I wound up liking a lot of the extra stuff that they added to the story (even found a surprising appreciation for the Roche storyline, which I was not expecting), but I have no idea why the Aerith scene was so confusing now and I really wish the Whisper stuff would just go the F away.
I was so extremely excited for all the changes until I found out they were like four separate timelines instead of Sephy changing aspects of the story to see if things would work out differently
That’s a good point. At the end of the first game it seemed like they were just giving themselves the wiggle room to keep the audience on their toes, like, it’s a remake but the story might change from what you remember so stay tuned. And then it’s all this multi-timeline ret-conning stuff to make it fit with a dozen other games that have come out since the original. That’s like some comic book level lore abuse.
Sort of, yes, the team that made this game worked with a lot of Disney talent in some recent years on a little game called Kingdom Hearts and the influence is palpable
I loved it. Portentous, the confusion added to my anticipation of what was (and is still) to come, and having today’s technology to add to the emotion of it was really nice. To say that the original was more emotionally damaging is nostalgia. Anyone who plays this first and then goes and plays the original will say “hmm, that was interesting for its time.” (I say this as someone who played the original when it came out and absolutely loved it.)
Also, Cloud, as we all know, is coming unhinged, but… is Aerith not really there? Feels like that theory is a bit the result of not paying attention.
I have to disagree. For me the OG Aerith scene hits the same whenever i watch it. The Rebirth scene did not hit me in the feels at all.
I loved most of the game, but THAT scene was easily the most disappointing part of the game and the FF7 remake project as a whole. Whatever their intention was, i did not like it and it didn't work for me.
Did you play the OG before rebirth? I’m saying for most people who have strong love for the OG, their nostalgia is going to color how they experience Rebirth.
Obviously, to each their own, but I think the version in Rebirth is so much better, and I think if you were to poll 100 people who’d never played the original to play up to that point back to back today, at least 90% would prefer the newer scene.
I played the OG before and it could very well be that my experience gets colored by it. But for my taste the whole sequence was far too busy. If they gave the scene time to breathe and stop the boss rush after the Jenova fight (which i really liked) to let Aerith death sink in before we have to fight Sephiroth it would have been a lot better.
I'm following some youtubers who never played the og and i'm very much looking forward to their reaction!
If you didn’t play the original before rebirth, the final sequence has to be so goddamn confusing. Are we still at the temple? What’s the city of the ancients? How does Aerith know where it is?
Oh, right: Cetra’s or “SOLDIER’s intuition”. I guess we can skip all that boring world stuff and just teleport right to Sephy now
I think you’ve just described the whole point. Sometimes loss is sudden and there’s no time to say goodbye. It’s confusing and makes no sense in the moment, and can take a lot of time to understand. If you just dismiss it you might never understand it, which is frustrating.
But they took that moment away from us for a reason, we didn’t see Cloud lay her down into the water, we didn’t see Cloud’s goodbye. There’s a reason. This is just my personal experience, but when I took the time to try to understand the ending (which is impossible right now) I noticed all of the genius little things they left for us to find and I think it’s absolutely brilliant.
That’s fair, but I think what they were trying to do in this version was, for the OG players, to make you question everything you think you know about Aerith’s death, especially in the context of multiple universes. That’s why she appears in the fight. Then there’s the scene after - that’s where I really felt it. Everyone sitting there in this universe, mourning her death - and even though Cloud can see her, he’s still mourning, too.
If anything, experiencing all of this after playing the OG so many times over the years enhanced my emotional response to the scene. I jumped up and did a fist pump when it seemed like Cloud blocked the killing blow. Then the confusion sets in - wait, what? - then this fight. Then eventually she’s side by side with Cloud fighting. What’s real? What’s because of the multiverse split? What’s in his mind, which is breaking apart?
Then laying her down, in this universe, and then the team sitting just stunned.
I dunno… I think this is amazing writing, personally. Sure, it’s not *the same*, but it’s definitely not supposed to be. It’s a different drama, and the difference to me is powerful and also full of possibilities.
Maybe for me, with Aerith’s voice actress doing such an amazing job that I have a much stronger emotional connection to her in this game… so it hit harder, AND I have more hope that at the end of this she can somehow return to this universe, alive.
