SPOILERS Predictions for Part 2? (*Open Spoilers for Part 1*)

[cold_spirit]

Once all parts are out, it’s dead in the ground, if it isn’t heading there already. You think after playing 3-5 video games the thing you want to do is play through a shittier looking boring version?

I’m not trying to put FF7 on a pedestal here, I think the old bastard deserves to be replaced. But not with this crap.

You must be OUTTA YOUR MIND (I'm not actually mad, just wanted to yell for fun lol) if you think FF7R is going to replace the OG in any capacity. Bro, even without the Whispers you despise so much, FF7R seeps dumb, boring, AAA video game design from the 2010's. Forced walking segments, ugly NPCs, a pointless skill tree, side quest menus, a Butterfinger collaboration, the list goes on. Furthermore, the modern AAA video game landscape is a constantly escalating shouting match inside an echo chamber. Meaning FF7R is already old news. The streamers and youtubers have had their way with it. Gaming at large is focusing on next-gen consoles to distract their minds from the trappings of rampant capitalism (at least I am). It's done and dusted. How else can I say it? FF7R in 2020 isn't even 1/10 as influential as FF7 in 1997. Someday we'll be talking about Remake like how we currently talk about the Compilation. Mark my words, FF7R was a moment in video game history, but FF7 was a revolution.

Also, why you shitting on the OG so much? Why are you underestimating all of its future players? You gotta believe in the OG more man. FF7's visuals became dated literally the moment the opening FMV stopped playing, yet here we all are. You should know this as well as any of us: someone with only an ounce of appreciation can be swept up in the narrative of FF7. It's so good. The art direction is ahead of it's time. The field and battle animations are snappy. The script is faultly, but clearly effective. And the music, my god the music. I'm gonna put FF7 on a pedestal. The gosh darn infrastructure to hold this post wouldn't be in place if FF7 didn't deserve to be on a pedestal.

 

[Clement Rage]

Must... not...digress... into... Star Wars...

I'm kind of puzzled at the idea that remakes replace the originals. Does that normally happen?

Resident Evil 2 and 3 Remakes were well received, but people still love the originals.

The primary response to all those Disney live action remakes seems to be mostly laughing at them. Magnificent Seven didn't replace Seven Samurai. The many remakes of the likes of Sherlock Holmes and Dracula don't replace each other. What's different about FF7?

 

[ForceStealer]

I guess I'm closest to Rishi in thinking that the ending to Remake Part 1 was freaking stupid, but I also don't have any of Ite's hangups about what it means with regard to the original. And the first ~90% of the game was so good that that my overall view of the experience is still a positive one. The stupid development can't undo the wonder I experienced of looking up at the underside of the plates and seeing Midgar be lived in.

But would the game have been immeasurably improved without all the meta bullshit and ended with this shot as the credits rolled? Abso-fucking-lutely.

 

[Obsidian Fire]

I think there's a difference between the legacy or impact of FFVII and the actual game of FFVII as it feels to be played today. No one is saying FFVII didn't impact the gaming industry in a huge way or that it didn't show people how a game could tell a story. It did, no question about it.

But you had better believe I give people a list of caveats when I recommend they play FFVII. It isn't a modern game and doesn't play like one, and if someone goes in expecting that, they're in for a world of disappointment. (For a non-JRPG example, look at Morrowind, which not even I would play without doing some heavy modding of today.)

Video games aren't like film where the overall look of it hasn't really changed all that much over the course of the medium. The medium of video games has changed a lot in the last twenty years and FFVII is a great example of that. Heck, it was one of the games that changed the medium.

I see the Remake "replacing" the OG like how the 2000s version of Lord of the Rings replaced the 1978 animated version of Lord of the Rings. No one really cares that there was an animated version of the Lord of the Rings trilogy once the life-action version got released. That one has a level of polish (and money) the 1978 version doesn't and that's how FF7R feels to me. There's an obvious level of polish and realism to it that the OG simply doesn't have because of the gaphics, fight system, etc. FF7R is what everyone has been seeing in their heads since the OG was released and everyone knows that when you say "FF7", they're going to be picturing the Remake's graphics, if not it's plot.

