Until these add-ons (which other than Dirge of Cerberus I haven't played or watched) I always considered FF7 to have had an open ending (i.e make your mind up yourself). This is because whenever I see the ending to FF7 I always get Bugenhagen's words in my head 'all that is good for the planet will remain, all that is bad will disappear. I wondser which we humans are'. I always liked to think that the games makers were letting the player make his/her own mind up about the ending, they never showed what happened to everyone after meteor was destroyed, just a flash, a quick shot of Aeris and the credits, so in theory the planet itself could have decided that humans having been one of the root causes of its problems were more trouble than they were worth. Or the planet could have decided that in helping save the planet they were worth keeping. Like I said I liked the fact that the game didn't answer of these questions for you. Even the bit after the credits with Red XIII didn't categorically show either way.
Anyone else always thought of the ending in this way?
Anyone disappointed they decided to set spin-off games after the ending of the original for this reason?

The truth is I used to hate the ending of FF7. I used to think wtf! What happen next! Until now anyways. I love the spin off! We been demanding for years about them. Give us something. At least I was. I'm still hopeing for a good sequel where we get to play as Cloud and the gang again.

THat is one of the funniest icons I have ever seen. But besides that the ending was left open to make other games; not to use your imagination.

Actually, I always thought that the Planet have wiped out the human race cos they were one of the cause of its slow demise (by draining the LifeStream).

Logically speaking, if you a man who lives in a forest area and mosquitoes kept bitting you to the point that you have developed malaria fever. What do you do?

First, you heal yourself then you will wipe out any and all places where mosquitoes could multiply. Right?

So, in the same way, Malaria here can be Jenova - problem you need to resolve immediately but the mosquitoes here could be humans, who are assisting Jenova by draining the Planet of its defenses. So, recovering from malaria alone could not be enough without destroying the agents which brings the Malaria in. It is the most logical approach - destroy the humans.

And besides, the Planet needs more LifeStream to defend itself and heal itself. Only choice for it to get it could be by wiping the large scaled population of humans and returning them back to the LifeStream (like what Hojo was trying to do in Dirge of Cerebus). Again, the option of destroying the Humans are present. The Planet could be beneficial in many ways by destroying the humans.

I always thought by seeing the ending that the Planet have wiped out the Humans and allow Red and his family to flourish as the new dominant species.

But then again, the Planet could do something like that but could Aeris do something like that? If she controls the LifeStream (like what evident at the ending), then she could find it in her heart to give the humans a second chance.

The Weapons did nothing against the "mosquitoes" nor against the "malaria" (in fact, the "mosquitoes" themselves fought against the "malaria"), and the Lifestream is not a mean of wiping what is bad to the Planet. That is Holy's function. From what I got from the ending, Aeris used the Lifestream to prevent Holy from annihilating the human race.

quote MissingScore

Anyone disappointed they decided to set spin-off games after the ending of the original for this reason?

quote Fire Fox

The Weapons did nothing against the "mosquitoes" nor against the "malaria" (in fact, the "mosquitoes" themselves fought against the "malaria"), and the Lifestream is not a mean of wiping what is bad to the Planet. That is Holy's function. From what I got from the ending, Aeris used the Lifestream to prevent Holy from annihilating the human race.

quote MissingScore

Anyone disappointed they decided to set spin-off games after the ending of the original for this reason?

I am.

LOL, I totally forgot about the cities. XD Alright, they did something, then. XD

On the Holy thing, tho, I thought Bugenhagen (sp?) said something in the lines of "Holy will go against anything that is harmul to the Planet". This includes the Meteor and also the humans.

quote Fire Fox

LOL, I totally forgot about the cities. XD Alright, they did something, then. XD

On the Holy thing, tho, I thought Bugenhagen (sp?) said something in the lines of "Holy will go against anything that is harmul to the Planet". This includes the Meteor and also the humans.

I thought the ending was weak, really really weak. The rest of the game was good but the ending let it down. Mind you, i could just have been pissed off that the last rumour i checked out didn't work. The rumour was beat safer sephiroth too quickly and easily and a demi god rune comes who you have to fight. Well, i killed safer sephiroth in less than two minutes without him even landing an attack and rune didn't appear. Stupid people who make up rumours; they are idiots!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I didn't think the ending was that bad. It summed up the end of the story nicely - AVALANCHE defeated Sephiroth, escaped from the Northern Crater, Holy stopped Meteor, the Planet was saved. And that was that. There's not much else that needed to be explained.

quote Kakarot0123

But besides that the ending was left open to make other games; not to use your imagination.

Sorry Gothic Girl I was being sarcastic. That's why I put my sleeping icon guy. Kind of in reference to how games now and days are all designed to lead into more games. A perfect example of this would be dirge of cerebus. The whole secret ending junk.

Gothic Girl :

FFVII was originally supposed to be a stand-alone title. Squeenix didn't start thinking about sequels until years after the game was released.

Actually, all the games which has Final Fantasy title to it - from FF1 to FF9 supposed to be a standalone title. All the answers supposed to be given at the end of the game. Only FFX game were made into a sequel (FFX-2) and now FF12.

In FF7, the game supposed to finish at the end of the game. Whatever questions left unanswered (like where Red found his mate) was left to the imaginations of the players to fill in.

And whether players liked the ending or not, SQUARE cannot do anything about it. It is up to individual taste whether they liked a story or not.

I know in more modern ff games it is squareenix but when did they change from squaresoft?

Square merged with Enix (becoming Square Enix) a short time after FF: Spirits Within failed at the box office (in 2001, I believe).
After going bankrupt, they had no choice but to merge.

quote Kakarot0123

Sorry Gothic Girl I was being sarcastic.

When the remake comes out, I'll bet all the plot holes will be covered with excuses, there'll be hints about Deep Ground and Genesis etc...just so that it makes everything related.

The ending wasn't anyone's favourite for sure, but it was good enough to end the plot.