From what I can tell, it’s the same sort of compromise that Cloud likes both girls but Tifa wins because Aerith dies.
That and the belief is that Aerith’s GS date ( in both games ) is more in line with the plot thus it must be canon.
SPOILERS LTD Remake — It's like New Coke except ... no, it's exactly like New Coke
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That and the belief is that Aerith’s GS date ( in both games ) is more in line with the plot thus it must be canon.
Nancy
Pro Adventurer
Ah yes, I have seen that take. Just remembering it still makes me laugh lol
Have you seen the new take, apparently it's from someone in the chat during Briana's rebirth playthrough, about how Yorda from Costal Del Sol is a Tifa clone AGAIN when she looks nothing like Tifa but more like Lucia from First Soldier
imach0c0
Pro Adventurer
Apparently there are claims that state that Chapter 8 Aerith date = LA and Chapter 12 Aerith date = HA and it does not have to do with affinity %. Due to this, the claim is the "Aerith Date" is canon as there are 2 narratives routes at play with respect to the Aerith dates and the dream date outcomes. The Chapter 8 Aerith Date + LA dream date and Chapter 12 Aerith Date + HA dream date.
Below are the claims (Note: In both scenarios, it is implied that Cloud and Aerith have romantic feelings for each other)
Scenario 1 - Chapter 8 Aerith date + LA dream date outcome
In the Chapter 8 date, after the Jesse conversation, Aerith gives hints to Cloud in regards to her feelings towards him when she mentions how Cloud is dense when it comes to relationships. Although Cloud gets the hint, this is not enough information for him to decipher the true nature of Aerith's feelings towards him. So in the LA dream date, when Cloud says the "Nakama" line, Cloud is wondering if Aerith thinks of him as the Nakama. He does not look at her because he doesn't know how he feels about him and he may be concerned at getting rejected by her. Aerith seems to make a dejected expression and then says she likes Cloud and does't know what her "suki" means. She hugs Cloud and Cloud responds to the hug by hugging her back.
Scenario 2 - Chapter 12 Aerith date + HA dream date outcome
When Aerith confesses her feelings to Cloud in the gondola, its made clear to Cloud on where he stands with her. So when Aerith says "next time", Cloud's "mochiron" is a reciprocation of romantic feelings as he is open to going on more dates with her. He looks at Aerith because he is opening up his heart to her. Aerith seems to react positively and then says she likes Cloud and does't know what her "suki" means. She hugs Cloud and Cloud responds to the hug by hugging her back.
In both scenarios, Aerith not knowing her "suki" is the player having to "read between the lines" Aerith knows what the "suki" means to her. She does not openly confess her feelings because she knows she is about to die and doesn't want Cloud to get hurt.
Thoughts?
abzy1200
Pro Adventurer
The problem is that I think at this point, people will still hold either the "both girls" or "Cloud settled for Tifa" takes because, as of now, we're ending up at Advent Children. The dream date as well, I think, completely fucked the chances of those takes dissappearing from the casual view point of this series. The damage was done, they had a chance to clear up misconceptions, then they chose to have Cloud all smiley holding Aerith's hand on a date with her.
I saw a person post on twitter about Cloud clearing up misconceptions for Tifa's sake, but let's be honest, that's not happening. How would it? How would the devs get those two into that situation in part 3 where they have that kind of conversation and it doesn't come across as a failure to show and not tell on the devs' part?
Again, they knew exactly what conclusions would be drawn when they made the decision to have a shot of a room that belongs to Cloud and has a single bed in it and then refusing to show the room they actually sleep in. Case of Tifa gives a deliberate implication that they share a bed, so this couldn't have been an accident that slipped through the cracks because they don't necessarily view the story through the same lens as some people in this fandom might.
Showing two people share a bed is usually a narrative shorthand for "they're together" and the opposite is usually true, that two people not sharing a bed means they aren't.
It's not even, though. Ask anybody about the situation and they'll immediately come out with disingenuous takes like "both girls", only takes one google search to see everybody saying it.
