#it makes WAY more sense to have the plot focus on aerith from just before the date (the battle square convo with dio. her writing NPTK)...

[my-current-obsession]

To be fair, the whole, “I’ll come back to you even if you don’t promise to wait,” is a line pulled directly from OG FFVII. It’s mentioned late game by Cid (who hilariously went to see a showing of loveless in Midgar but fell asleep then woke up just in time to view this ending scene 😂). But if you wanna deep dive on the meaning of this line, it’s worth noting that a version of the line is used in FFVIII in reference to the main ship of that installment — Rinoa and Squall — who also happen to be another mage/swordsman pair. And if you wanna go big brain square enix energy, there’s also the famous, “I’ll come back to you; I promise…I know you will,” between Sora and Kairi in Kingdom Hearts when he goes off on another journey while she awaits his return. If you go down those rabbit holes, it seems square really has a type for their main pairs, no?

I don't remember that line in OG FF7, but it's been years since I played it so I'll take your word for it. But you're right that similar lines/sentiments pop up frequently in other FF and KH games, so yeah, Square has a type. I still think the conversation between Cloud and Aerith in KH2 is the quickest and easiest parallel to make here though, considering the same pair can have basically the same interaction, in an entirely different game. Yes, Cloud could also have this conversation in the play with T or Y. But only Aerith's would have the added depth of being a potential callback/reference to another moment the pair shared.

And considering this game liked to callback to several moments between Cloud and Aerith in the previous game (him remembering their first meeting being what snaps him out of Sephiroth's control, the "will you be okay getting back", "if I said I wasn't" in the ending...) I think it's totally reasonable to assume that Square might have subtly referenced at least one Clerith moment from outside the compilation.

[umbral-stigmata-unbound]

Do you think that Seph will have a breakdown in the 7R trilogy when he is forced to realize that he really is a human and wouldn't be much different from Cloud if they changed places as a parallel to his breakdown in CC? I'd imagine this would only happen when Jenova takes the reigns back from him and straight tells the man, "Yeah homie, you just a puppet like Cloud. you're not special, I would've done same to any other human with my cells". or some sort. This is the only way I can see Seph BECOMING a good guy in the 7R timeline. I do not subscribe to the theory of him being THE good guy at this current point considering how he is relentlessly tormenting Cloud, killed Barret and trolling everyone else in Midgar to an lesser extent. Not to mention, as Aerith says, "selfishly challenging fate without concern of what could happen" What are your thoughts on Seph potentially back to the light? How do you think it will be done? I personally don't like my villains to be redeemed but in Seph's case, I can see how it can be well done if they give it enough time and respect for the character to make it happen.

Anon Asks | Always Open

Hi there! A lot of questions, haha, I'll do my best to answer them! But this is just my understanding, theories, as well as lack of information on FF7R right now.

1- Do you think that Seph will have a breakdown in the 7R trilogy when he is forced to realize that he really is a human and wouldn't be much different from Cloud if they changed places as a parallel to his breakdown in CC? To be honest? I don't really see him having a breakdown. I'm not sure, if Jenova is the one in control in this scenario if she would go so far as to psychologically attack her host, she'd be more likely to manipulate and come off as working with to keep him pliable. And that's if she's in control. I know I've read that there is more than one Sephiroth in Remake, but there are not exact, clear answers as to how many and which ones there are. So it is debatable that there are different ones, in different encounters in Remake and therefor motives are different. However, nature of Sephiroth aside, I don't really see him having another break down. It seems like his fate is either to be broken down, or defeated, unless he were to win (which duh, he likely won't). My only other theory (and this theory is one i hold with full awareness that it is 99.9 percent unlikely to happen and its more a fan idea), is that his motives may be selfish and and self serving but they are still to save the planet from a greater evil currently out of focus...and so he's looking to team up, at the very least, with Cloud, and change what bits of fate he can for a better hope of survival. But I don't see him coming back to any full acceptance of who he once was, canon Seph is too far gone IMO.

2- In reference to what Aerith said to him and about him before and during their battle at the end of Remake, as well as a side note on him being a good guy in Remake... I'll be honest, this is likely solely my opinion and my slightly off grasp of how things are working but...idk, what she says about Sephiroth seems like she's a little off the mark or, honestly, the writers are trying to be different and yet lazier from their original plot and story telling and sources of evil/cruelty/accountability from wrong doings. Because she speaks like he is the sole wrong in the world, everything about him is wrong. My In-Plot explination? Take from OG canon that she may have been disconnected from her abilities for a while and only recently started connecting to them fully, she could be sensing and reading things wrong. Yeah, sure, she's an Ancient and a lot of it is natural to her, but you can't tell my her instinct are infallible. OR, if she's been using them openly for some time, opposing OG canon, she is instead currently still confusing things. I think perhaps she's reading Jenova, the infection that she is, or something more that is connected to Sephiroth but not solely him and just assuming it is him alone. He is a villain, he is at this point in his existence self serving, I don't claim him to be a saint. But he is nowhere near the core evil. He was born from evil and selfishness and carelessness from all side and survived beyond that for only so long before too many things broke him. But he is not the sole evil and I don't like the story telling that. Now, as for him being a good guy in Remake? TBH, I seriously doubt it will happen. Good and Evil team up? Possible, but kind of unlikely; a part of me would love it, and a part of me also hates that this isn't a remaster like I really wanted. But, the only time he was ever 'good' was CC up until Nibelheim, and good is a loose term given all ShinRa had him do as a SOLDIER.

3- What are your thoughts on Seph potentially back to the light? How do you think it will be done? I personally don't like my villains to be redeemed but in Seph's case, I can see how it can be well done if they give it enough time and respect for the character to make it happen. My thoughts on Sephiroth returning to the light, as it were, are fond and self indulgent and are channels solely into fanfiction and roleplay. I do not see it happening in canon, ever, really. I'd be happy to be wrong but I seriously doubt it. How it could be done? There are a lot of ways, I think, but they would take time, consideration, and would likely involve altering one or two key points of Sephiroth's story just to make it work. Again, this is how fanworks are a better indulgent avenue of that possibility. I too prefer redemption to happen only when it fits the character and the story and as much as I adore Sephiroth and like to imagine how things would have went if, say, he'd found out his origins in a more stable environment, if he had been able to be there for Genesis and Angeal rather than run away from him and possibly brought him with...he's just not meant to be anything other than the tragedy he was written to be. And that is why he is my One-Winged Tragedy~

I hope I answered things well enough!! Thank you for your ask!

[hartofhearts]

Why Tifa is the only person, living or dead, who can resolve Cloud’s crisis

Alternate title: “What really happened in the Lifestream”

Of course the Lifestream scene has been discussed to death within the fandom. While some consider it one of the greatest triumphs of the Cloud/Tifa relationship and the game in general, others are quick to diminish its events and Tifa’s role. “Oh, any other childhood friend character who knew Cloud could do the job.” “Oh, Cloud only needed Tifa as moral support, he could have figured everything out himself.” “Oh, Aerith (maybe +Zack) could have done it by accessing her Cetra/time machine/empath/Planet powers.”

The Lifestream sequence is extraordinarily dense with many subtle visual cues, so there’s a lot to untangle and interpret. But no matter how you slice it, any take which downplays or eliminates Tifa is fundamentally missing the point of this scene, both for the plot and for Cloud’s character arc.

A lot of the confusion stems from a fundamental misunderstanding of what actually needs to happen in the Lifestream and why. Thus, using specific details from the sequence, I’d like to present my take on the following:

Part 1: What Cloud needs to accomplish in the Lifestream to advance the plot

Part 2: Why Tifa is the only person, living or dead, who can resolve Cloud’s crisis, where we will discuss fun things such as:

Why Tifa is the the focus of his greatest flaw

What Tifa’s presence in the Lifestream accomplishes

Part 3: Why those “Tifa-less” fan theories just can’t work

This is a very long ride so let’s get to it!

Part 1: What Cloud needs to accomplish in the Lifestream to advance the plot

Many fans think that all Cloud needs to accomplish in the Lifestream is prove to himself that he existed before the Nibelheim incident. This seems to make sense, as Cloud’s mental break at Northern Crater was due him losing faith that he was truly Cloud Strife of Nibelheim, right?

But that isn’t the only thing that needs to happen. Consider this: Ex-SOLDIER Cloud does believe that he is Cloud Strife of Nibelheim for almost the entirety of the game’s first half. However, Ex-SOLDIER Cloud couldn’t correctly remember the Nibelheim incident back at Kalm, and he occasionally exhibits alarming behavior (his headaches, his attempts on Aerith’s life). So the goal of the Lifestream sequence is not to restore Cloud to this previous flawed state, but... to accomplish something more. Accomplish something that will resolve the aforementioned issues by strengthening him against Jenova’s influence.

There are two ways to strengthen Cloud against the influence of the Jenova hivemind:

Rebuild Cloud’s sense of self by identifying and accepting his personal weakness -- without writing a whole other post, individuals injected with Jenova cells are susceptible to influence by the Jenova hivemind if they have a weak sense of self and weak will; thus, Cloud needs to fully understand and accept who he truly is, weaknesses and all, in order to withstand further Jenova tampering

Establish the truth of the Nibelheim incident -- until then, silver-tongued Sephiroth/Jenova will always be able to cast doubt on Cloud’s existence using the discrepancies between Cloud’s and Tifa’s memories

And wouldn’t you know it, but the Lifestream sequence does end up accomplishing all three of these things. It:

Proves that Cloud Strife of Nibelheim existed before the Nibelheim incident

Rebuilds Cloud’s sense of self by identifying and accepting his personal weakness

Establishes the truth of the Nibelheim incident

Something to note re: #3 - Establishes the truth of the Nibelheim incident: this is actually extremely challenging to do, as the truth lies solely within Cloud, but is blocked due to his own mental weakness. This is why the Lifestream sequence begins with Cloud trying and failing to correctly remember the Nibelheim incident: while he superficially does want to understand the truth of the incident, deep down he does not want to acknowledge his personal failings that are on full display in the true memory. It is only after Cloud accepts his personal weakness that he is able to face the full truth, failings and all.

So really, #2 - Rebuild Cloud’s sense of self by accepting his personal weakness is the most pivotal portion of the Lifestream sequence, as this empowers Cloud on a personal level and also allows him to remember the Nibelheim incident correctly. And as it happens, this is the portion that only Tifa can help with.

Part 2: Why Tifa is the only person, living or dead, who can resolve Cloud’s crisis

We’ve just discussed how rebuilding Cloud’s sense of self by helping him accept his personal weakness is one of the most important goals of the Lifestream sequence--and now I’d like to explain how this can only be accomplished with Tifa’s help and no one else’s.

>> Tifa is the focus of Cloud’s greatest weakness

I think that every fan, including non-shippers and anti-Tifa fans, will agree that Cloud is insecure and has a desperate need for acceptance. But because he needs to resolve and accept this greatest weakness, his shame, the real question is... when did it become pathological? What is it focused on, and what makes it his tragic flaw? The answers will give us a hint as to what Cloud needs to come to terms with his true self.

This is shown to us in the Mt. Nibel memory--the day Tifa’s mother died. And it is actually explicitly told to us by a very important entity...

...A blacked out, silhouetted version of Cloud that casually climbs out of his slack adult form. This silhouetted version of Cloud represents the deep dark secrets about himself that Cloud has hidden away for so long, and it tells us what exactly is on its mind. 

Let’s review everything Deep Dark (DD) Cloud says:

Young Cloud: I began to think I was different... That I was different from those immature kids. That then... maybe... DD: Just maybe, they would invite me in. I thought that might happen, so I hung around...

...

DD: That night I called Tifa out to the well... I thought to myself Tifa would never come... that she hated me.

...

YC: This was the day... DD: Tifa's mother... T: The day Mom died...

...

DD: I don't remember the path I walked. Tifa missed her step. I ran to her... but didn't make it in time. Both of us fell off the cliff. Back then, I only scarred my knees but...

...

DD: Tifa was in a coma for seven days. We all thought she wouldn't make it. If only I could've saved her... I was so angry... Angry at myself for my weakness. Ever since then, I felt Tifa blamed me... I got out of control... I'd get into fights not even caring who it was.

(fade to black)

DD: That was the first time I heard about Sephiroth. If I got strong like Sephiroth, then everyone might...

(return to the nexus/Cloud’s mind)

DD: If I could just get stronger... Then even Tifa would have to notice me...

Many fans fixate on DD Cloud’s very first line (”just maybe, they would invite me in”), and I understand why--not only is the first satisfying eureka moment in the Lifestream, but it’s also deeply relatable. Who hasn’t felt like an outsider and wanted acceptance and approval? These same players then attribute all of Cloud’s motivations to this relatable feeling. “Cloud had a deep inferiority complex and wanted to prove himself to the world and that’s why he pretends to be the super coolest SOLDIER ever.”

But that interpretation completely ignores the other 90% of what DD Cloud says. The other 90% of Cloud’s shame is wrapped up in Tifa. “Tifa’s mom died... I tried to save Tifa, but I got off relatively unscathed while she suffered terrible injuries... Tifa must have hated me... I thought Tifa wouldn’t come to the well because she hated me... I wanted to be like Sephiroth so Tifa would notice me...” Even if a little bit of Cloud’s motivations are attributable to the contempt of the townspeople, the vast majority of it is focused on Tifa--would she always hate him? Would she ever notice him? Could he ever be worthy of her? DD Cloud’s dialogue reveals that Cloud’s shame and tragic flaw is completely centered on his need for Tifa’s approval. Perhaps only his pedestaled perception of Tifa, but Tifa all the same.

The "Cloud wants to impress all the kids” interpretation also ignores what the cinematography of this scene is telling us. The “big takeaway” of the Nibelheim memory and DD Cloud’s reveal is the single sentence that DD Cloud speaks after the memory is over and lights turn back on and they’re back at the nexus--the sentence that he “took away” from the previous scene. And look! It’s this one!

DD: If I could just get stronger... Then even Tifa would have to notice me...

THIS. THIS IS IT. This is the root of Cloud’s shame and explains his pathological need to misremember himself as a SOLDIER and thus misremember the Nibelheim incident at all costs: he was ashamed at his inability to rescue Tifa and Mt. Nibel, so he swore to himself that he would get stronger to earn her notice. Cloud needs to be strong so Tifa will notice him; thus, Cloud creates an illusionary world where he misremembers his own identity and the Nibelheim incident in a way that makes him a strong man that is finally worthy of her. 

This is the personal weakness that Cloud needs to resolve in the Lifestream with Tifa’s help: he needs to learn that it is okay to not be the strong man, because Tifa will accept him regardless.

(And, sidebar, Cloud’s need for Tifa’s approval is not just some fleeting childhood dream in the distant past--even in present day, Ex-SOLDIER Cloud can’t bear to remember how he failed to be a stronger man for Tifa, because even in the present day, Tifa’s opinion of him is all that counts.)

>> What Tifa’s presence in the Lifestream accomplishes

While the above proves how Cloud’s personal weakness (his tragic flaw) revolves around Tifa and his feelings for her... we now need to answer, why does Cloud need Tifa to be in the Lifestream with him to work through these feelings? And this, I believe, comes down to two, very subtle, shown-not-told points:

Cloud’s honesty depends on Tifa’s presence, as Cloud’s need for Tifa to understand his feelings is greater than his need to hide his painful weaknesses from himself

Cloud draws strength from “his important person” (no matter how you want to define her: his main motivation, the person he’s been in love with forever...) accepting him and providing moral support

Let’s work through these in order.

REASON #1 -  Cloud’s honesty depends on Tifa’s presence, as Cloud’s need for Tifa to understand his feelings is greater than his need to hide his painful weaknesses from himself

This one is very easy to miss, but is illustrated in two key ways. First, did you know that DD Cloud speaks early on in the Lifestream, even before the Mt. Nibel memory? His two lines are:

T: Now that you mention it, why did you want to join SOLDIER in the first place? I always thought it was a sudden decision you made... DD: ...I was devastated. ...I wanted to be noticed. Adult Cloud: ...I was devastated. ...I wanted to be noticed. I thought if I got stronger I could get someone to notice... T: Someone to notice you...? ...who? DD: Who...? ...You know who! ...You, that's who. AC: You... T: ...Me? Why!? YC: Tifa... did you forget... about those days?

Those two lines are definitely DD Cloud’s; in the earlier photos, we see that DD Cloud’s speech bubbles don’t have a background box. These new two lines are similarly background box-less. Moreover, these lines cannot be attributed to Adult Cloud or Young Cloud. See the below comparison photos:

DD vs. Adult Cloud’s vs. Young Cloud’s speech bubbles:

What’s very interesting is the tone of the second line (”Who...? ...You know who! ...You, that's who”); this is the only exclamation that Cloud uses in the entire sequence until all the revelations of the Nibelheim Incident re-memory. DD Cloud is startled into indignance that Tifa has no idea that he’s been trying to impress her all along. (DD Cloud is like, “Tifa, the past 12 years of my life were entirely motivated by you, are you telling me that literally none of this has gotten through to you!!?”) Even if DD Cloud were dormant and hidden this entire time, the ignominy of Tifa not understanding the effort he made for her for 12 years is just too much for him to suffer through silently. 

