book though, has only just started really,
and this is what drives you to read more.
I give it 26/30
Quality of Writing:
A high level of writing in this story, not overly complicated; but the
game's writing wasn't so. The story is reasonably long and I finished it
without being at all bored, it's that good.
I give it 24/30
Universe: All
the extra characters, (including a partcular summon) all fit into the universe
very well and the game's original characters are very close to the originals.
One thing that is different is the magic, in the game; Ultima would barely
touch most bosses, in this fic it would probably kill about ten bosses.
Just a minor change but significantly so, it adds more tension to the story.
When a character pulls out a materia orb, you know something big is going
to happen. Another complaint is that the story doesn't explore enough of
the World Map, most of it is situated in Fort Condor and there is a short
visit to the City of the Ancients and the area around it. The battles in
the story, are very exciting, for me sword play is a lot more fun than
magic and the battles are similar to the final boss in the game. Overall,
the story sticks reasonably well to the game; and the changes are (for
this story anyway,) worth it.
I give it 25/30
Overall Enjoyment:
This story was very enjoyable for me to read, maybe it was because I read
it in weekly updates that contained a chapter or two or maybe it's because
it is that damn good. Either way I enjoyed it iimmensely, the new characters
are very interesting even if a large percentage of them are killed off.
The story barely stops once it get started and I couldn't stop reading
it once I started. There are many stories I have read a lot of FFVII Fanfiction
a large proportion of it is utter rubbish but every now and again there
is one that catches your eye, this is one of them.
I give it 28/30
Total Score:
The scores added together make:
103/120