*** Disclaimer, I am not a writer by any means…just someone who is passionate about Final Fantasy VII. For those of you who read this, thank you for understanding :) ***
*** Also there will be major spoilers in this post, so if you do not want any details of Final Fantasy VII or the remake to be spoiled DO NOT READ THIS. You’ve been warned! ***
I want to preface this by saying that I loved so many aspects of this remake, which is why I’m even more disappointed in the end result. The visuals, music, voice acting, and combat were all stunningly brilliant. It’s a shame that the story didn’t follow suit, otherwise this would have been my favorite game of all time.
If you are reading this, perhaps you feel the same. Or maybe you don’t, so feel free to explain to me why you feel differently! Looking forward to the discussion.
Main point/Introduction
Final Fantasy VII, originally released in 1997, is a game that is special to so many people. For many people it was their introduction to narrative-rich games, games that can deeply immerse you in its world, story, and characters. It’s a game that many look back on fondly, a game with characters that hold a special place in their hearts to this day.
That’s why the hype of a Final Fantasy VII Remake was immeasurable back when it was announced in 2015, and the years leading up to its eventual release in April 2020. People were excited to revisit the characters and story they remember so dearly from their younger days. A chance to return to that same world, re-imagined with stunning modern day technology.
However, now that I have completed the first installment of the Final Fantasy VII Remake, I can definitively say that my hype for the rest of the series has all but vanished entirely.
The Final Fantasy VII Remake changed main story elements, in a way that is irreparable… a way that makes the overall story far less impactful, meaningful, nuanced, and emotional compared to its predecessor.
“Changes are going to happen, so deal with it!”
One defense I’ve been seeing aimed at people who have voiced their disappointment has been “this is a remake, things can be changed so you shouldn’t be upset.” And my response to that is… I understand!
I’m totally ok with changes that add more subtext to characters and locations. I’m fine with modifying some details of certain events or interactions to add flavor. I don’t mind the extra side characters that were added.
I really enjoyed Chapter 4 (even with the random SOLDIER antagonist who ends up not reappearing for the rest of the game), because it provided more context to meaningful characters: Jessie, Biggs, and Wedge.
I thought Marle, Sam, Madam M, Rhodea, Leslie, Betty, etc… were all ok additions that didn’t detract too much from the main plot of the game. The side quests, while obviously just filler content, were even fine with me because I could separate and detach that aspect of the game from the main story.
I can even accept visions/hallucinations of Sephiroth appearing in this game, even though he doesn’t appear until much later in the original, because we’re getting a visual representation or a glimpse into Cloud’s psyche. That’s cool!
These changes are all examples of tasteful, non-intrusive additions that add to the world of Final Fantasy VII. Awesome! So what’s the issue then? The issue comes when you significantly alter the course of the main plot which is sacred to many people.
What makes a good story?
I’ll be the first to admit that the story of the original Final Fantasy VII was not perfect. The dialog felt unnatural at times, especially with some of the downright comical translation inaccuracies. That being said, the key moments of the game hit hard and fit in beautifully with the overall theme and pacing of the story and character development.
One of my favorite moments from Final Fantasy VII was when the squad is locked up in Shinra HQ when all of a sudden the cell doors are unlocked and you follow a blood trail up to find Jenova missing and president Shinra face down with Sephiroth’s sword in his back.
It’s at this point you realize that there is a greater threat out there other than Shinra. There is a dark, foreboding, mysterious, cryptic nature in the scene depicted here. Themes that persist throughout the party’s journey.
In a good story, you don’t need a great declaration from an all-powerful baddie that he is going to destroy the world. Great stories are ones that build up tension over time, that pose questions and provide intrigue to the reader/player, to make them want to go on a journey of discovery alongside the characters. These story-telling mechanisms provide a much more satisfying payoff down the road.
When the party escapes from Shinra HQ and reaches the end of the highway in the original FFVII, Cloud is the driving force to continue onward because he needs closure in finding out if Sephiroth is truly alive or not. The party decides to accompany him for different reasons (Barret wanting to help save the planet, no Sector 7 to return to for Tifa, Red XIII going back home, Aerith wanting to learn more about Ancients and herself).
