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Final Fantasy VII Remake

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Majora

Majora

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Posted

Just finished it and I don't have a bloody clue what most of the ending is about. Does it make more sense if you played the original? 

 

Most of the game is straightforward in terms of plot - underdogs Vs Shinra - but it takes a massive left-turn at the end. As someone with no knowledge of the original game apart from aa certain character dying I thought they did a really bad job explaining to a newcomer the role of Sephiroth and what he has to do with the rest of the story.

 

It may well be that little is revealed of Sephiroth in the early stages of the original but that doesn't have to stand alone where this does. The way the game ended made me feel like 

 

 



 

Sephiroth is ultimately more important than what I just spent most of the 50 hours working towards but it doesn't feel satisfying when he's been so peripheral for most of it and I still don't fully understand the point of him.

 

I also didn't have a clue who Zach was

 

Time to watch a video explaining what I just saw!

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Hexx

Hexx

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35 minutes ago, Majora said:

Just finished it and I don't have a bloody clue what most of the ending is about. Does it make more sense if you played the original? 

 

Most of the game is straightforward in terms of plot - underdogs Vs Shinra - but it takes a massive left-turn at the end. As someone with no knowledge of the original game apart from aa certain character dying I thought they did a really bad job explaining to a newcomer the role of Sephiroth and what he has to do with the rest of the story.

 

It may well be that little is revealed of Sephiroth in the early stages of the original but that doesn't have to stand alone where this does. The way the game ended made me feel like 

 

 

  Hide contents

 

 


 

Sephiroth is ultimately more important than what I just spent most of the 50 hours working towards but it doesn't feel satisfying when he's been so peripheral for most of it and I still don't fully understand the point of him.

 

I also didn't have a clue who Zach was

 

 

 

Time to watch a video explaining what I just saw!

 

Massive Spoiler

 

The point is that "Destiny" wants the game to play out as it did in the original - the whispers have spent the entire game nudging the story/events in the same direction as original (They weren't in the original). The heroes defeated the whispers, so what comes next is unknown - basically the next name can do whatever it wants.



 

Sephiroth know one knows - he's not playing the same role as the original. Time traveling changing things? He's obtained foreknowledge somehow? Who knows.


Aerith seems to know more than she's letting on - again not in the original game

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Majora

Majora

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Posted

Just watched a video about the ending:

 

 

 


 

It makes more sense now but it definitely feels like an ending made for the fans and with absolutely no regard for people who didn't play the original.

 

Maybe they figured that the audience for the remake is people who already know the original story anyway as it certainly seems like they expect people to know who Zach is, who Sephiroth is and so on. 

 

I guess it's nice that they've made something so meta and squarely aimed at the fans but it's all left me feeling a bit alienated and unsure whether the next game will be for me since I want a game/story that stands on its own merits. Which this did until the end. If the next game dives deeper into the meta side of things I might end up giving it a miss which would be a shame because I did mostly enjoy it and want to see where it goes. But not if it's incomprehensible to anyone but players of the original.

 

Willing to keep an open mind and hope for the best though.

 

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Mr. Gerbik

Mr. Gerbik

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@MajoraI played the original so many times and I found the ending to be Kingdom Hearts levels of random anime gibberish. I really like the idea of where it leaves the series mind, but even as a fan - someone who it was aimed at - I thought it was just messy and incomprehensible. Up until the ending sequence it was fine though, and I'm really looking forward to the next game.

 

 

 

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Alan Stock

Alan Stock

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I didn't mind the ending overall but had these two main issues with it (ending and final thoughts spoilers)



I never like fighting ethereal wispy god creatures in RPGS, they are so boring from a design perspective and also make little sense narratively - what, somehow Cloud and co can defeat this massive godlike collection of every soul in the world (or whatever) - I mean its a slight step up from giant robots and shit! And in a similar vein the whole floaty building fragments in the void thing is so overdone and cliche, the whole sequence lacked agency for me as it just went too full on anime for my tastes. At least the Sepiroth fight was pretty cool if waay over the top anime as well.

