Game is overall fun and the graphics are an incredible feat for a ps1 game, but the story, characters and gameplay unfortunately felt a bit of a step down from 7.

Most of the cast get very little real development and squall is famously quiet, even compared to cloud, though i have heard this is partially a translation thing so who knows. The story as a whole however can feel a bit bizarre and things sometimes just seem to happen without explanation. The ending is famously cryptic and an interestingly experimental way for a game series as mainstream as final fantasy to conclude a story. It's been scrutinised and theorised about for over 20 years now with no real conclusion, but it has produced many fun theories(e.g. "Squall is Dead").

The gameplay is of course based on the same template as every other final fantasy, but the gimmick of this game is the Junction system, which is pretty shit. I didnt appreciate it much, especially compared to materia and other mechanics in the series. Magic drawing was also very not fun. Besides this the same basic template is here and it is still fun enough to mess around with and see what breaks it.