Final Fantasy VII Modding with 7th Heaven, a Guide | Let's mosey (2024)

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Hello everyone,

With Final Fantasy VII Rebirth being just around the corner, some people might feel like doing a replay of the original game, or even play it for the first time if they didn't do that already four years ago. I figured that I could do a catch-all thread for modding the game for those who would be interested in that, and for those who are unfamiliar with FF7 mods and might be interested to learn about them.

The mod scene for FF7 has come a long way over the last two decades. For the longest time, modding the game was hard work. First timers could take up to a whole day just trying to set everything up. However, the tools of the scene have greatly improved over time, to the point that the mods are better than ever, and easier to install than ever. The mod manager 7th Heaven has been improved to such a degree that now, modding the game is mostly just a matter of installing 7th Heaven, browsing the catalogue and double-clicking on your desired mods. It only takes minutes. Moreover, there is no longer any need to fiddle with DS4Windows and Antimicro to get functional controller support; 7th Heaven now fully supports controllers inately, to the point that it even offers fully-analogue joystick support, just like FF8 and FF9 did! Really, look:

Another thing that is baked into the FFNx driver: true widescreen support. Previous thread on the topic.

Alright, let's get to the meat of it. There are a lot of mods for this game. Mods that change up the gameplay and combat, that replace the UI, that change character models, that add voice acting, and even mods that add day-night cycles. I'm not going to go over all of them. What I'm going to do is go over some of my favorites that I feel might appeal to most people here, or people who try to adhere more closely to a "vanilla+" experience.

First mod that might just be my favorite:

IFRIT - FF7 Interface Tweaks, by Kwrrk

One modder took it upon himself to adapt the vanilla UI to widescreen by tweaking it, amongst other smart changes here and there. The end result is a mod that keeps the spirit of the vanilla UI, and simply modernizes it. It even lets you select degrees of transparency for dialogue boxes. It also fixes/removes the black bar at the bottom of the screen that is ever present in the PC version of the game (as seen in the following screenshot).

Vanilla PC

Modded

View: https://streamable.com/39ji84

• The command window is now to the left and no longer obstructs any other part of the UI, even when expended;
• The barrier and mbarrier boxes have been removed, and their gauges have been minimized and put under the names of characters;
• There is now a blinking arrow icon next to character names on their turns;
• The HP bar is now much longer, starting all the way back under the character's name. There is a variant of the mod that restores the default short HP bar.

The mod also fixes some alignment issues that are present in the game:

Vanilla

Modded

My settings for this mod are as follows. Open the config menu for the mod: for "menu tweaks", set parameter to "enabled"; for "battle interface", set parameter to "revamped (16:9 only)"; for "bottom battle UI", set parameter to "on". You can set the other parameters to your liking (I use the "classic HD" intro videos).

There are some other UI mods out there, but this one is definitely my favorite as it keeps the spirit of the vanilla UI.

Wizard Staff, by Bonez

A simple mod that changes the names of spells to their modern, standardized forms (ex.: Firaga instead of Fire 3).

This mod is compatible with all variants of New Threat. It is also redundant with Shinra Archaeology Cut, which adds a new localization to the game (see further below).

KACTUAR - Controllers and Keyboard Icons, by Kwrrk

A mod that adds proper icons to text boxes.

This mod might not work if you have any other mod that modifies the dialogue boxes, such as ESUI, Shinra Archaeology Cut or New Threat.

Cosmos FMV, by Cosmos

This mod changes the character models in the pre-rendered CGI cutscenes to different ones (two variants of Ninostyle's models). It comes with Satsuki's AI-upscaled renders, including a 30fps option.

If you install this mod, make sure that you don't install another mod that modifies the CGI cutscenes, such as SYW FMV. Only one FMV mod in your list.

Postscriptthree's Tweaks, by Postscriptthree

This mod comes with a plethora of options: True Wait (ATB), EXP and AP for benched characters, multi-linked materia slots, break damage/hp limits, in-battle PHS, field music for battles (I very much recommend this one), and more.

Here is the in-battle PHS feature in action:

The mod was also updated to offer a fix for a music bug that plagues an important late-game scene. You want to turn on this fix.

New Threat, by Sega Chief

A mod that overhauls the combat, the progression system and the enemy encounters. It gives characters new innate abilities, and specializes them into builds that the player can choose from. All enemies in the game had their ability repertoire enhanced, as has been their behavior. Bosses in particular now have more bespoke behaviors that make their encounters truly unique and fun. It's a fantastic mod that breathes new life into the game, to the extent that I simply cannot play the game without it anymore.