The significance of this moment is actually incredible: the Deep Dark Secret that Cloud has been hiding from this entire time, the Deep Dark Secret that Cloud would rather die/go comatose than acknowledge... this Deep Dark Secret indignantly reveals itself just because Tifa apparently doesn’t know about it! Cloud’s need for Tifa to understand his Deep Dark Secret is even greater than Cloud’s need to be honest with himself to prevent his clone coma. 

And this becomes a trend that continues up to the Mt. Nibel memory--Cloud is reluctant to revisit these memories, and only does so because he wants Tifa to understand his feelings. Almost every other line we see Cloud’s reluctance, his disbelief at Tifa’s cluelessness, and him forcing himself to open up so Tifa can know what he’s been obsessing over for 12 years. See the dialogue yourself (my notes in square brackets):

YC: Tifa...... did you forget...... about those days? [Cloud’s disbelief that Tifa doesn’t know]

...

YC:  It's important to me... I hate to say it but... It's a very important memory... [Cloud’s reluctance to revisit the memory]  Do you want to see it? Come on, hurry. [Cloud’s need for Tifa to see]

...

AC: ...a sealed up secret... wish... Tender memories... no one can ever know... [Cloud’s reluctance to revisit the memory]

YC: Do you know where this window goes to, Tifa? [Cloud’s disbelief that Tifa doesn’t know]  Fine... I'll go. [Cloud’s need for Tifa to see]

Again, this is a tremendous moment. Cloud is only motivated to honesty for Tifa’s benefit, and takes each reluctant step towards the truth because Tifa is right next to him with all her cluelessness. In his desire to be honest for Tifa, Cloud ends up being honest for himself as well... Tifa’s presence is the only reason why Cloud can be honest to himself in the Lifestream. If not for her, Cloud never would have broached those painful memories and never would have resolved his crisis.

One last thing I want to highlight is that Cloud wouldn’t open up like this for anyone. Reread this line: “Tender memories... no one can ever know.”  If anyone else was in the Lifestream with Cloud--or if it was just Cloud by himself--DD Cloud would never have felt the need to express himself. He would have stayed hidden, preferring for Cloud and the others to forever perceive him as the super cool SOLDIER instead of a “weak man” who couldn’t even save the girl he loved back on Mt. Nibel or fulfill his promise to her.

REASON #2 - Cloud draws strength from Tifa (the object of his shame/his fellow Nibelheim survivor/the person he’s been trying to win the attention of forever/the person he’s loved for 12 years) accepting him and providing moral support

This one is the most subtle as it’s mostly shown and the dialogue is not explicit, but the scene simply does not work without it. It is thanks to Tifa’s support that Cloud is brave enough to correctly remember the Nibelheim incident. 

After DD Cloud says his final line in the nexus, he looks away from Tifa. 

Can’t even make eye contact with her, even though he was able to back in the Mt. Nibel memory. He must think that now that all the cards are on the table, Tifa will reject him in some way. Maybe she will heap on the blame for failing to save her at Mt. Nibel, or be disgusted that he dared try to win her notice, but whatever it is, he expects some kind of rejection. But... that’s not what happens. Instead, Tifa implicitly absolves him of any guilt or shame by apologizing to him instead.

DD: If I could just get stronger... Then even Tifa would have to notice me...

T: So that was it... Sorry, Cloud. If I had only remembered more clearly what happened, I could have done something sooner...

...

So not only does Tifa fail to reject Cloud, but she also implies that Cloud is completely faultless, as she would have corrected the townspeople’s misconceptions about Cloud if she’d only known. Tifa plainly supports Cloud and does not blame him for Mt. Nibel.

Moreover, she continues to encourage Cloud after this moment. Soon after, Tifa exclaims:

T: Hang in there Cloud! Just a little longer! You've almost found the real you!

It’s only after Tifa’s words of encouragement that both Adult Cloud and DD Cloud merge into one another. This is a powerful moment; it shows that Adult Cloud hasn’t lost those deep, sealed away feelings, but has finally made peace with them. Cloud’s deep dark feelings are still a part of him but no longer hold him back; he no longer needs to misremember himself as a strong man for Tifa because Tifa accepts him as he is.

The game then explicitly shows Tifa and Cloud behaving with a togetherness that we haven’t seen the entire game--these two have finally overcome the distance between them and are able to tackle the world as a team. Cloud can finally be brave because he knows Tifa won’t leave his side.

And the game shows us this. First, Tifa, Adult Cloud, and DD Cloud all resolutely hold their fists up in unison (so ‘90s shounen anime, I love it):

Then they run into the Nibelheim memory together, side by side, literally in lockstep--look how every foot step is in sync:

This is different from previous memories, where one is always following the other or doing different things. What it shows us is that after Cloud comes clean about his shame and Tifa accepts him as he is, the two are closer together than ever before. Cloud feels brave enough to properly remember the Nibelheim incident when he has Tifa with him. 

And it’s telling that the very first moment Cloud tries to remember is...

...the memory of Tifa being injured. Not the memories of him stabbing Sephiroth (or being stabbed by him), not the memories of Zack being injured, not the memory of Cloud putting on his helmet to hide his shame. If he were still afraid of Tifa’s disappointment, Cloud would not choose to relive this as his very first memory. Yet Cloud picks a painful moment that includes Tifa, trusting that they can work through it as a team. I know I keep on saying it, but it’s the truth: Cloud is empowered to fully face his deepest shame and weakness because he knows that the real Tifa accepts him as he is and will stay by his side.

Part 3: So what does this mean for those “alternate fan theories?”

Phew! That was a lot. Let’s recheck our notes on what the Lifestream scene needs to accomplish:

Prove that Cloud Strife of Nibelheim existed before the Nibelheim incident

Rebuild Cloud’s sense of self by identifying and accepting his personal weakness

Establish the truth of the Nibelheim incident

Given what we just discussed, any substitute for Tifa would accomplish some, but not all of the above three points.

So for those fans who say...

>> “Cloud could have done it all by himself” - did... did you miss the giant floating confused Cloud?? He was trying and failing to figure it out by himself because he couldn’t bear to be honest, even for his own sake. What ultimately turns the tide is Cloud’s need to express his true feelings to Tifa, and how it outweighs his need to hide his weakness from himself; thus, without Tifa’s presence, Cloud cannot be honest with himself and cannot resolve his identity crisis. 

And PS, when Tifa says, “Cloud found himself on his own,” she’s referring to Cloud’s choice to reveal his weakness to her, and Cloud’s bravery at confronting the Nibelheim incident afterwards. She’s not saying “oh I didn’t need to be there at all and Cloud really just needed a couple extra minutes and I was basically scenery lol.” She’s complimenting Cloud for the radical honesty/personal strength that allowed him to finally express his true thoughts to her and thus to himself. 

Verdict: Cloud gets half points for #2 (accept personal weakness) and #3 (remember Nibelheim) because ultimately he’s the one who decides to reveal the truth of those moments. Cloud gets 0 points for #1 (prove his existence) because he still needed to double-check with someone who knew him as a child.

>> “any childhood friend could have helped Cloud” - sure, that childhood friend could help accomplish #1 (prove his existence), but as we previously discussed, Cloud is only motivated to be honest with himself when he realizes that Tifa doesn’t know the extent of his feelings for her. If he never that Tifa was clueless, then Cloud would have kept the Mt. Nibel memory locked away from himself and everyone else. 

Verdict: A Nibelheim rando would be able to accomplish #1 (prove his existence) but would fail to accomplish #2 (accept personal weakness) or #3 (remember Nibelheim)--Tifa is needed for DD Cloud to come clean, and Tifa’s unique role allows her to support Cloud while he works to remember the truth of the Nibelheim incident.

>> “Aerith (+Zack) could have taken care of it” - sure, Aerith (+Zack) could have shown Cloud the truth of #1 (prove his existence) and #3 (remember Nibelheim), because they both could observe the truth of those events.

But how could they help Cloud with #2 (accept personal weakness), when Cloud has been trying to hide his weakness all along and would probably feel even worse in comparison to these two shining beacons of excellence? And there’s some proof to this line of thinking; in CC, Cloud explicitly does not want to share his feelings for Tifa with Zack; and in OG, Cloud arguably tries to preserve the hero fantasy of being the Coolest SOLDIER Ever for Aerith. I can’t imagine Cloud wanting to share these “tender feelings that no one can ever know”/his love-induced weakness with anyone except for the object of those tender feelings. So #2 is still allllll Tifa, baby.

Verdict: Aerith (+Zack) could take care of #1 and #3, but they could never get Cloud to open up about #2--and even if they did, they were not the “victims” of “Cloud’s failure,” so their forgiveness/acceptance would mean nothing to Cloud and would not help him accept his own weakness.

Final thoughts:

>> Fun theory, but Cloti isn’t essential for it... the sequence still works even if Cloud’s tragic flaw is a raging inferiority complex.

There’s a difference between something technically working vs. what the game actually shows us. Yes, it could work if Cloud has a generic inferiority complex that has nothing to do with Tifa... but the game’s explanation of Cloud’s psyche (DD Cloud’s dialogue) spends >90% of its wordcount on Tifa. This argument essentially works if you throw out >90% of what the game was trying to tell you. Cloud’s entire inner world revolves around Tifa and stuffing your fingers in your ears and loudly saying lalalala does not change that.

>> But didn’t Cloud choose to hide his face because he wanted to hide his failure from everyone in town, not just Tifa, which would prove it was just a generic inferiority complex?

Sure, Cloud says:

C: I... never made it as a member of SOLDIER. I even left my hometown telling everyone I was going to join, but... I was so embarrassed. I didn't want to see anyone.

Off that line alone, one would think that he is ashamed to show his face to anyone in his hometown.

But the game shows us that Cloud specifically decided to hide when he saw Tifa.

Look how this baby is prepared to stroll into town with his Chocobo head free in that Nibelheim breeze. Not what you’d expect someone to do if they’re trying to hide from everyone, right?

But as soon as Cloud notices Tifa, he runs offscreen and puts his helmet back on while Zack can only shrug a “you do you” in reply.

It’s Tifa that Cloud couldn’t bear to disappoint. Not the rest of the town.

>> That final “resolution” moment after the Mt. Nibel incident is a little weak, isn’t it? There’s nothing explicitly saying that Tifa accepted Cloud and that’s why he’s able to shake off his shame and remember the Nibelheim incident properly.

It’s true that so much of this is implicit (the absence of Tifa berating Cloud, Tifa wishing she could have helped Cloud more back then), or shown-not-told (Tifa and Cloud raising their fists in unison, Tifa and Cloud running in unison). The OG script also jumps right to Tifa’s exclamation that the Mt. Nibel memory proves Cloud is a real person, not really lingering on Tifa accepting Cloud or anything. To be honest, the biggest reason why I even put together this theory is because 1 + 1 ≠ 4, but somehow that’s what happens in the Lifestream if we remove this shame/acceptance aspect. Also... how unsatisfying and uncharacteristic is it for Cloud to just feel ashamed that he failed to save Tifa, then for that shame to be resolved during the Nibelheim incident re-memory with a “oh it’s not that bad, at least you saved her during the Nibelheim incident so that mitigates it”? Or for it to not be resolved at all?

If Cloud was so deeply ashamed that he’d prefer to become a potato instead of face these memories, then I can’t imagine that facing the memories with zero support from Tifa would help him feel confident enough to tackle the Nibelheim re-memory. I highly suspect that this scene will be expanded upon in the Remake to explicitly highlight Tifa’s acceptance, resulting in Cloud’s readiness to expose his true memories to Tifa and himself.

[insanehobbit]

a twenty-five thousand word post about a twenty-three year old “debate”

As time goes on, I’m baffled that it remains a commonly held opinion that:

The LTD remains unresolved

SE is deliberately playing coy, and are (or have been) afraid to resolve it.

To me, the answer is as clear as day, and yet seeing so many people acting as if it’s a question that remains unanswered makes me wonder if I’m the crazy one.

So I am going to try to articulate my thought process here, not because I expect to change any hearts and minds, but more to get these thoughts out of my head and onto a page so I can finally read a book and/or watch reruns of Shark Tank in peace.

To start off, there are two categories of argument (that are among, if not the most widely used lines of argument) that I will try NOT to engage with:

1) Quotes from Ultimania or developer interviews - while they’re great for easter eggs and behind-the-scenes info, if a guidebook is required to understand key plot points, you have fundamentally failed as a storyteller. Now the question of which character wants to bone whom is often something that can be relegated to a guidebook, but in the case of FF7, you would be watching two very different stories play out depending on who Cloud ends up with.

Of course, the Ultimanias do spell this out clearly, but luckily for us, SE are competent enough storytellers that we can find the answer by looking at the text alone.

2) Arguments about character actions/motivations — specifically, I’m talking about stuff like “Cloud made this face in this scene, which means be must be [insert whatever here].”

Especially when it comes to the LTD, these tend to focus on individual actions, decontextualizing them from their role in the narrative as a whole. LTDers often try to put themselves in the character’s shoes to suss out what they may be thinking and feeling in those moments. These arguments will be colored by personal experiences, which will inevitably vary.

Let’s take for example Cloud’s behavior in Advent Children. One may argue that it makes total sense given that he’s dying and fears failing the ones he loves. Another may argue that there’s no way that he would run unless he was deeply unhappy and pining after a lost love. Well, you’ll probably just be talking over each other until the cows come home. Such is the problem with trying to play armchair therapist with a fictional character. It’s not like we can ask Cloud himself why he did what he did (and even if we could, he’s not the exactly the most reliable narrator in the world). Instead, in trying to understand his motivations, we are left with no choice but to draw comparisons with our own personal experiences, those of our friends, or other works of media we’ve consumed. Any interpretation would be inherently subjective and honestly, a futile subject for debate.

There’s nothing wrong with drawing personal connections with fictional characters of course. That is the purpose of art after all. They are vessels of empathy. But when we’re talking about what is canon, it doesn’t matter what we take away. What matters is the creators’ intent.

Cloud, Tifa and Aerith are not your friends Bob, Alice and Maude. They are characters created by Square Enix. Real people can behave in a variety of different ways if they found themselves in the situations faced by our dear trio; however, FF7 characters are not sentient creatures. Everything they do or say is dictated by the developers to serve the story they are trying to tell.

So what do we have left then? Am I asking you, dear reader, to just trust me, anonymous stranger on the Internet, when I tell you #clotiiscanon. Well, in a sense, yes, but more seriously, I’m going to try to suss out what the creator’s intent is based on what is, and more importantly, what isn’t, on screen.

Instead of putting ourselves in the shoes of the characters, let’s try putting ourselves in the shoes of the creators. So the question would then be, if the intent is X, then what purpose does character Y or scene Z serve?

The story of FF7 isn’t the immutable word of God etched in a stone tablet. For every scene that made it into the final game, there are dozens of alternatives that were tossed aside. Let us also not forget the crude economics of popular storytelling. Spending resources on one particular aspect of the game may mean something entirely unrelated will have to be cut for time. Thus, the absence of a particular character/scenario is an alternative in itself. So with all these options at their disposal, why is the scene we see before us the one that made it into the final cut? — Before we dive in, I also want to define two broad categories of narrative: messy and clean.

Messy narratives are ones I would define as stories that try to illuminate something about the human condition, but may not leave the audience feeling very good by the end of it. The protagonists, while not always anti-heroes, don’t always exhibit the kind of growth we’d like, don’t always learn their lessons, probably aren’t the best role models. The endings are often ambivalent, ambiguous, and leaves room for the audience to take away from it what they will. This is the category I would put art films and prestige cable dramas.

Clean narratives are where I would categorize most popular forms of entertainment. Not that these characters necessarily lack nuance, but whatever flaws are portrayed are something to be overcome by the end of story. The protagonists are characters you’re supposed to want to root for

Final Fantasy as a series would fall under the ‘clean’ category. Sure, many of the protagonists start out as jerks, but they grow through these flaws and become true heroes by the end of their journey. Hell, a lot of the time even the villains are redeemed. They want you to like the characters you’re spending a 40+ hr journey with. Their depictions can still be realistic, but they will become the most idealized versions of themselves by the end of their journeys.

This is important to establish, because we can then assume that it is not SE’s intent to make any of their main characters come off pathetic losers or unrepentant assholes. Now whether or not they succeed in that endeavor is another question entirely.

FF7 OG or The dumbest thought experiment in the world

With that one thousand word preamble out of the way, let’s finally take a look at the text. In lieu of going through the OG’s story beat by beat, let’s try this thought experiment:

Imagine it’s 1996, and you’re a development executive at what was then Squaresoft. The plucky, young development team has the first draft of what will become the game we know as Final Fantasy VII. Like the preceding entries in the series, it’s a world-spanning action adventure RPG, with a key subplot being the epic tragic romance between its hero and heroine, Cloud and Aerith.

