fans love to make erroneous arguments about how detractors dislike the game cos it's different, but the problem has always been that those differences amount to nothing of substance. if they're not completely insignificant they're fakeouts or walked back, if they're not fakeouts or walked back they're jj abrams mystery box bullshit to keep the online dustcloud with arms and legs kicking and howling about The Implications for another four years. this is a game more concerned with how to capture will they/won't they Engagement than its own thematic core; an impressively meticulous effort moored in goopy fanservice and speculation bait
control freak energy from top to bottom, sanitized to an extent that you'd think square report directly to the health department, and guided by one of the medium's most overbearing directorial hands. all slick and shiny bombast and spectacle, perfect skin, compilation pilled navel gazing, and endlessly wrested control. thirty long hours of red light green light meandering thru kidzbop cover acts of familiar events and environments before shunting all responsibility for unpacking anything it might have to say onto the next game
big win for folks who wanted tifa to be a noodle armed simp and sephiroth to have the presence of yakuza kiwami majima
control freak energy from top to bottom, sanitized to an extent that you'd think square report directly to the health department, and guided by one of the medium's most overbearing directorial hands. all slick and shiny bombast and spectacle, perfect skin, compilation pilled navel gazing, and endlessly wrested control. thirty long hours of red light green light meandering thru kidzbop cover acts of familiar events and environments before shunting all responsibility for unpacking anything it might have to say onto the next game
big win for folks who wanted tifa to be a noodle armed simp and sephiroth to have the presence of yakuza kiwami majima
15 Comments
can't win 'em all! fwiw i felt the same way until a few months ago, after replaying both OG and remake a couple times. it's still got a lot of shit i'm not a fan of, but so does OG tbh. don't agree with the losing its thematic core thing, it spends even more time than the original exploring its anti-corporatism/revolutionary/class struggle themes. side-by-side with the whole original it's probably about pound-for-pound balanced the same between anti-capitalist plot beats and goofy RPG antics (with remake prolly having more textual depth along with barret being fleshed out beyond caricature). i have other things i disagree with (og ff7 is my immutable number one favorite, but i'd say tifa and aerith's writing is an overall net gain when it comes to them consistently being portrayed like actual people) but i'm not really trying to argue or anything i'm not here on this site for that at all, and like you're not even necessarily wrong in a lot of ways lol
i do kinda agree about the engagement thing, the leads are not always inspiring the most confidence in the authenticity of their creative goals, but it's all about framing and what it's gonna mean to people years from now. like, og ff7 was this opulent expenditure into cinematic 3D modeling made to appeal to a broad audience by copying contemporary media, made by a bunch of sexist dudes that ended up becoming way more than that for a lot of people
i do kinda agree about the engagement thing, the leads are not always inspiring the most confidence in the authenticity of their creative goals, but it's all about framing and what it's gonna mean to people years from now. like, og ff7 was this opulent expenditure into cinematic 3D modeling made to appeal to a broad audience by copying contemporary media, made by a bunch of sexist dudes that ended up becoming way more than that for a lot of people
@theia
I don't think it loses its thematic core so much as thematic focus. part of it is the choice to pad out the segment to several times its length, part of it is the change in presentation and tone, but most of it is that many big moments have their focal points shifted toward or are intruded on by the meta-layer. there's some good stuff that's been added here and there, and I don't disagree that the balance is largely even, or even that its political engagement might be more thorough, but as an experience it feels overwhelmingly preoccupied by its relationship to itself above all else, often to the detriment of key moments both old and new
when it comes to the characters I have mixed feelings. barrett and aerith are straight up improvements, but I don't particularly like what they did with tifa. she still feels like an extension of cloud, and I don't think the legacy issues with its core relationships being a hair away from harem anime does her any favours in a game that blows some very rudimentary character archetypes up to something closer to full fledged personhood. not a fan of the way some of the characters are animated either, and I think it ends up infantilizing some of them, but idk if that's a FFVIIR problem so much as a larger issue beyond this one game
no disagreement on the last bit really. and yeah, I don't wanna get in a scrap with anyone over a final fantasy either. review comes off as pretty adversarial, but at the end of the day it's just a lightning round of some grievances I have that's the result of hitting EJECT on a bunch of thoughts all at once
I don't think it loses its thematic core so much as thematic focus. part of it is the choice to pad out the segment to several times its length, part of it is the change in presentation and tone, but most of it is that many big moments have their focal points shifted toward or are intruded on by the meta-layer. there's some good stuff that's been added here and there, and I don't disagree that the balance is largely even, or even that its political engagement might be more thorough, but as an experience it feels overwhelmingly preoccupied by its relationship to itself above all else, often to the detriment of key moments both old and new
when it comes to the characters I have mixed feelings. barrett and aerith are straight up improvements, but I don't particularly like what they did with tifa. she still feels like an extension of cloud, and I don't think the legacy issues with its core relationships being a hair away from harem anime does her any favours in a game that blows some very rudimentary character archetypes up to something closer to full fledged personhood. not a fan of the way some of the characters are animated either, and I think it ends up infantilizing some of them, but idk if that's a FFVIIR problem so much as a larger issue beyond this one game
