SPOILERS LTD Remake — It's like New Coke except ... no, it's exactly like New Coke

[Ryushikaze]

I'm just so tired of the LTD at this point I'm finding it hard to care about either pairing. What doesn't sit well with me about "Cloud developing romantic feelings for Aerith and Tifa" is the fact that the story of ff7 happens within the span of 40 days. If Cloud loved Aerith--which is totally possible, I'm not denying this possibility--he was able to move on awfully quick after Aerith's death...

The problem with the highwind scene is regardless of how many affection points you have accumulated up until that point, Cloud stays with Tifa.

Because the Affection points don't represent anything to do with Cloud. They represent how the four feel about him, not how he feels about them.

Conversely, both girls falling in love also cheapens the story. The culmination of FFVII is the reveal that Cloud isn't a legendary 1st class soldier, but essentially just some guy. Cloud isn't the classical hero, that was Zack, Cloud was just a weak flawed human who happened to step up when he needed to because of his feelings for Tifa.

I never liked Sephiroths obsession with Cloud since that cheapened this story arc a bit by making the world revolve around Cloud a bit too much when the brilliance of the OG FFVII is that Cloud was actually relatively unimportant. While he was obsessed with Sephiroth, Sephiroth (jenova) didn't even recognize him when they first met on the boat. I thought this was brilliant, the game sets up this idea in your head of this legendary rivalry, only for you to discover that really this was completely one-sided. Id have preferred it had they leaned into that more and make Zack Sephiroths rival instead of Cloud, rather than Cloud being Sephiroths nemesis. Sephiroth says "I am your everything", but these days it really feels like the reverse.

Sephiroth being fixated with Cloud was part of the OG as well, though. He was fucking pissed at the nobody who struck him down right before he could begin his reign of conquest. He 'didn't recognize' Cloud because he was explicitly gaslighting him to tear him down.

Both girls (And jesse) falling in love with Cloud suffers from the same problem and would just make this worse, it makes Cloud the traditional boring center of the universe type MC who all girls adore, even above the man they'd been pining over for 5 years. Sure, have Jesse have a crush on Soldier persona Cloud, that makes sense. Sure, have Aerith fall in love with the version of Cloud that reminds her of Zack, that's fine. But don't make it so that Aerith just genuinely loves the real Cloud she's never met to the point that she'd just much rather have his gloomy ass after a week than Zack.

That is not fine, that is pathetic wish fulfillment writing and a stereotypical sexual power fantasy.

I too have joined the jaded camp, although the fandom has more to do with that rather than the actual characters at this point. The misconceptions of many fans being presented as facts is what gets me.

The most common example is the claim that Cloud's love for both girls is equal. The girls are equally important---Cloud's love for them is  not.

From my observations, it's usually because of this argument:
It's only because Aerith died that Cloud chose Tifa. Had Aerith lived, she would have had just as much a chance as Tifa. After the lifestream scene and Cloud reverts back to himself, why would he choose Aerith over the girl he has adored for most of his life? The one who snapped him out of his mako-induced state in Midgar by just seeing her face? The one who helped piece him back together when he had no idea who he was?

Saying his love is equal for them both shows a misunderstanding of the characters, their arcs, and the story itself. This "everything-is-equal because square can't alienate fans" argument is ridiculous.

I've been saying for a very long time now that despite this being a love triangle, we should not take that any point of the triangle is actually in love with the other, explicitly because several Cloud has a fragmented Psyche, Aerith is trying to distract herself from her grief of Zack by trying to move on with Cloud and pointedly ignoring that Cloud is trying to pretend to be.

Let me beat the dead horse again by saying "Disc 1 is a shell game." Cloud is lying to himself and everyone else about who he is, Aerith is lying to herself about Zack and Cloud, Sephiroth is lying to Cloud, Tifa isn't speaking up out of fear of losing Cloud, and the writers are loving it.