Now can the Remake's plot stick around in the public conscious more than the OG can? Maybe, maybe not. It's certainly going to take longer to tell in it's entirety than the OG's will, and I have no doubt there will be a lot more Remake plot analysis videos and articals made than ones about the OG when all is said and done. What I do see happening is that the OG will be viewed less on it's own merits and more as how it relates to the Remake series. And I don't know if that will make the FFVII narrative feel stronger or weaker overall; only time will tell on that front.

 

[Odysseus]

I see the Remake "replacing" the OG like how the 2000s version of Lord of the Rings replaced the 1978 animated version of Lord of the Rings. No one really cares that there was an animated version of the Lord of the Rings trilogy once the life-action version got released.

But did the LOTR movies replace the books? No, people still read those to this day, even if the movies are probably more well known among a casual audience. You can't just replace a cultural phenomena.

 

[Ite]

But did the LOTR movies replace the books? No, people still read those to this day, even if the movies are probably more well known among a casual audience. You can't just replace a cultural phenomena.

That’s a false equivalence, since we’re talking about an adaptation, not a remake, but I’ll bite. How many arguments to the effect of “the book was better” have actually had you go out to get the book of a movie you watched? The majority film audience isn’t going to like a movie so much that they go find the source material. That kind of thing is reserved for übernerds like us, and I haven’t even read Lord of the Rings, have you?

When people are browsing digital game stores five years from now, I predict that they’re going to assume that 7R is the shinier, better version of 7, as they would with RE2 or Mario All-Stars, as they should, because FF7R is a remake. As people have pointed out, the press buzz and content creators have all moved on, and warnings to the effect of “It diverges from the original story, um, significantly, and is widely considered not a worthy/valid replacement, nor was that the intention of the developers” aren’t going to be in 7R’s game description, because that’s not how 7R is marketed. They might hear ppl say they prefer the OG after the fact, but their time and money have already been expended on Remake, and convincing them to rehash the story in pixelated lego-land will be impossible, and if 7R only hadn’t had the Fuckery, I wouldn’t balk at the idea.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

Well... I was never interested in Tolkien, but I watched Part 1 of LOTR with my Tolkien superfan ex-husband. As we were coming out of the cinema, I overheard someone say, "I can't believe I'm going to have to wait a year to find out what happens next."

Bugger that, I thought, and went home and read the books. I skipped Tom Bombadil, though.

 

[Odysseus]

There's also situations like SM64 or even oot where they have remakes, but the original versions are still played pretty regularly too. Remakes and their original versions can coexist. The remake is a unique situation so finding a perfect comparison is difficult. The best I can think of is how RE2 original compares to RE2 remake. That doesn't diverge as hard as ff7r does, but that should give some idea of how recognition compares between a ps1 original and a ps4 remake.

 

[looneymoon]

Doesn't any FF kinda... inherently invite a certain uber nerdiness though? Like, FF7R isn't exactly like GoT TV show where it's actively targeting an audience of vapid frat boys. I mean there's a level of that yeah, moreso than I find tasteful sometimes, but even still. You can't deny the game actively encourages newbies to engage with other materials in the series, the original being the chief among them. The Whispers themselves are basically big neon advetizement saying "FF7 NOW AVAILABLE ON STEAM/PSN/SWITCH, SEE THE WHOLE STORY HERE."

The series as a whole has normalized making people jump through a lot of hoops to get a full picture. It's possible to play FF7R on its own and just move on, but the game gatekeeps its own narrative by making things not really make full sense without the context of the original.

I know Mako has said it, and I've said it months ago, but FF7R is incredibly similar to the approach of the Evangelion Rebuild series. Given how big of a deal those movies were in Japan (comparable to a new Star Wars trilogy), I'm pretty confident that FF7R took direct inspiration from that. Both requels come with the working assumption that everyone has already indulged in the originals, because of the classic status they have. I think that is an aspect that might be lost to a Western audience, where cartoons and video games are a comparatively more "niche" market than in Japan.

 

[Clement Rage]

In which case LOTR is a bad example to begin with, because there never was an original ff7 novel to be marketed.

How many arguments to the effect of “the book was better” have actually had you go out to get the book of a movie you watched? The majority film audience isn’t going to like a movie so much that they go find the source material. That kind of thing is reserved for übernerds like us, and I haven’t even read Lord of the Rings, have you?

It happens a lot. That's why in bookshops whenever a movie comes out the book gets a new cover and a sticker with 'now a major motion picture.'

People play old games all the time. Things like FF9's release on Steam make waves. HD Collections of Classics come out.

