Final Fantasy - The Pirates Strike Back

SquareEnix just had its hand cut off. Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children is the long awaited sequel to Final Fantasy VII. Really, it is a spin-off movie to a clumsy-yet-popular game. Final Fantasy brought millions of traditionally non-gamers into the fold with its beautiful pre-rendered sequences. It also turned off just as many traditional gamers with clumsy controls, long loading times and angst-filled, androgynous characters normal people wouldn't want to spend the afternoon with - let alone a 40 hour role-playing game.

The movie was pushed back from its North American release until sometime in November. Today, before the movie was released in Japan, a copy of the full DVD appeared on the Internet available for download. After having jerked around rabid fans of the game for so long, you can now expect most of them to download instead of waiting until November to purchase.

While sure to be a 3D effect powerhouse, one can only hope that the plot and characters turn out better than the other Square film, Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. Seeing how the best parts of Final Fantasy VII were the pre-rendered cut scenes, excluding the game for the sequel sounds like a great idea.