SPOILERS FFVII:R Chapter 18 Spoiler Discussion

[Russell]

Not to defend the scene itself, but I don't think that really has bearing on Aerith's death. The point of that scene seemed mostly to cement what the whispers were doing - protecting the timeline. If anything calls her death into question, it's that we killed the whispers. But that fact also implies that Sephiroth could kill anyone else, too, I guess.

That's a fair point, it just bothers me.
I feel Seph as 'The Villian' is devalued if whoever he kills springs back to life moments later, even if there are special reasons for it.

 

[Lord Noctis]

Yeah, I'm about 100% sure the whispers won't show up again. Killing them off was kinda the whole point of of Chapter 18 as well as Sephiroth's whole plan throughout the game, and he succeeded. The whispers are dead and no longer able to effect the outcome of events.

Hence Sephiroth's line "Careful now, that which lies ahead does not yet exist."

 

[ForceStealer]

Which of course put me in the awkward position of not liking the Whispers themselves, but aligning with their motive

 

[Lord Noctis]

Which of course put me in the awkward position of not liking the Whispers themselves, but I agreed with their motive

For me personally, whether or not I agree with the whispers motive is going to depend entirely on what Nomura and co do with their newfound, boundless, terrifying freedom

 

[Wol]

But we still fight a Sephiroth "made" of whispers even though the big guy was defeated.

Maybe those whispers materializing Sephiroth were the last ones...

 

[Lord Noctis]

But we still fight a Sephiroth "made" of whispers even though the big guy was defeated.

Maybe those whispers materializing Sephiroth were the last ones...

Yeah, basically. With the big guy dead we see Sephiroth absorb the remaining whispers, essentially gainning power over fate, hence how he can just conjure meteor and such despite not having the Black Materia at this stage.

Thus when Cloud slams his sword directly into Sephiroth's face, the whispers are destroyed, hence the giant flash of light and the fact that we subsequently see all of the whispers vanish from Zack's battle.

Whether Sephiroth specifically intended to let Cloud kill his whisper body from the start, or simply fell back on that as the battle loosened his control over the whispers is unclear. But either way, the end result is the same. Fate is dead, and Sephiroth is smug as shit.

 

[Russell]

For me personally, whether or not I agree with the whispers motive is going to depend entirely on what Nomura and co do with their newfound, boundless, terrifying freedom

Yeah that sums it up for me. A wait and see approach; Time will tell.

I was hoping that the remake would settle the question of 'Will it be good?"
'Was this remake good?' kinda depends on where it goes from here.

Part one was, but...
Say there are three parts and the next two are bad; the whole trilogy (and therefore the whole remake) will be remembered that way.

If the Whispers are done and Nomura doesn't go crazy I think it'll be alright, I'm hopeful.

 

[oty]

Theoretically, in the next installmentes we will find out more about the true nature of the Whispers, as in, they will be more explained. I don't think they necessarily need to show up, but it wouldn't be wise to remove every single trace of them and then explain them. They need to keep, or create, something related to the Whispers so that they still have something they can hook into an explanation. (that's where I think the Zack timeline is going to enter, but pretty much everything is possible)

And tbh, I would dig as hell a Bugenhagen-explaining-the-will-of-the-planet moment. It's exactly what Bugenhagen does, so it can be extra easy to make it feel more acquainted to the characters learning more about the Planet. Would be pretty cool, and would make everyone happy. Straight up OG7 moment, while still being new.

 

[Erotic Materia]

If the Whispers are done and Nomura doesn't go crazy I think it'll be alright, I'm hopeful.

I'm optimistic that the lunacy that is chapter 18 is the only time they're gonna let Nomura fully off the leash. Because honestly, prior to that whole insane ending, the game went more or less normally/not Kingdom Hearts-y. But by letting him do his thing, it allowed them to wrap it up neatly.

That being said, I hope (and believe) that we'll never see another Whisper going forward.

 

[argent_angel]

I'm optimistic that the lunacy that is chapter 18 is the only time they're gonna let Nomura fully off the leash. Because honestly, prior to that whole insane ending, the game went more or less normally/not Kingdom Hearts-y. But by letting him do his thing, it allowed them to wrap it up neatly.