When the Witcher netflix series kicked off, I went and looked up the books (without watching the series at all) Same with the Martian, and Stieg Larson, and The Hunger Games. It happens.

 

[Odysseus]

They did call the original game the "source material" in that behind the scenes series they made, so it is kinda like they were making an "adaptation" more than a remake, though the marketing doesn't reflect that.

 

[Theozilla]

I see the FFVII Remake like how the Peter Jackson 2005 King Kong film is a remake of the original. The core story is the same but a lot of additions and updates and expansions are added.

 

[Prism]

Right or wrong, Tolkien's writing is notoriously dense and heavy that keeps general audiences funneled towards the movies. And yet, I still know people who prefer them. FFVII doesn't even have that issue, as the original is still very accessible once people get over the "pixelated LEGOland" thing. The detailed backgrounds (as evidenced by a recent thread here) hold up very well. And if you think about accessibility, some people might prefer going through one 30 hour game rather than three (or however many parts Remake takes) 30 hour ones.

There's also situations like SM64 or even oot where they have remakes, but the original versions are still played pretty regularly too. Remakes and their original versions can coexist. The remake is a unique situation so finding a perfect comparison is difficult. The best I can think of is how RE2 original compares to RE2 remake. That doesn't diverge as hard as ff7r does, but that should give some idea of how recognition compares between a ps1 original and a ps4 remake.

Those situations are slightly unique though, right? OoT3D and Mario 64 DS both have similar technical restraints to the original, but the improved art techniques has them look way better. But, because they're in the same ballpark of technology, the original doesn't seem so far off - so people keep playing them.

 

[Odysseus]

situations are slightly unique though, right? OoT3D and Mario 64 DS both have similar technical restraints to the original, but the improved art techniques has them look way better. But, because they're in the same ballpark of technology, the original doesn't seem so far off - so people keep playing.

That's why I cited RE2 as the best counter example, but even that isn't quite a perfect example. What Square is doing with ff7 is very strange.

Regardless, there's still a huge market for retro games, with even a lot of new games being styled after retro titles (mostly indie games though) and even low poly models are becoming popular again, so I don't think the original VII is at any risk of being overwritten.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Well aside from the fact that I was the one of the people who were railing against the Compilation, I don’t really know what you mean by “people like you.” Even the coolest and least precious heads here on TLS were agog at Chapter 18, and I mostly lurked for that early outrage.

Yeah, I'm probably more accepting of the Rebuild of FFVII than most, and genuinely excited to see where things go next, but some of the turns taken along the route to get us here were baffling.

Even so, and even after seeing the trailer for XVI, I still one hundred percent agree with cold_spirit's post:

I can confidently say I'm going to buy FF16 day 1 despite not knowing anything about it. However, if I had to choose between two rooms, one with a FF16 trailer and the other with a FF7R-2 trailer, I'd probably break my wrist opening the door to the latter lol.

I'll even take it a step further, though, and say that I'd take a room with a FFVIIR-2 trailer over a room with a playable XVI.

I’ve said this before, but FF7R ain’t no 10 Things I Hate About You. It’s Pride & Prejudice & Zombies but merely advertised as Pride & Prejudice, and none of these analogies really work because none of them are the same writers releasing an updated version in the same medium with the express purpose (intentional or no) of supplanting the original.

It’s not a “transformative work” it’s the Final Fantasy VII remake. Lower case r because that’s what people will hear when you tell them on the street. It’s not an “adaptation” or a “sequel” it’s the Final Fantasy VII remake. It will outlive FF7, I guarantee it, the only reason ppl are playing the original is the same reason ppl went out and bought ASoIaF after season 1. It’s because despite being “a complete game” it’s obviously only the first act of the story. Once all parts are out, it’s dead in the ground, if it isn’t heading there already. You think after playing 3-5 video games the thing you want to do is play through a shittier looking boring version?

I don't think I would want to play any game that "boring" accurately describes. =P But the original FFVII isn't such a game.

 

[Makoeyes987]

At the end of the day, I think this tweet sums up this entire fucking thread.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1303007533322440710

 

[Odysseus]

I think spongebob should also be "FF7 fans," but yeah pretty much.