There are two variants of New Threat: New Threat 2.0 and New Threat Combat Only. New Threat 2.0 is the main variant, and comes with two game modes: Game Type A and Game Type B.

Type A mostly sticks to the vanilla scenario and encounters, with some exceptions. While not using a new translation, it does clean up the script to fix a lot of its issues. It also takes a page out of Star Ocean 2 and lets party members wander around towns, giving the player the opportunity to talk to them and hear their thoughts about transpiring events. These additional bits of dialogue were carefully integrated into the game's script and feel very natural.

Type B goes buck wild and doesn't hold back on changing the script of the game in places, and it introduces a slew of brand new enemies and bosses.

Combat Only is a new variant of the mod that was introduced late last year. As its name suggests, it only touches on matters related to combat: character abilities, the builds, and the behaviors of existing enemies and bosses. There are no new enemies in this mode, and the game strictly adheres to the vanilla script. This variant doesn't even use the touched-up translation of the main mod; you are getting the original localization, warts and all. This variant is canon-friendly, and also perfect for players who have never played the game yet would like to spice up their first playthrough to get something more engaging than the brain-dead combat of the vanilla game (sorry not sorry, it's true).

ADDENDUM: Combat Only has an advantage over the other two in that it is compatible with the new new translation currently worked on by the Shinra Archaeology Department folks, whose "early access" version is already available in the catalogue. If you want to use both mods, be sure to place New Threat Combat Only above Shinra Archaeology Cut in your mod list (see my mod list screenshot further in the OP for reference).

Ninostyle's New Character Models, by Ninostyle

Ninostyle is a Russian artist who has been, for years now, painfully going through every model in the game and recreating them in higher detail. He keeps the field models chibi-style, while for the combat models, he aims to stick close to Nomura's concept art. He originally started with characters and NPCs, but has since done some stuff outside of that, such as a new Shiva model, and other real-time-rendered models from throughout the game. He even got some assistance from other modders in some areas (such as fixing the blinking eyes of NPCs). There's even someone who whipped up a new pinball machine for the 7th Heaven field after I personally asked for one since the old model (rendered in real time) was an eyesore when using the upscaled environment.

There is also a variant of the mod that adds non-chibi renders of the characters on the field. You've probably seen images of this mod over the years, as it has been around for a long time and precedes the chibi models. Though from my understanding, Ninostyle is not the one who has done these models; rather, it is a hodge podge of models done by various modders over the years. In the catalog, it is called "Ninostyle HD Field models".

You can see some screenshots of the mod in action at this link. Here are a few:

If you want to use Nino's models, make sure that you download the variants you want from the catalogue and not from Nexusmods, as the catalogue has the mods in addition to the aforementioned tweaks that the mod community has done to them. The files on Nexus do not have these tweaks.

SYW, by Satsuki Yatoshi

SYW is the mod that updates all the textures and environments of the game with new AI-upscaled versions. It is the equivalent of Moguri for FF9. You want it. For the FMV mods, only download one (if you want Cosmos FMV instead, don't download any SYW FMV mod; only one FMV mod should be in your mod list or else you'll encounter issues).

ADDENDUM

Cosmos Gaia, by Cosmos

Cosmos has released a new fantastic mod that modernizes the graphics renderer of the world map section of the game, as well as expands the camera controls and adds analogue movement to Cloud. The new renderer fixes some issues present in the original renderer of the engine of the PC version of the game. It also lets you pilot the Highwind at a much higher altitude.

You can see the mod in action in its incredible release trailer:

Cosmos Gaia uses the upscaled textures of SYW Worldmap Textures, so if you intend on installing the former, you do not need to install the later.

Shinra Archaeology Cut

Courtesy of the fine folks at the Shinra Archaeology Department, Final Fantasy 7 is graced with a brand new localization. It fixes translation mistakes, makes dialogue more natural and tonally accurate, and aligns terminology with the current series canon. It also comes with the option to enable the restoration of cut content, such as a very different Honey Bee Inn section (this option is enabled by default, fyi; you can disable it).

If you want to use it alongside New Threat Combat Only, place Shinra Archaeology Cut under New Threat Combat Only in your mod list (see my mod list screenshot further in the OP for reference).

The mod is currently a work-in-progress and gets updated regularly. It currently covers all of Midgar and what comes right after.

