The Road and Legacy of Final Fantasy 7 Remake
- Thread starter CriticalGaming
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I know right. I was watching Max's stream last night, and it was hilarious seeing him a boy story spoilers. It was just him walking out of the room and being mostly off screen in the background. The chat let him know when something spoiler heavy came up.
The demo is the whole flashback scene. I have heard that your demo save can carry into the full game, but nothing on the demo actually says that so I dunno for sure.
It's awesome though.
So speaking on the demo, it is in fact the entire Flashback sequence from the original game. I am not sure if there is any setup into the Flashback that the full game would have that isn't here for the Demo or not. The way this opens makes sense to just be flatout the opening of the game as it's consistent with how the ending of Intergrade worked.
Years ago Maxamillion_Dood predicted that the second game would just open in the truck of the flashback sequence. He was right (probably) as the demo starts you right in the truck with Cloud and Sephiroth riding in the truck on the way to a mission in Nibelhiem. What's remarkable about the story here and throughout the demo is that if you know the truth from the original game, all the clues are here and it's beautiful. Anyway the story goes that Cloud in Kalm's modern day is telling the party about his mission with Sephiroth and how Sephiroth flipped from a hero to a monster.
Many people complained that they showed Sephiroth too much in the Remake. That the mystery of who Sephiroth is wasn't built up enough. But if you look at Remake and you had no idea who that guy was, what exactly did Sephiroth do in Remake? Not much until the end, and I bet a new player doesn't have a lot to go on besides knowing he was the bad guy from FF7 and he's still the bad guy here.
The Demo does a fantastic job at reminding you that the party doesn't really know who Sephiroth is besides Tifa and Cloud. Throughout the demo the party from the current day will interject with voice overs. Barret at one point early even says, "This Sephiroth guy we're chasing. Who is he and why does he want to destroy the planet?"
Just like in the original game the truck is halted by monsters on the road, and here you are given your first taste of combat......by playing as Sephiroth! And Sephiroth is fucking broken. You'll likely murder the enemies before you even realize it because he is that strong.
Once the group arrives at Nibelhiem you take over as Cloud and get a chance to explore. There are some great game design moments here that I want to point out. So now Cloud can climb over rocks, fences, most anything that is about as tall as him. And the game does a great job of reminding you of this without a tutorial. There is one part where you walk up some stairs and you see a box over a small railing, there is an NPC on the other side of the railing who hops over to your side as you approach in a subtle way to remain the player that Cloud can hop over too. It made me smile because of how organic of a teaching moment it was.
You are given as much time as you want to explore the town and most of the townsfolk will comment on Cloud, because he grew up there, everyone will be like "Hey Cloud holy fuck good to see you again." And things like that, which does a couple of things. A new player will feel like this makes perfect sense and it feeds into the illusion that Cloud was really there. An old player knows this is odd.
In typical Remake fashion this area is also expanded, which a wonderful moment in which Cloud can go home and visit his mom. This scene with his mom has so many fucking references to the original game and call backs to the remake that I was tearing up playing it. I wont spoil it, but it's amazing and if you know the old game you'll love it.
You can also visit Tifa's house just like in the original game going to Tifa's will have the modern day Tifa voice over "Cloud did you go to my house?" And the game will give you a choice of "yes" or "No?". Going inside is more story where you can even enter Tifa's room. In the original game you can look through Tifa's underwear drawer and get an item called "Orthopedic Underwear". In these game if you look in her cabinet Tifa will cry out, "YOU LOOKED THROUGH MY STUFF!?" And again you are given a choice of yes or no....choosing yes will have both Tifa and Aerith go...."Asshole!" I lol'ed.
Tifa's piano is there and you can play the new mini game here. The mini game is great and very fucking hard even on easy difficulty. Basically you have two wheels of notes, one for each thumb stick. As the song plays there will be lines that move across the note and you want to just move the thumbstick in that direction as the line hits the end of the note. If it was one thumbstick the game would be no problem but since it's both it's really easy to forget about the other thumbstick and miss notes. But with practice it'll feel real good to play songs using this system.
Anyway the rest of the flashback continues as expected. The group goes up the mountain to the reactor and Sephiroth learns some shit he doesn't like, goes crazy and everybody dies. Throughout the sequence though you can control Sephiroth in combat all the way through to the Materia Keeper boss fight and he is stupidly strong as I explained which does a great job of showing the player just how powerful this fucker is. Cloud doesn't have to tell you, because you as the player get to feel him in your hands and he feels broken compared to anyone you played in Remake.
