Since the weekends can be about relaxing from work and talking about fun stuff, I was really excited this week at E3 that Sony and Squeenix announced a remake of Final Fantasy 7. This is something many, many people have asked for and now we're finally seeing it. If you've seen Advent Children then you have an idea of what the characters and environment could look like. I, for one, am stoked about this. I'm a little wary, however, of whether the game can keep its charm or whether this will be a big disappointment with an overhaul of the combat system and story.
And the big question, of course.....In the remake can you revive Aeris?
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In an E3 About Nostalgia, One of the Big Announcements is a Final Fantasy 7 Remake
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(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @07:00AM
when E3 was about games? because I don't.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 26 2015, @09:32PM
pepperidge farms remembers...
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @07:48AM
Linux or it didn't happen.
(Score: 2) by VortexCortex on Monday June 22 2015, @08:55PM
For Linux I've ran my FF7 via ePSXe (or Wine for the PC version). As for an updated FF7? The high(er) res model pack does it for me, along with a few other mods [qhimm.com] (there's also mods that allow you to keep Areis alive).
From a design perspective, the death of an important character is a profound part of FF7, which places great significance on the subject of mortality via removing a character that players have invested time, if not empathy, into. The desire to revive her may have you pulling hairs out wondering why Cloud won't use any of the hundred Phoenix Downs in your inventory, but the tale would be less emotional, esp. the best ending, without the loss.
Loss is an important theme in FF7 which makes it great. There's a point where you lose all your materia. There's a point in the game where you lose the main character as he loses himself. Both Aeris and Red XII are the last of their kind and lost their families. The planet itself is withering due to over use of its magical energies. Not to mention the kidnappings. The theme of loss runs through just about every element of the plot, if you didn't have to lose a party member permantently I would have been disappointed and critics would be saying it would have been more powerful if Aeris (or Tifa) had died.
Personally, I'm not excited about a FF7 reboot.. I'd have been excited if they said they'd continue or expand the story, or perhaps made a prequel. The Final Fantasy universes change nearly every game (a few elements crossover, like chocobos). Sometimes we want more of the same universe rather than less of the beloved story/game getting butchered. I hope they keep in the very complex magic system, which allows some interesting chain effects, e.g. lightning + all casted on your own party after you've casted reflect + all on yourselves to magnify the damage to opponents. It wasn't immediately apparent that one could link more than two materia together at a time by equipping duplicates, but once discovered it makes for a powerful battle system having a large degree of depth emerging from a small amount of complexity. When I first figured it out I was amazed that the game's simple logic system actually allowed the long chains of effects to be "programmed" with materia.
It won't be a FFVII game to me if the battle system is butchered rather than accentuated. I'm sure Square knows this has far too much potential to screw it up, but seeing how Square typically scraps and rebuilds the battle systems between games rather than carrying forward successful features (such as the aforementioned action chaining) I don't have my hopes up. Maybe this is just an automatic response since too many reboots have been shitting on my childhood rather than giving me more of what I loved. I blame Microsoft for so many people assuming that a reboot is the answer.
Also, here's a link to the video on youtube [youtube.com] since that embedded one on TFA didn't play nice with the Debian I run in a VM.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @09:32PM
There is at least one prequel for the PSP that mostly focuses on Zack. Crisis Core: FF7.
(Score: 2) by mtrycz on Monday June 22 2015, @07:59AM
I was 15 when played it and it certainly evokes some great memories. I'll probably buy ps4 just to play this, and just sell it back afterwards. In the name of nostalgia.
The article stresses that it's a remake, not a remaster. It'll probably be significantly different, but still have the same feel and atmosphere. Knowing (the old) Square, they won't fuck it up, but who knows. Unfortunately, I'll buy it anyway.
Oh, and if you've seen the trailer, they sure know how to generate some hype.
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(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @08:13AM
You're damn right it's VII. We need to get rid of those dirty Arab numbers, made by terrorist scum, and use the Imperial Roman numbers like Jupiter himself intended, by Jove.
(Score: 2) by mtrycz on Monday June 22 2015, @12:09PM
You think you're funny or something?
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @12:58PM
The AC probably doesn't understand that the Final Fantasy numbering system is not for counting. The numbers are part of the title to designate the main series from sequels and spin-offs. This is why FF Tactics doesn't have a number and why X-2 isn't XI.
(Score: 1) by kazzie on Tuesday June 23 2015, @04:58AM
and why X-2 isn't XI
or VIII, for that matter...
(Score: 2) by khedoros on Monday June 22 2015, @09:22PM
I'll probably buy ps4 just to play this
In the announcement video that I saw, there was a line like "Coming first to Playstation 4". I plan on starting with the assumption that they'll release it for the PC eventually and that my current machine will handle it.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @08:30AM
never forget, never forgive
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/sony_rootkit [wikipedia.org]
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @08:39AM
REMEMBER TRAYVON!!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @10:51AM
I'll never forget or forgive, but at the same time I do break it down. I'll never buy anything from Sony MUSIC again.