 

[null]

Saying his love is equal for them both shows a misunderstanding of the characters, their arcs, and the story itself. This "everything-is-equal because square can't alienate fans" argument is ridiculous.

Yeah (rebirth trailer) Zack holding Aerith and brushing her cheek is identical to Cloud holding Tifa in Crisis Core.

Like, we've had parallels drawn before but not like this. The parallels are now jumping off the page screaming war cries. The parallels are now slapping us to and fro.

The parallels do not fear our puny alienation. The parallels say: go ahead, make your choices players. In the end we'll see who's John Wick.

Tifa is more than a love story, she is more than Cloud.

To be honest, I used to complain about this a lot. Tifa was kind of a two-headed character with Cloud in the OG. We'd get flashes of what she's like when Cloud's not around, but 95% of the time she was 100% pre-occupied with him. She had her Big Damn Hero opportunity to lead the team - cool, we get to be Tifa now! - and then she threw it overboard to sob in Cloud's lap. Laaame.

I'm sure other fans felt likewise and the devs caught wind of the feedback, because Remake is doing a great job finding Tifa (and the others) things to do apart from Cloud. Feels more like an ensemble this time around. Plus there's the prequel novella telling us what Tifa was doing all those years. Much more satisfying imo.

 

[frosty]

Both girls (And jesse) falling in love with Cloud suffers from the same problem and would just make this worse, it makes Cloud the traditional boring center of the universe type MC who all girls adore, even above the man they'd been pining over for 5 years.

Sure, have Jesse have a crush on Soldier persona Cloud, that makes sense. Sure, have Aerith fall in love with the version of Cloud that reminds her of Zack, that's fine.

But don't make it so that Aerith just genuinely loves the real Cloud she's never met to the point that she'd just much rather have his gloomy ass after a week than Zack.

But in 1997 Cloud/Player WAS the blank slate, boring center of the universe main character where all the girls available fell in love with him.

I feel Remake/Rebirth IS trying to balance what is true to the essence of OG (romance all the girls, date mechanics, sexist jokes, steal women's panties yaddayadda) but they are trying to build in modern relevance and already are make little tweaks, like how Jessie "loves" Cloud like in OG, but in Remake you're explicitly told she doesn't take it seriously. Only that one idiot on the internet can't see this.

Die hard Clotis will deny OG Cloud/Aerith were written to be romantic, but they were. The LTD is the basis of FF7. I think SE has already built up that anyone that has a modicum of media literacy will know Aerith will not "love Cloud more than Zack and Zack is going to be cucked" but SE will pay homage to the OG spirit of a budding romance between Cloud and Aerith before she died.

And I think the correct read for Aerith is Zack is going to be depicted as her one big love, the reason for her attraction to Cloud, but she develops a real affection for Cloud, DESPITE his real self being an awkward loser with no game . I don't see how this interpretation is "Cloud is the boring cool Main Character that all the women adore"

And at this point of time, I feel SE is already gearing Cloud/Tifa up to be one of their biggest, greatest romances. It's inevitable by part 3, despite whatever wailing and threats against creators that happens

Everything else is going to be fans just holding on to their own interpretations imho

 

[eleamaya]

Tbh, at first I expect the heroine portion was like this:
Remake: balance
Rebirth: Aerith
Re-???: Tifa

But since the latest interview also state that Rebirth will give the two equal onscreen, I think it's also connected to this Nomura's interview


Btw, before being familiar with FF7, I read this 90s shounen manga and later I found a similarity about the MC who copies his mentor mannerism, struggling to be his legacy, and the ex-girlfriend who copes her sadness through him. They aren't end up together and it's just a small portion of the romance in the story. I detail it here: https://www.tumblr.com/eleamaya/742646034177605632

 

[Maidenofwar]

Yeah, because in Rebirth, they already mention about Cloud and Tifa that

Spoiler

they were not actually childhood friends/truly close as kids, so they seem to have moved some of the truths later in OG to Rebirth already