They ask you for your notes.

(For the sake of your sanity and mine, let’s limit our hypothetical notes to the romantic subplot)

Disc 1 - everything seems to be on the right track. Nice meet-cute, lots of moments developing the relationship between our pair. Creating a love triangle with this Tifa character is an interesting choice, but she’s a comparatively minor character so she probably won’t be a real threat and will find her happiness elsewhere by the end of the game. You may note that they’re leaning a bit too much into Tifa and Cloud’s past. Especially the childhood promise flashback early in the game — cute scene, but a distraction from main story and main pairing — fodder for the chopping block. You may also bump on the fact that Aerith is initially attracted to Cloud because he reminds her of an ex, but this is supposed to be a more mature FF. That can be an obstacle they overcome as Aerith gets to know the real Cloud.

Aerith dies, but it is supposed to be a tragic romance after all. Death doesn’t have to be the end for this relationship, especially since Aerith is an Ancient after all.

It’s when Disc 2 starts that things go off the rails. First off, it feels like an awfully short time for Cloud to be grieving the love of his life, though it’s somewhat understandable. This story is not just a romance. There are other concerns after all, Cloud’s identity crisis for one. Though said identity crisis involves spending a lot of time developing his relationship with another woman. It’s one thing for Cloud and Tifa to be from the same hometown, but does she really need to play such an outsized role in his internal conflict? This might give the player the wrong impression.

You get to the Northern Crater, and it just feels all wrong. Cloud is more or less fine after the love of his life is murdered in front of his eyes but has a complete mental breakdown to the point that he’s temporarily removed as a playable character because Tifa loses faith in him??? Shouldn’t it be the other way around?

Oh, but it only gets worse from here. With Cloud gone, the POV switches to Tifa and her feelings for him and her desire to find him. The opening of the game is also recontextualized when you learn the only reason that Cloud was part of the first Reactor mission that starts the game is because Tifa found him and wanted to keep an eye on him.

Then you get to Mideel and the alarm bells are going off. Tifa drops everything, removing her from the party as well, to take care of Cloud while he’s a catatonic vegetable? Not good. Very not good. This level of selfless devotion is going to make Cloud look like a total asshole when he rejects her in favor of Aerith. Speaking of Aerith, she uh…hasn’t been mentioned for some time. In fact, her relationship with Cloud has remained completely static after Disc 1, practically nonexistent, while his with Tifa has been building and building. Developing a rival relationship that then needs to be dismantled rather than developing the endgame relationship doesn’t feel like a particularly valuable use of time and resources.

By the time you get to the Lifestream scene, you’re about ready to toss the script out of the window. Here’s the emotional climax of the entire game, where Cloud’s internal conflict is finally resolved, and it almost entirely revolves around Tifa? Rather than revisiting the many moments of mental anguish we experienced during the game itself — featuring other characters, including let’s say, Aerith — it’s about a hereto unknown past that only Tifa has access to? Not only that, but we learn that the reason Cloud wanted to join SOLDIER was to impress Tifa, and the reason he adopted his false persona was because he was so ashamed that he couldn’t live up to the person he thought Tifa wanted him to be? Here, we finally get a look into the inner life of one half of our epic couple and…it entirely revolves around another woman??

Cloud is finally his real self, and hey, it looks like he finally remembers Aerith, that’s at least a step in the right direction. Though still not great. With his emotional arc already resolved, any further romantic developments is going to feel extraneous and anticlimactic. It just doesn’t feel like there’s enough time to establish that:

Cloud’s romantic feelings for Tifa (which were strong enough to launch his hero’s journey) have transformed into something entirely platonic in the past few days/weeks

Cloud’s feelings for Aerith that he developed while he was pretending to be someone else (and not just any someone, but Aerith’s ex of all people) are real.

This isn’t a romantic melodrama after all. There’s still a villain to kill and a world to save.

Cloud does speak of Aerith wistfully, and even quite personally at times, yet every time he talks about her, he’s surrounded by the other party members. A scene or two where he can grapple with his feelings for her on his own would help. Her ghost appearing in the Sector 5 Church feels like a great opportunity for this to happen, but he doesn’t interact with it at all. What gives? Missed opportunity after missed opportunity.

The night before the final battle, Cloud asks the entire party to find what they’re fighting for. This feels like a great (and perhaps the last) opportunity to establish that for Cloud, it’s in Aerith’s memory and out of his love for her. He could spend those hours alone in any number of locations associated with her — the Church, the Temple of the Ancients, the Forgotten City.

Instead — none of those happens. Instead, once again, it’s Cloud and Tifa in another scene where they’re the only two characters in the scene. You’re really going to have Cloud spend what could very well be the last night of his life with another woman? With a fade to black that strongly implies they slept together? In one fell swoop, you’re portraying Cloud as a guy who not only betrays the memory of his lost love, but is also incredibly callous towards the feelings of another woman by taking advantage of her vulnerability. Why are we rooting for him to succeed again?

Cloud and the gang finally defeat Sephiroth, and Aerith guides him back into the real world. Is he finally explicitly stating that he’s searching for her (though they’ve really waited until the last minute to do so), but again, why is Tifa in this scene? Shouldn’t it just be Cloud and Aerith alone? Why have Tifa be there at all? Why have her and her alone of all the party members be the one waiting for Cloud? Do you need to have Tifa there to be rejected while Cloud professes his unending love for Aerith? It just feels needlessly cruel and distracts from what should be the sole focus of the scene, the love between Cloud and Aerith.

What a mess.

You finish reading, and since it is probably too late in the development process to just fire everyone, you offer a few suggestions that will clarify the intended romance while the retaining the other plot points/general themes of the game.

Here they are, ordered by scale of change, from minor to drastic:

Option 1 would be to keep most of the story in tact, but rearrange the sequence of events so that the Lifestream sequence happens before Aerith’s death. That way, Cloud is his true self and fully aware of his feelings for both women before Aerith’s death. That way, his past with Tifa isn’t some ticking bomb waiting to go off in the second half of the game. That development will cease at the Lifestream scene. Cloud will realize the affection he held for her as a child is no longer the case. He is grateful for the past they shared, but his future is with Aerith. He makes a clear choice before that future is taken away from him with her death. The rest of the game will go on more or less the same (with the Highwind scene being eliminated, of course) making it clear, that avenging the death of his beloved is one of, if not the, primary motivation for him wanting to defeat Sephiroth.

The problem with this “fix” is that a big part of the reason that Aerith gets killed is because of Cloud’s identity crisis. If said crisis is resolved, the impact of her death will be diminished, because it would feel arbitrary rather than something that stems from the consequences of Cloud’s actions. More of the story will need to be reconceived so that this moment holds the same emotional weight.

Another problem is why the Lifestream scene needs to exist at all. Why spend all that time developing the backstory for a relationship that will be moot by the end of the game? It makes Tifa feel like less of a character and more of a plot device, who becomes irrelevant after she services the protagonist’s character development and then has none of her own. That’s no way to treat one of the main characters of your game.

Option 2 would be to re-imagine Tifa’s character entirely. You can keep some of her history with Cloud in tact, but expand her backstory so she is able to have a satisfactory character arc outside of her relationship with Cloud. You could explore the five years in her life since the Nibelheim incident. Maybe she wasn’t in Midgar the whole time. Maybe, like Barret, she has her own Corel, and maybe reconciling with her past there is the climax of her emotional arc as opposed to her past with Cloud. For Cloud too, her importance needs to be diminished. She can be one of the people who help him find his true self in the Lifestream, but not the only person. There’s no reason the other people he’s met on his journey can’t be there. Thus their relationship remains somewhat important, but their journeys are not so entwined that it distracts from Cloud and Aerith’s romance.

Option 3 would be to really lean into the doomed romance element of Cloud and Aerith’s relationship. Have her death be the cause of his mental breakdown, and have Aerith be the one in the Lifestream who is able to put his mind back together and bring him back to the realm of consciousness. After he emerges, he has the dual goal of defeating Sephiroth and trying to reunite with Aerith. In the end, in order to do the former, he has to relinquish the latter. He makes selfless choice. He makes the choice that resonates the overall theme of the game. It’s a bittersweet but satisfying ending. Cloud chooses to honor her memory and her purpose over the chance to physically bring her back. In this version of the game, the love triangle serves no purpose. There’s no role for Tifa at all.

Okay, we can be done with this strained counterfactual. What I’ve hopefully illustrated is that while developers had countless opportunities to solidify Cloud/Aerith as the canon couple in Discs 2 and 3 of the game, they instead chose a different route each and every time. What should also be clear is that the biggest obstacle standing in their way is not Aerith’s death, but the fact that Tifa exists.

At least in the form she takes in the final game, as a playable character and at the very least, the 3rd most important character in game’s story. She is not just another recurring NPC or an antagonist. Her love for Cloud is not going to be treated like a mere trifle or obstacle. If Cloud/Aerith was supposed to be the endgame ship, there would be no need for a love triangle and no need to include Tifa in the game at all. Death is a big enough obstacle, developing Cloud’s relationship with Tifa would only distract from and diminish his romance with Aerith.

I think this is something the dead enders understand intuitively, even more so than many Cloti shippers. Which is why some of them try to dismiss Tifa’s importance in the story so that she becomes a minor supporting character at best, or denigrate her character to the point that she becomes an actual villain. The Seifer to a Squall, the Seymour to a Tidus, hell even a Quistis to a Rinoa, they know how to deal with, but a Tifa Lockhart? As she is actually depicted in Final Fantasy VII? They have no playbook for that, and thus they desperately try to squeeze her into one of these other roles.

Let’s try another thought experiment, and see what would to other FF romances if we inserted a Tifa Lockhart-esque character in the middle of them.

FFXV is a perfect example because it features the sort of tragic love beyond death romance that certain shippers want Cloud and Aerith to be. Now, did I think FFXV was a good game? No. Did I think Noctis/Luna was a particularly well-developed romance? Also no. Did I have any question in my mind whatsoever that they were the canon relationship? Absolutely not.

Is this because they kiss at the end? Well sure, that helps, but also it’s because the game doesn’t spend the chapters after Luna’s death developing Noctis’ relationship with another woman. If Noctis/Luna had the same sort of development as Cloud/Aerith, then after Luna dies, Iris would suddenly pop in and play a much more prominent role. The game would flashback to her past and her relationship with Noctis. And it would be through his relationship with Iris that Noctis understands his duty to become king or a crystal or whatever the fuck that game was about. Iris is by Noctis’ side through the final battle, and when he ascends the throne in that dreamworld or whatever. There, Luna finally shows up again. Iris is still in the frame when Noctis tells her something like ‘Oh sorry, girl, I’ve been in love with Luna all along,” before he kisses Luna and the game ends.

(a very real scene from a very good game)

Come on. It would be utterly ludicrous and an utter disservice to every character involved, yet that is essentially the argument Cloud/Aerith shippers are making. SE may have made some pretty questionable storytelling decisions in the past, but they aren’t that bad at this.

Or in FFVIII, it would be like reordering the sequence of events so that Squall remembers that he grew up in an orphanage with all the other kids after Rinoa falls into a coma. And while Rinoa is out of commission, instead of Quistis gracefully bowing out after realizing she had mistaken her feelings of sisterly affection for love, it becomes Quistis’ childhood relationship with Squall that allows him to remember his past and re-contextualizes the game we’ve played thus far, so that the player realizes that it was actually Quistis who was his motivation all along. Then after this brief emotional detour, his romance with Rinoa would continue as usual. Absolutely absurd.

The Final Fantasy games certainly have their fair share of plot holes, but they’ve never whiffed on a romance this badly.

A somewhat more serious character analysis of the OG

What then is Tifa’s actual role in the story of FFVII? Her character is intricately connected to Cloud’s. In fact, they practically have the same arc, though Tifa’s is rather understated compared to his. She doesn’t adopt a false persona after all. For both of them, the flaw that they must learn to overcome over the course of the game is their fear of confronting the truth of their past. Or to put it more crudely, if they’re not lying, they’re at the very least omitting the truth. Cloud does so to protect himself from his fear of being exposed as a failure. Tifa does so at the expense of herself, because she fears the truth will do more harm than good. They’re two sides of the same coin. Nonetheless, their lying has serious ramifications.

The past they’re both afraid to confront is of course the Nibelheim Incident from five years ago. Thus, the key points in their emotional journeys coincide with the three conflicting Nibelheim flashbacks depicted in the game: Cloud’s false memory in Kalm, Sephiroth’s false vision in the Northern Crater, and the truth in the Lifestream.

Before they enter the Lifestream, both Cloud and Tifa are at the lowest of their lows. Cloud has had a complete mental breakdown and is functionally a vegetable. Tifa has given up everything to take care of Cloud as she feels responsible for his condition. If he doesn’t recover, she may never find peace.

With nothing left to lose, they both try to face the past head on. For Cloud, it’s a bit harder. At the heart of all this confusion, is of course, the Nibelheim Incident. How does Cloud know all these things he shouldn’t if Tifa doesn’t remember seeing him there? The emotional climax for both Cloud and Tifa, and arguably the game as a whole, is the moment the Shinra grunt removes his helmet to reveal that Cloud was there all along.

Tifa is the only character who can play this role for Cloud. It’s not like she a found a videotape in the Lifestream labeled ‘Nibelheim Incident - REAL’ and voila, Cloud is fixed. No, she is the only one who can help him because she is the only person who lived through that moment. No one else could make Cloud believe it. You could have Aerith or anyone else trying to tell him what actually happened, but why would he believe it anymore than the story Sephiroth told him at the Northern Crater?

With Tifa, it’s different. Not only was she physically there, but she’s putting as much at risk in what the truth may reveal. She’s not just a plot device to facilitate Cloud’s character development. The Lifestream sequence is as much the culmination of her own character arc. If it goes the wrong way, “Cloud” may find out that he’s just a fake after all, and Tifa may learn that boy she thought she’d been on this journey with had died years ago. That there’s no one left from her past, that it was all in her head, that she’s all alone. Avoiding this truth is a comfort, but in this moment, they’re both putting themselves on the line. Being completely vulnerable in front of the person they’re most terrified of being vulnerable with.

The developers have structured Cloud and Tifa’s character arcs so that the crux is a moment where the other is literally the only person who could provide the answer they need. Without each other, as far as the story is concerned, Cloud and Tifa would remain incomplete.

Aerith’s character arc is a different beast entirely. She is the closest we have to the traditional Campbellian Hero. She is the Chosen One, the literal last of her kind, who has been resisting the call to adventure until she can no longer. The touchstones of her character arc are the moments she learns more about her Cetra past and comes to terms with her role in protecting the planet - namely Cosmo Canyon, the Temple of the Ancients and the Forgotten City.

How do hers and Cloud’s arcs intersect? When it comes to the Nibelheim incident, she is a merely a spectator (at least during the Kalm flashback, as for the other two, she is uh…deceased). Cloud attacking her at the Temple of the Ancients, which results in her running to the Forgotten City alone and getting killed by Sephiroth, certainly exacerbates his mental deterioration, but it is by no means a turning point in his arc the way the Northern Crater is.

As for Cloud’s role in Aerith’s arc, their meeting is quite important in that it sets forth the series of events that leads her to getting captured by Shinra and thus meeting “Sephiroth” and wanting to learn more about the Cetra. It’s the inciting incident if we’re going to be really pedantic about it, yet Aerith’s actual character development is not dependent on her relationship with Cloud. It is about her communion with her Cetra Ancestry and the planet.

To put it in other terms, all else being the same, Aerith could still have a satisfying character arc had Cloud not crashed down into her Church. Sure, the game would look pretty different, but there are other ways for her to transform from a flirty, at times frivolous girl to an almost Christ-like figure who accepts the burden of protecting the planet.

Such is not the case for Cloud and Tifa. Their character arcs are built around their shared past and their relationship with one another. Without Tifa, you would have to rewrite Cloud’s character entirely. What was his motivation for joining SOLDIER? How did he get on that AVALANCHE mission in the first place? Who can possibly know him well enough to put his mind back together after it falls apart? If the answer to all these questions is the same person, then congratulations, you’ve just reverse engineered Tifa Lockhart.

Tifa fares a little better. Without Cloud, she would be a sad, sweet character who never gets the opportunity to reconcile with the trauma of her past. Superficially, a lot would be the same, but she would ultimately be quite static and all the less interesting for it.

Let’s also take a brief gander at Tifa’s role after the Lifestream sequence. At this point in the game, both Tifa and Cloud’s emotional arcs are essentially complete. They are now the most idealized versions of themselves, characters the players are meant to admire and aspire to. However they are depicted going forward, it would not be the creator’s intent for their actions to be perceived in a negative light.

