Final Fantasy Seven. What can I say. I don't know how to express myself. This game did a lot for me. Saying it's the best game in the world isn't enough. I feel like I need to tell the world.

The story line is amazing. Brilliant. I would give it infinite stars. The characters...settings...music...playing it was just wonderful. I know I must sound crazy and obsessive.

When I first started playing it I thought wow, the only role-playing game I'd played before that was Zelda. It really surprised me. I didn't know a game could be so complicated, long, emotional and wonderful. But I never really realised how really good it was until after I played it, I wasn't really paying attention to the story line because I wasn't expecting it to be so good. Then I started reading fanfics and understanding the story line better.

I think I would be very lost without final fantasy 7. It opened my mind up to so many things. It's made me much more imaginative, which makes me a better writer (I'm not talking about that Midgar cons one I wrote) Before I never used to really like art. But now it's one of my favourite subjects at school and I'm so good at it! I can also now notice art, and the beauty of things, that's really important. It made me so much more open minded.

It was fate. We were meant to be, final fantasy and me. No joke. (I know I sound like a loony now)

I think it was during the half term break from school, in October 1999. I was only 12 actually. I stayed up late watching 'bits' with my brother. 'Bits' was this video game programme they used to show. I hadn't watched that show in a while, but it just so happened that I was watching that particular one that night. The presenters were at the Playstation awards, and they showed a few clips of it. A game named Final Fantasy 7 won game of the year, and they showed a clip from this game. I saw a blonde weird looking boy wearing some type of strange armour laying a pretty brown hared girl in his arms, who appeared dead, in blue clear water. It was in a lake, in some kind of crystal-like cavern. I was intrigued. The graphics were good. I figured this must have been some kind of romance or fun in this game. I remember my words, sitting there intrigued on my blue sofa: "Final fantasy seven...I wanna play that game..." I soon forgot about it though.

Guess what? It was either 4 days later, or 2 weeks, I don't remember. My brother brought the game home from his friend. I remembered it, and played it immediately. When I saw it was 3 disc I thought it must be a really long game. And it was.

Although I didn't fully understand it (I was new to me, I had never played such a complex game before) I fell in love with it almost instantly. On weekends I used to wake up at six a.m. every day and play it until 11. About five hours.

I completed it in 2 and a half months, with the help of a walkthrough.

Has it really been nearly three years?