This review contains spoilers
For context: I did not grow up with or during FFVII. The first time I paid interest to FFVII was actually around the time the remake came out. I saw the opening to it and thought it was neat, so I decided to check out the original, which I fully beat then played FFVIIR months later.
FFVIIR is a game I've grown to hate the more time and thought I put into it.
The graphics are incredible, which should go without saying. The location design and art direction are wonderful. Wall Market at night is a jaw-dropping view.
The OST is perfect, and the fun remixes you find around the game are incredible.
I do think some characters are improved and have more to them, but in the same breath, Aerith, Jessie, and Tifa almost feel like slight back-steps. The fan service and cute flirty moments feel worse than the original, but that just may be personal. Tifa in particular—I know her whole thing is being strong and sensitive; everyone understands this, and I like this aspect of her. I think she's a great counter to Aerith, but I feel like FFVIIR can push this characteristic to its limit, and it ignores how Tifa's kindness and sensitivity directly lead her to become a passionate member of Avalanche. All of Tifa's goals and aspirations have been ignored just so she can just be another cute girl who's Cloud's arm-candy.
I think my main issue with Tifa is that she is emblematic of something in this game that I absolutely despise. Games adding gray morality to their stories has become almost a trend. Developers see other games do it and the positive reception nuance gets, but they don't understand that it's not going to work in every situation. Some grass-roots eco-terrorist group is just not on the same level as a fascist and imperialistic government. That's not even a political debate that has to be entertained since FFVIIR takes all the moments from FFVII where Avalanche did something bad and has Shinra do them instead. It's hard to not be incredibly frustrated when the game throws an aggravating section where townsfolk are crying, trying to make the player feel bad about their involvement in Avalanche, right after showing that Shinra was directly at fault. Near the end of the game, Aerith says something along the lines of "Shinra isn't the enemy!" which is just laughable since they lead to literally every bad event in the plot. From my knowledge, FFVIIR has the same writers as the original, I don't understand how they are messing up the Shinra plot so much.
Now onto the additions and ending. To preface, I am not fully for the wave of constant remakes, and I actually love when remakes try to shake things up and do something special. I adore when games acknowledge what they are and how they exist and tell a story about that. MGS2 is one of my favorite games ever, if not my absolute favorite. I love FFVIIR as a concept. Taking one of the most important games ever, one that people have wanted a remake of for ages, and messing with it and making it a story about being a remake of one of the most anticipated games ever is an incredible concept, but in practice it is less ideal. Hammering in "Fans are like evil ghosts that force the characters to suffer so the plot can go on how they want it to!" just feels lame. It is so blatant as well. They are shoving fifth-grade reading-level dialogue about fighting destiny so often that it becomes annoying.
Not only that, but in FFVIIR's quest for meta-narrative, it completely tramples over important events and meanings from the original game. FFVII was very aptly not about fate; everything that happened in that game had an inciting incident. One of the most important moments in FFVII is when Cloud implied Aerith sacrificed herself, and Tifa stopped him in his tracks because Aerith didn't. She died because someone killed her. That's it.
The desire to show Sephiroth every second and the constant teasing of later plotlines, all seem to be done to in Square's attempts to "appease fans". Even if it can be argued they succeeded, these changes ruin all subtly of the original game's plot and pacing. The constant push to keep a teen rating and tone down both Avalanche and Shinra removes the iconic grit and edge of the original game to make some kind of mascot in its image.
The writers put all their focus into this "meta-narrative" that they seemed to have dropped the main Shinra one, which is an absolute shame since the story of Shinra is more relevant than ever. Not only that, but I would argue that Shinra is the centerpiece of everything in FFVII. FFVII is about so many things: life, identity, the planet, etc. It is able to be about all of these things and feel concise since it is about life in a world with Shinra, identity in a world with Shinra, truth in a world with Shinra, the planet in a world with Shinra, I could go on. I've seen the theories, but I don't think anything FFVIIR leads to can justify what it's done and sacrificed.
For some small and general negatives, some of the boss fights feel like they go on longer than they should have. The padding is incredibly apparent, and the ratio of good new content to bad new content isn't good enough for them to justify the game being stretched out to 30/40 hours. Just because something can be expanded on does not mean it should. At what point is it too much? The train graveyard area is less entertaining than some of the jobs I've had. That, combined with Tifa and Aerith constantly jumping into clouds arms, and the horrid pacing and slog to the big climax with the plate falling, made me want to bite my arms off.