On the other hand, I have no intention of putting a PS3/PS4/whatever disc in a computer assuming it had some payload to stealth install. So long as they don't go infecting usb thumbdrives that are plugged into it (To transfer non-DRMed content to the console for playback) with malware then I'm willing to keep separating the two branches of the company in my mind.
But. At the same time, there's nothing at all on the PS4 that I want to play. There's nothing on the Xbone I want to play. So it's a moot point.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 23 2015, @01:29AM
You're too forgiving. Don't forget that Sony will readily steal [wikipedia.org] from their customers too. They have always been anti-customer and do not deserve even a penny from anyone, yet suckers like you keep throwing money at them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @12:22PM
FF7 took itself too seriously to have much charm.
FF9, FF5, FF10/-2, and even FF13-2 are more lighthearted.
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Monday June 22 2015, @05:01PM
Sorry but I don't want every RPG to be child-friendly and Disney-fied like Mystic Quest.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @05:58PM
Child Friendly? Apparently you never played V or X. Adult themes abound and weird systems that require a certain level of mastery or intelligence.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @06:02PM
I agree but I would not call FF7 charming like TFS.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @12:49PM
Reviving Aeris would not be consistent with other FF7 derivatives so it is not going to happen.
I hope there is an option to revive Aeris' spirit so she can have a soliloquy about life, death, sacrifice, and facing the reality that there are some things you can't change. Even better if reviving Aeris would result in a "bad ending" that shows that her sacrifice was necessary and that the player would need to imprison her and put your selfish desires ahead of her desires and the greater good.
(Score: 1) by danaris on Monday June 22 2015, @02:56PM
Even better if reviving Aeris would result in a "bad ending" that shows that her sacrifice was necessary
Unless the ending changes substantially, that would be a necessary result of adding the ability to revive her. Both Holy and the Lifestream rising to stop Meteor were made possible by Aeris dying and returning to the Lifestream, adding her strong will/wish/prayer for the planet to be saved to its collective consciousness.
There are a lot of changes I'm kinda-sorta hoping they make to the remake, but that's one I very strongly hope they don't make.
Dan Aris
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Aichon on Monday June 22 2015, @03:43PM
For those of us with fond memories of the original, we need to just accept that Remake will be something else entirely, for better and worse. Likely mostly for worse.
Tetsuya Nomura (director on the project) has already said there will be some major changes. Nothing as drastic as changing a character's gender, he said, but the fact that he gave that as an example of what's NOT considered major has me concerned at just how large the changes they're planning will be.
But when you think about it, it makes sense that they'd have to make some serious changes, since a lot of stuff just doesn't translate from PS1 graphics to the HD of today. Thinking about just the first five or so hours of the game, you have the Honeybee Inn (a gentlemen's club) and the crossdressing scene in Wall Market. Some of those rooms in the Inn would land Squeenix in trouble today. For instance, one of the rooms that's harder to get into has a group of nearly naked body builder types calling the main character "Bubby" and then pulling him, perhaps against his will, into a bath tub with all of them before the screen goes steamy. It was easy to dismiss as a bit of silliness when there was a grand total of about 100 polygons on the screen, but put it in HD and you'll get yourself a major controversy, especially since the body builder stereotype is now more widely-known in the West as being a Japanese caricature for gay men. All they'd need is one parent saying the phrases "gay rape orgy" or "homosexual gang rape" to get every newspaper in America covering it and half the country calling for a boycott, and that's not the sort of press they need.
But it's hard to imagine how the crossdressing will function without some reworking. Or how the death scene will be as poignant. Or how they'll get a dolphin to carry the entire team out of the water and up onto a tower. And they've already said that they think it looks unnatural to have HD characters lining up for battle in two lines and then taking ATB turns to attack one another, so we should probably expect battle mechanics that more closely resemble those of FF13 than FF7.
All of which is to say, don't expect to relive your childhood, if you're someone who grew up in that era. Go in with low expectations, and you may, just may, find yourself pleasantly surprised. But I wouldn't hold out much hope for that.
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Monday June 22 2015, @04:46PM
Sounds like a GTA-style Streisand effect which would help generate buzz. And sales.
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(Score: 2) by Aichon on Monday June 22 2015, @05:01PM
Controversies do indeed generate buzz, but controversies, by themselves, do not necessarily generate sales. There's a big difference between picking up a copy of the game that's controversial because the developers spent 90% of their time getting the "jiggle" physics right for the boobs of the beach volleyball players, and picking up a game that will get you derided with homophobic comments from your bros, i.e. the target demographic. I'm not suggesting that's the way things should work; I'm just pointing out how things actually are.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Monday June 22 2015, @11:28PM
I think the better question is, will they finally fix Aerith's name?
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 23 2015, @01:33AM
Even if they remake it, there's no guarantee they'll bring it west. Still waiting for them to localize Dragon Quest 7 3D.