That being said, I hope (and believe) that we'll never see another Whisper going forward.

The ending to part 1 was very unexpected, different and big. It generated the most conversations that I've ever seen of a game's story. Given the scale of its impact to the story and how moments throughout the game are linked to it, I would say something equally if not bigger is going to happen in future installments of the game. The question is what and when will that be? It can happen many different ways. They could play it out to give you the experience of the original game then at the very end do another (large number of years later) and you see Cloud, Zack, Aerith, Tifa and everyone else living normal lives maybe in a totally different place also. Maybe you'll even see Sephiroth there hanging out with Cloud and Zack. AC and DoC gave the idea that history can repeat itself and those that died can/will eventually come back to life again with how the lifestream works. If not that then maybe something happens at another point in the story to bring the whole time/destiny stuff together so that what happened at the end of part 1 has a meaningful impact based on the scale of what actually happened. The actions done there already brought Zack back and changed Midgar which are 2 very big things to put into consideration now. How do we know similar things on the same level won't be happening going forward? Where they go with remake's story can be done in so many ways given the established elements of the way time and the lifestream works within FF7's story. We can gain a lot of hopeful speculation about it all at this point but we're just going to have to wait and see where it goes from here. I do like the idea that the possibilities are now endless.

 

[Makoeyes987]

That being said, I hope (and believe) that we'll never see another Whisper going forward.

 

[Obsidian Fire]

The more I look at what the devs created after the OG, the more I'm convinced the only reason the OG was as "grounded" as it was is due to hardware/software limitations at the time.

The Remake feels very tonally similar to FF8 and one of the biggest complaints I see about the Compilation as a whole is that it got less and less grounded and more and more... fantastical... as time went on. That's a similar trajectory as the games the devs did outside of the Compilation as well.

I'm fully expecting the rest of the Remake series to go completely crazy and off the rails compared to the OG because that is what the devs wanted to do with the OG... they just didn't have the technical ability they needed to pull it off. And now they do.

 

[Kai Schulen]

So, after 2 months of being really depressed (not because of the Remake, just being depressed in general I mean) and fooling around with other things to avoid acknowledging my depression, I finally beat the Remake~

I might post my thoughts later, but after 109 pages of this I doubt anyone would be interested and I'd probably end up rehashing something someone already said.

I'll probably take a short break from the Remake, before I start cracking on 100%ing for all the trophies though. This might be my first PS4 game I'll manage to Platinum.

 

[Wol]

I'm optimistic that the lunacy that is chapter 18 is the only time they're gonna let Nomura fully off the leash. Because honestly, prior to that whole insane ending, the game went more or less normally/not Kingdom Hearts-y. But by letting him do his thing, it allowed them to wrap it up neatly.

That being said, I hope (and believe) that we'll never see another Whisper going forward.

Its time for Echoes to shine, but Screams will be even worse on Part 3.

Echoes: daunting echoes of souls from a lost future... or past? Changing the course of destiny saved many lives, but condemned others to death.

Screams: menacing screams of OG fans (meta-commentary).

 

[Erotic Materia]

Its time for Echoes to shine, but Screams will be even worse on Part 3.

Echoes: daunting echoes of souls from a lost future... or past? Changing the course of destiny saved many lives, but condemned others to death.

Screams: menacing screams of OG fans (meta-commentary).

 

[Jairus]

If what SE wanted all along was to break away from the confines of the OG narrative, I think they should've done it right from the beginning instead of using this meta narrative with the whispers to justify it. There was so much they could've done with this part of the story if they had, but they willingly bound their hands instead. At least now with Part 2 onward, they'll have more freedom to change things.

 

[Ite]

The more I look at what the devs created after the OG, the more I'm convinced the only reason the OG was as "grounded" as it was is due to hardware/software limitations at the time.

The Remake feels very tonally similar to FF8 and one of the biggest complaints I see about the Compilation as a whole is that it got less and less grounded and more and more... fantastical... as time went on. That's a similar trajectory as the games the devs did outside of the Compilation as well.