A decent concept that entirely fails, and a story that treats me like a fifth grader at best and is frustratingly contradictory at its worst.
FFVIIR is a game I've grown to hate the more time and thought I put into it.
The graphics are incredible, which should go without saying. The location design and art direction are wonderful. Wall Market at night is a jaw-dropping view.
The OST is perfect, and the fun remixes you find around the game are incredible.
I do think some characters are improved and have more to them, but in the same breath, Aerith, Jessie, and Tifa almost feel like slight back-steps. The fan service and cute flirty moments feel worse than the original, but that just may be personal. Tifa in particular—I know her whole thing is being strong and sensitive; everyone understands this, and I like this aspect of her. I think she's a great counter to Aerith, but I feel like FFVIIR can push this characteristic to its limit, and it ignores how Tifa's kindness and sensitivity directly lead her to become a passionate member of Avalanche. All of Tifa's goals and aspirations have been ignored just so she can just be another cute girl who's Cloud's arm-candy.
I think my main issue with Tifa is that she is emblematic of something in this game that I absolutely despise. Games adding gray morality to their stories has become almost a trend. Developers see other games do it and the positive reception nuance gets, but they don't understand that it's not going to work in every situation. Some grass-roots eco-terrorist group is just not on the same level as a fascist and imperialistic government. That's not even a political debate that has to be entertained since FFVIIR takes all the moments from FFVII where Avalanche did something bad and has Shinra do them instead. It's hard to not be incredibly frustrated when the game throws an aggravating section where townsfolk are crying, trying to make the player feel bad about their involvement in Avalanche, right after showing that Shinra was directly at fault. Near the end of the game, Aerith says something along the lines of "Shinra isn't the enemy!" which is just laughable since they lead to literally every bad event in the plot. From my knowledge, FFVIIR has the same writers as the original, I don't understand how they are messing up the Shinra plot so much.
Now onto the additions and ending. To preface, I am not fully for the wave of constant remakes, and I actually love when remakes try to shake things up and do something special. I adore when games acknowledge what they are and how they exist and tell a story about that. MGS2 is one of my favorite games ever, if not my absolute favorite. I love FFVIIR as a concept. Taking one of the most important games ever, one that people have wanted a remake of for ages, and messing with it and making it a story about being a remake of one of the most anticipated games ever is an incredible concept, but in practice it is less ideal. Hammering in "Fans are like evil ghosts that force the characters to suffer so the plot can go on how they want it to!" just feels lame. It is so blatant as well. They are shoving fifth-grade reading-level dialogue about fighting destiny so often that it becomes annoying.
Not only that, but in FFVIIR's quest for meta-narrative, it completely tramples over important events and meanings from the original game. FFVII was very aptly not about fate; everything that happened in that game had an inciting incident. One of the most important moments in FFVII is when Cloud implied Aerith sacrificed herself, and Tifa stopped him in his tracks because Aerith didn't. She died because someone killed her. That's it.
The desire to show Sephiroth every second and the constant teasing of later plotlines, all seem to be done to in Square's attempts to "appease fans". Even if it can be argued they succeeded, these changes ruin all subtly of the original game's plot and pacing. The constant push to keep a teen rating and tone down both Avalanche and Shinra removes the iconic grit and edge of the original game to make some kind of mascot in its image.
The writers put all their focus into this "meta-narrative" that they seemed to have dropped the main Shinra one, which is an absolute shame since the story of Shinra is more relevant than ever. Not only that, but I would argue that Shinra is the centerpiece of everything in FFVII. FFVII is about so many things: life, identity, the planet, etc. It is able to be about all of these things and feel concise since it is about life in a world with Shinra, identity in a world with Shinra, truth in a world with Shinra, the planet in a world with Shinra, I could go on. I've seen the theories, but I don't think anything FFVIIR leads to can justify what it's done and sacrificed.
For some small and general negatives, some of the boss fights feel like they go on longer than they should have. The padding is incredibly apparent, and the ratio of good new content to bad new content isn't good enough for them to justify the game being stretched out to 30/40 hours. Just because something can be expanded on does not mean it should. At what point is it too much? The train graveyard area is less entertaining than some of the jobs I've had. That, combined with Tifa and Aerith constantly jumping into clouds arms, and the horrid pacing and slog to the big climax with the plate falling, made me want to bite my arms off.
A decent concept that entirely fails, and a story that treats me like a fifth grader at best and is frustratingly contradictory at its worst.