I missed the Elemental Materia in the Shinra building and it made me realize I have never managed to get Master Materia for any type in any playthrough lol

Like, I think I mastered a couple materia, and I normally get at least some of the huge materia, & I def managed to get gold chocobos

But...Master Materia & the Weapons are just an enormous grind

Like, that kinda grinding has just never interested me

Also like, I think I had a lot more comfort with weird pacing and transitions in games and movies as a kid

It's frustrating now tho. Like, we get taunted w/exploring the rest of the lower ring bc you can go "outside" from Aerith's place, but really we only get to see small parts of 3 sectors

Also that you just...climb the wire and are at Shinra HQ instead of getting to trek through the upper ring is...bad pacing/world building

Also as an adult I'm horrified by the terrible city planning

There's corkscrewing train around their double layer plate city, but there's no...means of following that path otherwise? That's so much wasted real estate, that would also make it easier to repair the plate as needed

Also lower slums used to be villages, but were clearly demolished and rebuilt in abandoned construction materials etc...but a lotta those folks work for Midgar/the upper ring. It's shocking none of that was planned in a way to at least extract wealth and utilities from them?

All of this is of course ignoring that this is a completely planned city (at least the upper level) is a perfect circle, but...the neighborhoods are divvied up like a fucking pizza

I assume this is a result of their TERRIBLE construction design where the ring was built in these town-size pizza-slice shapes, slapped together so they don't support each other at all, and then just...each section rested on top of one (1) fucking pillar

Like, take a sec and imagine this

You're a wealthy Midgardian, who lives on the upper ring. You work in Sector 2, but your friends & favorite restaurants are in Sector 3 so you decide to live walking distance from both

You pay in EXCESS bc you live near the ONE TRAIN & like to RP w/your wife in the lower bars ;)

It turns out, you're on a high rise apartment building kinnnda equidistant from two pillars

...and everytime the train goes by your building fucking WOBBLES as the seams on the fucking plate world are stressed

@yeenbean holy fucking shit I never even thought about this holy balls...

...I wonder if the remake addresses this at all? c_c;;

@Nine I feel like they must have just to make the city impressive in HD right? Cause like, these are images from the old game

The obvious answer is the game designers didn't really think about city layout since it's supposed to be a sprawling city with high rises and shit, but the tower in the center is like...60some stories and towers far above anything else?

Not to mention it'd be just as ugly living bn those giant section dividers as in the slums

@Nine but given there's no weird section dividey things from the lower level (except the one), I think the reality is the upper level folks don't encounter the construction of the Midgar in their day to day unless they commute bn levels

So...the only realistic way of constructing a city this way I can come up with is that giant tower is the main support for every sector, sky rises are only built in bn the tower & pillars, and the edge is for lower buildings/gardens that look over the ring

@yeenbean Yeah, if nothing else one single pillar would NOT be enough, no matter how big, to support all of that safely. the entire friggin plate would just shear off at the unsupported sides within days probably from the weight of the buildings. You'd need multiple pillars, side supports, suspension cables, the lot. holy christ. ...

...also hold up. Barret, Tifa and Cloud escaped S7 via a suspension cable attached to the upper plate, and down to that weak flimsy tower that blew up... wtf