no disagreement on the last bit really. and yeah, I don't wanna get in a scrap with anyone over a final fantasy either. review comes off as pretty adversarial, but at the end of the day it's just a lightning round of some grievances I have that's the result of hitting EJECT on a bunch of thoughts all at once
''sephiroth to have the presence of yakuza kiwami majima'' i dont even need to play yakuza to understand that reference. sometimes this game feels like its bad storytelling on purpose
yeah i kinda get the preoccupation with itself vibes as well; sometimes it can feel a little like disneyland with the semi-diegetic remixes playing throughout various locales, etc. tho i think the "meta-layer" is a lot more diegetic and narratively cohesive than people give it credit, but i know it's an element that not everybody is gonna be able to appreciate (as somebody who spent three years hating it). now my only problem is the meta-layer's design looks like shit!!! almost literally tbh
there's some things that bother me with tifa, i think the whole cloud choosing her outfit thing made me uncomfortable in a way i can't quantify lmao, but i would argue the opposite in regards to the tifa is an extension of cloud thing, or at the very least that she's less of an extension to cloud than she was in OG. in remake she's a little more prone to shrinking under pressure, which does typically lead to Cloud Help Me moments that can feel a little For The Straights, but she's also just like a bartender lady with PTSD. like she has extensive martial arts training and she's been through some shit, but she's probably the least experienced of the main cast when it comes to putting oneself in immediate bodily peril. also we already have aerith as the deconstruction of the stereotypical fantasy princess both thematically and personality-wise, i think it's fine that remake tifa is like an adult version of ff9 garnet who has a job and can a punch hole through a semitruck. also i think it helped that OG was so tightly paced cuz like, you get through the part where tifa is a wallflower pretty quickly, getting to see her open up and seeing why she was often escaping into herself, and then she eventually gets to take charge in her own way. now you wanna see an extension of the main character, look no further than ff16 jill tbh; and if anything tifa is more fleshed out and autonomous than characters like ff6 celes (who is also cool af mind you, but most of her character motivations and plot beats relate to her romance with locke, tho maybe a lil unfair given she's from a game that had to worry about text memory limits and shit)
but yeah i totally get it, i have at least like two deleted reviews from when i joined backloggd that read pretty similarly to this, and sometimes it's better to just put a game down when it's not working for you
there's some things that bother me with tifa, i think the whole cloud choosing her outfit thing made me uncomfortable in a way i can't quantify lmao, but i would argue the opposite in regards to the tifa is an extension of cloud thing, or at the very least that she's less of an extension to cloud than she was in OG. in remake she's a little more prone to shrinking under pressure, which does typically lead to Cloud Help Me moments that can feel a little For The Straights, but she's also just like a bartender lady with PTSD. like she has extensive martial arts training and she's been through some shit, but she's probably the least experienced of the main cast when it comes to putting oneself in immediate bodily peril. also we already have aerith as the deconstruction of the stereotypical fantasy princess both thematically and personality-wise, i think it's fine that remake tifa is like an adult version of ff9 garnet who has a job and can a punch hole through a semitruck. also i think it helped that OG was so tightly paced cuz like, you get through the part where tifa is a wallflower pretty quickly, getting to see her open up and seeing why she was often escaping into herself, and then she eventually gets to take charge in her own way. now you wanna see an extension of the main character, look no further than ff16 jill tbh; and if anything tifa is more fleshed out and autonomous than characters like ff6 celes (who is also cool af mind you, but most of her character motivations and plot beats relate to her romance with locke, tho maybe a lil unfair given she's from a game that had to worry about text memory limits and shit)
but yeah i totally get it, i have at least like two deleted reviews from when i joined backloggd that read pretty similarly to this, and sometimes it's better to just put a game down when it's not working for you
@theia
that makes sense. if I ever manage to actually get into a proper replay I'd like to see if coming at it from that perspective could change my mind some. I'm highly inflexible on the sephiroth issue, but I think I could come around on this at least a bit. nodded along to the bits about dagger + how the og ffvii breezed through that to get to where she's more self assured and in charge, and I get where you're coming from re: celes and (from what I read) jill
this is my second review so maybe third time's the charm
that makes sense. if I ever manage to actually get into a proper replay I'd like to see if coming at it from that perspective could change my mind some. I'm highly inflexible on the sephiroth issue, but I think I could come around on this at least a bit. nodded along to the bits about dagger + how the og ffvii breezed through that to get to where she's more self assured and in charge, and I get where you're coming from re: celes and (from what I read) jill
this is my second review so maybe third time's the charm
i'll avoid leaving another wall of text on your review lol, but i will say there's elements from the rebirth demo that made me change my mind and actually kinda love at least the first instance of sephiroth in remake, so i'm kinda hoping other parts i'm not a fan of in remake end up being things that get justified later in the narrative
they needed to show more sephiroth because he's hot and cunty now
"Control freak energy" is a phenomenal way to sum up my uni thesis of complaints with this game.