A few key moments standout, ones that would not be included if the game was intended to end with any other romantic pairing or with Cloud’s romantic interest left ambiguous:

The Highwind scene, which I’ve gone over above. It doesn’t matter if you get the Low Affection or High Affection version. It would not reflect well on either Cloud or Tifa if he chose to spend what could be his last night alive with a woman whose feelings he did not reciprocate.

Before the final battle with Sephiroth, the party members scream out the reasons they’re fighting. Barret specifically calls out AVALANCHE, Marlene and Dyne, Red XIII specifically calls out his Grandpa, and Tifa specifically calls out Cloud. You are not going to make one of Tifa’s last moments in the game be her pining after a guy who has no interest in her. Not when you could easily have her mention something like her past, her hometown or hell even AVALANCHE and Marlene like Barret. If Tifa’s feelings for Cloud are meant to be unrequited, then it would be a character flaw that would be dealt with long before the final battle (see: Quistis in FF8 or Eowyn in the Lord of the Rings). They would not still be on display at moment like this.

Tifa being the only one there when Cloud jumps into the Lifestream to fight Sephiroth for the last time, and Tifa being the only one there when he emerges. She is very much playing the traditional partner/spouse role here, when you could easily have the entire party present or no one there at all. There is clearly something special about her relationship with Cloud that sets her apart from the other party members.

Once again, let’s look at the “I think I can meet her there moment.” And let’s put side the translation (the Japanese is certainly more ambiguous, and it’s not like the game had any trouble having Cloud call Aerith by her name before this). If Cloud was really expressing his desire to reunite with Aerith, and thus his rejection of Tifa, then the penultimate scene of this game is one that involves the complete utter and humiliation of one of its main characters since Tifa’s reply would indicate she’s inviting herself to a romantic reunion she has no part in. Not only that, but to anyone who is not Cl*rith shipper, the protagonist of the game is going to come off as a callous asshole. That cannot possibly be the creator’s intention. They are competent enough to depict an act of love without drawing attention to the party hurt by that love.

What then could possibly be the meaning? Could it possibly be Cloud trying to comfort Tifa by trying to find a silver lining in what appears to be their impending death? That this means they may get to see their departed loved ones again, including their mutual friend, Aerith? (I will note that Tifa talks about Aerith as much, if not even more than Cloud, after her death). Seems pretty reasonable to me, this being an interpretation of the scene that aligns with the overall themes of the game, and casts every character in positive light during this bittersweet moment.

Luckily enough, we have an entire fucking Compilation to find out which is right.

But before we get there, I’m sure some of you (lol @ me thinking anyone is still reading this) are asking, if Cloti is canon, then why is there a love triangle at all? Why even hint at the possibility of a romance between Cloud and Aerith? Wouldn’t that also be a waste of time and resources if they weren’t meant to be canon?

Well, there are two very important reasons that have nothing to do with romance and everything to do with two of the game’s biggest twists:

Aerith initially being attracted to Cloud’s similarities to Zack/commenting on the uncanniness of said similarities is an organic way to introduce the man Cloud’s pretending to be. Without it, the reveal in the Lifestream would fall a bit flat. The man he’s been emulating all along would just be some sort of generic hero rather than a person whose history and deeds already encountered during the course of the game. Notably for this to work, the game only has to establish Aerith’s attraction to Cloud.

To build the player’s attachment to Aerith before her death/obscure the fact that she’s going to die. With the technological limitations of the day, the only way to get the player to interact with Aerith is through the player character (AKA Cloud), and adding an element of choice (AKA the Gold Saucer Date mechanic) makes the player even more invested. This then elevates Aerith’s relationship with Cloud over hers with any other character. At the same time, because her time in the game is limited, Cloud ends up interacting with Aerith more than any of the other characters, at least in Disc 1. The choice to make many of these interactions flirty/romantic also toys with player expectations. One does not expect the hero’s love interest to die halfway through the game. The game itself also spends a bit of time teasing the romance, albeit, largely in superficial ways like other characters commenting on their relationship or Cait Sith reading their love fortune at the Temple of the Ancients. Yet, despite the quantity of their personal interactions, Cloud and Aerith never display any moments of deep love or devotion that one associates with a Final Fantasy romance. They never have the time. What the game establishes then is the potential of a romance rather than the romance itself. Aerith’s death hurts because of all that lost potential. There so many things she wanted to do, so many places she wanted to see that will never happen because her life is cut short. Part of what is lost, of course, is the potential of her romance with Cloud.

This creative choice is a lot more controversial since it elevates subverting audience expectations over character, and understandably leads to some player confusion. What’s the point of all this set up if there’s not going to be a pay off? Well, that is kind of the point. Death is frustrating because of all the unknowns and what-ifs. But, I suppose some people just can’t accept that fact in a game like this.

One last note on the OG before we move on: Even though this from an Ultimania, since we’re talking about story development and creator intent, I thought it was relevant to include: the fact that Aerith was the sole heroine in early drafts of the game is not the LTD trump card so people think it is. Stories undergo radical changes through the development process. More often than not, there are too many characters, and characters are often combined or removed if their presence feels redundant or confusing.

In this case, the opposite happened. Tifa was added later in the development process as a second heroine. Let’s say that Aerith was the Last Ancient and the protagonist’s sole love interest in this early draft of Final Fantasy VII. In the game that was actually released, that role was split between two characters (and last I checked, Tifa is not the last of a dying race), and Aerith dies halfway through the game, so what does that suggest about how Aerith’s role may have changed in the final product? Again, if Aerith was intended to be Cloud’s love interest, Tifa simply would not exist.

A begrudging analysis of our favorite straight-to-DVD sequel

Let’s move onto the Compilation. And in doing so, completely forget about the word vomit that’s been written above. While it’s quite clear to me now that there’s no way in hell the developers would have intended the last scene in the game to be both a confirmation of Cloud’s love for Aerith and his rejection of Tifa, in my younger and more vulnerable years, I wasn’t so sure. In fact, this was the prevailing interpretation back in the pre-Compilation Dark Ages. Probably because of a dubious English translation of the game and a couple of ambiguous cameos in Final Fantasy Tactics and Kingdom Hearts were all we  had to go on.

How then did the official sequel to Final Fantasy VII change those priors?

Two years after the events of the game, Cloud is living as a family with Tifa and two kids rather than scouring the planet for a way to be reunited with Aerith. Shouldn’t the debate be well and over with that? Obviously not, and it’s not just because people were being obstinate. Part of the confusion stems from Advent Children itself, but I would argue that did not come from an intent to play coy/keep Cloud’s romantic desires ambiguous, but rather a failure of execution of his character arc.

Now I wasn’t the biggest fan of the film when I first watched a bootlegged copy I downloaded off LimeWire in 2005, and I like it even less now, but I better understand its failures, given its unique position as a sequel to a beloved game and the cornerstone of launching the Compilation.

The original game didn’t have such constraints on its storytelling. Outside of including a few elements that make it recognizable as a Final Fantasy (Moogles, Chocobos, Summons, etc.) and being a good enough game to be a financial success, the developers pretty much had free rein in terms of what story they wanted to tell, what characters they would use to tell it, and how long it took for them to tell said story.

With Advent Children, telling a good story was not the sole or even primary goal. Instead, it had to:

Do some fanservice: The core audience is going to be the OG fanbase, who would be expecting to see modern, high-def depictions of all the memorable and beloved characters from the game, no matter if the natural end point of their stories is long over.

Set up the rest of the Compilation - Advent Children is the draw with the big stars, but also a way to showcase the lesser known characters from from the Compilation who are going to be leading their own spinoffs.  It’s part feature film/part advertisement for the rest of the Compilation. Thus, the Turks, Vincent and Zack get larger roles in the film than one might expect to attract interest to the spinoffs they lead.

Show off its technical prowess: SE probably has enough self awareness to realize that what’s going to set it apart from other animated feature films is not its novel storytelling, but its graphical capabilities. Thus, to really show off those graphics, the film is going to be packed to the brim with big, complicated action scenes with lots of moving parts, as opposed to quieter character driven moments.

These considerations are not unique to Advent Children, but important to note nonetheless:

As a sequel, the stakes have to be just as high if not higher than those in the original work. Since the threat in the OG was the literal end of the world, in Advent Children, the world’s gotta end again

The OG was around 30-40 hours long. An average feature-length film is roughly two hours. Video games and films are two very different mediums. As many TV writers who have tried to make the transition to film (and vice-versa) can tell you, success in one medium does not translate to success in another. 

With so much to do in so little time, is it any wonder then that it is again Sephiroth who is the villain trying to destroy the world and Aerith in the Lifestream the deus ex machina who saves the day?

All of this is just a long-winded way to say, certain choices in the Advent Children that may seem to exist only to perpetuate the LTD were made with many other storytelling considerations in mind.

When trying to understand the intended character arcs and relationship dynamics, you cannot treat the film as a collection of scenes devoid of context. You can’t just say - “well here’s a scene where Cloud seems to miss Aerith, and here’s another scene where Cloud and Tifa fight. Obviously, Cloud loves Aerith.” You have to look at what purpose these scenes serve in the grander narrative.

And what is this grander narrative? To put it in simplistic terms, Aerith is the obstacle, and Tifa is goal. Cloud must get over his guilt over Aerith’s death so that he can return to living with Tifa and the children in peace.

The scenes following the prologue are setting up the emotional stakes of film - the problem that will be resolved by the film’s end. The problem being depicted here is not Aerith’s absence from Cloud’s life, but Cloud’s absence from his family. We see Tifa walking through Seventh Heaven saying “he’s not here anymore,” we see Denzel in his sickbed asking for Cloud, we see a framed photo of the four of them on Cloud’s desk. We see Cloud letting Tifa’s call go to voicemail.

What we do not see is Aerith, who does not appear until almost halfway through the film.

Cloud spends the first of the film avoiding confrontation with the Remnants/dealing with the return of Sephiroth. It’s only when Tifa is injured, and Denzel and Marlene get kidnapped that he goes to face his problems head on.

Before the final battle, when Cloud has exorcised his emotional demons and is about to face his physical demons, what do we see? We see Cloud telling Marlene that it’s his turn to take care of her, Denzel and Tifa the way they’ve taken care of him. We see Cloud telling Tifa that he ‘feels lighter’ and tacitly confirming that she was correct when she called him out earlier in the film. We see Cloud confirming to Denzel that he’s going home after this is all over.

What we do not see is Cloud telepathically communicating with Aerith to say, “Hey boo, can’t wait to beat Sephiroth so I can finally reunite with you in the Promised Land. Xoxoxo.” Aerith doesn’t factor in at all. Returning to his family is his goal, and his fight with Bahamut/the Remnants/Sephiroth/whatever the fuck is the final obstacle he has to face before reaching this goal.

This is reiterated again when Cloud is shot by Yazoo and seemingly perishes in an explosion. What is at stake with his “death”? We see Tifa calling his name while looking out the airship. We see Denzel and Marlene waiting for him at Seventh Heaven. We do not see Aerith watching over him in the Lifestream.

Now, Aerith does play an important role in Cloud’s arc when she shows up at about the midpoint of the film. You could fairly argue that it’s the turning point in Cloud’s emotional journey, the moment when he finally decides to confront his problems. But even if it’s only Cloud and Aerith in the scene, it’s not really about their relationship at all.

Let’s consider the context before this scene happens. Denzel and Marlene have been kidnapped by the Remnants; Tifa was nearly killed in a fight with another. This is Cloud at his lowest point. It’s his worst fears come to pass. His guilt over Aerith’s death is directly addressed at this moment in the film because it is not so much about his feelings for Aerith as it is about how Cloud fears the failures of his past (one of the biggest being her death) would continue into the present. If it was just about Aerith, we could have seen Cloud asking for her forgiveness at any other time in the film. It occurs when it does because this when his guilt over Aerith’s death intersects with his actual conflict, his fear that he’ll fail the the ones he loves. She appears when he’s at the Forgotten City where he goes to save the children. The same location where he had failed two year before.

This connection is made explicit when Cloud has flashes of Zack and Aerith’s deaths before he saves Denzel and Tifa from Bahamut. Again, Cloud’s dwelling on the past is directly related to his fears of being unable to protect his present.

Aerith is a feminine figure who is associated with flowers. That combined with the players’ memory of her and her relationship with Cloud in the OG, I can see how their scenes can be construed as romantic, but I really do not think that it is the creators’ intent to portray any romantic longing on Cloud’s part.

If they wanted to suggest that Cloud was still in love with Aerith or even leave his romantic interest ambiguous, there is no way in hell they would have had Cloud living with Tifa and two kids prior to the film’s events. To say nothing of opening the film by showing the pain his absence brings.

A romantic reading of Cloud’s guilt over Aerith’s death would suggest that he entered into a relationship with Tifa and started raising two children with her while still holding a torch for Aerith and hoping for a way to be reunited with her. The implication would be that Tifa is his second choice, and he is settling. Now, is this a dynamic that occurs in real life? Absolutely. Is this something that is often depicted in some films and television? Sure - in fact this very premise is at the core of one my favorite films of the last decade - 45 Years — and spoiler alert — the guy does not come off well in this situation. But once again, Cloud is not a real person, and Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children is not a John Cassavettes film or an Ingmar Bergman chamber drama. It is a 2-hour long straight to DVD sequel for a video game made for teens. This kind of messy, if realistic, relationship dynamic is not what this particular work is trying to explore.

(one of these is a good film!)

By the end of Advent Children, Cloud is once again the idealized version of himself. A hero that the audience is supposed to like and admire. We are supposed to think that his actions in the first half of the movie (wallowing in his guilt and abandoning his family) were bad. These are the flaws that he must overcome through the course of the film, and by the end he does. If he really had been settling and treating his Seventh Heaven family as a second choice prior to the events of the film, that too would obviously be a character flaw that needs to be addressed before the end of the film. It isn’t because this is a dynamic that only exists in certain people’s imaginations.

If the creators wanted to leave the Cloud & Aerith relationship open to a romantic interpretation, they didn’t have to write themselves into such a corner. They wouldn’t have to change the final film much at all, merely adjust the chronology a bit. Instead of Cloud already living as a family with Tifa, Marlene and Denzel prior to the beginning of the film, you would show them on the precipice of becoming a family, but with Cloud being unable to take the final step without getting over his feelings for Aerith first. This would leave space for him to love both women without coming off as an opportunistic jerk.

This is essentially the dynamic with Locke/Rachel/Celes in FFVI. Locke is unable to move on with Celes or anyone else until he finally finds closure with Rachel. It’s a lovely scene that does not diminish his relationships with either woman. He loved Rachel. He will love Celes. What the game does not have him do is enter into a relationship into Celes first and then when the party arrives at the Phoenix Cave, have him suddenly remember ‘Oh shit, I’ve gotta deal with my baggage with Rachel before I can really move on.’ That would not paint him in a particularly positive light.

Speaking of other Final Fantasies, let’s take a look another sequel in the series set two years after the events of the original work, one that is clearly the story of its protagonist searching for their lost love. And guess what? Final Fantasy X-2 does not begin with Yuna shacked up and raising two kids with another dude. And it certainly doesn’t begin with his perspective of the whole situation when Yuna decides to search for Tidus.

Square Enix knows how to write these kind of stories when they want to, and it’s clearly not their intent for Cloud and Aerith. Again, the biggest obstacle in the way of a Cloud/Aerith endgame isn’t space and time or death, it’s the existence of Tifa Lockhart.

A reasonable question to ask would be, if SE is not trying to ignite debate over the love triangle, why make Cloud’s relationship with Aerith a part of Advent Children at all? Why invite that sort of confusion? Well, the answer here, like the answer in the OG, is that Aerith’s role in the sequel is much more than her relationship with Cloud.

In the OG, it wasn’t Cloud and the gang who managed to stop Sephiroth and Meteor in the end, it was Aerith from the Lifestream. In a two-hour long film, you do not have the time to set up a completely new villain who can believably end the world, and since you pretty much have to include Sephiroth, the main antagonist can really only be him. No one else in the party has been established to have any magical Cetra powers, and again, since that’s not something that can be effectively established in a two-hour long film, and since Aerith needs to appear somehow, it again needs to be her who will save the day.

Given the time constraints, this external conflict has to be connected with Cloud’s internal conflict. In the OG, Cloud’s emotional arc is in resolved in the Lifestream, and then we spend a few more hours hunting down the Huge Materia/remembering what Holy is before resolving the external conflict of stopping Meteor. In Advent Children, we do not have that luxury of time. These turning points have to be one and same. It is only after Aerith is “introduced” in the film when Cloud asks her for forgiveness that she is able to help in the fight against the Remnants. Thus the turning point for Cloud’s character arc and the external conflict are the same. It’s understandably economical storytelling, though I wouldn’t call it particularly good storytelling.

