Final Fantasy 7 New Threat August 2018 Update

A long time ago I wrote about a Final Fantasy 7 mod exclusive for the PC version called New Threat. It overhauled the vanilla game in a big way, completely rebalancing game play, moving item locations, giving each character a unique skill called an innate and adding in new enemies and bosses and that's just the tip of the iceberg. 

Needless to say, it's an amazing and fun experience that's worth any Final Fantasy 7 fans' time. All you need is any PC version of Final Fantasy 7 and to download the mod from the forum linked in this blog. On that forum is all the files you'll need to mod your game and also a detailed tutorial for the installation, but it is a simple automatic installer anyhow, the biggest issue to overcome is getting the game to work nicely with Windows 10!

I've played the release version from last year before and it's pretty tough once you leave Midgar and the creator implemented level caps so you cannot grind your way out of a situation. The update released last month has made some significant changes to the mod and most notably is the toned down difficulty. New Threat was meant to be a renewed challenge, not an all out hard mode.

To reduce the difficulty it seems all that has been done is a global reduction to enemy defenses the damage they inflict or their HP values seem untouched. For instance, the first boss; the Guard Scorpion takes around 280 points of damage in the updated New Threat. In the 1.4 version it took around 170 points of damage. Plus, in the previous version Cloud's innate ability was that he would restore all HP and MP once per battle after so many turns. This is now changed to a stat boost that activates when any Limit Break is used. So Cloud was able to achieve over 300 points of damage in the battle. 

The trouble with the Guard Scorpion before was the time to kill, it often would leave you with a tiny amount of time left to escape the reactor, further unaided by the token boss fight that occurs when you rescue Jesse, but now ending the fight quickly is easily in hand.

The update addresses numerous bugs and other inbalances and suggestions Sega Chief received from the community after extensive play testing. Things are looking very positive for the mod as the reduced difficulty makes the whole package more inviting to a larger group of players. If you haven't tried the mod yet, give it a go. It's a great reason to replay Final Fantasy 7.

So far I'm only as far returning back to sector 7, but I'm definitely interested in seeing how the game unfolds post Midgar, as that was when the challenge really ramped up.

Click here to go straight to the Qhimm forums where all the information for the mod is located.

As always, a huge thanks to Sega Chief for his creation and his dedication to improving it.