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This is genuinely one of the best fangames ever made. A passion project with so much love put into it. I know some people will be put off with its black and white artstyle, the midi soundtrack, and the amount of grinding you have to do to progress but honestly neither of these things bothered me. if you're able to move past that you're left with a fantastic RPG with character customization, a myriad of different endings, secrets, an interesting plot, and a lot of replay value with post-game stuff.
I'd love a revamped version that's more up to date.
Insanely impressive if very unbalanced and maybe a little fanfic-y (maybe very fanfic-y) game, honestly worth playing as its own thing (though knowledge of JoJo is still very required) because it does do some genuinely interesting stuff.
it's definitely not perfect, but still pretty fun! i like the new stands, and the variations & endings were really cool. it's also really worth replaying the game a few times, just to see how different things are depending on your character and choices (on my second playthrough, my PC was implied to be a zeppeli of all things, and started the game already knowing some ripple moves. fun!). the grinding was fucking awful, though, but overall it's a pretty solid game :)
There's a pokemon mystery dungeon style personality test to determine your stand and I just think thats the coolest fucking thing ever. (Honestly its probably 4 stars I just want to gas up this game)
What tipped me over from a "huh, neat I guess" reaction to actually downloading and playing this was learning that the game opens with a goofy little personality test (ala the various Dragon Quest 3 remakes) that assigns you one of eighteen (18!) original Stands. On my first playthrough I was assigned "Adam Ant", a long-range swarm-type Stand made of insects. It has low attack power, but it can hit all enemies at once and has a host of status effect, debuff, and damage-over-time skills.
Each Stand also causes various changes in the dialogue and opens up special events and interactions both in and out of battle. For example, Ocean Blue is a Stand that uses long-range water-based attacks, which creates a special event in the battle against the Wheel of Fortune Stand when it attacks by shooting droplets of gasoline. Also, because water conducts the Ripple from Parts 1 and 2, it's possible to learn a unique Ripple-based attack from Joseph.
The slate of original Stands (playable and otherwise) is surprisingly diverse and probably the most impressive thing about the game. A few are clearly store-brand versions of canon Stands, but on the whole they avoid being Mary-Sue-like overpowered stuff that one might expect from a fan project. I could totally see "Quicksilver" or "The Joykiller" popping up as villains of the week in Parts 4-6.
The story, however, is what you might expect from a self-insert fix fic: it goes through the plot of Part 3, but with the player character standing off to the side and commenting on things. Your involvement is fundamentally limited and mostly consists of helping out in fights that characters generally handled solo in the manga. There are a handful of deviation points, though. Instead of Avdol, you can get "killed" by Hol Horse and head on a separate track of chapters through Saudi Arabia to buy a submarine. If you have enough relationship points with Kakyoin, you can believe him when he reveals he has carved the words "BABY STAND" into his arm with a knife. Depending on the specifics of your Stand, you can bypass certain obstacles altogether. Stuff like that.
Not to say there isn't a fair amount of original content in the game, of course. There's a persistent sub-plotline about how/why there's now a 7th Stand user that makes use of various concepts from elsewhere in the JoJo timeline, in a way where I reacted with "sure, alright" rather than "that's dumb". I can at least respect the gumption, you know?
Gameplay wise, between the big Stand fights there are hub zones where you can level grind, hang out with other party members, and do some minor sidequests that often involve original characters as sub-bosses. This is the main way you can fiddle with relationship values, which determine which ending you get. There's something like a dozen different endings, probably more.
Another point of interest for me was the option to play as Josuke from Part 4, which is my favorite arc of JoJo. There's a bit more specificity to Josuke's dialogue and unique events compared to the original protagonist, but not quite to the level that I wish there was. They end up saying "oh no, it happened too fast for us to do anything!" a lot since, well, the plot still has to happen the same way and Josuke's Stand would solve a lot a problems. It's also only available on a NG+ run, which brings up another issue...
Much of the bonus content and other interesting bits and bobs require you to beat the game multiple times. The "best" ending isn't even an option until you've gone through three full runs. The option to play as Josuke and the ability to skip cutscenes aren't available until the postgame developer's room (which you can only enter if you get specific endings), and unlocking them requires spending highly limited tokens that you also need to cash in to enter NG+ in the first place. It's dumb. I used Cheat Engine.
On the whole though, The 7th Stand User is an obvious labor of love, and I had a good time playing it despite my quibbles. I've been on a bit of a JoJo kick in the aftermath of the Part 6 anime ending (finally reading Steel Ball Run and such) and this helped scratch that itch and the JRPG itch at the same time. Might be worth a shot, even if just to see what Stand you get.
Each Stand also causes various changes in the dialogue and opens up special events and interactions both in and out of battle. For example, Ocean Blue is a Stand that uses long-range water-based attacks, which creates a special event in the battle against the Wheel of Fortune Stand when it attacks by shooting droplets of gasoline. Also, because water conducts the Ripple from Parts 1 and 2, it's possible to learn a unique Ripple-based attack from Joseph.
The slate of original Stands (playable and otherwise) is surprisingly diverse and probably the most impressive thing about the game. A few are clearly store-brand versions of canon Stands, but on the whole they avoid being Mary-Sue-like overpowered stuff that one might expect from a fan project. I could totally see "Quicksilver" or "The Joykiller" popping up as villains of the week in Parts 4-6.
The story, however, is what you might expect from a self-insert fix fic: it goes through the plot of Part 3, but with the player character standing off to the side and commenting on things. Your involvement is fundamentally limited and mostly consists of helping out in fights that characters generally handled solo in the manga. There are a handful of deviation points, though. Instead of Avdol, you can get "killed" by Hol Horse and head on a separate track of chapters through Saudi Arabia to buy a submarine. If you have enough relationship points with Kakyoin, you can believe him when he reveals he has carved the words "BABY STAND" into his arm with a knife. Depending on the specifics of your Stand, you can bypass certain obstacles altogether. Stuff like that.
Not to say there isn't a fair amount of original content in the game, of course. There's a persistent sub-plotline about how/why there's now a 7th Stand user that makes use of various concepts from elsewhere in the JoJo timeline, in a way where I reacted with "sure, alright" rather than "that's dumb". I can at least respect the gumption, you know?
Gameplay wise, between the big Stand fights there are hub zones where you can level grind, hang out with other party members, and do some minor sidequests that often involve original characters as sub-bosses. This is the main way you can fiddle with relationship values, which determine which ending you get. There's something like a dozen different endings, probably more.
Another point of interest for me was the option to play as Josuke from Part 4, which is my favorite arc of JoJo. There's a bit more specificity to Josuke's dialogue and unique events compared to the original protagonist, but not quite to the level that I wish there was. They end up saying "oh no, it happened too fast for us to do anything!" a lot since, well, the plot still has to happen the same way and Josuke's Stand would solve a lot a problems. It's also only available on a NG+ run, which brings up another issue...
Much of the bonus content and other interesting bits and bobs require you to beat the game multiple times. The "best" ending isn't even an option until you've gone through three full runs. The option to play as Josuke and the ability to skip cutscenes aren't available until the postgame developer's room (which you can only enter if you get specific endings), and unlocking them requires spending highly limited tokens that you also need to cash in to enter NG+ in the first place. It's dumb. I used Cheat Engine.
On the whole though, The 7th Stand User is an obvious labor of love, and I had a good time playing it despite my quibbles. I've been on a bit of a JoJo kick in the aftermath of the Part 6 anime ending (finally reading Steel Ball Run and such) and this helped scratch that itch and the JRPG itch at the same time. Might be worth a shot, even if just to see what Stand you get.