No FFVII Remake thread? Really?!

[Amasov]

I must say I'm surprised. This is has been such a highly-anticipated game and I just naturally assumed it'd spark a good discussion here.

At ANY RATE. I love what they did in expanding the story beyond the original. The gameplay and battle system are extremely tight. The battle system specifically is a much improved, more refined version of XV's.

I also love one of the newest additions to the game; a real shithead of a character named Roche who pops up at the worst times.

Forgive my random, unorganized thoughts on the subject. I just love the game so much and haven't truly discussed it with anyone that I can barely get a coherent sentence out.

Anyone else playing?

 

[XCV330]

I started playing FF in my last years of high school. For me VII wasn't the high mark of the series, but I understand why it is so popular and why there was so much interest in it. I'm glad it's done so someone at Squeenix can finally start thinking about X-3.

it is nice to hear someone who has played the remake and liked it. It really hasn't got a lot of notice. ill eventually get it.

 

[DonIago]

I've been playing it and am enjoying it so far. I never did beat the original FF7, but did get fairly far into it.

The story expansion they've done for the Remake is pretty great.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I'm playing it now, I'm up to chapter 8.

What I like the most about it is how they write the protagonists. They gave so much more nuance and personality to the good guys than in the original game, and made the setting look more like our real life to hammer home the anti-corporate environmentalist message. Little touches like Barret being told he's being live broadcast and loving the idea of having a national outlet to proselytize give the world a lot of life.

The combat is good, smooth, and it's good that they made all the characters very unique from each other in terms of their mechanics. It's not spectacular, but good. It's also nice that unlike games like Xenoblade they have real aiming and dodging and actual ability to issue your allies commands, and unlike Nier Automata they limit the frequency you can heal so you can't just attack with abandon and heal for free at will. It tends to have Tunnel Vision Syndrome with the camera. The camera is way too close to you and doesn't behave well when you're near a wall, so you're constantly losing sight of the biggest threats, which is a huge problem in fights you need to twitch dodge. They need to back the camera up a little more to give more visibility to the whole battlefield. And they should have had some sort of Gambit-like system so you can program the AI to act independently of you, so you're not having to constantly pause and issue commands to make the others do anything.

The biggest area I don't like it is how they write the antagonists. Nomura tends to have a single template for bad guys. Cackling evilly and deviously smirking at you, vindictive, focused more on their vendetta against you than any believable motive. Nomura seems to think if the enemies don't do that devious smirk the audience won't know they're evil. Reno, Heidegger, almost all of them, incredibly boring cookie cutter villains.

I also strongly disagree with the decision to have Shinra blow up their own reactor. It's a "Greedo shot first" level revision, another instance of Nomura not giving the audience credit to deal with moral shades of gray in their protagonists.

Also, there is some blatant padding. Yeah, with modern tech it was going to be longer than five hours. But they have three full chapters just to get to the second reactor, there's no reason at all you should have had to go all the way through a long subway tunnel, and all the way across the underplate before getting to the reactor except to artificially extend the game. Without the padding the five hours might have been 15-20 instead of 30+, but then they wouldn't have been able to cut it into more parts for a bigger cash grab. Why tell your story efficiently and sell them two games when you can drag your story out and sell them three or four?

It gives me a lot of hope that this game indicates Square has finally learned how to make ARPG combat actually work, that they remembered how to write for grownups, and maybe re-learned the right balance of main story and quests.

 

[jaime]

It’s the story of VII (except for...y’know...secret stuffs...) in the beautiful style of XIII.

I think people fool themselves over how much has been added...a lot of it is stuff that we knew happened in the original, but now it’s not happening off camera (just got to the bit where Aeris meets Marlene.)

The Shinra revisionism is light...and mostly it expands on what was obvious in the original while painting Avalanche a shade lighter and much bigger. It really fits in nicely with stuff like Crisis Core as well...which is good. It’s better than XV, and a seriously nice relief from Western gaming obsession with too much nihilism (ironic, because with the same story a studio like naughty dog would have found a way to depress the shit out of you with it.) as opposed to this.

