Come and Dive into the amazing world of Final Fantasy 7. This may be the all time greatest Final Fantasy RPG.
(Of course your favorite is probably the one you played first).
Battle Information:
While you move around in game, "random battles" will come up.
You will then see the character(s) in your party and the enemies.
Your Active Time Bar (ATB) slowly builds.
When your ATB is full, a menue will pop up, giving you a list of things you can do.
Careful! The default button to select is "O" not "X", remember this game is from Japan.
Enemies also have an ATB and will attack you, so don't be too brave.
As you take damage you will notice a pink bar build up. This is your "Limit Bar" when it reaches the max and turns into a flashing rainbow bar, you may use your special techniques known as Limit Breaks.
Each character has their own sets of limit breaks, from levels 1-4, Check out this site for more info on limit breaks and obtaining new ones.
Materia:
Materia is one of the most important things in the game.Materia allows you to cast magic, passive abilities, use special skills, heal you, or summon the ocasional gigantic monster to crush your foes.Green colored materia allows you to cast spells these spells can do damage to enemies (bolt, ice, fire, etc...) heal you (cure, ensuna, etc...) and set up defense (reflect, barrier, Mbarrier, etc...)Blue materia is for support, the most common is "All" which, when linked to green materia, allows you to cast that magic on either all your party members, or all your enemies.Purple materia is independent (hp up, mp up, Long range attack, counter, etc...). It doesn't do anything for other materia, just for the character it's placed on. Purple materia is one of the more special and varied ones in the game.Yellow(Gold) materia is command materia (Steal, enemy skill, coin, etc...)
Move! Move! Move!
Of course the thing that makes this an rpg is that you can go anywhere(almost) that you want. There is no deadlines to make (except the first mission where you have to get out of a reactor before it blows up, don't worry, you have 10 minutes).
