Fantastic game that gets held back via padding and a messy conclusion. The combat was great as usual, and even fixed many complaints I had with Remake's combat (bad air combat and no parrying without materia). Music was INCREDIBLE. The OST was probably the most varied I've heard in a very long time, with both rearranged versions of the original songs and the new ones all being joys to listen to. Lots of minigames too, with some being surprisingly addicting (Queen's Blood my beloved) and others being horrible to go through for high scores (any shooting game). Luckily, most of the minigames are optional for needing a high score, so I don't see them as too big of an issue.
The open world was a bit of a mixed bag for me. On one hand, it was straight up incredible to see some locations in the original (Kalm and Cosmo Canyon had me shook) greatly expanded on in Rebirth. On the other hand, the world map is padded to the brim with Ubisoft-tier objectives, with icons there just to do some busy work. Some of these I didn't mind (Protorelics), but others like the towers were just mindless fluff.
The best aspect of the game for me by far were the characters. The party dynamic feels so fleshed out, nuanced, and everyone gets a deeper layer to them that wasn't present in the original due to the system limitations. I think my favorites ended up being Barret and Tifa at the end, but everyone got a glow up in some way. They actually made Cait Sith into a GOAT, just think about that... The characters are what made me not mind the excessive padding issues the game has, as the slog usually has some character banter that just gives you more time to enjoy this amazing ensemble. The characters also make the side-quests well worth doing, as each side quest has a party member attached to it, giving you more time to see the party interact, and even have some more nuanced development in certain cases.
The characters also complement an aspect of the original that they kept wholeheartedly, the humor. This might be one of the funniest games I've played in my life, with a certain card sequence with Red XIII having me in stitches. I'm glad they kept to the general weirdness the original game had and didn't try to make it more serious than it was (no Advent Children tone shifts here).
And yeah, the ending was a bit of a clusterfuck. It didn't ruin the game by any means, but watching that entire sequence made me think how much more I would like the game if it was straight up faithful without any of the new stuff. I can't say definitively if the new content is BAD, since I don't know how it ends. But regardless of that, the overall presentation of the story in that segment was very convoluted, messy, and just confusing.
But overall, I loved this game so much. I very much look forward to Part 3, when it drops in 2028.
The open world was a bit of a mixed bag for me. On one hand, it was straight up incredible to see some locations in the original (Kalm and Cosmo Canyon had me shook) greatly expanded on in Rebirth. On the other hand, the world map is padded to the brim with Ubisoft-tier objectives, with icons there just to do some busy work. Some of these I didn't mind (Protorelics), but others like the towers were just mindless fluff.
The best aspect of the game for me by far were the characters. The party dynamic feels so fleshed out, nuanced, and everyone gets a deeper layer to them that wasn't present in the original due to the system limitations. I think my favorites ended up being Barret and Tifa at the end, but everyone got a glow up in some way. They actually made Cait Sith into a GOAT, just think about that... The characters are what made me not mind the excessive padding issues the game has, as the slog usually has some character banter that just gives you more time to enjoy this amazing ensemble. The characters also make the side-quests well worth doing, as each side quest has a party member attached to it, giving you more time to see the party interact, and even have some more nuanced development in certain cases.
The characters also complement an aspect of the original that they kept wholeheartedly, the humor. This might be one of the funniest games I've played in my life, with a certain card sequence with Red XIII having me in stitches. I'm glad they kept to the general weirdness the original game had and didn't try to make it more serious than it was (no Advent Children tone shifts here).
And yeah, the ending was a bit of a clusterfuck. It didn't ruin the game by any means, but watching that entire sequence made me think how much more I would like the game if it was straight up faithful without any of the new stuff. I can't say definitively if the new content is BAD, since I don't know how it ends. But regardless of that, the overall presentation of the story in that segment was very convoluted, messy, and just confusing.
But overall, I loved this game so much. I very much look forward to Part 3, when it drops in 2028.