This is an extremely important part of the game. A moment where the party begins their journey of discovery, both as individuals and as a group. They decide to set forth, not knowing what the future holds for them, into a world of unknowns with just a lead that Cloud believes “Sephiroth is out there somewhere”. That’s it…and it’s perfect.
It sets the stage for a world that’s about to open up more and more gradually, coinciding with a story and growing conflict that’s about to steadily ramp up over time. Characters will come to learn more and more about themselves and their motivations. Questions that were posed in the Midgar chapter will be answered eventually and that invokes excitement for the player who wants to learn more about Sephiroth and the Ancients and Cloud’s past.
This part of the story is essential to the themes of growth and self-discovery that are prevalent throughout Final Fantasy VII, and the alteration of this scene in the remake is when I knew the train had officially derailed.
Why the new story doesn’t work
When I was first introduced to the dementor-like ghosts that were revealed in one of the trailers leading up to the release of the remake, I had a level of reserved acceptance. “This isn’t like the original game”, I thought, and “Aerith seems out of character to be begging Cloud for help upon their first meeting,” but I decided to trust Square anyways because the stuff they had shown in trailers and demos up to that point all looked amazing.
Through playing the remake you come to learn that these dementors are not in fact from Harry Potter, but rather they are “arbiters of fate”. Sounds cool right? Surely these ghosts of destiny will tie into the main story of Final Fantasy VII and provide a cool additional story thread, right?
No, I can say confidently that these arbiters of fate are used solely as a meta, fourth wall-breaking plot device by Square to give themselves some sort of justification for, frankly, butchering the story. They never feel naturally incorporated into the story and simply represent “fate/destiny” as a ruse to deliver a transparent, unsubtle message from the creators of the remake.
Throughout the game, the arbiters keep the main characters on the path of the original Final Fantasy VII’s story. Near the end of the game, as the party arrives at the pivotal end of the highway at the edge of Midgar, the arbiters have all but consumed the Shinra HQ building (unintentional symbolism for how they have also consumed and shit out the plot of the original Final Fantasy VII at this point in time).
What happens next is utterly mind-boggling, something I still can’t wrap my head around.
Instead of having a touching, beautiful moment where the party decisively ventures onward into the unknown, open world to begin their real journey, we are instead greeted by Sephiroth who reminds the party that he is, in fact, a really bad, evil guy and proceeds to open a portal to a dark dimension called the singularity, and now all of sudden Aerith is the all-mighty prophet of everything good who now knows who Sephiroth is somehow and that he’s really, really bad…so now the party goes into the dark dimension and has to use the power of friendship and Cloud’s anime gymnastics to defeat the arbiter of fate shadow-demon monster who also summons smaller shadow demon monsters that represent each character in the party and then Cloud has to have a showdown with Sephiroth but is joined by his friends cliche-style for the third time this chapter and they defeat him…or did they? Because Cloud then has a one-on-one duel with Sephiroth in a different dimension where Sephiroth wins and leaves…*sigh*… you get all of that?
In this one sequence the remake manages to destroy the pacing of the game’s narrative, ruin Aerith’s character by making her some sort of all-knowing prophet of good, and eliminates any aspect of nuance and intrigue from the plot’s conflict and main antagonist. It adds a superfluous, immersion-breaking action sequence that frankly feels like it was written by a child, in a moment where the tone should have been the exact opposite.
Even going back to one of my favorite moments I described earlier, where you follow the blood trail to President Shinra’s room, the foreboding, cryptic mood is lost when the President is still alive. He proceeds to have a cliche moment with Barret straight out of a James Bond movie, hanging from a building and then having a gun showdown, until Sephiroth spontaneously appears and stabs him and also Barret for some reason but it’s ok because fate brings Barret back moments later. The scene changes completely from an intriguing, nuanced mystery to a cheesy, cliche-riddled sci-fi action film moment.
That brings me to my next point.
No one’s ever really gone
The absurdity doesn’t end once Cloud and Sephiroth finish their extremely forced early confrontation. If you haven’t seen this video by Red Letter Media I highly recommend it. It depicts a flaw in the recent Star Wars films that is prevalent in the FFVII Remake as well.