I'm pretty sure there's an ultimania page that specifies that the Tifa, Yuffie, and Barret dates are "deviations", and put off to the side of the page.
But to use that in an argument you'd have to concede that the HA UTH is canon, because I'm pretty sure the same "deviation" treatment is given to the LA.
I swear they were redder in Remake. In renders and CG cutscenes in Rebirth her eyes are quite red, but her actual in-game model has very brown eyes. Very annoying Square please stop getting rid of Tifa's eye colour.
That's something else with the Remake project, anyone else feel like Cloud's eyes are really green? Like, there's blue in there but it feels like he has green eyes with a hint of blue instead of the other way around. I almost have to adjust my eyes to see the blue a lot of the time because the blue is so dull compared to the green.
Like!? I can't be crazy, the blue is so watered down in comparison to even his younger self in the re;trilogy, right?
That would make sense but he puts it back on in Dirge of Cerberus, does he not?
Too little, too late honestly. They made the fuck up again of having Cloud being appreciative towards his family in an almost completely unrelated novel where Cloud and gang make a cameo. This really should have been at the end of ACC. Or at the very least him confirming to Tifa that they are a family. Instead, to the average viewer, the film ends with Cloud and Tifa having had a whole one conversation at the start of the film, them not sharing a bed, Cloud having left Tifa for Aerith, and then Tifa having been grouped with the rest of AVALANCHE throughout the film as if her role in the film is as small as theirs. IIRC She was basically shelved for the majority of the film. ACC still doesn't do Tifa or her relationship with Cloud justice in the slightest, the average take on Advent Children makes this obvious.
Surely there had to be at least one person in the writers room who said "uh guys, this isn't conveying what you want it to even after the adjustments made in ACC, might need a little bit more context from CoT"
I want to have a word with any liar who thinks a human being confesses their feelings by saying "I don't know if I like you or love you" followed by "at least now I know where we stand" if it apparently went well.
Ryushikaze
Deus Admiral Parsimonious, PHD, DDS, MD, JD, OBE
- AKA
- Tim, Ryu
You literally can't avoid changing them. While not all of the dialogue choices that change the values are mandatory, a vast preponderance are.
Honestly I think Aerith might have some bonus float points to help her not get totally tanked from screwing up pushing barrels in the church escape.
Of course not. They're cowards at heart.
Almost like she was the lover interest the entire time, the fiend.All this hate and vitriol for Tifa, because she kissed the main character...
None of the dates are "in line with" the plot, though. All of them are a deliberate step away from "the plot." to have a character interaction. And in Rebirth all of them are intended to be true depictions of what Cloud would do in the situation. So IF Yuffie or IF Red XIII etc. This is why the claims of "just fanservice" abound, because admitting there's character substance to Tifa's date (and of course it's only Tifa's date, because rules for thee but not for me) would be admitting defeat again.
In that she's got dark hair?Ah yes, I have seen that take. Just remembering it still makes me laugh lol
Have you seen the new take, apparently it's from someone in the chat during Briana's rebirth playthrough, about how Yorda from Costal Del Sol is a Tifa clone AGAIN when she looks nothing like Tifa but more like Lucia from First Soldier
Honestly she looks more like Yuffie but not really.
But if it's based on character choices, doesn't that make it.... OPTIONAL?
Both scenarios are cart before the horse, and both scenarios make no sense from Aerith's perspective. It's her last chance to confess, she has literally bent time and space to confess, and she DOES confess, only to be vague and wishy washy to not hurt Cloud? So why confess in the first place? No, Aerith did the dream date to pass on the Materia and for Closure. And like a lot of her interactions with Cloud, she's still subconsciously using him to stand in for Zack, but even this time her subconscious is telling her she's with the wrong man, and even her conscious conscious gets it at the end.
