Discuss and share your impression with the FFVII Remake and how it compares and differs from the original.

Spoilers allowed and expected.

Is there a reason this thread never really got started?

Surely there's a lot of people who have completed it now?

Anyway, I loved the remake. Pretty much everything worked for me. The voice acting breathed new life into once beloved characters, the backstories of characters like Jessie and Biggs just added to the tragedy of it all and the combat system is the best I've played in a JRPG... possibly ever.

Story wise, even from the start we know things are going to be different from the original compilation as the presence of a wider Avalanche group means the events of Before Crisis didn't happen. As for the whispers of fate stuff I take as mostly symbolic and a way to warn players some major story changes are coming. I actually think the whispers and the multiverse theories will only play a minor role in the story from here on out and only mentioned from Sephiroth and Aerith from time-to-time. Up until the last chapter the changes in this part seem minor, but they're going to balloon into some major changes in the later parts, and this was a way for the devs to take players of the original along for the ride.

I also read that fate was going to play a larger part in the story of the original so it could just be that they decided to explore this a bit more rather than going heavy into the multiverse thing. As I replay it, Aerith is obviously sensing a lot more than she lets the others know. Her resolution with Cloud really makes it clear she knows her journey will be ending in the near future and there are a few bits of dialogue where she hints at knowing future events without explicitly saying them.

The changes fall into three categories.

Good changes that flesh out the story and improve the characters- I.e. Aerith consoling Marlene or the Wall Market segment.
Changes that just pad out the game- I.e. Barrett walking through a tunnel.
Changes that are just wtf- Namely the ending.

I'd say the ratio is about 30, 60, 10 or somewhere around there. Most of the changes really didn't add much to the story, and were dull but inoffensive. A good amount of the changes really improved the game in a meaningful way. Then there were those changes that are best described as Kingdom Hearts bullshit.

Most of the changes, even [especially] the fate related stuff, are most likely not exactly what they seem. People are speculating but no direct answers were given by the developers, and even the ones who wrote the Ultimania book are asking questions and speculating and the devs only give vague answers or say that things will be explained in the sequels.

In the mean time, it’s funny as hell to see all the crazy and more often than not silly theories alongside the meltdown and complaints from those who think they know where any of this is going and pass definite judgment.

Like the one above.

Errrrr... was that aimed at me?  Cause if so, I think you have a pretty weird definition of what a meltdown is.  If you disagree with something I said, feel free to explain why.  If I posted a crazy or silly theory explain why it's crazy or silly.  But this seems to be an attempt to dismiss any criticism simply by attacking the person, and that is not ok.  Let's try to get this topic off on the right foot ^_^.

We know something dosen't feel quite right when Aerith tells Cloud not to fall in love with her. I suspect that Aerith and Sephiroth have some knowledge of what was to come, however there is no certainty of those event occurring in the same way.

I actually didn't have an issue with the changes and expansion to the story. After a while I actually think the ending was really good. I'm also confident that the next game with be even better because Kiatse has said the events will continue as normal. So I don't have a problem with the whispers or circumventing the will of fate at the end of the game. Those things were fine, partly because those things won't change the overall story of Sephiroth, Jenova, the Black Materia, etc.

The issue I have with the ending is Zack and whether he survived. It looks like they are using time travel or multiple realities to undo Zack's death and undo the meaning of life and death to this story. I think we have all heard how bad Kingdom Hearts is and also how the FF13 trilogy is riddled with poor writing with regards to time travel and time related story elements. Those are not things that feel like they belong in FF7 and those things are very difficult to do well even in something like Star Trek which is where they work best.

Time will tell where the story leads next, but if they wreck the story of FF7 with time travel horse manure, it will not be forgiven.

Based on what Kitase said I think the core elements of the original will still remain, but they got to realise that whilst the changes they make now are fairly minor, they're going to add up to some pretty major changes to the journey later down the line. A bit like the GoT TV show versus the books. Even when they still had the original source material, they started making some minor changes that eventually added up to completely different plot arcs by seasons 4/5. That's why I think the ending to this is almost entirely symbolic as a way to prepare fans of the original for a very different journey, even if core aspects are still the same.

As for Zack, my understanding is it was an alternate timeline and probably won't have any bearing on the future of this one. The reasoning being the picture of Stamp in that segment is different to the Stamp that was tagged throughout the game. I can think of a few reasons they might do this:

1. To give Aerith some closure on her history with Zack (she seems to be the character that is aware of Zack and Cloud in the ending)
2. As an example of how anything is possible in the future (as an addition to the ending text)
3. Lay the groundwork for the possibility of a Crisis Core remake/Zack DLC with the possibility of making Zack survive the ending

I don't see them playing too much with Zack and time travel in future parts of the remake as his death is just too pivotal to Cloud's personality and character.

I can pretty much pick out the sentence that made Hynad think "meltdown" as: "Then there were those changes that are best described as Kingdom Hearts bullshit."

The "Kingdom Hearts bullshit" line tends to be used as a pretty lazy criticism because there are other possibilities that haven't been explored with this assumption that they're going heavy into the weird time travel/alternative timelines direction like Kingdom Hearts (and is usually followed up with blaming Nomura). It seems like some people have made their conclusions on something that is still highly speculative.

The most rotten stuff FFVIIR really has is the terrible side quests. Getting the game 100% done is just a unbearable cringe fest with those retarded quests. SE needs to make secondary quests interesting like it's done is most western RRGs where they help expanding the lore.

The thing is that even with no knowledge of where it's going, the sequence was very Kingdom Heartsy.

You shift suddenly from a relatively grounded sci-fi environment to suddenly going to a very abstract "edge of creation" place.  Cloud is suddenly hopping across bits of land and slashing through large chunks of rock, very much like Sora.  Then, you're facing a massive shadowy entity that is completely unlike anything else in the game, but is very much like the kind of enemies you fight in Kingdom Hearts.  Instead of facing a concrete threat (we have to get away from Shinra!) you're suddenly facing an abstract one (we have to fight against destiny)!  It's all very Kingdom Heartsy.

So, yeah, I think Kingdom Hearts bullshit is a very apt description.  Without any discussion of alternate timelines (which are pretty heavily hinted at but I digress) the ending of the game was a massive and jarring tonal shift from both the original FF7, and even from everything proceeding it in the remake.