What Plot Lines or Characters Do You Think Are Ignored/Overlooked/Wasted In The Compilation?

[Clement Rage]

A lot of their money is tied up in Midgar and Mako, though. With that gone, they'd have taken a huge hit. Mako reactors decommissioned, the credibility of the Shinra name is in tatters... They'd still have lots of assets, but nothing to what they had. In refugee situations, money itself tends to have less value than food/guns etc. They've still got power, but at its height, Rufus could fund a transcontinental terrorist organisation with his pocket money.

Wouldn't it be interesting if the WRO backer was Palmer?

 

[CameoAmalthea]

From the sounds of it, yep lol.


Btw do we really offically know that Shinra are "finished" i mean in the OG they pretty much controlled everything, and even after all that has happend i cant believe that Shinra could have lost everything, i mean they had control of a army, most of the first contient you get to explore in FF7 is under there control, they must have had tonnes of money saved in backs ect ect...surely good old shinra are not compleaty finished yet?

"Case of Shinra" goes into this. Following Meteor Fall there was essentially chaos because no one was in charge to organize disaster relief or assistance, after initial evacuation. No was left in charge to say what to do next. (Though I assume Reeve was all readying trying to get the WRO in place at this point, along with Veld, and possibly other former Shinra execs).

People were gathered in front of the Shinra building demanding help and all the Turks could do was put up a "closed" sign because there wasn't a structure left to respond. People formed mobs. Ex-military members became war lords and tried to take control. Yes, Shinra had an army before Meteor, afterwards it was every man for himself with mobs following whoever seemed most fit to lead and murdering those leaders if they couldn't keep control.

There was chaos, and no chance of rebuilding until they could get the situation on the ground under control, amid the looting, power grabs, and general lack of order. It didn't help that Rufus was kidnapped, changed hands before he could be rescued, and then had to contend with the geostigma epidemic. So we have a major disaster, the destruction of the defacto government's head quarters, and then a global pandemic. The fact that they managed to get the WRO up and running, and build Edge (which was Rufus's doing) is pretty impressive given the circumstances.

But we're talking about anarchy. It doesn't matter that Shinra controlled a lot of resources pre-Metior, most of the leadership was killed, and Rufus wasn't in a position to get things under control. (Because he was kidnapped, and then infected with a terminal illness).

As for Shinra continuing, the question is how do you define ShinRa. ShinRa as a power company won't be what it once was because Mako is done. Rufus as a person cares about his own legacy and wanted to work to rebuild, which is why he organizes the construction of Edge and most likely funded the WRO. My assumption is the WRO is essentially ShinRa. It's run by former Shinra execs, and probably absorbed a lot of former Shinra Employees and Resources.

Shinra is done as it once existed.

As for the OG, the Turks say Shinra because Rufus is in critical condition, and they can't stop Meteor. Basically, there's no point fighting AVALANCHE or fighting to preserve Shinra as it once was because that ended when WEAPON's attack hit the building. Now it's just trying to cope with the aftermath.

 

[Keveh Kins]

Much as I love Rufus (and Wally Wingert's voice work) as a character, I would've preferred if he'd just been blown sky high by Diamond Weapon and stayed dead. Him surviving in the compilation just killed the impact of that scene for me, where the Planet finally gets some retribution for all the abuse Shinra as a company as subjected it to, by literally cutting off the head of the viper...er, Zolom. Him surviving just made the compilation seem very "Yaynobodydies!" to me, and I know he's on a redemption quest but I much preferred the arrogant little shithead Rufus because he made me WANT to see him get blown to pieces. There's nobody to hate as the villain in the compilation anymore except Sephiroth, and he doesn't do a great job of inciting emotion.

I feel kinda the same about Tseng surviving, even though his death in the OG was down to a genuine translation mistake. I liked the idea that the Turks are loyal to their leader, namely Tseng, then he dies so Reno kinda becomes the de facto leader. And when Reno sees that Shinra isn't of any further use to him, he decides to quit and so they all do out of loyalty to the leader. Or something like that.

 

[CameoAmalthea]

I think that Rufus dying in the original game works great in the context of the original game. I also likee Tseng's death, even if it's not what the writers intended to convey Elena's reaction is a lot more powerful if Tseng is dead rather than injured.

On the other hand, I love Before Crisis and Case of Shinra (these are my favorite bits of the compilation ). To me, in terms of the over all compilation, it works to have Rufus alive and continue and expand his story because it's a good story, it's interesting.

I also really like what Before Crisis did in terms of inverting the narrative of FFVII by having you play as a Turk trying to stop AVALANCHE from destroying the reactor. It allowed the authors to expand upon the question "what makes a hero" "what makes a villain" to what extent are we "the heroes of our own story and the villain of someone else's" or at what point is it clear we've crossed the lines.