Installing 7th Heaven

1. Download and install the latest .NET Desktop Runtime 7.0 for BOTH x86 and x64;
2. Download and install the latest Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable for BOTH x86 and x64;
3. Download and install the latest stable release of 7th Heaven (preferably outside of Program Files to make sure that Windows doesn't interfere with anything).
4. The installation process of 7th Heaven should ask you if you want to copy the FF7 install files outside of the Program Files folder. You should accept, as Windows' program files folder is known to interfere with FF7 modding some times.

You need a valid copy of the game purchased from Steam. If your copy is pirated, 7th Heaven won't work. Modders made sure of that.

There is not much configuration to do once 7th Heaven is installed. You just need to go in the Game Driver settings to change a couple of things. Here are my settings to help you should you need it:

"Graphics API", "Resolution" and "Window mode" you can set to whatever you want. Leave Graphics API to Auto to be safe. Just make sure to set "aspect ratio" to "widescreen 16:9" to get the full widescreen experience. "Advanced Lighting" is a fancy new lighting tech that applies to real-time models in the game. It's pretty neat (you can see the lighting in action in some of the aforeposted images, such as the gif for analogue controls). Turn "analogue controls" on.

Regarding "internal resolution scaler" (in the Advanced tab), while you can leave it to auto, if you're like me and have a 1080p screen, the auto setting won't select the best parameter for your screen. It will select the multiplier for the internal resolution that is slightly under what your native monitor resolution is. If you want to get the best image quality possible, you have to set it higher than "2" (which is what the auto setting will default to if you have a 1080p monitor). The drop down list goes from 2 to 4. I imagine 4 should be fine, but if you are particular like me, you can manually set it to 3 by opening the FFNx.toml document (with notepad) that resides in the FF7 game .exe folder and go to this section:

#[INTERNAL RESOLUTION SCALE]# The scale is in multiples of 640x480# The scale factor is used to multiply the internally used resolution to a given size before it is scaled to the final screen or window resolution.# This is required to avoid visual glitches that may happen when the game is not rendered in a 4:3 aspect ratio.# This is optional for native 4:3 resolutions, but it can enhance visual quality at values higher than the current screen or window resolution ( like Nvidia DSR ).# A setting of 0 will attempt to find a scale factor that most closely matches the current screen or window resolution.# Default = 0#~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~internal_resolution_scale = 3

"Steam compatibility" lets you play the game while having the Steam features active, including achievements. However, it only works when the player is using mods that do not touch the game logic in any way (such as graphics mods). If you are using any of the heavier mods such as New Threat or Echo-S, this parameter will crash your game upon launch. It does for me, at least.

In the General Settings menu, there are buttons that let you check for updates for both 7th Heaven and FFNx. I recommend that you click on them every once in a while (and maybe do so now for FFNx to make sure that you have the latest version). You can select between "stable" and "canary" builds, with "stable" being selected by default. I would stick with stable builds.

If you updated 7th Heaven to 3.3 or later from a previous version, you might need to click the "reset defaults" button in the General Settings page to add two new folders in the Additional Folders to Monitor section. Check if you have "widescreen" and "mesh". If yes, you don't need to do anything; if no, you need to click on "reset defaults". See:

Once that is set, all you have to do is go to the "Browse Catalogue" tab and start downloading! I prefer sorting the mods by their release date to see which ones are still active. There are some mods on there that haven't been touched in a very long time. Here is my mod list and order:

Once you have downloaded your mods, you need to configure them. Select your mod, and click on the cogwheel icon in the right pane (it will only work if the mod is set to "on" in the "active" column; if the mod is set to "off", clicking the button won't do anything). Some mods only have one or two options, while others (such as postscriptthree's tweaks) have a ton. Take your time and go through everything, and configure them to your liking.

Last but not least, make sure that the "category" label for every mod is correctly set (that should be done automatically when downloading a mod from the catalogue), and then click the "1/9" button in the right pane, which is the auto-sort button. It will sort your mod list in an order that should work. In case you want to do the order manually, the rule of thumb in modding is that more general mods should be lower in priority, while the more specific or targeted mods should be higher in priority. Higher on the list means higher priority, while lower on the list means lower priority.

Other thing. I recommend that you use the 60fps mod, as in addition to making animations smoother, it greatly reduces the judder that the game suffers from when the fields move horizontally. Even the 30fps option doesn't cut it: it's judder city (at least to me; I can notice it easily).

...phew. I think that's it? Spent all day making this thread, and a good portion of yesterday evening booting the game repeatedly in various states to take screenshots, some of which I didn't use lol. I hope that this guide inspires a handful of people who were previously hesitant to finally jump in and play FF7 with some mods. It's truly a terrific experience and has only strengthened my love of the game.