During the final sequence, we get a glimpse of Zack and the scenario leading up to his death, as depicted in the end of Crisis Core. Once the arbiter shadow monsters are defeated, however, we get another look at Zack who now has managed to hold off all of the Shinra soldiers and survives, thus breaking the “fate” he was destined to in the original story.
While some might enjoy this “plot twist”, it’s a slap in the face of people who appreciate the story of Final Fantasy VII. Zack’s death is the catalyst of Final Fantasy VII. Without it, Cloud is not Cloud. Aerith is not Aerith.
The whole premise of Cloud’s character development is that he is struggling with an identity crisis. He takes on Zack’s persona and backstory, the person who died to save him. Zack’s death is a tragic but necessary component of Cloud’s growth as a character later in the game, when he is able to piece together his true self in the lifestream.
Meanwhile as magic holy dust sprinkles across Midgar, we find out that Biggs is somehow still alive too. This is another moment that belittles a significant event of Final Fantasy VII and Barret’s character especially. The fact that Wedge and all of the new side characters introduced in Sector 7 survived is also guilty of this. Hell, Jessie is probably still alive too and they’re saving that reveal for later.
The collapse of Sector 7 and the deaths of Jessie, Biggs, and Wedge are important because it strengthens the player’s connection with the main characters who have to cope with the aftermath. It invests the player in getting back at Shinra. It’s the driving force of Barret’s character, to make sure his friends’ deaths were not in vain. It fuels his hatred of Shinra even more, in turn making them an even stronger antagonist in the player’s eye, which in turn leads to a much more satisfying twist when you discover the President dead with Sephiroth’s sword in his back.
In the remake, what’s even the point of the plate collapsing if everyone the player cares about survives? It changes what should have been a monumental point in the story to one of very little significance.
Alternatively, if Zack and Biggs aren’t actually alive and this is taking place in some alternate parallel universe, that is a story I do not wish to experience. Time travel and alternate universes aren’t easy plot devices to pull off, and I’m sorry but I don’t have faith that Square can pull that off properly from what I just witnessed in the final chapter of this game, nor do I even want them to because that is deviating so far from what makes Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII.
Summary/Closing
In summary, the Final Fantasy VII Remake was a massive disappointment for me, which hurts to say because of how much I love FFVII and honestly how much I loved certain aspects of this game. Not because they changed things from the original, but because the way they changed things make for a much less compelling story.
Sephiroth played too big of a role too early. What made him so appealing as a villain was the mystery surrounding him, and the process of trying to track him down and learning his motivations. Having him appear in Midgar at least a dozen times with apocalyptic visions and him straight up telling us his motivations kills this aspect. There’s no layering to that, no intrigue, no satisfaction of understanding his motives. I would’ve been totally cool with occasional visions/hallucinations from Cloud’s perspective like in Chapter 2, but the way he was used was too frequent and too on the nose, “I’m evil”. That’s not good writing.
The pacing and overall narrative of the story was destroyed on that highway overlooking the outside world. What was meant to be a pivotal, somber, triumphant, melancholic departure was instead replaced with an extremely over-the-top, out of place, forced end-game battle sequence that feigned importance because it shoved it in our face and told us to treat it that way. That’s not good writing.
Sacrifice and loss are amazing motivators and provide depth to characters who were affected by it. Zack, Jessie, Biggs, and Wedge’s deaths are all essential to the story of Final Fantasy VII because of the motivations and character growth that result from those tragic moments. Loss is a major theme of Final Fantasy VII. Loss of friends, loss of family, loss of home, loss of self. When you take away that loss, the story becomes a hollow shell of itself without the satisfaction of experiencing the characters’ growth of overcoming it. That’s not good writing.
I’ll forever hold Final Fantasy VII and its characters close to my heart. That will never change. It’s hard to wonder though what could’ve been. A modern day re-imagining of my favorite game that stayed faithful to the core story, characters, and themes of the original now seems too good to be true unfortunately. What we have instead is a game that strayed too far away from itself, with characters now destined to become puppets in a familiar, yet unsettlingly unfamiliar world.
For some of you, this may be closer to what you want, and that’s great. For me, this story does not come close to living up to the original, and it’s a disappointing fact that I’ll have to accept. Maybe in 20 more years someone will make a remake more faithful to the original :)