Amusingly it has a deep streak of horniness to it without being silly, which along with its unabashed nineties roots on show, make it a lot more fun. But hey...that’s these characters for you, it’s always been that way. I especially like the way the silent comedy of Reno and Rude comes in from Advent Children.

Best game in *years*.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Recent Persona, Trails, Nier and Valkyria Chronicles entries are way better than FFVIIR.

FFVIIR takes six hours for what is reasonably two or three hours of story even with updated graphics. And combat is a B at best. Which is still the best Final Fantasy game since FFIX, but other series are doing much better, RPG-wise, with less cliche villains.

They did add quite a bit to the flavor of the story events of the original though. The whole thing about the Wutai false flag wasn't in the original.

I just got through Wall Street and it's my least favorite part of the game so far. Feels like a Mad Max cosplay convention. And beating up a house may work when your graphics are cartoony but it looks completely ridiculous with more realistic graphics.

 

[jaime]

Recent Persona, Trails, Nier and Valkyria Chronicles entries are way better than FFVIIR.

FFVIIR takes six hours for what is reasonably two or three hours of story even with updated graphics. And combat is a B at best. Which is still the best Final Fantasy game since FFIX, but other series are doing much better, RPG-wise, with less cliche villains.

They did add quite a bit to the flavor of the story events of the original though. The whole thing about the Wutai false flag wasn't in the original.

I just got through Wall Street and it's my least favorite part of the game so far. Feels like a Mad Max cosplay convention. And beating up a house may work when your graphics are cartoony but it looks completely ridiculous with more realistic graphics.

Ironically, this isn’t even the first AAA game in which I have beaten up a house this year...but it took my a while to get around to getting through th modern Tomb Raiders, as I prefer the older, less torture heavy ones.

In terms of Persona etc...well, I will freely admit a nice chunk of why I am enjoying FFVIIR is because of nostalgia. Of hanging out with the Avalanche guys again (I fancied Jesse when I was a teen, and look at her now...) but...I also didnt get as much out of say P5 as I did P4 (still working through P5, and oh look..an updated version...) and didn’t get round to Nier as beyond its graphical prettiness and some of its idea, it didnt sing to me enough to want to buy it. I actually think a lot of modern RPGs lost something along the way (especially XV) and this game is pleasantly like they used to be before they got so... overwrought I guess. Chasing the Western Style over JRPG. (For FF at least)

In terms of what’s been added, there’s a lot of Crisis Core influence in there, and a lot of XIII Trilogy, which I think is a good thing, because those do tend to get overlooked.
Its just *better* than stuff around at the moment. I look at people getting depressed and fighting over TLOUII, shrug my shoulders, and go hang out with Avalanche crew.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I understand how you'd see it that way if you've mostly not been playing the nichier RPGs, since mainstream RPGs have generally been overwrought and cumbersome, but there's a wealth of great RPGs coming out right now for reasons beyond nostalgia. With original stories and combat systems which have modernized both turn based and real time RPG combat much better than the Final Fantasy team has figured out yet. (And the American adventure genre has become more like movies than games).

I agree the main protagonists are written really well, but the villains are such cliche and dull cookie cutter collection of cackling vindictive sadists it's impossible to take them seriously. And while they got combat way better than FFXV, they still give you very little strategic options and usually one clear strategy for every boss fight. And the AI allies do nothing but regular attack if you don't specifically command them to, making it so you kind of have to babysit them. They haven't figured out the things series like Tales, Ys and Star Ocean figured out over a decade ago for how to do real time RPG combat. Even Square games like Last Story and Nier got real time combat better.

Have you played the Trails series at all? It's turn based but has some of the best character development I've ever seen outside of Xenogears, and they made the turn based system extremely strategically varied, more so than Shin Megami Tensei/Persona games. And currently nine games and counting taking place in a two year span in the same world. The sort of series that demands player investment and gives huge payoffs.

 

[jaime]

I understand how you'd see it that way if you've mostly not been playing the nichier RPGs, since mainstream RPGs have generally been overwrought and cumbersome, but there's a wealth of great RPGs coming out right now for reasons beyond nostalgia. With original stories and combat systems which have modernized both turn based and real time RPG combat much better than the Final Fantasy team has figured out yet. (And the American adventure genre has become more like movies than games).