As much as Cloud feels guilt over both Zack and Aerith’s deaths, it’s only Aerith who can play this dual role in the film. Zack can appear to help resolve Cloud’s emotional arc, but since he has no special Cetra powers or anything, there’s little he can do to help in Cloud’s fight against the Remnants. More time would need to be spent contriving a reason why Cloud is able to defeat the Remnants now when he wasn’t before or explaining why Aerith can suddenly help from the Lifestream when she had been absent before. (I still don’t think the film does a particularly good job of explaining this part, but that is a conversation for another time).

Another reason why Zack could not play this role is because at the time of AC’s original release, all we knew of Cloud and Zack’s relationship was contained in an optional flashback at the Shinra mansion after Cloud returns from the Lifestream. If it was Zack who suddenly showed up at Cloud’s lowest point, most viewers, even many who played the original game, would probably have been confused, and the moment would have fallen flat. On the other hand, even the most casual fan would have been aware of Aerith and her connection to Cloud, with her death scene being among the most well-known gaming moments of all time. Moreover, Aerith’s death is directly connected to Sephiroth, who is once again the threat in AC, whereas Zack was killed by Shinra goons. Aerith serves multiple purposes in a way that Zack just cannot.

Despite all this, though Aerith is more important to the film as a whole, many efforts are made to suggest that Zack and Aerith are equally important to Cloud. One of the first scenes in the film is Cloud moping around Zack’s grave (And unlike the scene with Aerith in the Forgotten City, it isn’t directly connected with Cloud’s present storyline in any way). We have the aforementioned scene where Cloud has flashes of both Aerith’s and Zack’s deaths when he saves Tifa and Denzel. Cloud has a scene where he’s standing back to back with Zack, mirroring his scene with in the Forgotten City with Aerith, before the climax of his fight with Sephiroth. In the Lifestream, after Cloud “dies,” it’s both Aerith and Zack who are there to send him back. Before the film ends, Cloud sees both Aerith and Zack leaving the church.

Now, were all these Zack appearances a way to promote the upcoming spin-off game that he’s going to lead? Of course. But the creators surely would have known that having Zack play such a similar role in Cloud’s arc would make Cloud’s relationship with Aerith feel less special and thus complicating a romantic interpretation of said relationship. If they wanted to encourage a romantic reading of Cloud’s lingering feelings for Aerith, they would have given Zack his own distinct role in the film. Or rather, they wouldn’t have put Zack in the film at all, and they certainly wouldn’t have him lead his own game, but we’ll get to the Zack of it all later.

The funny thing is, in a way, Zack is portrayed as being more special to Cloud. Zack only exists in the film to interact with Cloud and encourage him. Meanwhile. Aerith also has brief interactions with Kadaj, the Geostigma children and even Tifa before the film’s end. Aerith is there to save the whole world. Zack is there just for Cloud. If it’s Cloud’s relationship with Aerith that’s meant to be romantic, shouldn’t it be the other way around?

Let’s take a look at Tifa Lockhart. What role did she have to play in the FF7 sequel film? If, like some, you believed FF7 to be the Cloud/Aerith/Sephiroth show, then Tifa could have easily had a Barret-sized cameo in Advent Children. And honestly, she’s just a great martial artist. She has no special powers that would make her indispensable in a fight against Sephiroth. You certainly would not expect her to be the 2nd billed character in the film. Though of course, if you actually played through the Original Game with your eyes open, you would realize that Tifa Lockhart is instrumental to any story about Cloud Strife.

Unlike Aerith’s appearances, almost none of the suggestive scenes and dynamics between Cloud and Tifa had to be included in the film. As in, they serve no other plot related purpose and could have easily been cut from the final film if the creators weren’t trying to encourage a romantic interpretation of their relationship.

It feels inevitable now, but no one was expecting Cloud and Tifa to be living together and raising two kids. In the general consciousness, FF7 is Cloud and Sephiroth and their big swords and Aerith’s death. At the time, in the eyes of most fans and casual observers, Cloud and Tifa being together wasn’t a necessary part of the FF7 equation the way say, an epic fight between Cloud and Sephiroth would be. In fact, I don’t think even the biggest Cloti fans at the time would have imagined Cloud and Tifa living together would be their canon outcome in the sequel film.

Now can two platonic friends live together and raise two children together? Absolutely, but again Cloud and Tifa are not real people. They are fictional characters. A reasonable person (let’s use the legal definition of the term) who does not have brainworms from arguing over one of the dumbest debates on the Internet for 23 years would probably assume that two characters who were shown to be attracted to each other in the OG and who are now living together and raising two kids are in a romantic relationship. This is a reasonable assumption to make, and if SE wanted to leave Cloud’s romantic inclinations ambiguous, they simply would not be depicting Cloud and Tifa’s relationship in this manner. Cloud’s disrupted peace could have been a number of different things. He could have been a wandering mercenary, he could have been searching for a way to be reunited with Aerith. It didn’t have to be the family he formed with Tifa, but, then again, if you were actually paying attention to the story the OG was trying to tell, of course he would be living with Tifa.

Let’s also look at the scene where Cloud finds Tifa in the church after her fight with Loz. All the plot related information (who attacked her, Marlene being taken) is conveyed in the brief conversation they have before Cloud falls unconscious from Geostigma. What purpose do all the lingering shots of Cloud and Tifa in the flower bed in a Yin-Yang/non-sexual 69ing position serve if not to be suggestive of the type of relationship they have? It’s beautifully rendered but ultimately irrelevant to both the external and internal conflicts of the film.

Likewise, there is no reason why Cloud and Tifa needed to wake up in their children’s bedroom. No reason to show Cloud waking up with Tifa next to him in a way that almost makes you think they were in the same bed. And there is absolutely no reason whatsoever for a close-up of Tifa’s hand with the Wolf Ring on her ring finger while she is admonishing Cloud during what sounds like a domestic argument (This ring again comes into focus when Tifa leads Denzel to Cloud at the church at the end - there are dozens of ways this scene could have been rendered, but this is the one that was chosen.) If it wasn’t SE’s intent to emphasize the family dynamic and the intimate nature of Cloud and Tifa’s relationship, these scenes would not exist.

Let’s also take a look at Denzel, the only new character in the AC (give or take the Remnants). Again, given the film’s brief runtime, the fact that they’re not only adding a new character but giving him more screen time than almost every other AVALANCHE member must mean that he’s pretty important. While Denzel does have an arc of his own, especially in ACC, he is intricately connected to Cloud and Tifa and solidifies the family unit that they’ve been forming in Edge. Marlene still has Barret, but with the addition of Denzel, the family becomes something more real albeit even more tenuous given his Geostigma diagnosis. Without Denzel in the picture, it’s a bit easier to interpret Cloud’s distance from Tifa as romantic pining for another woman, but now it just seems absurd. The stakes are so much higher. Cloud and Tifa are at a completely different stage in their lives from the versions of these characters we met early on in the OG who were entangled in a frivolous love triangle. And yet some people are still stuck trying to fit these characters into a childish dynamic that died at the end of disc one along with a certain someone.

All this is there in the film, at least the director’s cut, if you really squint. But since SE preferred to spend its time on countless action sequences that have aged as well as whole milk in lieu of spending a few minutes showing Cloud’s family life before he got Geostigma to establish the emotional stakes, or a beat or two more on his reconciliation with Tifa and the kids, people may be understandably confused about Cloud’s arc. Has Cloud just been a moping around in misery for the two years post-OG? The answer is no, though that can only really be found in the accompanying novellas, specifically Case of Tifa.

Concerning the novellas, which we apparently must read to understand said DVD sequel

I really don’t know how you can read through CoT and still think there is anything ambiguous about the nature of Cloud and Tifa’s relationship. The “Because I have you this time,” Cloud telling Tifa he’ll remind her how to be strong when they’re alone, Cloud confidently agreeing when Marlene adds him to their family. Not to mention Barret and Cid’s brief conversation about Cloud and Tifa’s relationship in Case of Barret, after which Cid comments that “women wear the pants,” which Barret then follows by asking Cid about Shera. Again, a reasonable person would assume the couple in question are in a romantic relationship, and if this wasn’t the intent, these lines would not be present. Especially not in a novella about someone else.

Some try to argue that CoT just shows how incompatible Cloud and Tifa are because it features a few low points in their relationship. I don’t think that’s Nojima’s intent. Even if it was, it certainly wouldn’t be to prove that Cloud loves Aerith. This isn’t how you tell that story. Why waste all that time disproving a negative rather than proving a positive? We didn’t spend hours in FF8 watching Rinoa’s relationship with Seifer fall apart to understand how much better off she is with Squall. If Cloud and Aerith is meant to be a love story, then tell their love story. Why tell the story of how Cloud is incompatible with someone else?

Part of the confusion may be because CoT doesn’t tell a complete story in and of itself. The first half of the story (before Cloud has to deliver flowers to the Forgotten City) acts as a sort of epilogue to the OG, while the second half of the story is something of a prologue to Advent Children (or honestly its missing Act One). And to state the obvious, conflict is inherent to any story worth telling. It can’t just be all fluff, that’s what the fanfiction is for.

Tifa’s conflict is her fear that the fragile little family they’ve built in Edge is going to fall apart. Thus we see her fret about Cloud’s distance, the way this affects Marlene, and Denzel’s sickness. There are certainly some low moments here --- Tifa telling Cloud to drink in his room, asking if he loves her -- all ways for the threat to seem more real, the outcome more uncertain, yet there’s only one way this conflict can be resolved. One direction to which their relationship can move.

Again, by the end of this story, both characters are supposed to be the best versions of themselves, to find their “happy” endings so to speak. Tifa could certainly find happiness outside of a relationship with Cloud. She could decide that they’ve given it a shot, but they’re better off as friends. She’s grateful for this experience and she’s learned from this, but now she’s ready to make a life for herself on her own. It would be a fine character arc, though not something the Final Fantasy series has been wont to do. However, that’s obviously not the case here as there’s no indication whatsoever that Tifa considers this as an option for herself. Nojima hasn’t written this off ramp into her journey. For Tifa, they’ll either become a real family or they won’t. Since this is a story that is going to have a happy ending, so of course they will, even if there are a lot of bumps along the way.

Unfortunately, with the Compilation being the unwieldy beast that this is, this whole arc has to be pieced together across a number of different works:

Tifa asking herself if they’re a real family in CoT

Her greatest fear seemingly come to life when Cloud leaves at the end of CoT/beginning of AC

Tifa explicitly asking Cloud if the reason they can’t help each other is because they’re not a real family during their argument in AC. Notably, even though Cloud is at his lowest point, he doesn’t confirm her fear. Instead he says he that he can’t help anyone, not even his family. Instead, he indirectly confirms that yes he does think they’re a family, even if is a frustrating moment still in that he’s too scared to try to save it.

The ending of AC where we see a new photo of Cloud smiling surrounded by Tifa and the kids and the rest of the AVALANCHE, next to the earlier photo we had seen of the four of them where he was wearing a more dour expression.

The ending of The Kids Are All Right, where Cloud, Tifa, Denzel and Marlene meet with Evan, Kyrie and Vits - and Cloud offers, unsolicited, that even if they’re not related by blood, they’re a family.

The ending of DVD extra ‘Reminiscence of FFVII’ where Cloud takes the day off and asks Tifa to close the bar so they can spend time together as a family as Tifa had wanted to do early in CoT

Cloud fears he’ll fail his family. Tifa fears it’ll fall apart. Cloud retreats into himself, pushing others away. Tifa neglects herself, not being able to say what she needs to say. In Advent Children, Tifa finally voices her frustrations. It’s then that Cloud finally confronts his fears. Like in the OG, Cloud and Tifa’s conflicts and character arcs are two sides of the same coin, and it’s only by communicating with each other are they able to resolve it. Though with the Compilation being an inferior work, it’s much less satisfying this time around. Such is the problem when you’re writing towards a preordained outcome (Cloud and Sephiroth duking it once again) rather than letting the story develop organically.

Some may ask, why mention Aerith so much (Cloud growing distant after delivering flowers to the Forgotten City, Cloud finding Denzel at Aerith’s church) if they weren’t trying to perpetuate the LTD? Well, as explained above, Aerith had to be in Advent Children, and since CoT is the only place where we get any insight into Cloud’s psyche, it’s here where Nojima expands on that guilt.

Again, this is a story that requires conflict, and what better conflict than the specter of a love rival? Notably, despite us having access to Tifa’s thoughts and fears, she never explicitly associates Cloud’s behavior with him pining after Aerith. Though it’s fair to say this fear is implied, if unwarranted.

If Cloud had actually been pining after Aerith this whole time, we would not be seeing it all unfold through Tifa’s perspective. You can depict a romance without drawing attention to the injured third party. We’re seeing all of this from Tifa’s POV, because it’s about Tifa’s insecurities, not the great tragic romance between Cloud and Aerith. Honestly, another reason we see this from Tifa’s perspective is because it’s dramatically more interesting. Because she’s insecure, she (and we the reader) wonder if there’s something else going on. Meanwhile, from Cloud’s perspective it would be straightforward and redundant, given what we see in AC. He’s guilty over Aerith’s death and thinks he doesn’t deserve to be happy.

Not to mention, the first time we encounter Aerith in CoT, Tifa is the one breaking down at her grave while Cloud is the one comforting her. Are we supposed to believe that he just forgot he was in love with Aerith until he had to deliver flowers to the Forgotten City?

And Aerith doesn’t just serve as a romantic obstacle. She’s also a symbol of guilt and redemption for both Cloud and Tifa. Neither think they have the right to be happy after all that’s happened (Aerith’s death being a big part of this), and through Denzel, who Cloud finds at Aerith’s church, they both see a chance to atone.

I do want to address Case of Lifestream: White because it’s only time in the entire Compilation where I’ve asked myself — what are they trying to achieve here? Now, I’d rather drink bleach than start debating the translation of ‘koibito’ again, but I did think it was a strange choice to specify the romantic nature of Aerith’s love for Cloud. I suppose it could be a reference her obvious attraction to Cloud in the OG, though calling it love feels like a stretch.

But nothing else in CoLW really gives me pause. It might be a bit jarring to see how much of it is Aerith’s thoughts of Cloud, but it makes sense when you consider the context in which it’s meant to be consumed. Unlike Case of Tifa or Case of Denzel, CoLW isn’t meant to be read on its own. It’s a few scant paragraphs in direct conversation with Case of Lifestream: Black. In CoLB, Sephiroth talks about his plan to return and end the world or whatever, and how Cloud is instrumental to his plan. Each segment of CoLW mirrors the corresponding segment of CoLB. Thus, CoLW has to be about Aerith’s plan to stop Sephiroth and the role Cloud must play in that. In both of these stories, Cloud is the only named character. It doesn’t mean that thoughts of Cloud consume all of Aerith’s afterlife. Case of Lifestream is only a tiny sliver of the story, a halfassed way to explain why in Advent Children the world is ending again and why Cloud has to be at the center of it all.

Notably, there is absolutely nothing in CoLW about Cloud’s feelings for Aerith. Even if it’s just speculation on her part as we see Sephiroth speculate about Cloud’s reactions in CoLB. Aerith can see what’s going on in the real world, but she says nothing about Cloud’s actions. If Cloud is really pining after her, trying to find a way to be reunited with her, wouldn’t this be the ideal story to show such devotion?

But it’s not there, because not only does it not happen, but because this story is not about Aerith’s relationship with Cloud. It is about how Aerith needs to see and warn Cloud in order to stop Sephiroth. By the end of Advent Children, that goal is fulfilled. Cloud gets his forgiveness. Aerith gets to see him again and helps him stop Sephiroth. There’s no suggestion that either party wants more. We finally have the closure that the OG lacked, and at no point does it confirm that Cloud reciprocated Aerith’s romantic feelings, even though there were plenty of opportunities to do so.

I don’t really know what else people were expecting. Advent Children isn’t a romantic drama. There’s not going to be a moment where Cloud explicitly tells Tifa, ‘I’ve never loved Aerith. It’s only been you all along.” This is just simply not the kind of story it is.

Though one late scene practically serves this function. When Cloud “dies” and Aerith finds him in the Lifestream, if there were any lingering romantic feelings between the two of them, this would be a beautiful bittersweet reunion. Maybe something about how as much as they want to be together, it’s not his time yet. Instead, it’s almost played off as a joke. Cloud calls her ‘Mother’, and Zack is at Aerith’s side, joking about how Cloud has no place there. This would be the perfect opportunity to address the romantic connection between Cloud and Aerith, but instead, the film elides this completely. Instead, it’s a cute afterlife moment between Aerith and Zack, and functionally allows Cloud to go back to where he belongs, to Tifa and the kids. Whatever Cloud’s feelings for Aerith were before, it’s transformed into something else.

