A Promising Tale - Final Fantasy 7 Remake Review (PS4)
- Zacky Dhaffa
- Jun 5, 2020
- 10 min read
I was interested in the game from the moment they announced remake, but I always got my hope down due to not having PS4. I am sharing PS4 with my roommates but it did not have much storage left until I volunteered to use my external hard drive as extended storage for PS4. That changed in the status quo creates the opportunity of installing new games. So, I opened Amazon Japan just for curiosity. Then, the FF7R game showed up and boom. It was an impulsive purchase. And there you have it, it's playtime.
(Minor spoilers ahead, proceed with caution)
The Story, Characters, and World Building
As a new player to the franchise, I have an amazing impression of how the story proceeds. Because of that, I would like to share my thoughts on the narrative and world-building, while also relates it to our current situation in the world at the end of this section.
The Tale of the Protagonists and the World They Live In
The story follows Cloud Strife, a former SOLDIER who turns into a mercenary. At the beginning of the game, he is hired by an eco-terrorist group called Avalanche to destroy Mako Reactor 1 as an action to oppose Shinra Electric Power Company, due to its excessive extraction of Mako, the energy of the planet. Avalanche is based on Sector 7 slums of Midgar, led by Barrett with Jessie, Biggs, Wedge, and Tifa,
At first, we were presented Cloud as someone who would do the job just for the money, as expected of a professional mercenary. But, things inside him started to change as he received more jobs from the Avalanche and interacted with these people more. This change is added by his interactions with Aerith who he met before. He started to be more responsive to others and more humane.
However, this softness is not something we see coming out of him as he developed. His past memories of Sephiroth, the series main antagonist, began to appear and haunted him and caused him hallucinations. This filled him with rage and the desire for revenge that fuel him to become a soldier with an enemy to kill in mind.
(I like how Tifa called him, なんでも屋さん; literal meaning: the person who does anything)
It is not only Cloud whose character develops throughout the game, but the people surround him too. For instance, Barrett who we saw in the start as someone who's indifference toward Cloud began to open up to Cloud and trust him as he knew him more. I talked to a friend and she said that characters are being expanded more and shown more personalities than the original game and sequels, and I agree with that point despite not playing the 1997's game. Minor characters feel like they are part of the world and not just some kind of "Supporting Character A" of a typical RPG. Their reactions help create the atmosphere and the world itself. But, not only minor characters do that.
NPCs also have some role in the world-building. The game paid attention to the smallest details of passerby's voices when Cloud or other characters in the party lead walk nearby them. People in both levels of Midgar feared the explosion of Mako Reactor 1. When another disaster happened, we could hear their sounds. Be it a child who is looking for their parents, people who were looking for other survivors, or those who were crumbled in anxiety and panic. Walking through the map and doing side quests give us an idea of what has happened and is happening around the story as it also gives expositions that complement the information we know from dialogues between the protagonists.
The story of Shinra Company we heard throughout the game portrays them as the enemy of the team. That might not be the case for Midgar citizens. The greedy and capitalist Shinra Company did contribute to society despite its horrific treatment to the team. Certain values were added to the society's utility as it brings prosperity to people in the upper level of Midgar with the technology improvements. However, the people on the lower level do not feel the same wealth and opportunity as a result of the exploitation by the company.
As the one who owns capital, it is rational for Shinra to maintain it by necessary means. That includes having the military capability and spreading propaganda to maintain stability. As a result, Avalanche as an environmentalist group appeared as retaliation against the tyrant. They keep saying that the planet is dying due to industrialization and pollution, but they also serve as the voice of oppressed people as they also take arms against Shinra.
So, is the game about freedom against the evil Shinra Company? Yes, but is it all about this game? No. The answer to that is perhaps something you might not expect of a remake game. To figure that out, play the game.
How the Game Reflects Our World
The game reminds us of the world we are living in a lot of aspects. If we look from an environmental perspective, we are faced with the danger of climate change due to the excessive pollution we made. Movements like Fridays for Future have somehow given us hope that there are still people who care about the planet. Unlike the game, I do believe that we would not need resorting to violence in the name of the earth like Avalanche,
However, we also see that oppressive governments start to rise all over the world which slowly reduces the freedom of expression and democracy which incite usage of force on both sides. By the time I was writing this review, there are ongoing protests around the globe on the matter of racism, police brutality, and the government itself. Even though the game does not really talk about these topics specifically, it tells us not to stop the fight for a true cause. Changing a status quo or the current system is uncomfortable for both the rulers and those who are impacted.
If the protagonists believe in a better future, why wouldn't we?
Gameplay
Experiencing the Main Contents - Difficulty: Normal, Gameplay time: 34 hours
This game has the "Hack-and-slash" elements while constantly thinking, switching characters, using abilities, and casting spells like an RPG you may know. You also have the chance to build your own playstyle by upgrading weapons and using materia to further personalize the characters. Furthermore, upgrading weapons and resetting its upgrade is not a huge problem, thus changing your playstyle in the mid-game or late-game does not take too much hassle. But for materia, it does take some time to improve the level with more combat experiences.
Motorcycle combat that appeared on two chapters (the earliest one in chapter 4) is a cool combat mode that gives a break away from normal combat mode. However, it still comes with challenges as in both chapters there are bosses. It needs some strategical thinking to conserve the bike's health when you can't heal as you wish while also attacking with limited options. There are a trophy and an extra scene for accomplishing chapter 4's motorcycle combat with high health, yet I failed to do so. I am aiming to get that.
Mini-games such as squats, pull-up, and darts are surprisingly fun. It requires a calm mind and steady fingers to win the dart games by using only 7 darts, and I did. Somehow it feels satisfying like finishing a chapter. On the other hand, side quests can sometimes be annoying as it takes too much of time and detours (for some) and not really story-related. Yet, it helps in building the world of the Midgar itself. Also, whether completing side quests or not can affect certain events (but not the main story), so there is always a reason to do so.
