Even moreso than Remake, Rebirth is a passionate retelling that takes full advantage of its modern cinematic approach to breathe new life into the original story but not without a few awkward infantilizations and, especially in the final act, needlessly contrived twists that exist solely for insipid fanservice and complexity's sake. Exploration is too streamlined to be enjoyable in itself, but an exhilaratingly dense combat system, along with a staggering amount of minigames, activities and challenges to experience, makes it one of the most incredibly diversified, layered JRPGs.

It clearly understands the original skillfully expanding on the essence of FF7's world and its characters, but sometimes fails to commit to the darker aspects of it and its final narrative twists can be egregiously clumsy and questionable in execution. An atmospheric wonder to experience, Midgar is not too fun to explore due to a simplistic level design and sluggish environmental interactions, however combat largely makes up for it: challenging enemies make the most out of an addictive battle system that blends real-time management and action in a dynamic way with ample room for strategic creativity.

Expansive traversal mechanics allow for areas of rich, layered verticality and sweeping vistas that become exciting playgrounds for exploration and stealth, although the former is occasionally made needlessly tedious by frustrating enemy placements and the latter slightly trivialized by weak enemy AI. Combat's deflection-focused, tight rhythmic flow doesn't leave too much room for strategic freedom but in its methodical design offers some of the most exhilarating, dynamically challenging, absolute best bosses in the history of the videogames. When the camera actually works properly, that is.