There’s a second in Last Fantasy VII Rebirth — one I received’t spoil however will say it’s not That Second — the place I may hardly breathe. The story had taken a slight detour away from the occasions of the unique’s continuity however not a lot to be wholly totally different. Characters have been in the identical locations and had the identical attitudes as they did earlier than however have been remixed simply so. I had no thought how every little thing was going to shake out, which careworn me out as a result of as much as that time, I used to be deeply invested in predicting how Rebirth would depart from its predecessor.
That nervousness is strictly what Naoki Hamaguchi, director of Last Fantasy VII Rebirth, needs gamers to really feel — together with a couple of different feelings.
“By implementing these changes,” Hamaguchi says, “we bring about this new sense of wonder and excitement and anxiety in a positive sense that I believe is key to a work of entertainment.”
In an interview with The Verge, Hamaguchi and veteran Last Fantasy producer Yoshinori Kitase, who labored on the unique FF7 and Remake / Rebirth, converse concerning the balancing act between honoring the 1997 authentic whereas creating one thing new.
“We bring about this new sense of wonder and excitement and anxiety in a positive sense that I believe is key to a work of entertainment.”
Trendy reinterpretations of “classic” video games isn’t a brand new development, however Rebirth is exclusive in that it falls between a straight-up current-gen refresh just like the Resident Evil remakes and full reboots just like the Tomb Raider trilogy of the 2010s.
There’s loads of alternative in that center house and Hamaguchi says for Rebirth, there have been two key factors he and his group stored in thoughts to keep up stability between updating the outdated and making one thing wholly new. The primary was expression.
“So much more detail is possible in what we’re able to portray and express in much of these scenes,” Hamaguchi says by way of an interpreter. “We’re now able to show certain [moments] that perhaps the original creators intended to but could not with the technology at the time.”
Using know-how in service of expression allowed Rebirth’s builders to deepen present canon occasions such that they really feel new with out being new.
“Allowing players this sort of new discovery in experiencing these details was the first point we took care of.”
The second level was recognizing that FF7’s story needed to be modified someway and determining the place to implement these adjustments successfully. Hamaguchi and Kitase labored to create a type of guessing recreation with Rebirth, designed to maintain gamers on their toes.
“If the story that we follow for Rebirth is exactly the same, players’ overall excitement would decrease,” Hamaguchi explains. “Zack, for example, was a character who died in the original game. But by bringing him back in the Remake series, we’ve created this sense of wonder and excitement in players that believe perhaps this is something different.”
Zack’s presence in Rebirth was certainly one thing that stored me questioning. He’s a fairly fashionable character, starring in Disaster Core, certainly one of FF7’s prequel video games, and I assumed maybe his inclusion was a little bit of fan service — particularly contemplating he’s alleged to be lifeless.
However Kitase says Zack’s resurrection wasn’t finished in response to his recognition however as a result of bringing in characters from throughout the FF7 universe, fashionable or obscure, was at all times the plan.
Zack and different characters like Cissnei, additionally from Disaster Core, add “spice,” Kitase says.
In my years of loyal service to the Last Fantasy collection, I’ve stored abreast of most of FF7’s lore unfold throughout a number of spinoff video games that both star or characteristic music from certainly one of my favourite J-rock artists. And the one defining throughline is that it may possibly get fairly complicated.
This wasn’t an excessive amount of of an issue in Remake, however issues get much more advanced as Rebirth begins. I questioned if resurrecting somebody canonically lifeless whereas introducing copies of Cloud and Aerith would possibly complicate what was already a sophisticated story — particularly for gamers who didn’t undergo a Gackt section.
Hamaguchi didn’t fairly promise that the story wouldn’t get too unwieldy to observe, however did say you wouldn’t want my stage of FF7 lore understanding to observe alongside.
“There’s nothing that [a player] wouldn’t understand because they haven’t played the spinoff titles,” he says. “Everything you need to know will be addressed in Rebirth.”
One of many main criticisms of Remake was that sure sections have been an excessive amount of of a departure from the unique. Moments like Remake’s Wall Market part, which as soon as represented 20 minutes to an hour’s price of gameplay, spiraled out into hourslong slogs that unnecessarily padded comparatively inconsequential sections of the sport.
“Everything you need to know will be addressed in ‘Rebirth.’”
Hamaguchi acknowledges the criticism, explaining that he felt it wasn’t a lot the aspect tales themselves that have been the problem, quite that gamers weren’t in a position to determine whether or not to pursue them. I used to be certainly touched by the tragic backstory of certainly one of Don Corneo’s henchmen, however supremely didn’t respect preventing by way of yet one more sewer dungeon to listen to it. (Or catching ghosts, or monitoring down any person’s misplaced pockets.)
Hamaguchi says these sorts of aspect tales are nonetheless current however shouldn’t be as disruptive as they have been for Remake. “For Rebirth, the volume of side contents is quite massive,” he says. “But a key difference here is that players are now able to choose when they play the side contents.”
A number of the “side content” you may select from is properly definitely worth the detour. The protorelic quests — a collection of treasure looking quests in quest of a group of mysterious artifacts — particularly stunned me with all of the totally different actions you take part in. Within the grasslands space, you need to stymie the efforts of a bunch of thugs. In Corel, to win the protorelic housed there, you battle waves of cactuar to rack up factors; whereas in Junon, Cloud and the gang are returned into their polygonal kinds from 1997 to play the Fort Condor tower protection mini-game.
That selection, in each story and gameplay, is what makes Rebirth a precious growth of Last Fantasy VII — even when it means coping with somewhat nervousness.