FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH ANNOUNCED

Makoeyes987

Listen closely, there is meaning in my words.
AKA
Smooth Criminal
It's actually insane how hyped I am for this game.

Can safely say I feel an anticipation and excitement that goes beyond even what I felt going into Remake. I suppose because this is the part of FFVII that gets really good. And it looks like the team pulled out all stops to make this part of the story shine.

Part of me still can't believe this game is real.

I'm playing the demo now and never in a million years did I ever imagine I'd see a Nibelheim this size with this many villagers. It actually feels like a fucking village. Not just a remote cluster of houses and a mansion. I've seen more NPC villagers just going up towards the square than the entirety of Nibelheim in CC. The layout, size and population feels legit lived in. The food, people, everything. Like. Holy shit. This is immersive.

The opening truck ride was phenomenal.

HA! Zangan! Omfg. That intro for him was amazing.

.... They even included the two children siblings.. The sister and younger brother who mispronounces the last word of everything his sister says.

The hilarity of Aerith and Tifa calling Cloud an asshole so angrily at once when Cloud goes through Tifa's things in her room is something that made me bust out laughing. Holy shit.

"Oh I'll be telling everyone how I welcomed the great Sephiroth to town, til the day I die." Oh, you won't be telling everyone long, sir...

The remix of Tifa's theme when she shows up as the tour guide was sublime.

God, this fucking Mt. Nibel map is good. As is the music. I'm just gobsmacked at how good this is.

Screamers are in this. LOL that was a neat surprise.

Yeah, its late. I'm gonna have to save the rest for tomorrow. This is... This is exciting and I should try to get some sleep lol
 

Misterbadguy

Phantom Lord
AKA
METEODRIVE
So what's the deal with the FMV version of the Sephiroth in flames scene, the one that was shown at the TGS booth? It's not used during the Nibel flashback, at least not in the demo (which is definitely lacking certain sequences on purpose, in fairness). Was it made purely for marketing purposes or is it used during a different part of the game somehow?
 

cold_spirit

he/him
AKA
Alex T
I didn't watch the State of Play or final trailer! I'm so proud of myself. Of course there was a chance that the temptation would break me, but it was easier than I thought it'd be. The fact that I was working during the presentation helped.

I have no idea what new revelations the trailer revealed as to the "big mysteries" that surround this project. Nor do I have any idea where the community is at with discussing it. And as I explained earlier, I won't even see your responses to this. So I thought it would be fun to share my story theory one last time for everyone to laugh at.

Here is my original diagram, made in MS Paint. The timestamp reads "5/14/2020". I cooked this up after the first Ultimania translations made their rounds, and I still stand by it. Multiple timelines affected by the defeat of Whisper Harbinger.

1707306086522.png

1707306106858.png

Let me paint a picture. When I first shared this, some folks still believed that Remake's ending was just a homage, realigning Zack's death scene from how we saw it in Crisis Core to how we see it in the original game. They argued that Zack would be shot a few moments later by a Shinra grunt while carrying Cloud, just like in the OG. Oh how far we've come.

And here's my latest version. The biggest difference is clearly defining a third world to serve as the origin of Aerith and Sephiroth's memories.

ff7r-worlds-final.jpg

Again, I can't gauge if this is closer or further from whatever the new trailer revealed, but it's been fun regardless. Sorry for spamming the threads with these over the years, and sorry if I ever seemed egotistical about it. Know that it was always meant to come from a good place. I just love engaging with the world of FF7. And these new mysteries allowed me to do that anytime, anywhere. So yeah, I really invested in them.

I don't think I'll be this way between Rebirth and Part 3. With Rebirth's release, we'll have 2/3rds of the story, and a better idea of the project's direction. There's less to speculate on, but there's also another reason. I want to care less about other people's opinions on the internet. And I've come to the conclusion that the only way to do that is to distance myself from it all.

Let me use an example. I like The Drum in Chapter 17 of Remake. I think it's a well designed dungeon and adequately spooky. The designers put a lot of thought into its progression, and the Brain Pod scene is really good. However, the general consensus among fans is that the chapter is a slog and a downgrade from the OG. Now that's fine, obviously people have different opinions, but that knowledge does something to me. When I play the chapter, I can't enjoy it because I'm constantly thinking of counter arguments. I'm not immersed. Instead, I'm defensive.

Two years ago I played the very first Persona game for the first time, which I thoroughly enjoyed because I didn't have people screaming in my ear about how much it sucks. Yes there's a lot of encounters, yes the battle animations take forever. On the internet, that's as far as discussion goes on the game. It never reaches something more meaningful. Because I played the game before those impressions reached me, I feel like I was able to take away so much more from the experience. My mind wasn't bogged down with other people's thoughts, which social media relentlessly bombards us with. I could come to my own understanding and appreciations.

So yeah. This isn't goodbye by any means, it's just where I'm at mentally. I did not expect to write all this, it just fell out! Hope everyone enjoys the demo!
 