Crisis Core -- or how Aerith finally gets her love story

The other relevant part of the Compilation is Crisis Core, which I will now touch on briefly (or at least brief for me). In the OG, Zack Fair was more plot device than character. We knew he was important to Cloud — enough that Cloud would mistake Zack’s memories for his own -- we knew he was important to Aerith — enough that she is initially drawn to Cloud due to his similarities to Zack — yet the nature of these relationships is more ambiguous. Especially his relationship with Aerith. From the little we learn of their relationship, it could have been completely one-sided on her part, and Zack a total cad. At least that’s the implication she leaves us with in Gongaga. We get the sense that she might not be the most reliable narrator on this point (why bring up an ex so often, unsolicited, if it wasn’t anything serious?) but the OG never confirms this either way.

Crisis Core clears this up completely. Not only is Zack portrayed as the Capital H Hero of his own game, but his relationships with Cloud and Aerith are two of the most important in the game. In fact, they are the basis for his heroic sacrifice at the game’s end: he dies trying to save Cloud’s life; he dies trying to return to Aerith.

Zack’s relationship with Aerith is a major subplot of the game. Not only that, but the details of said relationship completely recontextualizes what we know about the Aerith we see in the OG. Many of Aerith’s most iconic traits (wearing pink, selling flowers) are a direct product of this relationship, and more importantly, so many of the hallmarks of her early relationship with Cloud (him falling through her church, one date as a reward, a conversation in the playground) are a direct echo of her relationship with Zack.

A casual fling this was not. Aerith’s relationship with Zack made a deep impact on the character we see in the OG and clearly colored her interactions with Cloud throughout.

Crisis Core is telling Zack’s story, and Tifa is a fairly minor supporting character, yet it still finds the time to expand upon Cloud and Tifa’s relationship. Through their interactions with Zack, we learn just how much they were on each others’ minds during this time, and how they were both too shy to own up to these feelings. We also get a brief expansion on the moment Cloud finds Tifa injured in the reactor.

Meanwhile, given the point we are in the story’s chronology, Cloud and Aerith are completely oblivious of each other’s existence.

One may try to argue that none of this matters since all of this is in the past. While this argument might hold water if we arguing about real lives in the real world, FF7 is a work of fiction. Its creators decided that these would be events we would see, and that Zack would be the lens through which we’d see them. Crisis Core is not the totality of these characters’ lives prior to the event of the OG. Rather, it consists of moments that enhance and expand upon our understanding of the original work. We learn the full extent of Hojo’s experimentation and the Jenova project; we learn that Sephiroth was actually a fairly normal guy before he was driven insane when he uncovers the circumstances of his birth. We learn that Aerith was a completely different person before she met Zack, and their relationship had a profound impact on her character.

A prequel is not made to contradict the original work, but what it can do is recontexualize the story we already know and add a layer of nuance that may have not been obvious before. Thus, Sephiroth is transformed from a scary villain into a tragic figure who could have been a hero were it not for Hojo’s experiments. Aerith’s behavior too invites reinterpretation. What once seemed flirty and perhaps overtly forward now looks like the tragic attempts of a woman trying to recapture a lost love.

If Cloud and Aerith were meant to be the official couple of the Compilation of FF7, you absolutely would not be spending so much time depicting two relationships that will be moot by the time we get to the original work. You especially would not depict Zack and Aerith’s relationship in a way that makes Aerith’s relationship with Cloud look like a copy of the moments she had with her ex.

Additionally, with Zack’s relationship with Angeal, we can see, that within the universe of FF7, a protagonist being devastated over the death of a beloved comrade isn’t something that’s inherently romantic. Neither is it romantic for said dead comrade to lend a helping hand from the beyond.

SE would also expect some people to play Crisis Core before the OG. If Cloud and Aerith are the intended endgame couple, then SE would be asking the player to root for a guy to pursue the girlfriend of the man who gave his life for him. The same man who died trying to reunite with her. This is to say nothing of Cloud’s treatment of Tifa in this scenario. How could this possibly be the intent  for their most popular protagonist in the most popular entry of their most popular franchise?

What Crisis Core instead offers is something for fans of Aerith who may be disappointed that she was robbed of a great romance by her death. Well, she now gets that epic, tragic romance. Only it’s with Zack, not Cloud.

If SE intended for Cloud and Aerith to be the official couple of FF7, neither Zack nor Tifa would exist. They would not spend so much time developing Zack and Tifa into the multi-dimensional characters they are, only to be treated as nothing more than collateral damage in the wake of Cloud and Aerith’s great love. No, this is a Final Fantasy. SE want their main characters to have something of a happy ending after all of the tribulations they face. Cloud and Tifa find theirs in life. Zack and Aerith, as the ending of AC suggests, find theirs in death.

Cloud and Aerith’s relationship isn’t a threat to the Zack/Aerith and Cloud/Tifa endgame, nor is it a mere obstacle. Rather, it’s a relationship that actually deepens and strengthens the other two. Aerith is explicitly searching for her first love in Cloud, revealing just how deep her feelings for Zack ran. Cloud gets to live out his heroic SOLDIER fantasy with Aerith, a fantasy he created just to impress Tifa.

There are moments between Cloud and Aerith that may seem romantic when taken on its own, but viewed within the context of the whole narrative, ultimately reveal that they aren’t quite right for each other, and in each other, they’re actually searching for someone else.

This quadrangular dynamic reminds me a bit of one of my favorite classic films, The Philadelphia Story. (Spoilers for a film that came out in 1940 ahead) — The single most romantic scene in the film is between Jimmy Stewart’s and Katherine Hepburn’s characters, yet they’re not the ones who end up together. Even as their passions run, as the music swells, and we want them to end up together, we realize that they’re not quite right for each other. We know that it won’t work out.

More relevantly, we know this is true due to the existence of Cary Grant’s and Ruth Hussey’s characters, who are shown to carry a torch for Hepburn and Stewart, respectively. Grant and Hussey are well-developed and sympathetic characters. With the film being the top grossing film of the year, and made during the Code era, it’s about as “clean” of a narrative as you can get. There’s no way Grant and Hussey would be given such prominent roles just to be left heartbroken and in the cold by the film’s end.

Hepburn’s character (Tracy) pretty much sums it herself after some hijinks lead to a last minute proposal from Stewart’s character (Mike):

Mike: Will you marry me, Tracy?                      

Tracy: No, Mike. Thanks, but hmm-mm. Nope.

Mike: l've never asked a girl to marry me. l've avoided it. But you've got me all confused now. Why not?

Tracy: Because l don't think Liz [Hussey’s character] would like it...and l'm not sure you would...and l'm even a little doubtful about myself. But l am beholden to you, Mike. l'm most beholden.

Despite the fact that the film spends more time developing Hepburn and Stewart’s relationship than theirs with their endgame partners, it’s still such a satisfying ending. That’s because, even at the peak of their romance, we can see how Stewart needs someone like Hussey to ground his passionate impulses, and how Hepburn needs Grant, someone who won’t put her on a pedestal like everyone else. Hepburn and Stewart’s is a relationship that might feel right in the moment, but doesn’t quite work in the light of day.

I don’t think Cloud and Aerith share a moment that is nearly as romantic in FF7, but the same principle applies. What may seem romantic in the moment actually reveals how they’re right for someone else.

Even if Aerith lives and Cloud decides to pursue a relationship with her, it’s not going to be all puppies and roses ahead for them. Aerith would need to disentangle her feelings for Zack from her attraction to Cloud, and Cloud would still need to confront his feelings for Tifa, which were his main motivator for nearly half his life, before they can even start to build something real. This is messy work, good fodder for a prestige cable drama or an Oscar-baity indie film, but it has no place in a Final Fantasy. There simply isn’t the time. Not when the question on most players’ minds isn’t ‘Cloud does love?’ but ‘How the hell are they going to stop that madman and his Meteor that’s about to destroy the world?’

With Zerith’s depiction in Crisis Core, there’s a sort of bittersweet poetry in how the two relationships rhyme but can’t actually coexist. It is only because Zack is trying to return to Midgar to see Aerith that Cloud is able to reunite with Tifa, and the OG begins in earnest. In another world, Zack and Aerith would be the hero and heroine who saved the world and lived to tell the tale. They are much more the traditional archetypes - Zack the super-powered warrior who wants to be a Capital-H Hero, and Aerith, the last of her kind who reluctantly accepts her fate. Compared to these two, Cloud and Tifa aren’t nearly so special, nor their goals so lofty and noble. Cloud, after all, was too weak to even get into SOLDIER, and only wanted to be one, not for some greater good, but to impress the girl he liked. Tifa has no special abilities, merely learning martial arts when she grew wise enough to not wait around for a hero. On the surface, Cloud and Tifa are made of frailer stuff, and yet by luck or by fate, they’re the ones who cheat death time and time again, and manage to save the world, whereas the ones who should have the role, are prematurely struck down before they can finish the job. Cloud and Tifa fulfill the roles that they never asked for, that they may not be particularly suited for, in Zack and Aerith’s stead. There’s a burden and a beauty to it. Cloud and Tifa can live because Zack and Aerith did not.

All of this nuance is lost if you think Cloud and Aerith are meant to be the endgame couple. Instead, you have a pair succumbing to their basest desires, regardless of the selfless sacrifices their other potential paramours made for their sake. Zack and Tifa, and their respective relationships with Aerith and Cloud, are flattened into mere romantic obstacles. The heart wants what it wants, some may argue. While that may be true in real life, that is not necessarily the case in a work of fiction, especially not a Final Fantasy. The other canon Final Fantasy couples could certainly have had previous romantic relationships, but unless they have direct relevance to the their character arcs (e.g., Rachel to Locke), the games do not draw attention to them because they would be a distraction from the romance they are trying to tell. They’ve certainly never spent the amount of real estate FF7 spends in depicting Cloud/Tifa and Zack/Aerith’s relationships.

At last…the Remake, and somehow this essay isn’t even close to being over

Finally, we come to the Remake. With the technological advancements made in the last 23 years and the sheer amount of hours they’re devoting to just the Midgar section this time around, you can almost look at the OG as an outline and the Remake as the final draft. With the OG being overly reliant on text to  do its storytelling, and the Remake having subtle facial expressions and a slew of cinematic techniques at its disposal, you might almost consider it an adaptation from a literary medium to a visual one. Our discussions are no longer limited to just what the characters are saying, but what they are doing, and even more importantly, how the game presents those actions. When does the game want us to pay attention? And what does it want us to pay attention to?

Unlike most outlines, which are read by a small handful of execs, SE has 23 years worth of reactions from the general public to gauge what works and what doesn’t work, what caused confusion, and what could be clarified. While FF7 is not a romance, the LTD remains a hot topic among a small but vocal part of the fanbase. It certainly is an area that could do with some clarifying in the Remake.

Since the Remake is not telling a new story, but rather retelling an existing story that has been in the public consciousness for over two decades, certain aspects that were treated as “twists” in the OG no longer have that same element of surprise, and would need to approached differently. For example, in the Midgar section of the OG, Shinra is treated as the main antagonist throughout. It’s only when we get to the top of the Shinra tower that Sephiroth is revealed as the real villain. Anyone with even a passing of knowledge of FF7 would be aware of Sephiroth so trying to play it off like a surprise in the Remake would be terribly anticlimactic. Thus, Sephiroth appears as early as Ch. 2 to haunt Cloud and the player throughout.

Likewise, many players who’ve never even touched the OG are probably aware that Aerith dies, thus her death can no longer be played for shock. While SE would still want the player to grow attached to Aerith so that her death has an emotional impact, there are diminishing returns to misdirecting the player about her fate, at least not in the same way it was done in the OG.

How do these considerations affect the how the LTD is depicted in the Remake? For the two of the biggest twists in the OG to land in the Remake — Aerith’s death and Cloud’s true identity in the Lifestream — the game needs to establish:

Aerith’s attraction to Cloud, specifically due to his similarities to Zack. This never needs to go past an initial attraction for the player to understand that the man whose memory Cloud was “borrowing” is Zack. Aerith’s feelings for Cloud can evolve into something platonic or even maternal by her end without the reveal in the Lifestream losing any impact.

Cloud’s love for Tifa. For the Lifestream sequence to land with an “Ooooh!” rather than a “Huh!?!?”, the Remake will need to establish that Cloud’s feelings for Tifa were strong enough to 1) motivate him to try to join SOLDIER in the first place 2) incentivize him to adopt a false persona because he fears that he isn’t the man she wants him to be 3) call him back to consciousness from Make poisoning twice 4) help him put his mind back together and find his true self. That’s a lot of story riding on one guy’s feelings!

The player’s love for Aerith so that her death will hurt. This can be done by making them invested in Aerith as a character by her own right, but also extends to the relationships she has with the other characters (not only Cloud).

What is not necessary is establishing Cloud’s romantic feelings for Aerith. Now, would their doomed romance make her death hurt even more? Sure, but it could work just as well if Cloud if is losing a dear friend and ally, not a lover. Not to mention, her death also cuts short her relationships with Tifa, Barret, Red XII, etc. Bulking those relationships up prior to her death, would also make her loss more palpable. If anything, establishing Cloud’s romantic feelings for Aerith would actually undermine the game’s other big twist. The game needs you to believe that Cloud’s feelings for Tifa were strong enough to drive his entire hero’s journey. If Cloud is shown falling in love with another woman in the span of weeks if not mere days, then the Lifestream scene would be much harder to swallow.

Cloud wavering between the two women made sense in the OG because the main way for the player to get to know Aerith was through her interactions with Cloud. That is no longer the case in the Remake. Cloud is still the protagonist, and the player character for the vast majority of the game, but there are natural ways for the player to get to know Aerith outside of her dialogue exchanges with Cloud. Unless SE considers the LTD an integral part of FF7’s DNA, then for the sake of story clarity, the LTD doesn’t need to exist.

How then does the Remake clarify things?

I’m not going go through every single change in the Remake — there are far too many of them, and they’ve been documented elsewhere. Most of the changes are expansions or adaptations (what might make sense for super-deformed chibis would look silly for realistic characters, e.g., Cloud rolling barrels in the Church has now become him climbing across the roof support). What is expanded and how it’s adapted can be telling, but what is more interesting are the additions and removals. Not just for what takes place in the scenes themselves, but how their addition or removal changes our understanding of the narrative as a whole vis-a-vis the story we know from the OG.

Notably, one of the features that is not expanded upon, but rather diminished, is player choice. In the OG, the player had a slew of dialogue options to choose from, especially during the Midgar portion of the game. Not only did it determine which character would go on a date with Cloud at the Gold Saucer, but it also made the player identify with Cloud since they’re largely determining his personality during this stage. Despite the technological advances that have made this level of optionality the norm in AAA games, the Remake gives the player far fewer non-gameplay related choices, and only really the illusion of choice as a nod to the OG, but they don’t affect the story of the game in any meaningful way. You get a slightly different conversation depending on the choice, but you have to buy the Flower, Tifa has to make you a drink.

So much of what fueled the LTD in the OG came from this mechanic, which is now largely absent in the Remake. Almost every instance where there was a dialogue branch in the OG has become a single, canon scenario in the Remake that favors Tifa (e.g., having the choice of giving the flower to Tifa or Marlene in the OG, to Cloud giving the flower to Tifa in the Remake). Similarly, for the only meaningful choice you make in the Remake — picking Tifa or Aerith in the sewers — Cloud is now equidistant to both girls, whereas in the OG, his starting point was much closer to Aerith. In the OG, player choice allowed you to largely determine Cloud’s personality, and the girl he favored — and seemingly encouraged you to choose Aerith in many instances. In the Remake, Cloud is now his own character, not who the player wants him to be. And this Cloud, well, he sure seems to have a thing for Tifa.

In fact, one of the first changes in the Remake is the addition of Jessie asking Cloud about his relationship with Tifa, and Cloud’s brief flashback to their childhood together. In the OG, Tifa isn’t mentioned at all during the first reactor mission, and we don’t see her until we get to Sector 7.

Not only does this scene reveal Tifa’s importance to Cloud much earlier on than in the OG, but it sets up a sort of frame of reference that colors Cloud’s subsequent interactions. Even as Jessie kind of flirts with him throughout the reactor mission, even with his chance meeting Aerith in Sector 8, in the back of your mind, you might be thinking — wait what about his relationship with this Tifa character? What if he’s already spoken for?

Think about how this plays out in the OG. Jessie is pretty much a non-entity, and Cloud has his meet-cute with the flower girl before we’re even aware that Tifa exists. It’s hard to get too invested in his interactions with Tifa, when you know he has to meet the flower girl again, and you’re waiting for that moment, because that’s when the game will start in earnest.

After chapter 1 of the Remake, a new player may be asking — who is this Tifa person, and, echoing Jessie’s question, what kind of relationship does she have with Cloud? It’s a question that’s repeated when Barret mentions her before they set the bomb, and again when Barret specifies Seventh Heaven is where Tifa works — and the game zooms in on Cloud’s face — when they arrive in Sector 7.

It’s when we finally meet her at Seventh Heaven in Ch. 3 that we feel, ah now, this game has finally begun.