Perfectly put into words why I have such an intense dislike for FF7 Remake, wich also extends to the FF7 Compilation project for me. Bravo.
i'm pretty sure i had a good time with this when i played it on ps4, but your complaints ring true. especially regarding tifa and sephiroth. in the latter's case, it's especially unfortunate to see sephiroth so clearly presented as a phantom haunting cloud's addled mind, rather than the way he was in the original: enigmatic and entirely indifferent toward cloud. it's a strange thing that the ps1 game handles their connection and the unraveling of cloud's truth with more grace and subtle foreboding. on the same token, i guess, the way aerith's character and vibe blossom here just about makes it all worth it.
will probably not truly know how i feel about this until my perception is colored by later installments.
will probably not truly know how i feel about this until my perception is colored by later installments.
@zn0
aerith is great but yeah sephiroth feels emblematic of most of my issues here. choosing to have him be omnipresent at the expense of all the tension and ominous offscreen presence he had just doesn't do it for me. I don't like advent children to begin with so I'm biased but seeing the compilation inform stuff like that so strongly is very disappointing to me. sometimes less is more
aerith is great but yeah sephiroth feels emblematic of most of my issues here. choosing to have him be omnipresent at the expense of all the tension and ominous offscreen presence he had just doesn't do it for me. I don't like advent children to begin with so I'm biased but seeing the compilation inform stuff like that so strongly is very disappointing to me. sometimes less is more
> this is a game more concerned with how to capture will they/won't they Engagement than its own thematic core
perfectly sums up why I dislike the Remake so much. it's not that they're doing weird shit with the idea of a video game remake, I think that stuff is largely pretty cool, it's that it's Fundamentally A Bad Remake Of Final Fantasy VII in the most basic ways possible. like, okay, FFVII is about the Mortifying Ordeal Of Being Known and the dissonance between the perception of one's self and the manners in which others perceive you etc. and there's a lot of ambiguity and opacity and breadcrumb-trail teeter-tottering on pieces of characters that may or may not be there, right?
anyways like the remake has characters look into the camera and verbally exposit how they feel or their motivations or something like a Dramatic Headache and it's just bad. even worse when they completely re-write one of the strongest characters for some reason (i hate remake tifa)
perfectly sums up why I dislike the Remake so much. it's not that they're doing weird shit with the idea of a video game remake, I think that stuff is largely pretty cool, it's that it's Fundamentally A Bad Remake Of Final Fantasy VII in the most basic ways possible. like, okay, FFVII is about the Mortifying Ordeal Of Being Known and the dissonance between the perception of one's self and the manners in which others perceive you etc. and there's a lot of ambiguity and opacity and breadcrumb-trail teeter-tottering on pieces of characters that may or may not be there, right?
anyways like the remake has characters look into the camera and verbally exposit how they feel or their motivations or something like a Dramatic Headache and it's just bad. even worse when they completely re-write one of the strongest characters for some reason (i hate remake tifa)
one of the best reviews i've read of this game. lost it at calling it jj abrams mystery box shit mixed with kidz bop cover acts
"if they're not fakeouts or walked back they're jj abrams mystery box bullshit to keep the online dustcloud with arms and legs kicking and howling about The Implications for another four years" Spot fucking on. All this speculation theorycrafting shit will mean literally nothing once part 3 is out and all the questions are answered, and we'll be left with a trilogy of games whose story is a mess for no reason.
Funbil
2 months ago