I prefer this to be honest because

Spoiler

the whole point is they were not good friends/childhood sweethearts but only got to know each other, truly know each other through the journey of FFVII and beyond, it was more than childhood fantasies and idealised versions of people they didn't really know

 

[Stiggie]

Tbh, at first I expect the heroine portion was like this:
Remake: balance
Rebirth: Aerith
Re-???: Tifa

I assumed the same, since if there is a balance in rebirth, then I have no idea how to maintain that in the third trilogy when we don't have Aerith.
And if she sticks around in the other universe or in the lifestream or something in a similar amount as Tifa is present in the world of the living then I feel that would take away from the feeling of loss.

 

[null]

I think we're getting Aerith and Zack by the barrelful in part 3. The sense of loss will be reduced to the characters experiencing it rather than the players.

 

[birbcode]

Because the Affection points don't represent anything to do with Cloud. They represent how the four feel about him, not how he feels about them.

That's precisely my point, because if Cloud loved Aerith, by the time we get to the highwind scene it's quite clear he's moved on to Tifa (or should I say moved back to Tifa lol). It's part of the reason why I'm not particularly fond of the idea that "Cloud loved both girls."

 

[Edley]

Yeah, because in Rebirth, they already mention about Cloud and Tifa that

Spoiler

they were not actually childhood friends/truly close as kids, so they seem to have moved some of the truths later in OG to Rebirth already

I prefer this to be honest because

Spoiler

the whole point is they were not good friends/childhood sweethearts but only got to know each other, truly know each other through the journey of FFVII and beyond, it was more than childhood fantasies and idealised versions of people they didn't really know

Nojima's Novella provides context:

Spoiler

The novella informs us of Tyler, Lester, an Emilio who along with Tifa get dubbed 'The Four Fiends' because they were inseparable as kids. Cloud is dubbed 'the weirdo' and 'a menace to society' for getting in fights and general anti-social behavior. We can put two and two together and infer that young Cloud distanced himself when young Tifa started spending time with the other boys. Later on, Tifa and Cloud fall off Mt. Nibel and the other boys blame Cloud by falsely accusing him of goading Tifa into danger. Cloud doesn't deny the accusations as he felt responsible for Tifa almost dying.

 

[billy22]

Tbh I'd rather not have another LTD thread to police, so I'm going to to say discuss as normal but tag any Rebirth leaks/ spoilers until the game has been out for like a month.

This topic is going to blow up just days after it releases. It would be pretty annoying having to click through 50+ pages of

Spoiler: covered text

spoiler covered text.

So perhaps it would be better to just put a warning on release day that this topic contains Rebirth spoilers, and that people should stay away until they finish that game?

 

[Yumelinh]

The fun has begun!

Anyways, I'm pretty sure I've said this before somewhere around here, but personally, I believe the LTD is still alive not because SE has never confirmed a pairing (because they did), but because we don't know for a fact what Cloud's feelings for Aerith in OG are, and since it has never been officially stated, it leaves room for people to interpret it either as affection/attraction or just simply... love.

Cloud's feelings for Tifa are a completely different matter. We know for a fact what the nature of it is and that it runs as deep as Tifa's feelings for him. There's not much room for interpretations here.

So, now that I think of it, the ambiguity of the LTD doesn't lie too much in who Cloud loves or ends up with (we know the answer for that), but in the nature of Cloud's feelings for Aerith at the time they spent together. Because in OG, if you favored Tifa in your playthrough during the first disc, you might end up thinking that Cloud’s feelings for Aerith were just a small crush, but if you favored Aerith instead, then you may end up thinking it was something stronger than that.

Remake seems to be less likely to play it in the same way as before. They seem to be setting boundaries at what is left up to interpretation and what is not, so maybe we will get a definitive answer to that this time around (or maybe they will feed this confusion even more this time, who knows...).