I will mark this next section as a spoiler for those who don't know, but I did want to point out some of the little details that I though were brilliant.
Anyway this is GOTY there is no fucking chance anything even comes close this year. And even people who aren't hardcore FF7 fans are saying this after playing the demo so I expect this will be the frontrunner at the awards this year for sure. And it's absolutely 100% getting best soundtrack.
10/10
Years ago Maxamillion_Dood predicted that the second game would just open in the truck of the flashback sequence. He was right (probably) as the demo starts you right in the truck with Cloud and Sephiroth riding in the truck on the way to a mission in Nibelhiem. What's remarkable about the story here and throughout the demo is that if you know the truth from the original game, all the clues are here and it's beautiful. Anyway the story goes that Cloud in Kalm's modern day is telling the party about his mission with Sephiroth and how Sephiroth flipped from a hero to a monster.
Many people complained that they showed Sephiroth too much in the Remake. That the mystery of who Sephiroth is wasn't built up enough. But if you look at Remake and you had no idea who that guy was, what exactly did Sephiroth do in Remake? Not much until the end, and I bet a new player doesn't have a lot to go on besides knowing he was the bad guy from FF7 and he's still the bad guy here.
The Demo does a fantastic job at reminding you that the party doesn't really know who Sephiroth is besides Tifa and Cloud. Throughout the demo the party from the current day will interject with voice overs. Barret at one point early even says, "This Sephiroth guy we're chasing. Who is he and why does he want to destroy the planet?"
Just like in the original game the truck is halted by monsters on the road, and here you are given your first taste of combat......by playing as Sephiroth! And Sephiroth is fucking broken. You'll likely murder the enemies before you even realize it because he is that strong.
Once the group arrives at Nibelhiem you take over as Cloud and get a chance to explore. There are some great game design moments here that I want to point out. So now Cloud can climb over rocks, fences, most anything that is about as tall as him. And the game does a great job of reminding you of this without a tutorial. There is one part where you walk up some stairs and you see a box over a small railing, there is an NPC on the other side of the railing who hops over to your side as you approach in a subtle way to remain the player that Cloud can hop over too. It made me smile because of how organic of a teaching moment it was.
You are given as much time as you want to explore the town and most of the townsfolk will comment on Cloud, because he grew up there, everyone will be like "Hey Cloud holy fuck good to see you again." And things like that, which does a couple of things. A new player will feel like this makes perfect sense and it feeds into the illusion that Cloud was really there. An old player knows this is odd.
In typical Remake fashion this area is also expanded, which a wonderful moment in which Cloud can go home and visit his mom. This scene with his mom has so many fucking references to the original game and call backs to the remake that I was tearing up playing it. I wont spoil it, but it's amazing and if you know the old game you'll love it.
You can also visit Tifa's house just like in the original game going to Tifa's will have the modern day Tifa voice over "Cloud did you go to my house?" And the game will give you a choice of "yes" or "No?". Going inside is more story where you can even enter Tifa's room. In the original game you can look through Tifa's underwear drawer and get an item called "Orthopedic Underwear". In these game if you look in her cabinet Tifa will cry out, "YOU LOOKED THROUGH MY STUFF!?" And again you are given a choice of yes or no....choosing yes will have both Tifa and Aerith go...."Asshole!" I lol'ed.
Tifa's piano is there and you can play the new mini game here. The mini game is great and very fucking hard even on easy difficulty. Basically you have two wheels of notes, one for each thumb stick. As the song plays there will be lines that move across the note and you want to just move the thumbstick in that direction as the line hits the end of the note. If it was one thumbstick the game would be no problem but since it's both it's really easy to forget about the other thumbstick and miss notes. But with practice it'll feel real good to play songs using this system.
Anyway the rest of the flashback continues as expected. The group goes up the mountain to the reactor and Sephiroth learns some shit he doesn't like, goes crazy and everybody dies. Throughout the sequence though you can control Sephiroth in combat all the way through to the Materia Keeper boss fight and he is stupidly strong as I explained which does a great job of showing the player just how powerful this fucker is. Cloud doesn't have to tell you, because you as the player get to feel him in your hands and he feels broken compared to anyone you played in Remake.
I will mark this next section as a spoiler for those who don't know, but I did want to point out some of the little details that I though were brilliant.
So Cloud's behavior throughout this section is NOT Cloud. It's very much not Cloud. In fact....it's Zack. The personality, the manner of speech, is all the way Zack speaks in Crisis Core and the like. Sephiroth even calls Cloud, "Such a puppy." Which is what the other Soldier members used to call Zack. Zack the Puppy. It's a great callback. Additionally Tifa doesn't treat Cloud like someone she knows during this whole section, she just talks to him like any other person, again a great hint at the truth.