I'm fully expecting the rest of the Remake series to go completely crazy and off the rails compared to the OG because that is what the devs wanted to do with the OG... they just didn't have the technical ability they needed to pull it off. And now they do.

Yep. I've said that FF7R combines everything that's wrong with the Hobbit Movies, the Matrix Sequels, the PotC Sequels and the Star Wars Special Edition. All things that were popular until their respective artists were freed from their respective limitations to create whatever they wanted without being told no.

 

[Clement Rage]

Um...there's nothing wrong with any of those? (Haven't seen the POTC sequels, so with a reservation there)

 

[Makoeyes987]

PotC sequels are of deprecating value. They get worse and worse the further they go on.

Matrix trilogy is legit as fuck and a testament to the Wachowski sister's slaying in badass cinema.

Hobbit film series is good if you like drawn out shit, I mean... There is a market for it. It's well done and amazing just... Drawn out....

Star Wars well.. I guess it depends on which "Special Edition" we're talking about. Some are better than others

 

[looneymoon]

I love the shit POTC movies. That last one with Barbossa's hot daughter + uncanny-valley young Johnny Depp was a blast. I was probably the 1 person in the world that was sad they canceled the final one

Yes, of all the examples being discussed, POTC is the hill I choose to die on.

 

[Ite]

I mean:

-sacrificing pacing to include new and fresh content (Hobbit, SW)
-putting a popular character front and center, when he shouldn’t even be there, and losing sight of what made him effective the first go-round by trying to capitalize on fan demand (PotC, Hobbit)
-action that is so constant and fantastical that it loses all stakes (Matrix, Hobbit, and Compilation in general)
-retconning stuff, and saying it was your vision all along (SW:SE)

The common threads here are indulgence, back-to-front writing, and fan-forward thinking.

 

[Clement Rage]

There's nothing wrong with the Special Editions, it's just that the fanbase is super attached to the original cut and treat deviations as heresy.

The Hobbit films are fairly good, it's just that LOTR was brilliant, and so anything less than brilliance was a disappointment to the fans. Not to say that they didn't have problems, but they were not the awful travesties the fandom said they were.

Spoiler: Matrix

I actually think the Stakes in the Matrix are kept up pretty well. Neo is a God in the Matrix at the end of film 1, so they level up Smith too and the stakes become 'can Neo save his friends' instead of 'can he survive', and then the stakes move out of the Matrix where his powers aren't so all consuming.

.

Edit: Oh, and as for 'needing to be told no', the love triangle everyone hated in the Hobbit was imposed on the creatives by the Execs, it wasn't creative freedom going wild.

Who should have told George no, exactly? Is he not entitled to edit his own work?

 

[Makoeyes987]

-putting a popular character front and center, when he shouldn’t even be there, and losing sight of what made him effective the first go-round by trying to capitalize on fan demand (PotC, Hobbit)

It is a scientific fact Jack Sparrow and Captain Barbossa are the two greatest things to come out of PotC.

Yes, of all the examples being discussed, POTC is the hill I choose to die on.

I admire your dedication.

The Hobbit films are fairly good, it's just that LOTR was brilliant, and so anything less than brilliance was a disappointment to the fans. Not to say that they didn't have problems, but they were not the awful travesties the fandom said they were.

I mean, I agree on that point. But they did unnecessarily pad it. Which is the most consistent criticism of it all. If you get past that, yeah they're still pretty good. But coming from the greatness that was LotR sorta hurt it's perception for sure.

There's nothing wrong with the Special Editions, it's just that the fanbase is super attached to the original cut and treat deviations as heresy.

...Well. Some of those deviations are heresy.

 

[Jairus]

...Well. Some of those deviations are heresy.

Oh, most definitely. Han fired first. Every true SW fan knows that.

Thankfully, we have the Despecialized Editions to preserve the true masterpieces.

 

[Clement Rage]

It doesn't actually matter whether Han fired first or not. It's like seven frames, FFS. It's not like Greedo killed Han and flew away with the Falcon. It's one of the dumbest things fandom has ever got upset about.