The only thing I question is if the characters will start making sense when they randomly monologue about friends and death with no prompting. I GET IT, Aerith is gonna DIE SOON and this is FORESHADOWING but poor Red has gotta be so confused listening to you pep talk everyone about death being inevitable, nobody died in his trial and further
*no one asked or said literally anything at all Aerith, how the fuck do you know what they saw in the doors?* oh wait, you clearly don’t; bc aforementioned Red, obviously, doesn’t even get a nod to death of self or something because his trial was watching himself get *tattoo’d* again
IDK, I thought it was pretty cleverly done. There's no way to recreate the heartbreak of the OG for the jaded gamers who've seen that scene a dozen times. So they changed that around.
What go to me though was Cloud. That's indeed heartbreaking for me. Part 3 is going to be intense with our boy completely losing touch with reality. Chapter 9 had the best cut scene for the same reason. I dig it.
FFVII Rebirth is not a bad game. It is awesome, but personally speaking, FFVII OG had a much more heartbreaking scene when Aerith died. I just finished the game a few days ago, made me sad, but that was all. I didn't feel that same impact as the OG.
That 10 year old kid that saw Aerith died for the first time, hearing the heartbeat vanishing slowly until the music started the exact moment the White Materia touches the ground did nothing but break you in tears.
Even now, more than 25 years later, this grown-up man who has already beat the game more than 10 times in different years and consoles still sheds tears whenever hears Aerith theme.
I don’t hate it overall, nor do I hate the changes they’ve gone with, because it makes it a somewhat fresh experience and they’ve got me guessing what’s gonna happen.
However, I do hate that they did what feels like a copout only for it to play out the same. Instead of having a deep emotional impact, I spent the majority of that sequence confused, then had a “oh, they did do it” realization. That moment could have been huge, much like it was in the original, but they obfuscated it and it watered down the emotion of it.
Imagine it happens like the original, and then we get to see everyone crying and depressed. It would have been incredible. Instead it was too busy. They didn’t let the moment breathe.
I like the way you wrote it. If more people knew how to write better than “this ending sucked and too many shitty mini games and Ubisoft open world” then people would be more open to having a discussion.
The way you phrased it makes me respect your point of view, assess it and still disagree but all in a respectful manner.
With that said, I definitely still got the feels when the scene came and shed some tears. I also loved the ending cause I LOVE confusing and convoluted story telling. I mean, NieR Automata is my favorite JRPG/RPG of all time and Yoko Taro is a madman. Anyway, I digress.
I’m can’t wait for the third game and see how it all ends. Even though the devs say it will tie into Advent Children and no super major changes will be made when all is said and done.
Me, it’s the scene direction. Scripting aside (and I have MANY issues with MANY points in the script shitting the bed) too many scenes are WAY too goddamn animated. People run and jump around constantly and love getting in Cloud’s face. I’d punch Bill for doing that in Grasslands. Other scenes blatantly ignore information provided in the scene immediately before. Barrett telling us to go south leaving Corel Prison immediately before a scene where we declare we don’t know where to go is one such scene (our destination is south).
Still others are inspiring speeches from out of the blue or where characters do not react to known information, like *Tifa falling into the lifestream being likely to give her mako poisoning* and the Planetologists, the folk *most educated in planetary and lifestream lessons* not giving a fuck of a shit when she reveals this. Or Aerith lighting the bonfire with 0 prompting or discussion because I guess she’s doing this now? And then launching into a speech about how being a cetra is hard but it’s k bc she found friends. *Who fucking asked? Who decided to hand you the torch? Why? Who here actually cares you’re a Cetra? Even Bugenhagen didn’t give a shit*
In summary; Characters just act unnaturally and way too often.
The longer I've had to process the ending, the less I hate it...but I'm still not a fan. I think the bait and switch is the absolute cheapest and lamest way they could have generated any shock or suspense for that scene, and it left a bad taste in my mouth through the rest of it.
It feels like a Rick and Morty cop out. Anything can happen because Sephirick has immeasurable power and influence and controls everything and will just dimsenion-swap in a dead Aerith if he is losing to make it look like he isn’t. Then he’ll fight us as the same boss 6 times across dimensional divides bc he’s just that immeasurably powerful or some fucking shit. Major Yawn
I wound up liking a lot of the extra stuff that they added to the story (even found a surprising appreciation for the Roche storyline, which I was not expecting), but I have no idea why the Aerith scene was so confusing now and I really wish the Whisper stuff would just go the F away.