Another great detail that is incredibly easy to overlook, is one of the Shinra grunts that is with you is clearly Cloud. They do a good job of hiding the eyes with those dumbass helmets but looking at the jawline and mouth it's identical to Cloud and is clearly him, which is great as it's a callback to the truth again. Later on when the village is burning down, this same grunt is laying in front of Cloud's mother's house and whimpers, "Mo...m...mom".
These little details show me how much they know the original story and how much they care about it. A lot of people had complaints and worries that shit would be all fucky with plot ghosts and shit but that's not the case. They are adding things sure and fleshing things out more, but the core of what should be is still there and it's wonderful
Another great detail that is incredibly easy to overlook, is one of the Shinra grunts that is with you is clearly Cloud. They do a good job of hiding the eyes with those dumbass helmets but looking at the jawline and mouth it's identical to Cloud and is clearly him, which is great as it's a callback to the truth again. Later on when the village is burning down, this same grunt is laying in front of Cloud's mother's house and whimpers, "Mo...m...mom".
These little details show me how much they know the original story and how much they care about it. A lot of people had complaints and worries that shit would be all fucky with plot ghosts and shit but that's not the case. They are adding things sure and fleshing things out more, but the core of what should be is still there and it's wonderful
Anyway this is GOTY there is no fucking chance anything even comes close this year. And even people who aren't hardcore FF7 fans are saying this after playing the demo so I expect this will be the frontrunner at the awards this year for sure. And it's absolutely 100% getting best soundtrack.
10/10
They were never going to hugely change Nibelheim because its already Sephiroth-heavy. Their approach to changing things so far has been to insert Sephiroth where he wasn't before, and to dramatically change his character, motives, and relationship with Cloud-- to match the simpy anime way (a subset of) the fans saw him after FF7 ended. That'll all carry on later as it did in Part 1.
It hasn't even come out!
Don't even bother; he won't care and he's already made up his mind. This was known, Silvanus.
Hmm, to save for vacation, or spend around $700 for PS5 GOW:R bundle + FF7Rebirth.
Tough decision.
Tough decision.
Well, I need to start saving every little bit, and right now it's looking around 3k at minimum
You you do what works for you, but if you're going to some place nice or peaceful, take the vacation. Especially if you're going somewhere exotic. Make some good memories.
Not really, remake 1 end with Sephiroth asking Cloud for help, so they know he's not the final bad guys (ref 1) and it end with the party kicking his ass, so they know he's a weak little *****.
Ref 1:
There was a running theory that in Remake when you step into that weird dimention at the end of the game to battle the whispers and Sephiroth, you are actually stepping into a place where everyone's full potential is unlocked. That's why it got into crazy Advent Children flippy bullshit with dodging buildings and whatever. It explains the apparently jump in power to everyone and also explains how they even had a chance against Sephiroth at that point. Sephiroth was also clearly just toying with Cloud in the end anyway so that also works as an explanation in that Sephiroth wasn't even trying, considering he doesn't actually want to beat Cloud and the gang there as he needs them to do things later in the world.
But... Well, you said earlier on that the Remake keeps essentially to the essence and story of the original.
Can't you see that everything you just described here is completely out of tone and at odds with the story of the original?
Just because you keep the essence of the original doesn't mean you can't add things or even outright change things. There is a difference between keeping the essence and story without being a 1-to-1 recreation of the same story.
I just don't understand this mindset people have that the Remake had to be EXACTLY the same fucking thing. FF7 is my favorite game of ALL TIME, It's Maxamillion_dood's favorite game of all time. FF7 is my obsession, look at how much I've talked about it on this very board. If anyone would have wanted a pure 1-to-1 recreation remake don't you think it would be people like me?
And yet the only people complaining about Remake's changes seem to just be haters for no reason, with no stake in how the Remake project as a whole turn out. I don't get it. Nothing they added or changed takes away from the original game's story, characters, or anything. NOTHING! You can make the argument that Sephiroth was over used in the first game but if you paid attention to the context of that game then it fits perfectly. It does the same thing as the original game by building up to this bad guy who's reasons and motivations are completely unknown even to the end. His mystique is built over the course of the game, who is he, what does he want, is he even real or just Cloud's halucinations? New players would be asking themselves this, because a new player would have no idea what Sephiroth's deal is.
Considering Sephiroth is such a huge part of gaming's pop culture, it's not like you can hide his appearance like the original did. Everyone knows something about Sephiroth even if they don't know FF7's plot. So keeping him nonexistent for the first game would make no sense. Therefore they did the next best thing with him.
