Final Fantasy VII now on Japanese PSN

By Ellie Gibson Published 14 April, 2009

Yours to download for around a tenner.

Sony has released classic PSone game Final Fantasy VII for download via the PlayStation Network.

It's only available on the Japanese PSN, mind, and is priced at JPY 1500. That's just over a tenner in the Queen's money or around EUR 11.

If you don't live in Japan, it's still possible to download the game by setting yourself up with a Japanese PSN account. Just remember all the talking will be, you know, in Japanese.

Can you believe it'll be 12 years this November since FFVII was released in Europe? More to the point, can you believe you're that old?

Picture of Ellie.

About Ellie Gibson

Since joining Eurogamer in the mid 2000s, Ellie has written about subjects as diverse as the fall of Gizmondo, the rise of Hollyoaks actresses in Red Alert games and the noise a bear makes under NSFW circumstances.

Read more articles from Ellie by visiting the Ellie Gibson archive page.

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Comments (25) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • ZuluHero #1 3 years ago

    Man, i was quite old when i played it... And has it really been 12 years? Where is my life going? :S
    Edited by 1 at 14/04/09 @ 09:26

  • Doctor_What #2 3 years ago

    I was at uni... Ellie, why di you have to tell me that was 12 years ago? As if Tuesday after Easter wasn't hard enough to take already.

    Welcome back to work. You're old.

    EDIT: and I'm really looking forward to playing this again, although I never did get the hang of the materia stuff. Are the visuals up-res'd? 720p? 1080p? Even with the low-poly models, I'm sure they'd look nice enough in HD.
    Edited by 1 at 14/04/09 @ 09:30

  • patch #3 3 years ago

    Oh... my... god...!!!!!! European release date please?

  • NotSoSlim #4 3 years ago

    Too bad is in bloody Japanese..hopefully E3 will have a western release announcement as the Bluray is out E3 week
    Edited by 1 at 14/04/09 @ 09:31

  • Aggesan #5 3 years ago

    It's also availiable on Hong Kong's PSN. Only in japanese there also though. I really hope they will release it on EU PSN as well. Don't know if I'd have the energy to re-play the game from beginning to end, but just to go back to Midgar again for a moment would be really, really nice.

  • menage #6 3 years ago

    So, why is this news exactly? I mean, there's tons of stuff on the Asian PSN, but there bloody useless with the language barrier and the lack of creditcard support.

    Better news would be. Why do the EU and US PSN suck so much in comparisson?
    Edited by 1 at 14/04/09 @ 09:36

  • Banksy #7 3 years ago

    It's actually FFVII International that has been released on PSN, but it's still in Japanese - just with the extra bits that the West got back in the day.

  • dadrester #8 3 years ago

    course you could just go down cash converters or on ebay and pick up the euro version and play it on the PS3.

  • Les #9 3 years ago

    Have the PSone disc version, still in shrink wrap. Played it on PC back in the day. If I ever feel the need to revisit it, I can. Is a comfortable feeling. :)

  • patch #10 3 years ago

    @menage: It's news cause chances are all they've done is taken the Japanese version from a CD, jigged and poked and stuck it on PSN. In theory it shouldn't be too hard to do the same with the English version (no translation needed), which means it could be here very soon.

    @dadrester: I've got it on my PS3 already, but my g/f would rather watch Emmerdale on our plasma. I want it on PSP for handheld midgar goodness!

    **Ellie** I'm assuming it's for PS3 AND PSP?!?

  • ZuluHero #11 3 years ago

    surely if it was on PSP it would be bigger news than this?

  • Hokum #12 3 years ago

    I thought all the PS1 games worked on PSP too?

  • patch #13 3 years ago

    My Japanese isn't brilliant, but this page seems to say Playstation 3 / PSP. Is PSP in Japanese the same as PSP in English? :D

    Edit: 1715mb... gotta get me a new memory card!
    Edited by 1 at 14/04/09 @ 10:09

  • Les #14 3 years ago

    "My Japanese isn't brilliant, but this page seems to say Playstation 3 / PSP. Is PSP in Japanese the same as PSP in English? :D "

    Forgot about the PSP compatibility of PSN PSone titles. :) Would be an incentive to get it again from PSN as I don't have custom firmware on my PSP (tinkering with a battery was a bit too much work for me personally).

