You know what I'd like to see? Optional scenic montages of the main characters just walking, riding Chocobos, riding the buggy etc for silly stretches of time if the player decides to watch it all. A hundred variations of the main FF7 themes playing depending on the mood of the environment and of the current atmosphere in the story.
Just imagine it. Cloud and company first appearing as barely visible ants in the distance, gradually coming into view until at long last we can see their facial expressions. Sometimes they'll be in good spirits, exchanging smiles and quips. Other times their expressions will be grim and gray, staring only forward in the hopeless dream of their destination. You may hear parts of their conversation during that precious half-minute or so when the camera is close enough, but as the camera zooms far out again to reveal the spanning environment we are left dreaming as to what the team said or did next.
When all FFVIIR parts are out, the number of these scenic montages would count in the hundreds and with dozens of hours of slow-moving camera shots to match.
On one hand, this idea would be the antithesis of good game design. Nothing would be happening and for completionists like me you'd be left watching all these hours of scenic shots for the simple reason that YOU MUST SEE EVERYTHING THERE IS TO SEE. But I feel that it'd be a necessary inclusion in order to give us an essential aspect of the FF7 experience we want.
People want FFVIIR to deliver on the same feelings of traversing the overworld in the original game. But even if Square surprised us and used actual ABSTRACTION by having Remake Cloud be a walking giant on a miniaturized version of the world (and I'd be happy to see this) I'd still feel cheated by not having that actual ZOOMED IN, earthbound perspective of the world. If traversing the planet becomes primarily a mimicry of how it was done in the original game, the Remake will suffer from something that has often happened to the world of FF7: It will feel small. I don't want the FF7 planet to feel small.
I want epic explorations of the world as though I was a drone flying past it, but I don't want the dreariness of actually controlling the characters through vast stretches of nothing *cough*Death Stranding*cough*. I want
spanning environment shots like the opening of FFVIIR to be commonplace throughout the next installments. Primarily first-time players who are very dedicated would watch these scenic shots in full but they would at least provide the sense of scale and depth that an FF1->FF9 style overworld does not.
Give me an unhealthy supply of "
Fellowship of the Ring go on their journey" moments in FFVIIR, yes please. Ahead On Our Way, in both 1:1 scale and in 1:10000 scale abstractions.