Sacky
Pro Adventurer
- AKA
- SackyBoy
How they are trying to say the Date dialogue has nothing to do with affinity, when to get the Aeirth dates you need high affinity is just not logical. Cloud obviously can't work out Aeriths feelings towards him because not even Aerith knows XD. They can try twist that scene anyway they want but the whole dream date shows choices are a illusion and it always ends with Cloud saying you are being weird, and then the hug and don't blame yourself, while we know a Zack reunion is happening next game. Plot wise there is no reason to have Aeriths feelings for Cloud be important anymore. Unless it's for Zack and Aerith to talk about in a reunion.
Ryeleigh
Pro Adventurer
- AKA
- Rye
Zack, lol.
To be honest, I simply refuse to think that this game, which has bigger themes than that, is an average high school romance drama. Like, "Aerith and Cloud like each other romantically, Cloud and Tifa like each other romantically, Aerith and Zack like each other romantically". I'm sorry, I don't like that level of shenanigans even in my average high school romance drama, lol.
Also, to me, Cloud just looked troubled when Aerith confessed to him, kind of. I mean, "liking and liking" isn't exactly a strong confession.
LunarTarotGirl
Pro Adventurer
- AKA
- Lunarae
Can you clarify if you mean OG or Rebirth dates?
Because for OG I don't believe this to be true at all. Both girls dates in OG give information to the player that is definitely in line with the plot? Aerith's talk of how she sees Zack in Cloud and her "I want to meet you" is a huge hint of what is happening with him. You don't get that information literally anywhere else until that point and it's a huge part of her own story arc too.
And Tifa's is about how she notices something is wrong with Cloud another hint at why we see her taking a step back and him not being himself? We see her trying to speak up about it but get interrupted, (something she is blamed for not doing ironically being not telling Cloud the truth and here we see her try). Once again it's part of her story arc too.
Both of these are 100% in line with the plot. They're hints to the internal plot. And without them it feels like there's a huge hole in the story honestly.
I can say maybe the Barrett and Yuffie dates in OG not so much? But for OG Aerith and Tifa both I say they both are definitely plot related.
The way Nomura describes it too is you're supposed to eventually see all the dates through replaying. So I think that's the answer. They're all intended to be viewed, in order of your preference but still. I would never call them just fanservice myself for this alone.
Note: I don't believe this for Rebirth either as both Tifa's and Aerith's continue plot points for stuff literally brought up in the main story Gongaga and Nibelhiem and again are the only place you'd get information that they did speak about Zack after Cloud remembered him...but apparently the devs do. So if they say so.
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Maidenofwar
They/Them
From my (admittedly limited) testing so far it does indeed seem to be the case, my old chapter 13 file where I had Tifa c8, and Cait Sith and guys, I mean, why not c14, redo c8 with Aerith at 38% affinity, get her as c8 date, c14, yeah why not. So DA (dated Aerith) and DDA (didn't date Aerith) is maybe another way of putting it.
Eerie
Fire and Blood
That’s not true, we do have Tifa’s line wondering if Cloud is really himself in Cosmo Canyon. So this plot point is also asked by Tifa even before Aerith’s date.
I fully believe that Tifa’s date is about confessing her feelings for Cloud, and not about Cloud’s identity troubles. This is why it’s her date that is interrupted by the fireworks, because it’s the romantic date. It’s also why it’s been furthered in Rebirth with the CT kiss: it’s the true romance of the game.
LunarTarotGirl
Pro Adventurer
- AKA
- Lunarae
I don't think Tifa wondering if Cloud is himself is the same as what I'm saying. Yes it shows something's wrong with Cloud, he isn't himself.
But this part I'm referring to is about why Aerith is acting the way she is because she's linking him to Zack. It gives information about the connection between Cloud and Zack specifically. In the beginning Aerith says stuff like oh he reminds her of him but this is basically I saw you as him. Which begs the question why would there be any similarities between these two. It's definitely plot aligned and if you don't see it the Zack reveal is a bit more out of left field. Especially since Gongaga and the scene in the basement was also optional/or missing back then.
Tifa bringing up about Cloud not being himself is one part of this puzzle. Aerith talking about Zack reminding her of him, of similarities being the other part. Just as crucial.
