Final Fantasy VII: REmake
The Shinra Electric Power Company rules/controls the city of Midgar. There are many citizens that see the company as a blessing, giving them what they believe is an unlimited power supply so that they may live in luxury, but there’s a dirty secret: not everyone gets that same life. Midgar is a city with many levels. There is the level that gets to see the night’s sky, and then there is the world that when they look up all they see is the upper plate that separates them from the outside world. Some of the citizens that live under the plates have formed an organization called Avalanche and they are hellbent on trying to rectify the injustices that they see being done to their fellow citizens. One cell of Avalanche has been disowned by the leaders of Avalanche for being too radical, and it is that organization that you will be a part of in the first chapter of Final Fantasy VII: REmake.
The main character is Cloud Strife, an exSOLDIER, an elite military fighter, who has turned to mercenary work. You will be teaming up with the likes of Barret Wallace, the leader of the Avalanche cell, Tifa Lockhart, a member of Avalanche, a bartender, and a friend from Cloud’s past, and Aerith Gainsborough, a naive flower girl who seems to want to have Cloud as her permanent bodyguard. There are of course more characters to be added to your roster, but in this portion of the remake, which there’s rumored to be a total of three, these are the only characters. Well there is one surprise guest that will come to your aid late in the game, but I’d rather not ruin the surprise for you.
Having played the original Final Fantasy VII in the late 90s, I have to say that I was scared to even give this game a shot. My main fear came from the possibility of my warm fuzzy feelings of nostalgia being stomped on until I questioned why I thought the game was that good in the first place, but because of Square Enix’s approach to the remake it feels like a new game set in the Final Fantasy VII universe. They have completely fleshed out your time in Midgar, adding more to the story of the characters, side characters, and the sectors in general. Part of me was extremely excited about this result because it gave even more depth to the experience, but it did also cause more severe tugs on one’s heart strings when something tragic happened.
As the Final Fantasy franchise has evolved, so has their approach to combat. In the beginning it was a turn-based system, and then it evolved into more of a live action approach. Final Fantasy VII: REmake gives you the choice between the two. I thought I would want the old school turn-based system that was used in the original FFVII but I decided to give the updated style a shot and I ended up sticking with it for my entire playthrough. There’s something about being able to run to far corners in combat and wait for your action bar to fill up so that you can heal or unleash devastating attacks/spells/skills that could and would turn the tide of battle. Now this combat mode does make you have to be more aware of your surroundings, and be prepared to block or parry if an enemy decides to zero in on you, but I think that this mode is the better of the two.
One of the things to take into consideration about this game is that it IS NOT the complete story, this is really just your time in Midgar. Will you get some closure at the end of this chapter? Sort of, but having to play the waiting game now is killing me. Now that’s not to say that you should wait to play this game until the next 2 chapters come out, but you should know that this remake is a trilogy. Even knowing that this is only a fraction of the game I believe I spent close to the amount of time that I did on the entire original, so that should tell you that there is a lot of game to get through and I have to say that almost all of it is enjoyable, immersive, and there is part of me that really wants to go back and play through it again.