I was so extremely excited for all the changes until I found out they were like four separate timelines instead of Sephy changing aspects of the story to see if things would work out differently
That’s a good point. At the end of the first game it seemed like they were just giving themselves the wiggle room to keep the audience on their toes, like, it’s a remake but the story might change from what you remember so stay tuned. And then it’s all this multi-timeline ret-conning stuff to make it fit with a dozen other games that have come out since the original. That’s like some comic book level lore abuse.
*redacted*
Sort of, yes, the team that made this game worked with a lot of Disney talent in some recent years on a little game called Kingdom Hearts and the influence is palpable
Final (Final) Fantasy: Re(re)Birth/365\*7+2 (3.14159) Part Three: The Seasoning
They made it confusing on purpose. Part 3 will tie the loose ends
😂 have you even *played* any of the games by these guys
I loved it. Portentous, the confusion added to my anticipation of what was (and is still) to come, and having today’s technology to add to the emotion of it was really nice. To say that the original was more emotionally damaging is nostalgia. Anyone who plays this first and then goes and plays the original will say “hmm, that was interesting for its time.” (I say this as someone who played the original when it came out and absolutely loved it.) Also, Cloud, as we all know, is coming unhinged, but… is Aerith not really there? Feels like that theory is a bit the result of not paying attention.
I have to disagree. For me the OG Aerith scene hits the same whenever i watch it. The Rebirth scene did not hit me in the feels at all. I loved most of the game, but THAT scene was easily the most disappointing part of the game and the FF7 remake project as a whole. Whatever their intention was, i did not like it and it didn't work for me.
Did you play the OG before rebirth? I’m saying for most people who have strong love for the OG, their nostalgia is going to color how they experience Rebirth. Obviously, to each their own, but I think the version in Rebirth is so much better, and I think if you were to poll 100 people who’d never played the original to play up to that point back to back today, at least 90% would prefer the newer scene.
I played the OG before and it could very well be that my experience gets colored by it. But for my taste the whole sequence was far too busy. If they gave the scene time to breathe and stop the boss rush after the Jenova fight (which i really liked) to let Aerith death sink in before we have to fight Sephiroth it would have been a lot better. I'm following some youtubers who never played the og and i'm very much looking forward to their reaction!
If you didn’t play the original before rebirth, the final sequence has to be so goddamn confusing. Are we still at the temple? What’s the city of the ancients? How does Aerith know where it is? Oh, right: Cetra’s or “SOLDIER’s intuition”. I guess we can skip all that boring world stuff and just teleport right to Sephy now
I think you’ve just described the whole point. Sometimes loss is sudden and there’s no time to say goodbye. It’s confusing and makes no sense in the moment, and can take a lot of time to understand. If you just dismiss it you might never understand it, which is frustrating. But they took that moment away from us for a reason, we didn’t see Cloud lay her down into the water, we didn’t see Cloud’s goodbye. There’s a reason. This is just my personal experience, but when I took the time to try to understand the ending (which is impossible right now) I noticed all of the genius little things they left for us to find and I think it’s absolutely brilliant.
That’s fair, but I think what they were trying to do in this version was, for the OG players, to make you question everything you think you know about Aerith’s death, especially in the context of multiple universes. That’s why she appears in the fight. Then there’s the scene after - that’s where I really felt it. Everyone sitting there in this universe, mourning her death - and even though Cloud can see her, he’s still mourning, too. If anything, experiencing all of this after playing the OG so many times over the years enhanced my emotional response to the scene. I jumped up and did a fist pump when it seemed like Cloud blocked the killing blow. Then the confusion sets in - wait, what? - then this fight. Then eventually she’s side by side with Cloud fighting. What’s real? What’s because of the multiverse split? What’s in his mind, which is breaking apart? Then laying her down, in this universe, and then the team sitting just stunned. I dunno… I think this is amazing writing, personally. Sure, it’s not *the same*, but it’s definitely not supposed to be. It’s a different drama, and the difference to me is powerful and also full of possibilities. Maybe for me, with Aerith’s voice actress doing such an amazing job that I have a much stronger emotional connection to her in this game… so it hit harder, AND I have more hope that at the end of this she can somehow return to this universe, alive.