OG has a lot of conversations we can skip and optional content but a lot of it are important pieces of information regardless.
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I think Tifa's date is about both. Like in Rebirth the topics brought up are again the mystery of Zack and then she confesses in the end of it. I don't think her Rebirth date is a coincidence and it seems like it shows what would have happened had she finished her sentences instead of being a full on deviation. Here she definitely gets to talk more about her feelings and gets a kiss. In OG she barely got a word out. But in both cases she basically needed to have a conversation with Cloud a plot aligned one that we just never see her have if we don't see her date. With it also establishes Tifa feels the same about Cloud which matches with the LS scene too.
And even if it's only about confessing that's still plot relevant. It ties to the later parts of the game.
My point being both these dates are definitely plot relevant. I just don't agree with the notion anything here is fanservice even if the devs imply it.
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Ryushikaze
Deus Admiral Parsimonious, PHD, DDS, MD, JD, OBE
- AKA
- Tim, Ryu
So when I said "step away from the plot" I mean the big overarcing plot, and by character interaction I mean "give us information about Cloud and his companion" which is absolutely plot related but is not yet "the plot" as it were. And this is true for both OG and Rebirth, I think. The GS dates are deliberately there so the characters and the player can relax before shit gets serious and we can get character interactions that we can cogitate over until they become plot relevant.
I'd say that the Rebirth dates are overall more plot relevant than the OG ones, as each one of them contains a hidden seed in the character moments.
Perhaps it might help to think of the dates as little bonus slices of lore outside of strict continuity? All of them MATTER, but none of them definitively happened. All of them are little potential worlds in slices of the lifestream like the EC special episodes.
And that got you Mochiron or Nakama, to be clear? I'm guessing mochiron, which would give us a mochiron result for having a single date. I'm guessing you don't have the affinity to get the other ch12 dates even on a clear file, but it would be interesting to test some other variations at low affection as well as high. Possible variations of Aerith date include YN, YY, NY, NN, and I'm curious if it's matter of "If date >=1" or a more complex and/or situation.
None of it is fanservice, and I apologize if I gave the idea that it was. I don't think the devs see it as pure fanservice either. They clearly want all of them to be seen and understood, they just don't want you worrying about which one actually happened because that's not relevant to the narrative. What Cloud and his companions do on the dates is important, not which of them he definitely spent the night with.
Nancy
Pro Adventurer
Yep, that's the one. Short dark hair with a cap on.
Ryushikaze
Deus Admiral Parsimonious, PHD, DDS, MD, JD, OBE
- AKA
- Tim, Ryu
So, under what logic is she a "Tifa Clone" exactly? And just as importantly, what is her being a Tifa clone supposed to mean?
They’re fanservice to the extent that they take the opportunity to lovingly craft each date to be sweet, funny, informative, or some combination of the three. I’d call it that under the most glowing of terms vs it being empty as most people have come to use it.
The GS dates strike me as a “in case you missed the hints sprinkled throughout, here’s the vibe check on Cloud and his companion up to this point in the story” which is why they are interchangeable. Nothing is said or done that breaks the flow of the story, yes even a kiss between two characters because shit hits the fan and doesn’t even out until… after Cloud is back back.
The GS dates strike me as a “in case you missed the hints sprinkled throughout, here’s the vibe check on Cloud and his companion up to this point in the story” which is why they are interchangeable. Nothing is said or done that breaks the flow of the story, yes even a kiss between two characters because shit hits the fan and doesn’t even out until… after Cloud is back back.
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Nancy
Pro Adventurer
Tifa clone = Tifa look alike
Also I don't think the people claiming Yorda is a Tifa clone/look alike even have a reason behind it. Just like when they claim to say Elena look like Tifa when that isn't even close
Eerie
Fire and Blood
Oh I'm sorry, I misunderstood you, I thought you were talking about Aerith mentioning Cloud's identity troubles (because that's always what's mentioned to say it's the canon route). I really should sleep early tonight x'D
nars305
🎵 I am so, so bored 🎶
I see Rebirth as the building of everyone’s bonds and that’s why each date is important. They are all on this quest to save the planet, all broken people with horrible pasts. It’s the “good ole times” or as good as they could get.
