Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth – test, role playing game, PlayStation 5

Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth – The second act of a great epic

The game is logically linked to FF7: Remake, so it is recommended that you have looked into the predecessor in more detail. You get an overview of what happened in the first part and also the introduction to it in the form of review videos and character explanations Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth succeeds quickly; However, if you want to understand the game's story in all its intricacies and understand the motivations of the characters, you should take the time to play both games – or have played the original.

Oh yes, Final Fantasy 7 – what can I say? Actually, this game speaks for itself. Many consider it to be one of the best video games of all time. It was the first title in the series to be published in Europe in 1997 and from then on not only started its triumphant march, but also made it The JRPG genre is becoming increasingly popular with us. To date, 16 parts of Final Fantasy have been released in the main series alone, as well as countless spin-offs such as Final Fantasy Tactics, Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles or Dissidia Final Fantasy, and the heroes also make many guest appearances in other games. For example, what would this be? Kingdom Heartsseries without Final Fantasy? The main characters of the seventh part such as Cloud Strife, Tifa Lockhart and Sephiroth have become famous beyond the franchise.

You encountered this scene several times in Cloud's visions in the 2020 remake. You will find out what this is all about at the beginning of the game.

2020 marked the start of a remake trilogy that gave the game more than just a makeover. Seeing the characters almost a quarter of a century later in contemporary graphics made fans' hearts beat faster. Midgar, Shinra, Avalanche, Mako and Armored Sword – Terms that bring images to the mind of every Final Fantasy fan were suddenly omnipresent again. Developer Square Enix dared to make a makeover with Final Fantasy 7: Remake, adding additional side stories, characters and background details and raising the popular game to the level of the (then) Current Gen. Accordingly, this review article will also cover events from Remake received; I will avoid story spoilers for FF7: Rebirth.

Get out of the city and into nature

The setting for the first part of the remake trilogy was exclusively the city of Midgar. Even though you were in many different parts in terms of mood, such as Sector 7, the Wall Market and the Upper City, the game world felt quite small to me. The individual dungeons were also very tube-like, which gave me unpleasant associations Final Fantasy 13 got. In FF7: Rebirth you start after a flashback sequence and a stay in the small town of Kalm immediately in a large open area, the grasslands that you can freely explore. Little by little you will also come to the other regions of the game world, which are as visually impressive as they are varied and in which you can invest a lot of time in fights, side quests or treasure hunts. In some areas, such as cave systems or ruins of Mako reactors, the path is largely straight.

The beautiful and almost dreamy starting region gets you in the mood for what you can expect visually from the game.

By the way, the score or equipment from the first part cannot be transferred, but of course you don't start from scratch either. For example, some materials – including the summoner variety – are available to you for magical actions. Also you start with a five-man battle group from the start: In addition to the protagonist Cloud Strife, these are his childhood friend Tifa Lockhart and Barret Wallace – both members of the eco-terrorist group Avalanche – the flower seller Aerith Gainsborough, who the Shinra corporation is after because of her mysterious origins, and the big cat-like Red XIII Shinra's research object. Later, the ninja fighter Yuffie Kisaragi and the mysterious cat Cait Sith join the group.

Another flood of foreign shame from the drawing board?

In Costa del Sol you can unlock beach outfits for Cloud and his companions. For Aerith I chose something a little more modest…

I found the portrayal of characters in FF7: Remake to be overly clichéd, to the point where it was almost painfully embarrassing in some scenes. This may be a stylistic device in JRPGs, which is also used in many anime, for example, and in 1997 it may even have been something new and unusual for us Western audiences who were easily impressed. But in the 2020s it seemed worn out and outdated to me. Main character Cloud was so aloof and emotionless, which was probably supposed to be cool, but just seemed infantile to me. The muscle-bound Barret with his machine gun arm was a boorish, punch-it-first-ask-questions block (but is, of course, a gentle father figure). Aerith and Tifa – who undeniably also have their baggage to bear – were so fake naive and kawaii in many scenes that it was clumsy. And then there were supporting characters like Don Corneo or Locche, who were actually just caricatures of themselves.

This cringe factor is somewhat toned down in all facets in Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth. The characters are still classic JRPG stereotypes, but no longer as striking. Cloud comes a bit out of his introvert comfort zone and sometimes opens his mouth, even talks about his past, Barret cracks a joke here and there and Aerith is just a normal, friendly, serious woman and not a 14-year-old wannabe innocence from the country. Tifa fades into the background for long stretches of the story, but visually she continues to be the game's poster girl, whose anatomically questionable female assets are sometimes displayed a little too prominently. Red

Mysterious, taciturn and cool. That's how we know Cloud and he can't completely get rid of these character traits in FF7: Rebirth.

In the cutscenes and especially in conversations and dialogues clarify character backgrounds or contribute relevantly to the story could, but Cloud in particular often still reacts with an “Oh” or “Hmm” as if he were overwhelmed by having a conversation, whereas a complete sentence could help prevent misunderstandings or clarify issues. This is typical anime behavior and is just as difficult to understand as it is to endure as a defenseless player on the controller.