The whole theme running through the Remake Trilogy is that they want to keep people asking questions, including hardcore FF7 fans. That's why they keep bringing Zack back, that's why they fuck with Sephiroth, so that everyone new and old asks questions about where this is going despite Kitase explicitly saying that the trilogy would still be following the original game's story.
And really what did the Remake really change? At the end of the game the party leaves Midgar in the exact same state as they left Midgar in the original game, chasing Sephiroth on an uncertain journey. Nothing is different.
I'm not asking for an "exact 1-to-1 recreation". I would just want a game that was consistent with the characterisation, tone, and storyline of the original, which i don't feel like we got. That's usually what's understood by a Remake, and doesn't seem like an unfair wish.
Dude, I love the FF series, i was invested in how the Remake turned out, and I was disappointed in the direction they took with the series. Don't just assume criticisms come from a place of bad faith. If you can't comprehend that someone might both care about the topic and also disagree with you, its time to take a step back.
Also not asking for him to be unseen or nonexistent. I'm just asking for his role to be similar to that in the first game. His motives, relationships and characterisation are all drastically altered.
- Zack lives.
- Plot ghosts, which tbh shift the focus of the entire game quite drastically.
- Sephiroth wishes to enlist Cloud's assistance in defying fate or some bollocks, as opposed to original-Sephiroth having scant care or even recognition for him.
- Appears this isn't even the same Sephiroth from their world, potentially...? So we have alternate timeline versions of people, a-la Spiderverse.
- Trailer for the next game suggests we're moving into multiverse territory.
- The focus on Sephiroth pretty much eclipses Genova, who's the one you're actually chasing in OG FF7.
I mean, this is pretty drastically shifting the focus and tone both, as well as the basic plot.
How is the characterization different. The Remake's characters are awesome. Tone....that's hard to convey when translating text up into a full movie basically, the voices in your head that read the original script as you played are not going to be the voices that play out now. Everything you interpret from playing the OG game is unique to you and in that regard they can't pull that same feeling from your head and put it into these new games. So this I can kind of agree on, but you gotta give it a pass on that.
The storyline is the same. What's changed, besides adding content to the story they have taken nothing away.
Then explain the direction differences to me, because we've not gone in any different directions. Bomb reactor 1, bomb reactor 5, fall and meet aerith, wall market, plate drop, shinra build, escape midgar. In the remake we do more than that, but i don't see how any new events take away or change direction from the original plotline.
Are they? His motivation is to take control over the planet as it always was, I will admit the relationships changed from the original game because in the original game he had no relationships. Cloud was another Jenova puppet that he used, but beyond that he had no relation to Cloud. Quite frankly Sephiroth is a shitty bad guy in the original game because he has no real character at all. His connection to Cloud is only from Cloud's PoV, but otherwise Sephiroth has no character in the game and only preaches about the planet and his right to rule it.
In that sense is it any wonder why they had to give him more? He's a nothing burger for most of the game, hell when you encounter him in Junon's ship, he literally has no fucking idea who the party even is.
All that being said, you can argue that Sephiroth in Remake is a figment of Cloud's trama with him from the past. That's why he continues to have nightmares and flashes of him, because it's Cloud that's attached and obsessed with Sephiroth not the other way around. In which case Sephiroth's appearances as an apperation in Cloud's head makes perfect sense and also adds weight to the Kalm Flashback. Sephiroth only appears as real to other people in the Shinra building in which he was there in the original game (though we don't see it) to take Jenova away.
Admittedly the final battle is quite out of place, but I forgive it as it serves purpose to make that climax something worth while, versus that stupid rollerball fight.
I don't really think that Sephiroth is out of place or even altered much in the Remake because of the sort of reconning that happened during Crisis Core and Advent Children to sort of build him up to be more of a character. Like I said, the Sephiroth in the original game is not much of a character at all really, so they had to build him up somehow.
They are using Zack, but him living is still kind of a question.
How so? I feel like people focused on these guys way too much, they aren't really that impactful with much in the game. And honestly they work pretty well as a device that allowed the developers to add a bunch of shit to the Midgar section of the story while also having a good way to keep shit on track and allow for mystery in new players. You can totally say they are dumb, but I think a drastic distraction is a bit of an overstatement.
Jenova always used Cloud as a puppet. Cloud was used to bring the black materia to Sephiroth, and the Jenova cells in Clouds body take over his control more than once in the game. Again I think the fate talk is just a manipulation tactic by the writers to keep veteran players guessing when nothing really changes.