I agree the main protagonists are written really well, but the villains are such cliche and dull cookie cutter collection of cackling vindictive sadists it's impossible to take them seriously. And while they got combat way better than FFXV, they still give you very little strategic options and usually one clear strategy for every boss fight. And the AI allies do nothing but regular attack if you don't specifically command them to, making it so you kind of have to babysit them. They haven't figured out the things series like Tales, Ys and Star Ocean figured out over a decade ago for how to do real time RPG combat. Even Square games like Last Story and Nier got real time combat better.

Have you played the Trails series at all? It's turn based but has some of the best character development I've ever seen outside of Xenogears, and they made the turn based system extremely strategically varied, more so than Shin Megami Tensei/Persona games. And currently nine games and counting taking place in a two year span in the same world. The sort of series that demands player investment and gives huge payoffs.

The shortest answer is: yes.
The medium answer is: I am a UK vita owner. XD

In all seriousness though, I think a big reason why this remake is working for me is precisely because I have *started* so many of these JRPGs, but very few have managed to keep me going or keep me hooked. This one has the unfair advantage of being a remake of pretty much my first ever JRPG, the one all of the others had to live in the shadow of to some extent, even if my love for some of those matched or surpassed my love for the original. There’s always something there y’know?

 

[JirinPanthosa]

After my latest hour of gameplay I am going to have to revise my opinion of the game heavily downward.

I'm in Wall Market still. After all the walking around talking to people when I got there, and the tacked on colosseum battles, I was just eager to move on with the story. And it hits me with a quest that is nothing but 45 minutes of walking around talking to uninteresting people. Nothing is moving forward here, there's no character development, no real world building besides "Hey look we're in a seedy slum". I get through all that, and it's going to make me go through *another* big production just to get Cloud into the audition.

At least when they made the long walk to the second reactor unncessarily long, there was combat, and you were with interesting characters. This is maybe 3 hours of absolutely nothing, just for the sake of making me do stuff to make the game longer.

 

[jaime]

After my latest hour of gameplay I am going to have to revise my opinion of the game heavily downward.

I'm in Wall Market still. After all the walking around talking to people when I got there, and the tacked on colosseum battles, I was just eager to move on with the story. And it hits me with a quest that is nothing but 45 minutes of walking around talking to uninteresting people. Nothing is moving forward here, there's no character development, no real world building besides "Hey look we're in a seedy slum". I get through all that, and it's going to make me go through *another* big production just to get Cloud into the audition.

At least when they made the long walk to the second reactor unncessarily long, there was combat, and you were with interesting characters. This is maybe 3 hours of absolutely nothing, just for the sake of making me do stuff to make the game longer.

Just like mama used to make. That section introduces some of the new characters, and is a throwback to the stuff we liked in the original.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Just like mama used to make. That section introduces some of the new characters, and is a throwback to the stuff we liked in the original.

I like the better pacing, focus on main story and lack of useless busywork quests in the original.

 

[jaime]

I like the better pacing, focus on main story and lack of useless busywork quests in the original.

Not a find the turtle bar flyers and chocobo racing kind of guy huh?

I have to say I don’t like Kyrie much, but Johnny has been amusing. I wonder if they are P4G and MGS homages respectively.

 

[XCV330]

Not a find the turtle bar flyers and chocobo racing kind of guy huh?

I have to say I don’t like Kyrie much, but Johnny has been amusing. I wonder if they are P4G and MGS homages respectively.

Who needs Final Fantasy for that?

Bayak, having liberated Egypt from the Ptolemys and established the foundation of a new Creed, strides forth into dying of the light in the western desert across his manficient CHOCOBO?!?!?!

 

[jaime]

Who needs Final Fantasy for that?

Bayak, having liberated Egypt from the Ptolemys and established the foundation of a new Creed, strides forth into dying of the light in the western desert across his manficient CHOCOBO?!?!?!

I have never managed to get into those. It could be a hair thing.