 

[looneymoon]

if we go by the Eva:Rebuild structure

Part 1 - You Are (Not) Alone : Mostly faithful retelling.
Part 2 - You Can (Not) Advance : Somewhat faithful retelling. Some fucky surreal shit surrounding Aerith's death will set up for even greater puzzling plot progression than in part 1.
Part 3 - You Can (Not) Redo : Nothing to do with a retelling of original FF7 at all. Compilation characters come back. Everything we think we know goes out the window. Implies that the last game will not only be the conclusion to the Remake series, but the entire Compilation of FF7.
Part 4 - Thrice Upon a Time : Goodbye to FF7! This game will be stuck in development hell for 10 years. Nomura will refocus on Kingdom Hearts 4, and it will slap harder than almost everything we've seen from him. FF7R will be lucky to see a 2035 release date.

 

[Rydeen]

Do not speak of Rebuild. If no one talks about it, maybe it will stop existing.

 

[Makoeyes987]

if we go by the Eva:Rebuild structure

Part 1 - You Are (Not) Alone : Mostly faithful retelling.
Part 2 - You Can (Not) Advance : Somewhat faithful retelling. Some fucky surreal shit surrounding Aerith's death will set up for even greater puzzling plot progression than in part 1.
Part 3 - You Can (Not) Redo : Nothing to do with a retelling of original FF7 at all. Compilation characters come back. Everything we think we know goes out the window. Implies that the last game will not only be the conclusion to the Remake series, but the entire Compilation of FF7.
Part 4 - Thrice Upon a Time : Goodbye to FF7! This game will be stuck in development hell for 10 years. Nomura will refocus on Kingdom Hearts 4, and it will slap harder than almost everything we've seen from him. FF7R will be lucky to see a 2035 release date.

 

[Clement Rage]

How the Whispers play out depends heavily on part 2. I mostly thought they were funny. My impression was that they're now off history's chain... but so is Sephiroth. Now devs, do something with that. Scare us.

 

[Cat on Mars]

So I was browsing my memes and I found this belonged here.

I'm positive this is the exact reasoning Nomura uses for games.

 

[leowhy77]

It’s interesting reading these passionate opinions and comments. It just show how much we (generally speaking) care for this game.

To me FF7OG is such an iconic thing, along with the more stand out crisis core on the gaming front.
Then we have the ACC movie, and some short clips I believe? Next we have all those related novels...
All these originated from FF7 OG game!

I feel that it’s the creators effort to gather all related compilations ( for better or worse) and packaged it into FF7R to serve as a centralised source to serve the coming generations ( new younger players)

Imagine this.
FF7OG:” FF7R, u r my living legacy....” (I didn’t mean the OG will die off or whatever so please don’t get me wrong)

Old timers especially the purists that enjoy FF7OG as it is will surely feel the uneasiness. But somehow I feel that is also due to the open ending of the remake part1.

So... cheers everyone...

 

[null]

VIIR-2.0: Aerith cheers Cloud on while he hands the Black materia over.

VIIR-3.0: Everyone hates Cloud because he did what they told him to. Cloud rejoins Shinra and plays piano with Roche. Yuffie looks 16 but the eyepatch means she's 30; make sure to explain that when your wife asks about your new ¥30,000 figurine. There's no room left for the final act because you can (not) fit all this shit into 4 games.

....

I enjoy VIIR today more than the original. There, I said it. I haven't had this much fun with a Final Fantasy game since the 90's. The battle system and the OST and the bosses. The characters, god, I love them all more than ever. I love Remake Barret to death. Tifa is perfection. Cloud is phenomenal. I'm more attached to Aerith in this glorified prologue than any point in the OG. The criticism isn't wrong. I just wish everyone had my mental filter so they could enjoy Remake as much as I do.

Can't wait for the unknown journey to continue. Please take risks in part 2. The feeling that all bets are off is exciting.

 

[looneymoon]

I hate the Rebuild movies a lot less than a lot of the Eva community, even though I agree with the general sentiment that they're.... pretty whatever. But I also take them as Anno's final middle finger to the fandom. Which is very much in the spirit of Eva itself, ya know? FF7R has a similar energy. I think the way FF7R is going about it is a huge missed opportunity, but the parallels are kind of hilarious. I'm sure Anno would likely prefer to work on another Godzilla in the same way that I'm sure Nomura would still rather be trying to somehow make Versus 13 happen as he envisioned it. I would honestly be more interested in what those projects could yield, rather than have them shackled to these Requel projects due to public demand. Then again, I am probably in the minority of not really wanting a Remake in the first place