 

The other main issue I have is Sepiroth. Now I've played the original and don't have any problem with him showing up in this game, or how he does it. What I do have a problem with is the way that without really any explanation the game wants you to consider him the big bad and feel some epic feelings towards him by the end of the game. Despite us knowing nothing about his motivations or really having any idea who he is, aside from he's a badass, suddenly he's pronounced the Big Bad by Aerith and despite fighting Shinra the whole time we're suddenly supposed to be scared of Sepiroth and he's now the end boss? Yes, he's built up through the game as a maelevolent presence and kills President Shinra etc, but I feel like its a kind of about turn where hes suddenly shoved into the forefront and made the Big Bad. I found it hard to feel super invested as I didn't really know too much about him, it was mainly my faint memories of him from the first game that caught my emotions. I feel like for new players this turn of events with Sepiroth must be quite jarring.

 

Other than that I was fine with the direction they took with the ending, I can hardly remember anything about Zack from the original so its not a big deal for me, just curious how it will play out. I'm all for the story continuing in this new direction, i.e. essentially the same plot but with tweaks. I thought the whispers were a kind of lame way to do it, especially the boss, but I think its clever how they have found a way to change fate and have things turn out a different way - the memory flashes inbetween the boss whisper fight were really cool for anyone who's played the original game. However, Wedge getting potentially killed was lame, too abrupt and open-ended, Biggs surviving is bullshit (just because it takes any agency away from what you feel on the tower), and if they make Jesse survive too that will be lame too. I have no problem in any of them surviving, its just the way they did it by revealing at the end "they still might be alive" is pretty lame.

 

My issues with Sepiroth aside, the final Sepiroth fight was suitably epic and the music amazing as ever. For the final CG movie I kind of wish they had stuck with the ingame character models as its a bit jarring when they switch to fully CG characters which don't quite match up with the ingame models (even though they look great).  Also I really liked how they introduced the Shinra main players and especially Rufus. I can't remember feck all about any of the Shinra characters and I liked that they all got built up as ongoing villains we can look forward to seeing more of in future.

 

I don't remember much going on with a Shinra/Wutai war in the original so I'm hoping they push that aspect in the next game to add some extra spice, I love RPGs with intercontinental politics, big wars and shiz.

 

Anyway amazing game and like someone said in their review above, it pretty much hit all the right buttons for me. The music, reimaginining of the world, the characters, the combat, I loved it all. Yes there are few lame bits but compared to the incredible highs it reaches, plus hitting the nostalgia buttons, its very special. Its got so many moments where your heart is pumping, the music's pounding, the visuals are amazing and you're just so immersed in this high quality experience it definitely matches the feelings I got from playing the first game. Lets hope it continues!

 

 

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Mogster

Mogster

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Posted

I just finished it myself. The last few battles were excellent, and I liked the ending too.

 

Spoiler

It really does rely on you knowing the story of the original though, and even throws a bit of Crisis Core in for good measure. I think it still kind of works in its own right though. All you really need to take from it is that you're changing your destiny and forging a new path, and presumably stuff like Zack showing up will be explained next time around. It's a teaser for part 2 as well as an ending.

 

Overall it wasn't perfect, and it really didn't need so much padding, but it did a good job retelling the start of the story and I really loved the battle system. I'm almost tempted to start over to see how the early battles go now that I know what I'm doing, but, you know, fourty hours. :ph34r:

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sprite

sprite

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Posted

@Alan Stock

 

Your points re Sephiroth

 


For me, people only care that much if they have played the original, which has been highlighted as a shame.  We know he is the big bad because of the original, but newbies don’t, it’s not built up enough.  For those who have played the original though, it’s totally playing on our experience in the way it’s broached the whole story - changing Destiny and all that - and it continues to play on our experiences of Sephiroth to build him up.  See also: flash forward “memories”, eg city of the ancients.  So, I get that.  I didn’t play this pretending to wipe my “FF7 Original” memories clean :) 

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Majora

Majora

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Putting aside the ending itself, I thought they did a good job of not alienating new players. I understand there's lots of winks and nods and references for people familiar with the source material but I never felt like I was missing out on anything, which is really how it should be done, and why the climax really didn't work for me.