It’s also interesting how inorganically this question is introduced in the Remake. Up until that moment, the dialogue and Cloud are all business. Then, as they’re waiting for the gate to open, Jessie asks about Tifa completely out of the blue, and Cloud, all of a sudden, is at a lost for words, and has the first of many flashbacks. That this moment is a bit incongruous shows the effort SE made to establish Tifa’s importance to the game and to Cloud early on.

One of the biggest changes in the Remake is the addition of the events in Ch. 3 and 4. Unlike what happens in Ch. 18, Ch. 3 and 4 feel like such a natural extension of the OG’s story that many players may not even realize that SE has added an whole day’s and night’s worth of events to the OG’s story. While not a drastic change, it does reshape our understanding of subsequent events in the story, namely Cloud’s time spent alone with Aerith.

In the OG, we rush from one reactor mission to the next, with no real time to explore Cloud’s character or his relationships with any of the other characters in between. When he crashes through the church, he gets a bit of a breather. We see a different side of him with Aerith. Since we have nothing else to compare it to, many might assume that his relationship with Aerith is special. That she brings something out of him that no one else can.

That is no longer the case in the Remake. While Cloud’s time in Sector 5 with Aerith remains largely unchanged though greatly expanded, it no longer feels  “special.” So many of the beats that seemed exclusive to his relationship with Aerith in the OG, we’ve now already seen play out with both Tifa and the other members of AVALANCHE long before he meets Aerith.

Cloud tells the flowers to listen to Aerith; he’s told Tifa he’s listening if she wants to talk; told Bigg’s he wants to hear the story of Jessie’s dad. Cloud offers to walk Aerith back home; he offered the same to Wedge. Cloud smiles at Aerith; he’s already smiled at Tifa and AVALANCHE a number of times.

Now, I’m under no illusion that SE added these chapters solely to diminish Aerith’s importance to Cloud (other than the obvious goal of making the game longer, I imagine they wanted the player to spend more time in Sector 7 and more time with the other AVALANCHE members so that the collapse of the Pillar and their deaths have more weight), but they certainly must have realized that this would be one effect. If pushing Cloud/Aerith’s romance had been a goal with the Remake, this would be a scenario they would try to avoid. Notably, the other place where time has been added - the night in the Underground Shinra Lab, and the day helping other people out around the slums — are also periods of time when Aerith is absent.

Home Sweet Slums vs. Budding Bodyguard

Since most of the events in Ch. 3 were invented for the Remake, and thus we have nothing in the OG to compare it to (except to say that something is probably better than nothing), I thought it would be more interesting to compare it to Ch. 8. Structurally, they are nearly identical — Cloud doing sidequests around the Sectors with one of the girls as his guide. Extra bits of dialogue the more sidequests you complete, with an optional story event if you do them all. Do Cloud’s relationships with each girl progress the same way in both chapters? Is the Remake just Final Waifu Simulator 2020 or are they distinct, reflecting their respective roles in the story as a whole?

A lot of what the player takes away from these chapters is going to be pretty subjective (Is he annoyed with her or is he playing hard to get), yet the vibes of the two chapters are quite different. This is because in Ch. 3, the player is getting to know Tifa through her relationship with Cloud; in Ch. 8; the player is getting to know Aerith as a character on her own.

What do I mean by this? Let’s take Cloud’s initial introduction into each Sector. In Ch. 3, it’s a straight shot from Seventh Heaven to Stargazer Heights punctuated by a brief conversation where Tifa asks Cloud about the mission he was just on. We don’t learn anything new about Tifa’s character here. Instead we hear Cloud recount the mission we already saw play out in detail in Ch. 1 But it’s through this conversation that we get a glimpse of Cloud and Tifa’s relationship — unlike the reticent jerk he was with Avalanche, this Cloud is much more responsive and even tries to reassure her in his own stilted way. We also know that they have enough of a past together that Tifa can categorize him as “not a people person” — an assessment to which Cloud agrees. Slowly, we’re getting an answer to the question Jessie posed in Ch. 1 — just what kind of relationship does Cloud have with Tifa?

In Ch. 8, Aerith leads Cloud on a roundabout way through Sector 5, and stops, unprompted, to talk about her experiences helping at the restaurant, helping out the doctor, and helping with the orphans at the Leaf House. It’s not so much a conversation as a monologue. Cloud isn’t the one who inquires about these relationships, and more jarringly, he doesn’t respond until Aerith directly asks him a question (interestingly enough, it’s about the flower she gave him…which he then gave to Tifa). Here, the game is allowing the player to learn more about the kind of person Aerith is. Cloud is also learning about Aerith at the same time, but with his non-reaction, either the game itself is indifferent to Cloud’s feelings towards Aerith or it is deliberately trying to portray Cloud’s indifference to Aerith.

The optional story event you can see in each chapter after completing all the side quests is also telling. In Ch. 3, “Alone at Last” is almost explicitly about Cloud and Tifa’s relationship. It’s bookended by two brief scenes between Marle and Cloud — the first in which she lectures him about how he should treat Tifa almost like an overprotective in-law, the second after they return downstairs and Marle awards Cloud with an accessory “imbued with the fervent desire to be by one’s side for eternity” after he makes Tifa smile. In between, Cloud and Tifa chat alone in her room. Tifa finally gets a chance to ask Cloud about his past and they plan a little date to celebrate their reunion. There is also at least the suggestion that Cloud was expecting something else when Tifa asked him to her room.

In Ch. 8’s “The Language of Flowers,” Cloud and Aerith’s relationship is certainly part of the story — unlike earlier in the chapter, Cloud actually asks Aerith about what she’s doing and even supports her by talking to the flowers too, but the other main objective of this much briefer scene is to show Aerith’s relationship with the flowers and of her mysterious Cetra powers (though we don’t know about her ancestry just yet). Like a lot of Aerith’s dialogue, there’s a lot of foreshadowing and foreboding in her words. If anything, it’s almost as if Cloud is playing the Marle role to the flowers, as an audience surrogate to ask Aerith about her relationship with the flowers so that she can explain. Also, there’s no in-game reward that suggests what the scene was really about.

If there’s any confusion about what’s going on here, just compare their titles “Alone At Last” vs. “The Language of Flowers.”

I’ll try not to bring my personal feelings into this, but there’s just something so much more satisfying about the construction of Ch. 3. This is some real storytelling 101 shit, but I think a lot of it due to just how much set up and payoff there is, and how almost all of said payoff deepens our understanding of Cloud and Tifa’s relationship:

Marle: Cloud meets Tifa’s overprotective landlady towards the beginning of the chapter. She is dubious of his character and his relationship with TIfa. This impression does not change the second time they meet even though Tifa herself is there to mediate. It’s only towards the end of the chapter, after all the sidequests are complete, that this tension is resolved. Marle gives Cloud a lecture about how he should be treating Tifa, which he seems to take to heart. And Cloud finally earns Marle’s begrudging approval after he emerges from their rooms with a chipper-looking Tifa in tow.

Their past: For their first in-game interaction, Cloud casually brings up that fact that it’s been “Five years” since they’ve last, which seem to throw Tifa off a bit. As they’re replacing filters, Cloud asks Tifa what she’s been up to in the time since they’ve been apart, and Tifa quickly changes the subject. Tifa tries to ask Cloud about his life “after he left the village,” at the Neighborhood Watch HQ, and this time he’s the one who seems to be avoiding the subject. It’s only after all the Ch. 3 sidequests are complete, and they're alone in her room that Tifa finally gets the chance to ask her question. A question which Cloud still doesn’t entirely answer. This question remains unresolved, and anyone’s played the OG will know that it will remain unresolved for some time yet, as it is THE question of Cloud’s story as a whole.

The lessons: Tifa starts spouting off some lessons for life in the slums as she brings Cloud around the town, though it’s unclear if Cloud is paying attention or taking them to heart. After completing the first sidequest, Cloud repeats one of these sayings back to her, confirming that he’s been listening all along. By the end of the chapter, Cloud is repeating these lessons to himself, even when Tifa isn’t around. These lessons extend beyond this chapter, with Cloud being a real teacher’s pet, asking Tifa “Is this a lesson” in Ch. 10 once they reunite.

The drink: When Cloud first arrives at Seventh Heaven, Tifa plays hostess and asks him if he wants anything, but it seems he’s only interested in his money. After exploring the sector a bit, Tifa again tries to play the role of cheery bartender, offering to make him a cocktail at the bar, but Cloud sees through this facade, and they carry on. Finally, after the day’s work is done, to tide Cloud over while she’s meeting with AVALANCHE, Tifa finally gets the chance to make him a drink. No matter, which dialogue option the player chooses, Tifa and Cloud fall into the roles of flirty bartender and patron quite easily. Who would have thought this was possible from the guy we met in Ch. 1?

This dynamic is largely absent in Ch. 8, except perhaps exploring Aerith’s relationship with the flowers, which “pays off” in the “Language of Flowers” event, but again, that scene is primarily about Aerith’s character rather than her relationship with Cloud. The orphans and the Leaf House are a throughline of the chapter, but they are merely present. There’s no clear progression here as was the case with in Ch. 3. Sure, the kids admire Cloud quite a bit after he saves them, but it’s not like they were dubious of his presence before. They barely paid attention to him. In terms of the impact the kids have on Cloud’s relationship with Aerith, there isn’t much at all. Certainly nothing like the role Marle plays in developing his relationship with Tifa.

The thing is, there are plenty of moments that could have been set ups, only there’s no real follow through. Aerith introduces Cloud around town as her bodyguard, and some people like the Doctor express dubiousness of his ability to do the job, but even after we spend a whole day fighting off monsters, and defeating Rude, there’s no payoff. Not even a throwaway “Wow, great job bodyguarding” comment. Same with the whole “one date” reward. Other than a quick reference on the way to Sector 5, and Aerith threatening to reveal the deal to cajole Cloud into helping her gather flowers, it’s never brought up again, in this chapter, or the rest of the game.

Aerith also makes a big stink about Cloud taking the time to enjoy Elmyra’s cooking. This is after Cloud is excluded from AVALANCHE’s celebration in Seventh Heaven and after he misses out on Jessie’s mom’s “Midgar Special” with Biggs and Wedge. So this could have been have been the set up to Cloud finally getting to experience a nice, domestic moment where he feels like he’s part of a family. And this dinner does happen! Only…the Remake skips over it entirely. Which is quite a strange choice considering that almost every other waking moment of Cloud’s time in Midgar has been depicted in excruciating detail. SE has decided that either whatever happened in this dinner between these three characters is irrelevant to the story they’re trying to tell, or they’ve deliberately excluded this scene from the game so that the player wouldn’t get any wrong ideas from it (e.g., that Cloud is starting to feel at home with Aerith).

Speaking of home, the Odd Jobs in Ch. 3 feel a bit more meaningful outside of just the gameplay-related rewards because they’re a way for Cloud to improve his reputation as he considers building a life for himself in Sector 7. This intent is implicit as Tifa imparts upon him the life lessons for surviving the slums, and then explicit, when Tifa asks him if he’s going to “stick around a little longer” outside of Seventh Heaven and he answers maybe. (It is later confirmed when Cloud and Tifa converse in his room in Ch. 4 after he remembers their promise).

Despite Aerith’s endeavors to extend their time together, there’s no indication that Cloud is planning to put down roots in Sector 5, or even return. Not even after doing all the Odd Jobs. If anything, it’s just the opposite — after 3 Odd Jobs, Aerith, kind of jokingly tells Cloud “don’t think you can rely on me forever.” This is a line that has a deeper meaning for anyone who knows Aerith’s fate in the OG, but Cloud seems totally fine with the outcome. Similarly, at the end of the Chapter 8, Elmyra asks Cloud to leave and never speak to Aerith again — a request to which he readily agrees.

Adding to the different vibes of the Chapters are the musical themes that play in the background. In Ch. 3, it’s the “Main Theme of VII”, followed by “On Our Way” — two tracks that instantly recall the OG. While the Main Theme is a bit melancholy, it's also familiar. It feels like home. In Ch. 8, we have an instrumental version of ‘Hollow’ - the new theme written for the Remake. While, it’s a lovely piece, it’s unfamiliar and honestly as a bit anxiety inducing (as is the intent).

(A quick aside to address the argument that this proves ‘Hollow’ is about Cloud’s feelings for Aerith:

Which of course doesn’t make any damn sense because he hasn’t even lost Aerith at this point the story. Even if you want to argue that there is so timey-wimey stuff going on and the whole purpose of the Remake is to rewrite the timeline so that Cloud doesn’t lose Aerith around — shouldn’t there be evidence of this desire outside of just the background music? Perhaps, in Cloud’s actions during the Chapter which the song plays — shouldn’t he dread being parted from her, shouldn’t he be the one trying to extend their time together? Instead, he’s willing to let her go quite easily.

The more likely explanation as to why “Hollow” plays in Ch. 8 is that since the “Main Theme of FFVII”  already plays in Ch. 3, the other “main theme” written for the Remake is going to play in the other chapter with a pseudo-open world vibe. If you’re going to say “Hollow” is about Cloud’s feelings for Aerith then you’d have to accept that the Main Theme of the entire series is about Cloud’s feelings for Tifa, which would actually make a bit more sense given that is practically Cloud’s entire character arc.)

Both chapters contain a scripted battle that must be completed before the chapter can end. They both contain a shot where Cloud fights side by side with each of the girls.

Here, Cloud and Tifa are both in focus during the entirety of this shot.

Here, the focus pulls away from Cloud the moment Aerith enters the frame.

I doubt the developers expected most players to notice this particular technique, but it reflects the subtle differences in the way these two relationships are portrayed. By the end of Ch. 3, Cloud and Tifa are acting as one unit. By the end of Ch. 8, even when they’re together, Cloud and Aerith are still apart.

A brief (lol) overview of some meaningful changes from the OG

One of the most significant changes in the Sector 7 chapters is how The Promise flashback is depicted. In the OG, Tifa is the one who has to remind Cloud of the Promise, in a rather pushy way, and whether Cloud chooses to join the next mission to fulfill his promise to her or because Barret is giving him a raise feels a bit more ambiguous.

In the Remake, the Promise has it’s own little mini-arc. It’s first brought up at the end of Ch. 3 when Cloud talks to Tifa about her anxieties about the upcoming mission. Tifa subtly references the Promise by mentioning that she’s “in a pitch” — a reference that goes over Cloud’s head. It’s only in Ch. 4, in the middle of a mission with Biggs and Wedge, where Tifa is no where in sight, that a random building fan reminds him of the Nibelheim water tower and the Promise he made to Tifa there. There’s also another brief flashback to that earlier moment in the bar when Tifa mentions she’s in a “pinch.” Again, the placement of this particular flashback at this particular moment feels almost jarring. And the flashback to the scene in the bar — a flashback to a scene we’ve already seen play out in-game — is the only one of its kind in the Remake. SE went out of the way to show that this particular moment is very important to Cloud and the game as whole. It’s when Cloud returns to his room, and Tifa asks him if he’s planning to stay in Midgar, that this mini-arc is finally complete. He brings up the Promise on his own, and makes it explicit that the reason he’s staying is for her. It’s to fulfill his Promise to her, not for money or for AVALANCHE — at this point, he’s not even supposed to be going on the next mission.

The Reactor 5 chapters are greatly expanded, but there aren’t really any substantive changes other than the addition of the rather intimate train roll scene between and Cloud and Tifa, which adds nothing to the story except to establish how horny they are for each other. We know this is the case, of course, because if you go out of your way to make Cloud look like an incompetent idiot and let the timer run out, you can avoid this scene altogether. But even in that alternate scene, Cloud’s concern for Tifa is crystal clear.

Ch. 8 also plays out quite similarly to the OG for the most part, though Cloud’s banter with Aerith on the rooftops doesn’t feel all that special since we’ve already seen him do the same with Tifa, Barret and the rest of AVALANCHE. The rooftops is the first place Cloud laughs in the OG. In the Remake, while Cloud might not have straight out laughed before, he’s certainly smiled quite a bit in the preceding chapters. Also, with the addition of voice acting and realistic facial expressions, that “laughter” in the Remake comes off much more sarcastic than genuine.

It’s also notable that in the Remake, Cloud vocally protests almost every time Aerith tries to extend their time together. In the OG, Cloud says nothing in these moments, which the player could reasonably interpret as assent.

One major change in the Remake is how Aerith learns of Tifa’s existence. In the OG, Cloud mentions that he wants to go back to Tifa’s bar, prompting Aerith to ask him about his relationship with her. In the Remake, Cloud calls Tifa’s name after having a random flashback of Child Tifa as he’s walking along with some kids. Again the insertion of said flashback is a bit jarring, prompting Aerith to understandably ask Cloud about just who this Tifa is. In the OG, this exchange served to show Aerith’s jealousy and her interest in Cloud. In the Remake, it’s all about Cloud’s feelings for Tifa and his inability to articulate them. As for Aerith, I suppose you can still read her reaction as jealous, though simple curiosity is a perfectly reasonable way to read it too. It plays out quite similarly to Aerith asking Cloud about who he gave the flower to. Her follow ups seem indicate that she’s merely curious about who this recipient might be rather than showing that she’s upset/jealous of the fact that said person exists.