I did nearly finish the vita entry, but then my save went on the futz. Might get round to the classical era ones soon.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Currently in chapter 10 and I think I'll break down different aspects of the game.

Combat: B-
It's fun, though has major camera issues with keeping enemies in frame. And sometimes it feels like your strategy is a bit too curated and there's not a lot of room for other approaches than the one the game wants. It also really needs a gambit system so you don't have to specifically order ever single attack from an ally that isn't a regular attack.

Worldbuilding: B+
They really flesh out Midgar more than the original. Though places like Wall Market take away the A. Places that clearly do not intersect with the writers personal experience so they basically make cartoon Mad Max. Also the lack of nuance in their portrayal of capitalism detracts from the impact of the criticism.

Protagonist writing: A
Antagonist writing: D-
The good guys are interesting, likable, nuanced. The bad guys are one dimensional cackling vindictive sociopaths and 80s action movie rejects.

Graphics/Cinematography: A+
Music: A
Obviously

Pacing: D-
The slowest, most unnecessarily padded game I've ever played. Three hour walks to places, 45 minute quests just walking back and forth talking to people. The five hours of the original game with modern graphics and more detail needed to be 15 hours, tops.

Overall: B/B-

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Pacing remains bad. I get through the sewers in chapter 10, and chapter 11 is another filler dungeon.

The ghost thing was kind of cool, but why does there need to be two hour plus dungeons back to back in between anything happening in the story?! Get this show on the road please.

 

[jaime]

I dunno...again, I think it’s a big push to recreating some of the experience of the original. All those sequences are there to some extent...and the ghosts one is interesting in view of what they *have* changed from the original. I got the same *sick of tunnels* feeling as you did, but also realised it was recreating an older experience with newer polish. It’s also there for people to grind their levels and materia up a bit.

As to the mad max stuff, wall market and twirling musta he villains? Well, again...it’s remaining true to its source text. At the same time...none of them are moustache twirling villains really. Apart from maybe the Don. If you pay attention to the dialogue, or know the previous history, you will see that. Especially as it’s practically directly addressed in some of the games end sequences. (This is very true of President Shinra. You’re gonna have to wait a few games for Rufus and Sephiroth. The Turks aren’t exactly villains either, but just how many of the villains are actually more grey won’t be clear for some time.)

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Heidegger and Reno are mustache twirlers. They can’t do a single evil thing with cackling and smirking. They clearly enjoy killing and causing pain.

I enjoy this game a lot when the story is happening. Just adding three hour walks and 45 minute walking back and forth quests just for fanwank, if you only liked the original and don’t think it’s the nostalgic GOAT, it’s a very poor experience.

I just got through chapter 12 and find the specters really interesting. They always seem to show up to prevent anyone from changing the story. Without them, a they might have stopped Rude from activating the plate drop, Jessie might have hit the chopper with her bomb instead of blowing herself up, and Wedge might have gotten out in time.

It’s almost like their sole purpose is to ensure the story is not changed. I have a theory there is some sort of time loop or something involved (Where the original game was the first loop and this is the second), Cloud and Aerith have subconscious memory of it, and the specters are trying to stop anything from changing.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

After really liking the story heavy parts in chapters 12 and 13, I really hate that they threw out nine quests that require you to walk all over the world through dungeons you already finished to do. It's a huge momentum killer, the way they tie quests to a handful of specific points in the game so you can't just do the ones you want at your leisure.

The Behemoth fight is also the first one that makes me really annoyed how dumb the AI controlling your other characters is. Tifa and Barret refuse to avoid damage from this thing. This hasn't been much of a problem till now cause enemies couldn't do enough damage quickly enough and the enemies tend to focus more on whoever you're controlling. But it's dumb they don't have basic AI commands every other ARPG has like 'Keep your distance'.

And the quests in this game are really badly designed too. There's no character development or world building in them. It's either "Go through this dungeon you already did to fight some monster", or "Go talk to this list of people" or "Go find these people". Like this game has random busywork bombs that just add time to the game and hold up the story.

I'm going to skip the quests and go straight to Shinra tower as soon as I'm satisfied I'm strong enough for how the game is balanced.