 

That said, I still felt like even as a newcomer I could see some of the issues translating the game across in this episodic way

 



 

There are characters who seem to exist because they are presumably important later on but who basically do absolutely nothing in this game. Scarlett springs particularly to mind - I have to assume she plays a bigger role later on and that's why she's here at all but in the context of this entry I kept waiting for her to play some kind of noteworthy part in proceedings. 

 

By the end I also kind of felt like I hadn't actually achieved anything much in the end. If you leave Midgar at the end of the original feeling the same then that's quite a different matter because you're just a few hours into an epic game. But when you've put 50 hours in and get very little tangible sense of accomplishment at the end it's a bit more of a problem. I was expecting to be able to kill at least one of the Shinra crew by the end.

 

This is probably where they're caught between a rock and a hard place when it comes to plotting the arc of each episode. What works as the end of an arc in a small piece of an epic RPG doesn't necessarily translate so well as the arc of a full game. It seems like they tried to remedy this via the Sephiroth encounter at the end but I knew so little about him I think I probably found it more unsatisfying than if it had just ended with you escaping Midgar and looking to the future.

 

I don't pretend to have the answers to these problems, just musing from the perspective of a genuine newcomer.

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Captain Novaforce

Captain Novaforce

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Interesting to see observations from newcomers to the ending. I suppose from the original games and the spin offs I was just smiling throughout at what they were doing, but you are right it was probably a bit confusing if you didn't know all that backstory.

 

Hopefully in the next game they will have time to fill out some of other characters so that the flash backs / flash forwards make more sense!

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Mr. Gerbik

Mr. Gerbik

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@Majora fwiw, in regards to how much better the point at which this game ends works in the original (spoilers for original FF7):

Spoiler

Sephiroth is regularly mentioned as some legendary character, but until the very end of the Midgar section he's just a noteworthy and intriguing part of the background lore. You don't even realize he's supposed to be a bad guy iirc. You're completely focused on Shinra but when you get there in his office, he's already been murdered. By Sephiroth, judging by the blade. But you don't *see*  Sephiroth at this point, it's an OMG he is actually somewhere doing shit oh god moment - but he's still a completely fascinating enigma. Then you leave the city to follow Sephiroth and it was a mind blowing moment back then to discover there's an ENTIRE WORLD outside of Midgar, which already felt huge and epic. And it feels like the game starts for real now, and as you progress Sephiroth is slowly built up as this powerful evil - with a very dramatic and shocking moment halfway through which really makes you completely forget about Shinra. The stakes are way bigger.

All of that is missing here, that's why it feels like a weird ending for newcomers. But to be fair I have no idea how they could have handled it better, it's a difficult problem to solve. In that regard they did a great job imho.

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droodling

droodling

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Posted

Ugh, I'm struggling with this. I'm only at the beginning, doing the first quests in Midgar, but it's boring AF. Find 3 cats? really? Please tell me it gets better, it all seems rather charmless at the moment.

 

Not really getting on with the combat either, but that might be because i keep hitting X to dodge and opening the bloody menu instead.

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Hexx

Hexx

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13 minutes ago, BedroomBusinessman said:

Anyone able to give me a spoiler free answer regarding Chapter 14...

 

  Hide contents

I’m mopping up the side quests at the moment. Is now the best time to do the colosseum battles, or is it something to leave until post game? 

 

 

You never return to the Collosseum in the story - but you get a chapter select after the credits

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NecroMorrius

NecroMorrius

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On 03/05/2020 at 20:20, Kevvy Metal said:


It’s there for you to learn the ropes of the whole game, by that logic you’d skip every encounter in something like DMC. Can’t say I’m surprised that would wouldn’t have the patience or attention span. 
 

