Final Fantasy VII Remake Wants to Know Its Own History

Released successful 1997, Final Fantasy VII was a landmark crippled of its era, making waves crossed its ain series, genre, and the full medium. Over the years, fans turned that love into hopes for a remake oregon immoderate benignant of revisitation. Those hopes seemed to carnivore effect successful 2015, erstwhile Square Enix revealed astatine E3 that a remake was happening! After the archetypal excitement, fans waited…

…And kept waiting for years, wondering wherever it was arsenic seasoned developer Tetsuya Nomura worked connected different projects like Final Fantasy XV and Kingdom Hearts III. After trailer aft trailer and a precise bully demo, Final Fantasy VII Remake finally released connected April 10, 2020 for PlayStation 4, the archetypal of a multi-game saga. It was a rubric that came astatine conscionable the close time: the PS4’s large 2 first-party games, The Last of Us Part II and Ghost of Tsushima, weren’t owed until the summer, and the then-early COVID-19 pandemic made staying astatine location to play video games a valid activity. Add onto that the involvement successful seeing however Nomura and different alums from the archetypal crippled would re-develop the rubric that helped marque (and successful immoderate cases, wholly define) their careers successful the industry, and it’s nary wonderment it was a critcal and commercialized darling.

The word “remake” carries a beardown antagonistic connotation successful the movie space, but successful games, it’s somewhat much complicated. Ports and remasters person been a portion of the mean since forever, and everyone knows what that entails. A remake is different substance wholly and varies from crippled to game. When the first 2 Halo games were remade, players could toggle betwixt its archetypal graphics oregon a modern mentation astatine the propulsion of a button, and some came with suplemental worldly that helped acceptable up aboriginal titles. Capcom’s Resident Evil remakes diagnostic modernized gameplay and updated crippled elements, portion the Dead Space remake’s biggest alteration was giving a dependable to Isaac Clarke, who didn’t talk until the 2nd game.

© Square Enix

Final Fantasy VII Remake both is and isn’t what its rubric suggests. Underneath the tegument of the original VII is the DNA of then-recent Final Fantasy games Nomura contributed to successful immoderate fashion. From Final Fantasy XV, the remake takes real-time combat, allowing players to freely power betwixt 3 enactment members—occasionally reducing the size to conscionable 1 oregon 2 characters—while hearkening backmost to the archetypal VII’s turn-based quality by slowing down clip truthful players tin queue up circumstantial attacks oregon instrumentality potions. Structurally, it borrows from the XIII trilogy, which was derided for taking players down a linear path. Remake is likewise straightforward astir of the time: its 2 hub areas are big, but not that big, and you tin lone bash circumstantial actions similar leap oregon participate circumstantial areas erstwhile prompted. Such linearity was noted astatine the time, but that was astir drowned retired by however bully the combat felt and older players’ affection for playing done a prettied up mentation of Midgar connected modern hardware.

By far, Remake’s biggest changes came to its narrative. At first, it was tiny things similar introducing main baddie Sephiroth overmuch earlier than successful the archetypal game, oregon fleshing retired supporting formed members Jessie and Biggs. Over time, those tweaks extended to the instauration of wholly caller characters similar Roche oregon beefing up the original’s aboriginal conception successful Midgar into its ain beginning, middle, and extremity to assistance warrant the translation into what’s apt a trilogy. To punctuation Austin Walker during Waypoint’s podcast connected Remake, several conversations successful the archetypal crippled were efficaciously turned into brag fights oregon minigames for its modern time incarnation, which tin consciousness similar padding successful its worst moments. (2024’s Final Fantasy Rebirth is particularly blameworthy of this, fixed its galore minigames and expansive open-world areas.)

Oh right, there’s besides different large communicative change: Final Fantasy VII Remake is astir the bequest of Final Fantasy VII. It often teases the subordinate with characters oregon events diverging from the root material, resulting successful ominous ghosts called Whispers moving to enactment things backmost connected track. Usually, this amounts to redeeming oregon sidesplitting idiosyncratic that didn’t dice wherever they were meant to, occasiaonally sticking astir to marque definite the job’s done earlier vanishing again. For characters successful the cognize astir however this each shakes out, similar Aerith and Sephiroth, the Whispers tin beryllium utilized to their ain ends. In these beings exists the imaginable to archer the archetypal communicative and support everything arsenic is oregon interruption disconnected into new, uncharted territory. Maybe immoderate of the aforesaid crushed is tread, but the endpoint could beryllium antithetic for VII’s cast, who each go progressively alert they’re being manipulated to 1 grade oregon another.

© Square Enix

With overmuch of the archetypal game’s endowment astatine the helm, it whitethorn person been inevitable that Remake would straight research the value of its ain root material. Still, the mode it does this makes each the difference, since this full endeavor from Nomura and Square Enix includes bringing successful parts oregon elements from spinoffs similar Crisis Core, plus the diagnostic movie Advent Children. Its full scope is astatine erstwhile breathtaking and perchance exhausting, depending connected however things reason successful the unannounced 3rd installment. 2024’s Final Fantasy VII Rebirth had it some ways, leaving players uncertain conscionable however overmuch would truly alteration erstwhile it paradoxically recreated Aerith’s death and gave immoderate she whitethorn unrecorded connected successful different timeline lone disposable to the ever-traumatized Cloud. (Plus, his enactment hubby Zack, who died anterior to the archetypal events of VII, is live successful Rebirth, briefly teaming up with Cloud against Sephiroth earlier helium returns to his ain alternate timeline.)

What is the Final Fantasy VII remake saga? The reply is, seemingly, thing for everyone: a mode for longtime fans to relive the archetypal arsenic it’s simultaneously expanding, tweaking, oregon successful speech with parts of that earlier product. Newcomers get to play a bid of slick action-RPGs that could usher them to different Final Fantasy games, oregon adjacent conscionable a elemental remaster of the original. (Like EA with Dead Space, Square Enix thankfully doesn’t privation these remakes to wholly erase the OG Final Fantasy VII.) The developers are treating it arsenic a mode to bespeak connected 1 of the biggest games of their careers, and for the characters? We’ll person to hold for whenever Part 3 comes to find out.

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