 

[Rose Alive]

So, now that I think of it, the ambiguity of the LTD doesn't lie too much in who Cloud loves or ends up with (we know the answer for that), but in the nature of Cloud's feelings for Aerith at the time they spent together.

I hope Rebirth clears up how Cloud feels toward Aerith instead of muddying the waters even more. Perhaps we won't get this insight until the Lifestream scene though.

If Rebirth leans too hard toward Cloud/Aerith, it'll confuse the Zack/Aerith narrative they appear to be pushing. Let's assume Aerith dies like the OG. Damaged psyche or not, if you have a lot of Cloud/Aerith in Rebirth, all it will do is fuel the belief that Cloud settles for Tifa and that she "wins" by default.

Remake did a good job of showing that he loves Tifa. Giving her the flower, the stars reflecting in his eyes at Aerith's house, and even Aerith's resolution scene where she tells him that his feelings for her, if he has them, are not real.

And maybe Aerith's resolution scene is the only confirmation we're going to get. But of course people are twisting that scene to fit the narrative they want.

 

[Maidenofwar]

To me, it's not about twisting, I just genuinely did not see the Remake or Aerith's resolution that way is all, and Ì really enjoyed c/a in Remake

 

[Yumelinh]

I hope Rebirth clears up how Cloud feels toward Aerith instead of muddying the waters even more. Perhaps we won't get this insight until the Lifestream scene though.

If Rebirth leans too hard toward Cloud/Aerith, it'll confuse the Zack/Aerith narrative they appear to be pushing. Let's assume Aerith dies like the OG. Damaged psyche or not, if you have a lot of Cloud/Aerith in Rebirth, all it will do is fuel the belief that Cloud settles for Tifa and that she "wins" by default.

Remake did a good job of showing that he loves Tifa. Giving her the flower, the stars reflecting in his eyes at Aerith's house, and even Aerith's resolution scene where she tells him that his feelings for her, if he has them, are not real.

And maybe Aerith's resolution scene is the only confirmation we're going to get. But of course people are twisting that scene to fit the narrative they want.

Yeah, that's why I've been looking at the spoilers a little doubtfully because I truly don't believe SE will end the LTD as of now, but will probably still lean into the intended direction in some way or another.

As for Remake, while I don't think Cloud was showcasing his love for Tifa per se (I don't think he's even aware of his feelings for her in this moment due to his mind being all over the place), I believe what they did in Remake with Cloud and Tifa is that, even though Part 1 Cloud is still not fully himself, his care for Tifa shines through. Even though this Cloud isn't aware that he was in love with her, he just KNOWS she's important, and their relationship develops from that. I guess that's why it works so well even though Cloud is kinda broken at the moment, because they have a past before Cloud becomes the mess he is and their relationship is probably one of the very few moments where Cloud is confronted with his true memories.

That said, I don't mean it in the way that everything that Cloud felt before the lifestream wasn't true or we would need to discard all the relationships he developed throughout that part of his life, but rather that it's all very, very confusing and lacking full context.

Regarding Aerith's resolution, we discussed it extensively in the past, and many believe she was meaning that in a way that he shouldn't fall in love with her because she was going to die. Personally, I believe the word used i.e 'real' is very telling that it wasn't referring to her death in itself but rather Cloud's state of mind, and maybe Rebirth will give us more insight into it and which one of the interpretations is more correct ( if any).

 

[KindOfBlue]

My impression of what’s happening between Cloud and Aerith in the remake goes right back to what was said about the OG:

Nojima: As a motif for them, Tifa is “the childhood friend who’s been with you since nursery school”, and Aerith is “the girl who transfers school mid-term and quickly leaves for another school.” Since she doesn’t have many scenes, you’ve got to make it so that the transfer student has a big impact. That was what I thought.

