Pros:
- The amazing combat system from Remake returns with new mechanics, status effects, abilities, and more.
- Level design has been improved from Remake, now with several more modes of traversal than before, and more ways of making your way through dungeons.
- The game world is incredibly content-rich throughout the entire game. Every new area has a new set of unique side-quests. Many of them (even if not all of them) offer additional character development, worldbuilding, and an absurd amount of mini-games with relatively deep mechanics.
- The difficulty is just as satisfying as it was in Remake. It’s satisfying to master the combat system and finish battles optimally with whatever character combination you have with you. You feel like you need to think about your actions, but you still always know that you have a chance to pull through when things get ugly.
- As the plot continues, many additions to the original game’s story go a long way to further accentuate the worldbuilding and characters. The new mystery introduced by Remake makes significant and fascinating developments, while also bringing up new questions that serve to build immense anticipation for the final game.
- Just like Remake, the characters are faithfully realized, and the insane amount of new interaction is a joy to see. Fantastic vocal performances, now with a bit less weird anime grunting!
- Great pacing with each portion of the story feeling rather worthwhile, whether because of it endearing the characters to you or for plot developments.
- Art direction and music are immaculate. Adaptive music makes its glorious return.
-Production value in general is incredible. Cutscenes/cinematography, animation, etc. are top of the line.

Cons:
- Despite level design improvements, puzzles and other roadblocks/pace setters lack much stimulation or variety after the first couple of instances (e.g. Red’s wall walking, mako vacuums, etc.).
- Most of the repeating world activity types were immediately obnoxious, like Lifesprings and Divine Intel.
- Needing to take only one materia at a time when transferring between party members can be somewhat tiresome.
- Despite plot additions being largely positive, things that were changed about the original story were a mixed bag. For example, despite the Nibelheim flashback being mostly incredible, certain dialogue and set pieces being cut down are a huge disappointment. For another example, the big scene with Barret (you know the one) was altered to be far less impactful than the original, for seemingly no reason. Scenes and visuals that are even more iconic and thematically important than this share this issue.
- Lighting took a hit in this game (the only exception in the otherwise great art direction). There’s that visual effect when you are indoors looking into the outdoors where the light from outside shines blindingly. This wouldn’t be as big of a deal if this effect didn’t seemingly also sometimes trigger when you are outdoors too, making the entirety of the background extremely washed out.

Score: 8/10, closer to a 9 than a 7.