Fan theories only. It's possible I suppose but we don't know for sure. It is possible that this whole Remake project is a sequel to FF7, a reset timeline with a knowledgeable Sephiroth pulling strings. I don't think that's super likely...but maybe.
Uh..possibly again, we don't know anything yet about this. I hope not and I agree with you there, but all we have are teases and The Last of Us 2 teased me that Joel was alive a lot longer than he actually was so....
And you don't learn this until the end of the game in the original. As far as you ever knew as a player, you ARE chasing Sephiroth the whole time. It's only later made clear that you have not been doing that, which still might be the case here.
I still just can't agree with this. I don't see much weight in a lot of the complaints I've seen people have (not just you there is a lot of it online). I suppose we wont know until the final game is out and it's all over.
I don't mean the tone of dialogue. I'm saying that shifting the focus from the evil Corp draining the planet, and the ancient alien menace, onto defying fate ghosts is a pretty drastic shift. The former doesn't seem important, and the latter is nonsense.
The villains primary motivation and methods are completely different! It's a multiverse story about defying fate-controlling spirits!
Is his aim the same?! He's now wanting to ally with Cloud so they can live free of the bounds of fate in every multiversal reality. And yeah, his lack of a relationship with Cloud is kind of the point. Just because you didn't like it as much doesn't mean they didn't make a significant change. I prefer their relationship as it was.
Yup! Villains don't need a deep personal connection to the hero. If you think that's preferable, fine-- I don't. The fact he lacked it was a plot point, not just an oversight. It underlined the delusional nature of Cloud's memory and idolisation. But here, his delusions of a personal relationship with Sephiroth have been retroactively validated, because Sephiroth is inexplicably also obsessed with this random grunt.
The retconning and tone-shifts of Crisis Core and Advent Children were even more jarring. Much worse. I just hoped they'd take it back to the intent of the original rather than endorse the weird AU.
Their presence dramatically alters the implications of every event that happens. It becomes a story about overcoming causality and fate, which were not major themes in the original.
Well then, you're writing headcanon to integrate Remake with original, because that is not implied at all. Genova is sidelined in Remake quite severely.
But Jenova isn't even a part of the Midgar part of the game. Isn't that the same complaint people have with Sephiroth in that he shouldn't even be any part of Midgar and yet is all over the place? But at the same time you are arguing that Jenova is sidelined in a section that had nothing to do with her. You don't even learn of Jenova until Kalm outside of her getting stolen from the Shinra Building at the end of the Midgar section. Beyond that Jenova is not a concern nor even an idea in the party's mind in anyway up till that point.
I think both the Jenova and the Sephiroth thing is a problem that comes from making the game a trilogy instead of one full game. I understand why they split it up because the game would be insane all together, but the split is going to cause some issues because it makes them need to tease future shit and things that wont happen until other parts. Like the flashback of Sephiroth talking about ancients, or the flash forward to the Reunion and whatnot. Like those things are part of a good trilogy because you can't just blindly make a trilogy otherwise you have Star Wars and that shit was wack because each movie just made shit up as it went along.
I don't think you can put the cat back in the bag in that regard. Crisis Core was fine mostly, but Advent Children was a mess admittedly and yet they can't just ignore all that shit.
Plus you have the short stories "Life Stream White." And "Life Stream Black". Written by the original writer for the OG game. Life Stream Black specifically is told from the perspective of Sephiroth's Soul in the lifestream and is supposed to bridge the gap between the original game and the AV movie. Basically Sephiroth exists in the lifestream as a consciousness because Cloud refuses to let his memory go. Because Cloud remembers him and fears his return is how Sephiroth can hold onto himself in the lifestream and use his influence to inflect the Geostigma upon the world. Of course then you also have his three clones which he can also thrive off of and eventually manifest himself.
All of this content sort of builds on Sephiroth's obsession with Cloud in that Sephiroth needs Cloud to be obsessed with HIM to exist. It's very Japanese and strange.
But again you can't unring that bell. The characters have evolved beyond the original game at this point and we have to run with their evolution now.
I don't think that's it. See above about the mini story staring Sephiroth. I don't think it's about fate, it's about dominating Cloud's mind and eventually black materia.
Eh...hibahibidaba. It's not really though. That's just the very end of the Remake chapter, it's not a focus of the party throughout the game, nor is it really a focus of the game after the boss fights. There is no mention of fates or anything like that when they are talking about chasing Sephiroth down. It's just a "Normua-esque" excuse to have a big final boss fight. I think calling it a focus of the story is a bit of a stretch.