That’s why everything about Cloud and Aerith is presented in such an idealized way, like something out of a Disney movie. The devs want the audience to fall in love with the idea of Cloud and Aerith as a couple so that the impact of her death hurts even more when they DON’T end up together. The problem is that shippers get so caught up in all the glitz and glamour of the shipteasing that the punchline goes over their heads and they don’t realize the story significance of their emotions being played with like a fiddle.

So when Aerith directly tells Cloud (the audience) that falling in love with her is pointless/not real, it’s almost to say “fall in love with me if you’d like, but it won’t end well for you.” If the leak about the Gold Saucer date is true (“I told you not to fall in love with me” or something) then that only cements this further.

Both sets of shippers share the same problem of thinking Cloud’s development with one girl pits that relationship against his relationship with the other. Whether he “loves” them both or one over the other is just another goalpost for shippers to argue over. At this point, I regard any interpretation of the story that ignores or directly contradicts the words of the devs as strictly headcanon, “death of the author” be damned.

 

[null]

Death of the Author is a load of crap anyway imo. Any story can be twisted to mean anything with that excuse.

It's more like the author had a child. In many ways the author knows their own child better than anyone, but the author can't interact with it the same way the audience does. The audience knows a side of that child the author will never see.

 

[roku]

Death of the Author means only the text itself matters. It means you can ignore anything outside the text(interviews for example) but not the text itself.

 

[KindOfBlue]

Death of the Author means only the text itself matters. It means you can ignore anything outside the text(interviews for example) but not the text itself.

The philosophy of death of the author extends to any supplementary information from the author, be it their background or any commentary they’ve made on their own work. Proponents of death of the author argue that only the audience’s interpretation of the material matters.

 

[Ryushikaze]

The philosophy of death of the author extends to any supplementary information from the author, be it their background or any commentary they’ve made on their own work. Proponents of death of the author argue that only the audience’s interpretation of the material matters.

And that is a stupid way to approach a work. Every creator has a vision and a purpose for their work. Ignoring that idea is stupid. You can evaluate how well they execute that (You can absolutely create a work that exemplifies literally the opposite of your intention) but ignoring it is folly.

 

[KindOfBlue]

And that is a stupid way to approach a work. Every creator has a vision and a purpose for their work. Ignoring that idea is stupid. You can evaluate how well they execute that (You can absolutely create a work that exemplifies literally the opposite of your intention) but ignoring it is folly.

Agreed. Of course, there’s no way to police how other people interpret art, nor would I want there to be. I think what mainly rubs me the wrong way is when people try to take their own interpretations and pass them off as the creators’ intent so as to make their own view the “correct” one.

In the most extreme cases, you get a disgruntled fan who’s so frustrated that the creators won’t validate his interpretation that he pretends to hire yakuza to kill them…

 

[Makoeyes987]

....

We might need to pack this thread up.

ROTFL, this might be a wrap. I don't even know what to say...

 

[Rose Alive]

....

We might need to pack this thread up.

ROTFL, this might be a wrap. I don't even know what to say...

I say it's about time!

Frankly I'm relieved it was so blatant. You gotta hit these people over the head; you can't be subtle. All I ever wanted to know was did Cloud have feelings for Aerith? And I  finally have my answer.

 

[Yumelinh]

I'm a cautious woman, so I'll wait for the last game to call it a wrap, but I must admit... I wasn't expecting SE to be this direct not even in the 3rd game, let alone in the 2nd one

 

[null]

Welp. The game's in the refrigerator, the door's closed, the light's out, the eggs are cooling, the butter's getting hard and the jello's jiggling.

… is what I’d like to say but we got another full game y’all, and we ain’t even started this one!

You’re the champs, you’ve all been here before. Until that buzzer goes off, and they rope off that court, and wheel out that trophy, and sell those championship T shirts… we bros will be right here squatting with honor.

 

[Rose Alive]

we bros will be right here squatting with honor.

Oh no. Spent way too much time in that thread of chaos and now you're a Zackbro.