Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is a behemoth of an RPG experience. My play through clocked in at over 100 hours, and although I made an effort to complete the vast majority of side content, there was still a surprising amount of material that I have yet to complete. I do, however, feel that I have given it more than enough time to give an informed review.

As my title suggests, this game is astounding on a mechanical level. The sheer amount and quality of varied content available to the player is easily this game's greatest strength. Mini games, world exploration, and combat mechanics are all virtually flawless, and I cannot praise the dev team enough for the evident love and care they used in crafting these aspects. While a depressing majority of modern RPGs fill their runtimes with generic fetch quests as side quests, FF7 Rebirth gives a plethora of great side missions and content that never got bland or repetitive. I would go as far as saying that in this regard, FF7 Rebirth is the standard to which future RPGs should be held. Square Enix outdid themselves in this category a thousand times over, especially in comparison to its predecessor on the PS4.

As far as the story goes, I will avoid spoilers, but suffice it to say that I have some issues. FF7 original already has a hyper-convoluted story in typical JRPG fashion, but Rebirth dials it up to 11. A good chunk of changes made to the new game seem to require a decent amount of knowledge of other games, and I can't help but feel that players unfamiliar with expanded FF7 lore will find themselves confused on multiple occasions. The story still has a lot of strong moments, but longtime fans will likely be scratching their heads at some of the decisions the writing team made. It didn't ruin my experience, but I felt that many story elements were actively competing with each other, as well as with the otherwise very cohesive gameplay mechanics. Ultimately, it's something that everyone will have to decide for themselves.

In conclusion, I would highly recommend this game. It's story isn't a masterpiece, but the gameplay was so consistently and reliably engaging that these issues with the writing were minimal for the most part. Strong world exploration, variety in side missions, and a very polished combat system make this one of the best modern RPGs I've played, and I'll happily sing its praises despite its flaws.

Great game overall. The combat was a step up. Characters and character relationships were fantastic. The world building was great as was the story as a whole. Graphics are incredible. The only thing that bogged this down slightly was the sheer number of side content and mini games. I know there were a lot of mini games in the original game, but this game, part 2 of 3, is already larger than the original game was. 90% of the game was truly amazing, but there were a few points where I just got tired of the mini games. I don't have the time that I used to for gaming, so the volume of side content and checking off open world boxes knocked this from a 10 to a 9 for me. Everything else was near perfect though. Seeing the scenes and world play out in high def graphics and with voice acting was an incredible nostalgia trip.

Seems they are all bad reviews on here, apart from one who seems to have totally missed the nostalgia of this game, "something in inverted comas" - no, they definitely should have! This is so true to the original narrative. Yes they've thrown in one character to appease the alphabet brigade but other than that, it's a beautiful rendition of the game that meant so much to many of us.

It's a wonderful expansion on a world and characters that meant so much to so many.

Then there's the guys who, I don't know, get paid? The have a pre written awful review that they change some words to the film/game they are trying to destroy.

No character development? Clearly didn't play this game at all. So disregard those reviews straight away.

There is a good, 8/10 game, here, but it's hidden behind the majority of what the game is. That good game is the "main scenario", not counting Chapters 1 and 14. The Nibelheim flashback and Forgotten Capital largely handled very poorly.

The sea of cynically-made open-world anti-accessibility "content" obscures what is good about this game. The main scenario is effectively a sidequest, because the majority of the gameplay time is spent on "optional" side content. That side content (minigames, sidequests, world intel, VR fights) are this game's main features.

Difficulty is forced and accessibility is non-existent. This is the least accessible RPG in history, and it's a remake/sequel/requel to the most accessible RPG in history.

They went out of their way to fill the game with unoriginal Ubisoft Open world content, and artificially unbalanced difficulty.

The game also forces players to engage in some very predatory romantic/sexual actions with underage characters.

Ironically, by choosing to chase money over quality, Square Enix is selling far less than they could have.

Final Fantasy has constantly reinvented itself through the years, and Rebirth is no exception. Final Fantasy VII has become its own mega-franchise within gaming and its namesake's universe. And for good reason. This game takes what made Remake great and expands on it with an open-world gameplay design that also blends the seamless level transitions of the Uncharted video games and keeping the otherworldly charm of the Final Fantasy franchise fully intact the whole time.

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth may be a bit overwhelming for casuals, but the choice of difficulty definitely eases some newcomers' anxieties of the experience being too overwhelming. Yes there's the trademark difficult boss-fights that require some trial-and-error strategising, but victory is never too far away to achieve for the player. The world on display here is something else, and the open-world design (in select chapters that is) really adds countless hours of replay value and depth to the world's dense story. Cloud and his friends are exploring the massive iceberg that is Rebirth's world-building with absolute swagger that's daring and cinematic all at once.

There's a lot of stuff to unpack here. Maybe almost too much; but hey, JRPGs were always bursting with several hours of stuff to do. Some of the mini-games are unnecessarily hard (the piano is near impossible to perfect with the analog controls), but they're thankfully 110% optional and don't roadblock the story completely. Rebirth gets a lot right, but a game this massive can't be perfect; but it doesn't need to be PERFECT perfect. Rebirth just needed to be a deep exploration of Final Fantasy VII's iconic world, and with that it succeeds many-folds over.

Rebirth has something for hardcore fans, for newcomers, and it delivers on the cut-scenes too. It's already shaping up to be 2024's game of the year. And who knows? Maybe Part Three will be even better?

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is the reason gamers play video games so passionately. It has the characters, exploration, and immersion people have come to expect from the best JRPGs on the market. It's a modern classic that's begging for Part Three to round up the trilogy as soon as possible (but seriously, let's hope they don't rush Part Three THAT quickly).

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is a 5/5-star masterpiece. 10/10 IMDb points. Give this one a go if you love the Final Fantasy franchise.