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ForceStealer

Double Growth
I like the Drum too, fwiw :P

I understand the point about the pacing, but I thought it was a very good "final dungeon," the party switching in particular was enjoyable. And relative to what was to come in the next chapter, it was an entirely tame departure. Atmospheric too, although if they felt they used up all their Creepy Allotment here and therefore didn't use it as much for the Trail of Blood sequence, that's one thing I can hold against it, but they could have jsut made both creepy :P
 

Rose Alive

Pro Adventurer
AKA
Always hungry
I can't concentrate on anything since watching the state of play and I only got a few hours of sleep because I was so excited. This is me trying to get stuff done but then thinking about Rebirth every fifteen seconds:


 

Suzaku

Pro Adventurer
I really don't think this is the case based on the more recent PR material, but what if "the Zack timeline" actually turned out to not be an alternate timeline at all?

We don't really know how it's integrated with the game yet -- I assume the story will just cut to it at certain points as it did at the end of Remake -- but I think it would be a pretty crazy twist, and in keeping with the original, if it turned out to just be a subconscious delusion Cloud is having due to his Jenova Cells copying Zack's memories and personality.

Make the players think it's an alternate timeline, but then when Cloud falls into the Lifestream and has his mental breakdown, the two "parallel timelines," and perhaps others, are revealed to actually be a jumble of real and false memories that Tifa has to help him untangle and piece back together.
 

X-SOLDIER

Harbinger O Great Justice
AKA
X
I really don't think this is the case based on the more recent PR material, but what if "the Zack timeline" actually turned out to not be an alternate timeline at all?

We don't really know how it's integrated with the game yet -- I assume the story will just cut to it at certain points as it did at the end of Remake -- but I think it would be a pretty crazy twist, and in keeping with the original, if it turned out to just be a subconscious delusion Cloud is having due to his Jenova Cells copying Zack's memories and personality.

Make the players think it's an alternate timeline, but then when Cloud falls into the Lifestream and has his mental breakdown, the two "parallel timelines," and perhaps others, are revealed to actually be a jumble of real and false memories that Tifa has to help him untangle and piece back together.

Especially with the latest trailer showing Sephiroth & Zack together, and Ever Crisis making use of the idea of "another possibility of <event>" there's some flexibility around how to interpret those things, but I think most specifically the Gi Tribe asking for the Black Materia to end their tortured dream will be a pivotal element to what that actually is.

I'd expect that they're using the "dream" analogy in the same way that Hinduism and other religions use that as the projection of experienced reality from the "true soul" of yourself that exists outside of the universe in the way that we see Cloud & Sephiroth at the Edge of Creation in the end of Remake. (It also seems to match with the visual aesthetic of the Gi tribe there, though I haven't taken my usual time to dive exceptionally deep into those design elements quite yet, as that'll have to wait until the full game's out). Essentially it's seems like it's leading up to Cloud needing to make an existential choice about what he keeps and what he gives up – ultimately, what is Cloud's Promised Land?

As such we're not looking at classical timeline convergences, but you're looking at those things as a possibility of something that could impact the world depending on choices that get made when you're using the power of the ultimate Black/White magic in order to achieve that. The Portal materia allows convergences, but you don't retain any memory of it just like awakening from a dream you don't know that you had. While it may leave some tiny change in your mind/heart, you don't experience anything other than you would when falling asleep for hours where you feel like you just instantly woke up – which is exactly how the Portals work in Ever Crisis. They experience time there but don't remember it, and no time passes in the real world for their absence.

I think it's essentially just a philosophical framework that's building up to pose the same opportunity for Cloud to grab Aerith's hand at the end of the original FF7 or snaps back to reality and jump to grab Tifa's and save her. That's why the OG, Cloud understands how to have a Promised Land where the losses of friends that they've suffered are accepted and irreversible, but at the same time, he's constantly slipping into those little white headspace moments with his deceased friends in Advent Children when he needs help living with that decision.

While this is still before actually getting to play Rebirth, I think that terms like "possibility" or "dream" fit the things occurring with Zack far better than "timeline" because they imply a different type of relationship to how you're perceiving concepts of reality. While mechanically it seems like that's just another way to perceive multiverse interactions or something like that and the distinction is splitting hairs – especially when it comes to "dream" it matters because you have to choose to be awake or asleep and you can't just live with both of them at once, which is a frequent condition given to Cloud about the choice he eventually has to make that Sephiroth keeps guiding him towards with experiences of pain that Cloud wants to have the power to prevent or revert.



X :neo:
 

Wol

None Shall Remember Those Who Do Not Fight
AKA
Rosarian Shield
why the fuck the mayor and his men stood there like fools without firing a single shot lol

anyway I liked the rendition of these events, but wished they were even more sinister.

edit:

we got robbed of seph-missile

sephiroth.gif
 
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Golden Ear

Pro Adventurer
AKA
M. Prod
I find it a funny coincidence that the first thing Hulk is talking about is "Destiny is taking its course, brother" in that video. I didn't even realize that till after I posted it.
 

Jimmy XH

Pro Adventurer
I’ve mentioned a couple of times how much I like the realism of games like The Last Of Us and RDR in terms of its dialogue and scenarios.

I know FF is a very different genre but I didn’t get that level of very high level of realism from Remake, despite its more serious moments (plate fall, Jessie’s death, etc)

This flashback however hit harder because of the brilliance of its direction. It has been handled incredibly, and it’s amazing that a scene we’ve seen so many times in different media can still has the impact it has.

The combination of world building, character development, music, dialogue and voice acting made these scenes gripping all over again. Remarkable. If this applies to the whole game we are in for a bona fide masterpiece.

How can anyone play this demo and not buy the game immediately?
 
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