The original game did a good job exploring moral issues by having you play as terrorists, which made you wonder if the ends justified the means, but AVALANCHE's arc was sort of side lined once Sephiroth made an appearance, so I'm glad Case of Barret was able to explore these themes, and that BC was able to explore the themes by sort of turning the narrative on it's head.

I think in terms of exploring grey morality, it's nice to have Rufus as a complex, nuanced character who does bad things for what he believes are the right reasons instead of just a wholly irredeemable Joffrey type brat. Make no mistake, he can be a little shit, even more so in BC than in the original game (I may or may not have yelled at my screening while watching play throughs and wanted Tseng or someone to punch him), but I like that he's also complex because it fits with the overall exploration of good and evil.

So basically, OG Rufus dying fits with what they were doing in the OG, and compilation Rufus fits what they were dong in the compilation.

 

[Keveh Kins]

I think in terms of exploring grey morality, it's nice to have Rufus as a complex, nuanced character who does bad things for what he believes are the right reasons instead of just a wholly irredeemable Joffrey type brat. Make no mistake, he can be a little shit, even more so in BC than in the original game (I may or may not have yelled at my screening while watching play throughs and wanted Tseng or someone to punch him), but I like that he's also complex because it fits with the overall exploration of good and evil.

I'd be more okay with Rufus presenting a more nuanced not-quite villain in the compilation if the same characterization didn't apply to every other villain in the compilation. Every villain has some kinda of tragic story behind them that makes them do what they do, Deepground are these forgotten experiments buried underground who come to the surface thinking they need to purge the Planet and basically start afresh through Omega, Genesis is the victim of experimentation that wasn't as succesful as his rival's, the original AVALANCHE are the rebels who commit atrocities in the name of saving the world. Having so many tragic, pseudo-complex villains dilutes the effectiveness of Rufus' and Shinra Company's role as the morally grey characters, IMO. It makes them just another in a long line of morally grey villains in the compilation who we can't quite bring ourselves to label as villains.

What the OG did well was explore the moral grey areas, as you pointed out, but still provided an absolute evil that was necessary to overcome. You were the heroes caught between two evils. Shinra, who would, had they succeeded in their plans for Neo-Midgar, benefited numerous people, but that was more of a side consequence of their main goal which was to extend their own power and profit. I don't buy into Shinra wanting to do things for what they see as the right reasons, whatever way you cut it, dropping the plate on countless civilians just to get rid of a small group of rebels isn't morally justifiable and was purely a political power play and Rufus blithely admits he wants to rule through fear and tries to execute people just to protect his own interests rather than out of any moral indignation with Avalanche. The reason they turn against Sephiroth is because he's a competitor trying to achieve the same goal as them, total dominion and power, he's just going about it differently and his succeeding would obviously be detrimental to them.

Then you had Sephiroth, the other evil, who we could sympathise with to a much greater extent because we can understand how horrifying it was for him to discover the circumstances of his creation. But once he comes back, he basically divorces himself from that tragedy in favour of pursuing power, of becoming a God and ruling over all. Thus we lose our sympathy for him and he comes another absolute evil that must be stopped.

Then there's the heroes, who have done morally reprehensible things too, but who are also somewhat self-interested, insofar as Cloud mostly fights to settle the score with Sephiroth for the evils he has done, or Barret mostly fights to protect Marlene. But they also have a compassion for others, they go out of their way to help Aerith when she is captured, they go with Red into the Cave of the Gi even though it doesn't really benefit them at all, it's things like that which make us identify them as more good in their moral greyness than evil, like Shinra, or absolutely evil, like Sephiroth. And ultimately they have no choice but to try and take on Sephiroth and Shinra, as should either succeed they will be killed, subjugated and tyrannised and their home, their planet will suffer.

I've ranted a bit too much, but basically I think the OG did a much better job of subtly exploring moral grey areas and making you think and feel whilst still providing an absolute evil to overcome than a lot of the compilation titles did. The compilation has become too morally grey...as well as just grey in general, damn colour pallette. So characters like Rufus who are trying to redeem themselves have our sympathies and desire to see them succeed diluted, because there's always other people we have to devote that energy to as well, most of them the central villain of the piece. Sure there's always Sephiroth, but he wasn't much more than a footnote in Advent Children.

Does that make sense? O_o

 

[jazzflower92]

For Genesis I actually found him unintentionally unsympathetic and that he got off too lightly. In fact I found him to be just as bad as Shinra in the way he would trample others in order to get what he wants. Sure, he was dying but he was a big dick about it and condemned many to die by them sharing his cells. He very much commits those same atrocities that Sephirtoth would do in the future but never pays for any of his actions.