I like to think everything will make sense and be more cohesive when the third part caps it off. I say that because I have a new respect for Remake AFTER Rebirth where at first I didn’t care much about it.
Ryushikaze
Deus Admiral Parsimonious, PHD, DDS, MD, JD, OBE
- AKA
- Tim, Ryu
Yeah, Elena looks nothing like Tifa. I honestly don't know why it matters or even came up in the first place.
Changing topics a bit, I want to talk about seeing a Clerith on twitter gushing about the Kimi ni Todoke anime getting a third season. I bring this up because if you all remember, that was the manga I posted a page of where the main heroine kisses her love interest during a gondola ride. I bring this up because I am rather certain the Clerith in question was also pushing the various kiss cope arguments, and I really wonder if seeing a gondola kiss in another show might make her reflect.
It also makes me wonder what these people have against Tifa when Sawako and Tifa are extremely alike- though Sawako's foibles are more humorous given she's the viewpoint character.
(I lied. It doesn't make me wonder. I know what they have against Tifa. It's the figure.)
The level of character assassination to try and downplay a simple kiss ( that in some cases, they were sure was going to CA ) is fascinating. Doesn’t matter that it ruins these characters we’re supposed be rooting for, nope victory at any cost.
Nancy
Pro Adventurer
Just wait until the game comes out in PC they will go gogo gaga over modding them over the kiss scene and go 'OMG ITS SO ROMANTIC'
No shit sherlock
abzy1200
Pro Adventurer
Just wait until the game comes out in PC they will go gogo gaga over modding them over the kiss scene and go 'OMG ITS SO ROMANTIC'
Just thought I'd leave this here. Just thought it was funny
Incredible how they insist a scene being optional means it doesn't matter when they themselves were gassing up their date because they thought they were getting one. But Aerith's is the canon one, of course.
Rebirth was such a Clerith fest that it caused many a Clerith to dissappear from the ff7 fandom. But how could that be?
Honestly, at this point we're at a point of no return, that even if part 3 is clear, we'll still have to deal with terrible takes.
Going back to what I said a while ago about Cloud's feelings for Aerith and how I couldn't see a world where Cloud confirming otherwise to Tifa wouldn't come across as some sort of formality, I think that if they did a "it's always been you" thingy during the Lifestream, around the moment Cloud tells her that he wanted to be noticed by her it might slot in nicely.
Nancy
Pro Adventurer
Lmao they don't care about CT at all but crying and screaming over CA then why don't they do that instead but always downplaying CT kiss 24/7 of their life
I will believe them they don't care about CT when I see pigs fly
eleamaya
Pro Adventurer
There's one more hilarious tweet I saw that they said "If Clerith's kiss happened, Clotis would say it's rebound kiss" or something like that.
Really? I'm tired 24/7 of them keep talking about Marlene sinking Zerith and Zack bless Clerith. Also Clotis don't help because they defend the ship BUT hate Aerith. So I'm exhausted of another 24/7 of them keep saying Zerith is just Clotis in disguise, spare ship, Zeriths dont'c care of Aerith, they're all Zack-fanboy, etc.
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I think some old fans who maybe didn’t care for the compilation just don’t want any part of it influencing the original game. I get it, especially since the compilation is a mixed bag in terms of quality.
Crisis Core, however, took those little hints about Aerith and made them much more plain to see. Zack is a whole character now, and that’s the true nail in the coffin imo. So much of his story with Aerith is a precursor to her time with Cloud, and that was a deliberate choice. Much like Remake, there are things they could have done to bolster Cloud and Aerith but the deliberately chose to do things that delude it.
I like Zerith because it seamlessly lets two tragic characters ( both whom I’ve grown to like in their Remake iterations ) have a path to a happier ending, even if they both are dead in the end because in FF7, death doesn’t have to be THE end.