"False dichotomy the video game" is how I always refer to this game. The premise of the game's plot is that you play as Vincent, a sheepish coward of a man who is engaged to a woman named Katherine-with-a-K. One night while at the bar you frequent nightly with your friends, you meet a girl named Catherine-with-a-C, and end up cheating on your fiancé with her. This becomes a regular thing, and the central conflict of the game is making binary choices that decide who you'll end up with. The whole game is broken into two distinct sections. While you're awake you are at a bar with your friends, and this is where all of the story bits happen, talking with everyone there. While you're asleep you are trapped in a nightmare realm in which some monster representing Vincent's relationship fear of the night is tormenting him, and he must do a block moving puzzle game to escape death. The two stars I am giving this game are because the puzzle sections are genuinely good, and if that was all this game was I would love it.

Unfortunately, this game has Things It Wants To Say™ and those things are pretty horrible. At the end of each puzzle section you are put into a confession booth and given a series of false dichotomy questions to answer. The one that always stuck out to me was "Does life begin or end after marriage?" To answer this question honestly in either direction is equally cynical, marriage can be a part of life, but it is neither the beginning nor the end of it. During one of the the bar segments I also remember a patron asking a similarly asinine false dichotomy question, "Who do you hate more, men or women?" These are the two examples that stick out most in my memory, but every question the game throws at you is like this.

The reason every choice in the game is framed this way is because the game has an extremely sexist assumption at its core. I suppose if I were to apply a more feminist framework to my dubbing of the game as "false dichotomy the game" I could instead give it the moniker of "virgin-whore dichotomy the game." You see, each of the two options of every question you've been answering falls into one of two categories, "freedom" or "order", and each of these ideas are represented by Catherine and Katherine respectively. There is zero room for grey here, if your answers were too close to a 50/50 split throughout the game, Vincent ends up alone as he can't decide what he wants. If you choose "Order" you end up with Katherine, who the game frames as mature, dull, and controlling, but stable. And if you choose "Freedom" you end up with Catherine, who the game frames as infantile, sexy, and exciting, yet erratic. You cannot be free with Katherine, and you cannot have order with Catherine, according to the game you must choose, virgin or whore. If you think I'm being too harsh, here is the pièce de résistance: in a final twist at the end of the game it is revealed that Catherine is literally a succubus.

And on top of all of this sexist garbage, they also decided to throw in a trans character just to treat her transness as a Cool Bit of Lore™ that you can find out about if you pick up on hints, or get this, if you see them deadname the character in the credits. This is the only Atlus game I've played and apparently queerphobia and transphobia are trends in their games, and it's the one thing that makes me hesitant to get into any of their other works. After all of this, I'm not quite sure how I can end this review with anything other than a resounding "fuuuuuuck this!"

Final Fantasy is good again! Well, at least this remake series of an older game is so far. There’s so much to love about this game, the audio and visual upgrades to the music and the setting instantly got me nostalgic. The art direction for the various locations in Midgar really make this game stand out, every area’s distinct color palette gives it it’s own unique feeling. Final Fantasy VII just has its own whole sci-fi/fantasy thing going on that you really can’t get anywhere else.

The combat is a breath of fresh air, combining real time fighting with an ATB meter for your magic and abilities, and allowing you to slow the combat down at any time to really soak in the visuals. It’s a really nice blend of action and tactics, and I never got tired of it. So much so that the areas of the game that some have criticized as pacing issues, never managed to bother me, as I enjoyed the combat so much. A part of me still wants to go back and try it on the harder difficulty which forces you to manage your combat resources even more closely for a truly tactical experience.

These characters are more than two decades old at this point, but their personality still shines through in this game. I love how spunky and fun Aerith is. Barrett still being a political radical fighting for the planet against a massive corporation is one of my favorite things, and definitely hit different in 2020; and his soft fatherly side is also wonderful to watch. I love Cloud’s fake tough guy demeanor, and how the improved animations let you see the subtlety in his performative attitude.

Before this game came out, I was really worried about how it would handle the whole Wall Market section, given some problematic elements in the original game. But they updated it in a way that made it stand out as my favorite section of the entire game by far. The Honeybee Inn song still gets stuck in my head, and I am a stan for Andrea Rhodea.

Ending spoilers past this point

The ending to this game is what elevates it to something special for me. It’s this whole meta-commentary on what a remake is, and how creators can feel an overwhelming pressure from fans to not stray too far outside the lines in re-imagining the original work. In the end, the main characters of the game ultimately decide to destroy their fates, which kept them tied to the events of the original game, and free the creators to take the story where they want to. It’s a bold ending for a AAA game to take, especially for a game this beloved. I’m excited to see what comes next, and hopefully they stick to their guns and have a story they feel passionate about telling, and aren’t going to renege on the ending or just use it as a way to add fan service. But whatever happens with the sequel, the boldness of this first part’s ending will still be there to stand on its own, and deliver a powerful message about art.