Post-game Contents: Hard Mode
The game is actually hard and not only a gimmick, as I died a lot to minor bosses. Enemies attack harder, no items allowed, and what worse is that no MP recovery when sitting in the blue bench or taking a rest. MP is for the whole chapter, but it can still regenerate during battles. Furthermore, chests that contain recovery items are redundant in Hard Mode because we can't use it anyway. Healing materia is still powerful, but I tend to use more Prayer materia as it heals all the party in one-go and it conserves MP as well. So far it has been challenging, punishing, and tempting to try again and again.
Initially, I have no incentive to play it as I somewhat tend to not playing a game after clearing the main story. But, as I want to take some screenshots for this article, I decided to replay the game in a hard mode to challenge myself. Because of that, I will be playing more of the mode to unlock trophies, summons, getting chests and weapons, and maxing the level to 50.
Visual
This game is really beautiful. It is one of the latest games that are made using Unreal Engine 4. The pre-rendered scenes are absolutely gorgeous, and one of them being the cinematic intro scene of Midgar (as shown in the trailer), which creates a great first impression on the players. A lot of the pre-rendered scenes are used in the final chapter which I appreciate much, but sadly it could not be captured as it will be explained later. Backgrounds used are something that I really fond especially like the photo above where I can see the starry skies and enjoy the scene. The background when exploring the world helps build the world and lead us to understand the situation they are living in.
The cinematography creates more entertaining narratives. For instance, shots for action scenes often feel thrilling and tense. On the other hand, close-up shots direct us to pay attention to the character models and receive more emotions of the cutscenes, which is a wonderful thing to be done. Focus and motion blur that is often used in scenes make it even more realistic. Details such as flying objects or lightning particles when fighting the enemies on the battle mode are also adding the excitements when playing in high-pace combat while not dropping the frame rate of the game.
However, a lot of detailed textures are not that good. From far away, things seem to be beautiful but if you zoom or get closer, the quality drops. I found a video on Youtube that review the graphics of the game more in-depth, with its pros and cons. The problem of the detailed textures is discussed further in the video.
Audio
Audio experiences create the mood of places and scenes of the game. A battle scene is always complemented by sound effects of the swinging blades, shouts, gunfires, and even explosives. Calming, lovely, nostalgic, and reminiscing scenes are always being accompanied by a soothing and relaxing piano that makes me touched emotionally more.
For the battle soundtrack, I have to go with "Let the Battles Begin!" as my favorite. For relaxing ones, my favorites are:
"Tifa's Theme - Seventh Heaven",
"Aerith's Theme - Home Again"
"Flowers Blooming in the Church"
"Midnight Rendezvous"
"Main Theme of FFVII - Nightfall in the Undercity"
"Hollow Skies"
Jukebox is a nice place to listen to some of the OSTs, however, not all of them are available in-game. One of the songs that I wish was in the game is "Hollow" by Yosh (Survive Said the Prophet). I first listened to this song in the video of making of the song by Square Enix on January. It gave me a memorable impression, making it love at first sight, or in this case, first hearing.
La canción me da impresión memorable. ¡Enseguida me le encanta!
In regards to the voice acting, I chose to play with the Japanese voice, and it sounds really great. I didn't expect to see a name like Uesaka Sumire (Kyrie) until the trailer roll, as well as Sakamoto Maaya (Aerith) who was a returning voice actress, along with others from the original game. Some Japanese phrases are translated a bit differently to English subtitles, so when I heard it, I have to contextually translate it in my mind but mostly it says the same thing.
Other Verdicts from Personal Experiences
During my first gameplay, I tried so hard to get all the chests to be opened (including those that contain weapons) and summoning materia but missed some as I did not realize upon the requirements. There is even a weapon that needs to be stolen from the enemy boss, which is easily missed. If only the game gives us more clearer hint of the requirements without relying on online walkthrough, it would be great.
After dying several times, I learned that autosave is not equal to the checkpoint, which is confusing. Despite that, the Hard mode does not have the option of choosing "return to the checkpoint" so at least that solves my confusion at the expense of doing manual save more.
Tifa-Aerith combo is so far my hardest group of units to play with. I have played it in Normal mode and I could not help not to worry thinking how many times I have to die in the Hard mode. My Tifa build is fast and hard-hitting yet frail, while Aerith is a strong mage for attack and heal yet also frail. I definitely need to consider more defensive play later on.
There is one chapter that I really wanted to take some screenshots, and it is the final chapter, I was infuriated when I could not do it. Later on, I heard from a friend that PS4 prevents players from doing so to avoid leaking major spoilers of the finale, and it happens to other games as well. I can understand the reasoning, but even I who is writing a review still consider my post to be not giving spoilers as much and crucial as possible.
Perhaps playing the original first is better than jumping straight to the remake to some extent. There are some easter eggs that refer to the original game and left as mysteries in this first part of the remake project. Catching up through the universe story using other ways without playing the game might be helpful to fill in the dots. But it is not that significantly important to understand when playing the remake as a fresh and new player as it might be explained possible future releases. You just have to wait.
Final Words
The story of the team and the whole events that take place remind us something that we should be believing in, hope. That is why the game is a promising tale for me. As hope for a better future.
This game is officially the second Final Fantasy game that I completed if you count Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions. The wait, price, and time are worth it. As the end credits said,
The Unknown Journey Will Continue
Looking forward to the sequel on the next-gen console, PS5, with its gorgeous graphics.
To Square Enix and PlayStation:
Don't destroy my expectation, please.
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