  • Erinan #15 3 years ago

    1715mb... gotta get me a new memory card!

    O_o They could have recompressed the videos at least, that's what took most of the discs space :(

  • viper_h #16 3 years ago

    Yeah, that's a bit of a ridiculous size considering how low-res the videos are.

    This sets hopes of a PS3 remake back even more :(

  • Darknight #17 3 years ago

    Not so sure about that Viper, if this sells well it'll prove to Square that FFVII is still a big seller (as if they needed any more proof of this).

  • deanbmmv #18 3 years ago

    1715MB is quite good considering it's on 3 700MB disc's(2.1GB)
    FFIX could be even bigger if/when that get's released.

    And to be honest I don't get why S-E don't jsut release all of the PS1 FF's, Chrono Triggger etc, it's the closest to a FFVII remake we will probably get, and it'll help fund FFXIII development.
    Iif sales are high enough maybe give funding and incentive to make a FFVII remake. Personally I'm not holding out FFVII was good but not prophetically great video game it get's lavished with ( which I place on Nostalgia)

  • Vilhelm #19 3 years ago

    I bought this game over the weekend. Although 1500 yen is a steep price for a PS1 game, especially considering that all the other PS1 games, including Xenogears and Metal Gear Solid, go for 600 yen, it still is a fair price. Do mind that Final Fantasy VII International is still for sale in all bigger stores for the original PSX and the street price for that version is around 2500 yen. 1000 yen shaved off isn't too bad.

    Now, what do people get for 1500 yen?
    - The game, obviously, on three "disks" which need to be swapped, just like the original version.
    - An extra disk that comes with Final Fantasy VII International and has maps, artwork and making of info.
    - The graphics have been slightly improved.
    - Loading times are only half of what they were on the PS1.
    - No, there's no English language option.
    - Being able to play it while on the underground/bus/whatever.

    I've had a blast playing it, although my first playthrough in Japanese is giving me nightmares at times. The problem, unfortunately, is that the story and dialogue is a lot cheesier in Japanese than it is in English. Also, some characters have almost completely different personalities; Barret, for example, doesn't swear nearly as much in Japanese as he does in English, and Cloud is a huge sissy in the Japanese version. Yup, there goes my old vision of Final Fantasy VII when English was the only foreign language I spoke and understood.

    Well, bottom line, if you understand Japanese, go buy it now. If you don't understand Japanese, but want to play this game now, go buy it now! If you want to wait until it comes to Europe (highly unlikely, considering how err, things are going right now), then you can wait.

  • dr_faulk #20 3 years ago

    "More to the point, can you believe you're that old?"

    Extra hurt considering it's my birthday today.

  • Cid #21 3 years ago

    Stupid question, but I know nothing about it: is PSN for both the PS3 and PSP? So this can be downloaded and played on the handheld?

    Also, why is it unlikely to come to Europe? (@Vilhelm)

  • Vilhelm #22 3 years ago

    Cid: To answer both your questions...

    Yes, you can play it on both PSP and PS3 like all other PS1 Classic games bought and downloaded from the PlayStation Store. These games are just straight ports of the old PS1 disk versions and run on emulators on the PSP and PS3.

    As for why I believe it's highly unlikely to see this game on the PlayStation Store... If you just look at the selection right now, you'll see my point. The only decent PS1 game that has been released on the PS Store is Silent Hill, and it was soon pulled out again! The selection isn't as bad in the United States, but it still is bad there as well. It all comes down to licensing and royalties, I guess. It's a legal mess far more complicated than it is in Japan.

    Which is why Japan has a much better offering of PS1 titles, such as Resident Evil 1-3, Metal Gear Solid, Xenogears and now Final Fantasy VII.

  • MisterCraig #23 3 years ago

    Apparently there is DLC where you get to play as Tifa's breasts.

  • patch #24 3 years ago

    Whatever you do, don't go on google images, turn safe search off, and then search for images of Tifa. Some people got waaaay too into FFVII!!!

  • firefly #25 3 years ago

    @Vilhelm

    Interesting...I'm tempted to download it just to force myself to improve my Japanese. I'm quite curious now about what it was like pre-localisation.

    @patch
    Plus really don't search for Tifa and Aeris/th yuri. I'd hate to imagine what people have come up with there.