Why not go one step forward and just straight uninstall it? 


It’s there to eke our another 5-10 minutes of use from their expensive-to-produce linear corridors, rather than having you run from one end to the other a single time before moving onto the next. That’s fine, but in the process they could have written some content worth playing, at least bookending their uninteresting quests with some interesting dialogue if nothing else. 
 

I don’t know how you got from trying to claim their limp sidequests are good to DMC(?) and attention spans. I finished every sidequest (they were virtually all bad) and combat challenge arena (all two of them) and finished the game with 52 hours on the clock. Then I went back and finished half of it on hard mode (the combat seems a lot better!) before lending it to a welder who can’t afford it because he’s been furloughed.

 

I actually really liked it overall despite so many problems with the structure and combat mechanics. I can’t wait for Mickey and Donald to turn up in the next one. 

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Alan Stock

Alan Stock

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6 hours ago, droodling said:

Ugh, I'm struggling with this. I'm only at the beginning, doing the first quests in Midgar, but it's boring AF. Find 3 cats? really? Please tell me it gets better, it all seems rather charmless at the moment.

 

Not really getting on with the combat either, but that might be because i keep hitting X to dodge and opening the bloody menu instead.

 

It does get a lot better, in fact I'd say that and one other chapter are the weakest. I'd even argue not to bother with the side quests in chapter 3 as the combat is so limited at that point in the game and the chapter drags out for too long anyway.

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Kevvy Metal

Kevvy Metal

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Posted
9 hours ago, Moz said:


It’s there to eke our another 5-10 minutes of use from their expensive-to-produce linear corridors, rather than having you run from one end to the other a single time before moving onto the next. That’s fine, but in the process they could have written some content worth playing, at least bookending their uninteresting quests with some interesting dialogue if nothing else. 
 

I don’t know how you got from trying to claim their limp sidequests are good to DMC(?) and attention spans. I finished every sidequest (they were virtually all bad) and combat challenge arena (all two of them) and finished the game with 52 hours on the clock. Then I went back and finished half of it on hard mode (the combat seems a lot better!) before lending it to a welder who can’t afford it because he’s been furloughed.

 

I actually really liked it overall despite so many problems with the structure and combat mechanics. I can’t wait for Mickey and Donald to turn up in the next one. 


No, that’s a terribly cynical outlook to have.
They’re there for you to engage with the combat system, defeat enemies and traverse the environment with lite puzzling. 
You might feel the content “isn’t worth playing” but it’s all generally within the act of playing the actual core mechanics of the game. 

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sprite

sprite

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The side quests don't bother me, at least not compared to FFXV.  I want to feel like I'm clearing my quest log in FFXV but it just gets longer and longer.  At least FF7R has a finite number and it's never overwhelming.

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BadgerFarmer

BadgerFarmer

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29 minutes ago, Kevvy Metal said:


No, that’s a terribly cynical outlook to have.
They’re there for you to engage with the combat system, defeat enemies and traverse the environment with lite puzzling. 
You might feel the content “isn’t worth playing” but it’s all generally within the act of playing the actual core mechanics of the game. 

It's a bit of both, I think. Having those early side quests makes sense, as they introduce various aspects of the game. But the design of them is uninspired, in a way that makes them feel like pointless chores. A little more imagination and originality would've gone a long way.

 

Edit: And the later ones often are more interesting in that respect, despite often asking you to do similar stuff.

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Qazimod

Qazimod

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Posted

Ultimania interview notes on the future of this project

 

TLDR:

They are "in the current stages of planning" for the next instalment

Re. the world map - they intended for the first game in the project to focus on Midgar, and the next game will then "allow the player to experience the vast world of FFVII"

They want to "differentiate" the next instalment because otherwise "there might not be a sense of surprise or novelty".

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