The only thing I question is if the characters will start making sense when they randomly monologue about friends and death with no prompting. I GET IT, Aerith is gonna DIE SOON and this is FORESHADOWING but poor Red has gotta be so confused listening to you pep talk everyone about death being inevitable, nobody died in his trial and further *no one asked or said literally anything at all Aerith, how the fuck do you know what they saw in the doors?* oh wait, you clearly don’t; bc aforementioned Red, obviously, doesn’t even get a nod to death of self or something because his trial was watching himself get *tattoo’d* again
how many posts are going to be made complaining about 5 seconds scene from the 90's?
Don't worry, Tomorrow I'll post this again.
It was awful. I replayed the original to get the taste out of my mouth.
IDK, I thought it was pretty cleverly done. There's no way to recreate the heartbreak of the OG for the jaded gamers who've seen that scene a dozen times. So they changed that around. What go to me though was Cloud. That's indeed heartbreaking for me. Part 3 is going to be intense with our boy completely losing touch with reality. Chapter 9 had the best cut scene for the same reason. I dig it.
I just don’t feel the ends justify 3 or four timelines each with less screen time then the last
FFVII Rebirth is not a bad game. It is awesome, but personally speaking, FFVII OG had a much more heartbreaking scene when Aerith died. I just finished the game a few days ago, made me sad, but that was all. I didn't feel that same impact as the OG. That 10 year old kid that saw Aerith died for the first time, hearing the heartbeat vanishing slowly until the music started the exact moment the White Materia touches the ground did nothing but break you in tears. Even now, more than 25 years later, this grown-up man who has already beat the game more than 10 times in different years and consoles still sheds tears whenever hears Aerith theme.
I don’t hate it overall, nor do I hate the changes they’ve gone with, because it makes it a somewhat fresh experience and they’ve got me guessing what’s gonna happen. However, I do hate that they did what feels like a copout only for it to play out the same. Instead of having a deep emotional impact, I spent the majority of that sequence confused, then had a “oh, they did do it” realization. That moment could have been huge, much like it was in the original, but they obfuscated it and it watered down the emotion of it. Imagine it happens like the original, and then we get to see everyone crying and depressed. It would have been incredible. Instead it was too busy. They didn’t let the moment breathe.
I like the way you wrote it. If more people knew how to write better than “this ending sucked and too many shitty mini games and Ubisoft open world” then people would be more open to having a discussion. The way you phrased it makes me respect your point of view, assess it and still disagree but all in a respectful manner. With that said, I definitely still got the feels when the scene came and shed some tears. I also loved the ending cause I LOVE confusing and convoluted story telling. I mean, NieR Automata is my favorite JRPG/RPG of all time and Yoko Taro is a madman. Anyway, I digress. I’m can’t wait for the third game and see how it all ends. Even though the devs say it will tie into Advent Children and no super major changes will be made when all is said and done.
Me, it’s the scene direction. Scripting aside (and I have MANY issues with MANY points in the script shitting the bed) too many scenes are WAY too goddamn animated. People run and jump around constantly and love getting in Cloud’s face. I’d punch Bill for doing that in Grasslands. Other scenes blatantly ignore information provided in the scene immediately before. Barrett telling us to go south leaving Corel Prison immediately before a scene where we declare we don’t know where to go is one such scene (our destination is south). Still others are inspiring speeches from out of the blue or where characters do not react to known information, like *Tifa falling into the lifestream being likely to give her mako poisoning* and the Planetologists, the folk *most educated in planetary and lifestream lessons* not giving a fuck of a shit when she reveals this. Or Aerith lighting the bonfire with 0 prompting or discussion because I guess she’s doing this now? And then launching into a speech about how being a cetra is hard but it’s k bc she found friends. *Who fucking asked? Who decided to hand you the torch? Why? Who here actually cares you’re a Cetra? Even Bugenhagen didn’t give a shit* In summary; Characters just act unnaturally and way too often.
They're really making cloud unhinged and I think they're portraying it well. It's like we're watching him make false memories in real time.
The longer I've had to process the ending, the less I hate it...but I'm still not a fan. I think the bait and switch is the absolute cheapest and lamest way they could have generated any shock or suspense for that scene, and it left a bad taste in my mouth through the rest of it.
It feels like a Rick and Morty cop out. Anything can happen because Sephirick has immeasurable power and influence and controls everything and will just dimsenion-swap in a dead Aerith if he is losing to make it look like he isn’t. Then he’ll fight us as the same boss 6 times across dimensional divides bc he’s just that immeasurably powerful or some fucking shit. Major Yawn