For the collapsed tunnel segment, the Remake adds the recurring bit of Aerith and Cloud trying to successfully complete a high-five. While this is certainly a way to show them getting closer, it’s about least intimate way that SE could have done so. Just think about the alternatives — you could have Cloud and Aerith sharing brief tidbits of their lives after each mechanical arm, you could have them trying to reach for each other’s hand. Instead, SE chose an action that is we’ve seen performed between a number of different platonic buddies, and an action that Aerith immediately performs with Tifa upon meeting her. Not to mention, even while they are technically getting closer, Cloud still rejects (or at least tries to) Aerith’s invitations to extend their time together twice — at the fire and at the playground.

One aspect from these two Chapters that does has plenty of set up and a satisfying payoff is Aerith’s interest in Cloud’s SOLDIER background. You have the weirdness of Aerith already knowing that Cloud was in SOLDIER without him mentioning it first, followed by Elmyra’s antipathy towards SOLDIERs in general, not to mention Aerith actively fishing for information about Cloud’s time in SOLDIER. (For players who’ve played Crisis Core, the reason for her behavior is even more obvious, with her “one date” gesture mirroring Zack’s, and her line to Cloud in front of the tunnel a near duplicate of what she says to Zack — at least in the original Japanese).

Finally, at the playground, it’s revealed that the reason for all this weirdness is because Aerith’s first love was also a SOLDIER who was the same rank as Cloud. Unlike in the OG, Cloud does not exhibit any potential jealousy by asking about the nature of her relationship, and Aerith doesn’t try to play it off by dismissing the seriousness. In fact, with the emotional nuance we can now see on her face, we can understand the depth of her feelings even if she cannot articulate them.

This is the first scene in the Remake where Cloud and Aerith have a genuine conversation. Thus, finally, Cloud expresses some hesitation before he leaves her — and as far as he knows, this could be the last time they see each other. You can interpret this hesitation as romantic longing or it could just as easily be Cloud being a bit sad to part from a new friend. Regardless, it’s notable that scene is preceded by one where Aerith is talking about her first love who she clearly isn’t over, and followed by a scene where Cloud sprints across the screen, without a backwards glance at Aerith, after seeing a glimpse of Tifa through a tiny window in a Chocobo cart that’s about a hundred yards away.

The Wall Market segment in the Remake is quite explicitly about Cloud’s desire to save Tifa. In the OG, Aerith has no trouble getting into Corneo’s mansion on her own, so I can see how someone could misinterpret Cloud going through all the effort to dress as a woman to protect Aerith from the Don’s wiles (though of course, you would need to ask, why they trying to infiltrate the mansion in the first place?). In the Remake, Cloud has to go through herculean efforts to even get Aerith in front of the Don. Everyone who is aware of Cloud’s cause, from Sam to Leslie to Johnny to Andrea to Aerith herself, comments on how hard he’s working to save Tifa and how important she must be to him for him to do so. In case there’s any confusion, the Remake also includes a scene where Cloud is prepared to bust into the mansion on his own, leaving Aerith to fend for herself, after Johnny comes with news that Tifa is in trouble.

Both Cloud and Aerith get big dress reveals in the Remake. If you get Aerith’s best dress, Cloud’s reaction can certainly be read as one of attraction, but since the game continues on the same regardless of which dress you get, it’s not meant to mark a shift in Cloud and Aerith’s relationship. Rather, it’s a reward for the player for completing however many side quests in Ch. 8, especially since the Remake incentives the player to get every dress and thus see all of Cloud’s reactions by making it a Trophy and including it in the play log.

A significant and very welcome change from the OG to the Remake is Tifa and Aerith’s relationship dynamic. In the OG, the girls’ first meeting in Corneo’s mansion starts with them fighting over Cloud (by pretending not to fight over Cloud). In the Remake, the sequence of events is reversed so that it starts off with Cloud’s reunion with Tifa (again emphasizing that the whole purpose of the infiltration is because Cloud wants to save Tifa). Then when Aerith wakes, she’s absolutely thrilled to make Tifa’s acquaintance, hardly acknowledging Cloud at all. Tifa is understandably more wary at first, but once they start working together, they become fast friends.

Also interesting is that from the moment Aerith and Tifa meet, almost every instance where Cloud could be shown worrying about Aerith or trying to comfort Aerith is given to Tifa instead. In the OG, it’s Cloud who frets about Aerith getting involved in the plot to question the Don, and regrets getting her mixed up in everything once they land in the sewers. In the Remake, those very same reservations are expressed by Tifa instead. Tifa is the one who saves Aerith when the platform collapses in the sewer. Tifa is the one who emotionally comforts Aerith after they’re separated in the train graveyard. (Cloud might be the one who physically saves her, but he doesn’t even so much give her a second glance to check on her well-being before he runs off to face Eligor. He leaves that job for Tifa). It almost feels like the Remake is going out of its way to avoid any moments between Cloud and Aerith that could be interpreted as romantic. In fact, after Corneo’s mansion, unless you get Aerith’s resolution, there are almost no one-on-one interactions at all between Cloud and Aerith. Such is not the case with Cloud and Tifa. In fact, right after defeating Abzu in the sewers, Cloud runs after Tifa, and asks her if what she’s saying is one of those slum lessons — continuing right where they left off.

Ch. 11 feels like a wink-wink nudge-nudge way to acknowledge the LTD. You have the infamous shot of the two girls on each of Cloud’s arms, and two scenes where Cloud appears as if he’s unable to choose between them when he asks them if they’re okay. Of course, in this same Chapter, you have a scene during the boss fight with the Phantom where Cloud actually pulls Tifa away from Aerith, leaving Aerith to defend herself, for an extended sequence where he tries to keep Tifa safe. This is not something SE would include if their intention is to keep Cloud’s romantic interest ambiguous or if Aerith is meant to be the one he loves. Of course, Ch. 11 is not the first we see of this trio’s dynamic. We start with Ch. 10, which is all about Aerith and Tifa’s friendship. Ch. 11 is a nod to the LTD dynamic in the OG, but it’s just that, a nod, not an indication the Remake is following the same path. Halfway through Ch. 11, the dynamic completely disappears.

Ch. 12 changes things up a bit from the OG. Instead of Cloud and Tifa ascending the pillar together, Cloud goes up first. Seemingly just so that we can have the dramatic slow-mo handgrab scene between the two of them when Tifa decides to run after Cloud — right after Aerith tells her to follow her heart.

The Remake also shows us what happens when Aerith goes to find Marlene at Seventh Heaven — including the moment when Aerith sees the flower she gave Cloud by the bar register, and Aerith is finally able to connect the dots. After seeing Cloud be so cagey about who he gave the flower to, and weird about his relationship with Tifa, and after seeing how Cloud and Tifa act around each other. It finally makes sense. She’s figured it out before they have. It’s a beautiful payoff to all that set up. Any other interpretation of Aerith’s reaction doesn’t make a lick of sense, because if it’s to indict she’s jealous of Tifa, where is all the set up for that? Why did the Remake eliminate all the moments from the OG where she had been noticeably jealous before? Without this, that interpretation makes about as much sense as someone arguing Aerith is smiling because she’s thinking about a great sandwich she had the night before. In case anyone is confused, the scene is preceded by a moment where Aerith tells Tifa to follow her heart before she goes after Cloud, and followed by the moment where Cloud catches Tifa via slow-motion handgrab.

On the pillar itself, there are so many added moments of Cloud showing his concern for Tifa’s physical and emotional well-being. Even when they find Jessie, as sad as Cloud is over Jessie’s death, the game actually spends more time showing us Cloud’s reaction to Tifa crying over Jessie’s death, and Cloud’s inability to comfort her. Since so much of this is physical rather than verbal, this couldn’t have effectively been shown in the OG with its technological limitations.

After the pillar collapses, we start off with a couple of other moments showing Cloud’s concern over Tifa — watching over her as she wakes, his dramatic fist clench while he watches Barret comfort Tifa in a way he cannot. There is also a subtle but important change in the dialogue. In the OG, Tifa is the one who tells Barret that Marlene is safe because she was with Aerith. Cloud is also on his way to Sector 5, but it’s for the explicit purpose of trying to save Aerith, which we know because Tifa asks. In the Remake, Tifa is too emotionally devastated to comfort Barret about Marlene. Cloud, trying to help in the only way he can, is now the one to tell Barret about Marlene. Leading them to Sector 5 is no longer about him trying to help Aerith, but about him reuniting Barret with his daughter. Again, another moment where Cloud shows concern about Aerith in the OG is eliminated from the Remake.

Rather than going straight from Aerith’s house to trying to figure out a way into the Shinra building to find Aerith, the group takes a detour to check out the ruins of Sector 7 and rescue Wedge from Shinra’s underground lab. It’s only upon seeing the evidence of Shinra’s inhumane experimentation firsthand that Cloud articulates to Elmyra the need to rescue Aerith. In the OG, they never sought out Elmyra’s permission, and Tifa explicitly asks to join Cloud on his quest. Rescuing Aerith is framed as primarily Cloud’s goal, Tifa and Barret are just along for the ride.

In the Remake, all three wait until Elymra gives them her blessing, and it’s framed (quite literally) as the group’s collective goal as opposed to just Cloud’s.

In the aptly named Ch. 14 resolutions, each marks the culmination of the character’s arc for the Part 1 of Remake. While their arcs are by no means complete, they do offer a nice preview of what their ultimate resolutions will be.

With the exception of Tifa’s, these resolutions are primarily about the character themselves. Their relationships with Cloud are secondary. Each resolution marks a change in the character themselves, but not necessarily a change in Cloud’s relationship with said character. Barret recommits to AVALANCHE’s mission and his role as a leader despite the deep personal costs. Aerith’s is full of foreshadowing as she accept her fate and impending death and decides to make the most of the time she has left. After trying to put aside her own feelings for the sake of others the whole time, Tifa finally allows herself to feel the full devastation of losing her home for the second time. Like her ultimate resolution in the Lifestream that we’ll see in about 25 years, Cloud is the only person she can share this sentiment with because he was the only person who was there.

Barret does not grow closer to Cloud through his resolution. Cloud has already proved himself to him by helping out on the pillar and reuniting him with Marlene. Barret resolution merely reveals that Barret is now comfortable enough with Cloud to share his past.

Similarly, Cloud starts off Aerith’s resolution with an intent to go rescue her, and ends with that intent still intact. Aerith is more open about her feelings here than before, it being a dream and all, but these feelings aren’t something that developed during this scene.

The only difference is during Tifa’s resolution. Cloud has been unable to emotionally comfort Tifa up until this point. It’s only when Tifa starts crying and rests her head upon his shoulder that he is able to make a change, to make a choice and hug her. Halfway through Tifa’s resolution, the scene shifts its focus to Cloud, his inaction and eventual action. Notably, the only time we have a close-up of any character during all three resolutions (I’ll define close-up here as a shot where a character’s face takes up half or more of the shot), are three shots of Cloud when he’s hugging/trying to hug Tifa. Tifa’s resolution is the only one where Cloud arcs.

What of the whole “You can’t fall in love with me” line in Aerith’s resolution? Why would SE include that if not to foreshadow Cloud falling in love with Aerith? Or indicate that he has already? Well, you can’t just take the dialogue on its own, you how to look at how these lines are framed. Notably, when she says “you can’t fall in love with me,” Aerith is framed at the center of the shot, and almost looks like she’s directly addressing the player. It’s as much a warning for the player as it is for Cloud, which makes sense if you know her fate in the OG.

This is followed directly by her saying “Even if you think you have…it’s not real.” In this shot, it’s back to a standard shot/reverse shot where she is the left third of the frame. She is addressing Cloud here, which, again if you’ve played the OG, is another bit of heavy foreshadowing. The reason Clould would think he might be in love with Aerith is because he’s falsely assuming of the memories of a man who did love Aerith — Zack.

For Cloud’s response (”Do I get a say in all this?”/ “That’s very one-sided” depending on the translation), rather than showing a shot of his face, the Remake shows him with his back turned.

Whatever Cloud’s feelings may be for Aerith, the game seems rather indifferent to them.

What is more telling is the choice to include a bit with Cloud getting jealous over a guy trying to give Tifa flowers in Barret’s resolution. Barret also mentions both Jessie and Aerith in their conversation, but nothing else gets such a reaction from Cloud.

It also should go without saying that if Aerith’s resolution is meant to establish Cloud and Aerith’s romance, there should have been plenty of set-up beforehand and plenty of follow-through afterward. That obviously is not the case, because again, the Remake has gone out of its way to avoid moments where Cloud’s actions towards Aerith could be interpreted romantically.

Case in point, at around this time in the OG, Marlene tells Cloud that she thinks Aerith likes him and the player has the option to have Cloud express his hope that she does. This scene is completely eliminated from the Remake and replaced with a much more appropriate scene of father-daughter affection between Marlene and Barret while Tifa and Cloud are standing together outside.

The method by which they get up the plate is completely different in the Remake. Leslie is the one who helps them this time around, and though his quest to reunite with his fiance directly parallels with the trio’s desire to save Aerith, Leslie himself draws a comparison to earlier when Cloud was trying to rescue Tifa. Finally, when Abzu is defeated again, it is Barret who draws the parallel of their search for Aerith to Leslie’s search for his fiance, making it crystal clear that saving Aerith is a group effort rather than only Cloud’s.

Speaking of Barret, in the OG, he seems to reassess his opinion of Cloud in the Shinra HQ stairs when he sees Cloud working so hard to save Aerith and realizes he might actually care about other people. In the Remake, that reevaluation occurs after you complete all the Ch. 14 sidequests and help a bunch of NPCs. Arguably, this moment occurs even earlier in the Remake for Barret, after the Airbuster, when he realizes that Cloud is more concerned for his and Tifa’s safety than his own.

Overall, the entire Aerith rescue feels so anticlimactic in the Remake. In the OG, Cloud gets his big hero moment in the Shinra Building. He’s the one who runs up to Aerith when the glass shatters and they finally reunite. In the Remake, it’s unclear what the emotional stakes are for Cloud here. At their big reunion, all we get from him is a “Yep.” In fact, when you look at how this scene plays out, Aerith is positioned equally between Cloud and Tifa at the moment of her rescue. Cloud’s answer is again with his back turned to the camera. It’s Tifa who gets her own shot with her response.

Another instance of the Remake being completely indifferent to Cloud’s feelings for Aerith, and actually priotizing Tifa’s relationship with Aerith instead.

It is also Tifa who runs to reunite with Aerith after the group of enemies is defeated. Another moment that could have easily been Cloud’s that the Remake gives to Tifa.

Also completely eliminated in the Remake, is the “I’m your bodyguard. / The deal was for one date” exchange in the jail cells. In the Remake, after Ch. 8, the date isn’t brought up again at all; “the bodyguard” reference only comes up briefly in Ch. 11 and then never again.

In the Remake, the jail scene is replaced by the scene in Aerith’s childhood room. Despite the fact that this is Aerith’s room, it is Tifa’s face that Cloud first sees when he wakes. What purpose does this moment serve other than to showcase Cloud and Tifa’s intimacy and the other characters’ tacit acknowledgment of said intimacy?

(This is the second time where Cloud wakes up and Tifa is the first thing he sees. The other was at Corneo’s mansion. He comes to three times in the Remake, but in Ch. 8, even though Aerith is right in front of him, we start off with a few seconds of Cloud gazing around the church before settling on the person in front of him. Again, while not something that most players would notice, this feels like a deliberate choice.)

Especially since this scene itself is all about Aerith. She begins a sad story about her past, and Cloud, rather than trying to comfort her in any way, asks her to give us some exposition about the Ancients. When the Whispers surround her, even though Cloud is literally right there, it's Tifa who pulls her out of it and comforts her. Another moment that could have been Cloud that was given to Tifa, and honestly, this one feels almost bizarre.

Throughout the entire Shinra HQ episode, Cloud and Aerith haven’t had a single moment alone to themselves. The Drums scenario is completely invented for the Remake. The devs could have contrived a way for Cloud and Aerith to have some one-on-one time here and work through the feelings they expressed during Aerith’s resolution if they wanted. Instead, with the mandatory party configurations during this stage - Cloud & Barret on one side; Tifa & Aerith on the others, with Cloud & Tifa being the respective team leaders communicating over PHS, the Remake minimizes the amount of interaction Cloud and Aerith have with each other in this chapter.

On the rooftop, before Cloud’s solo fight with Rufus, even though Cloud is ostensibly doing all this so that they can bring Aerith to safety, the Remake doesn’t include a single shot that focuses on Aerith’s face and her reaction to his actions. The game has decided, whatever Aerith’s feelings are in this moment, they’re irrelevant to the story they’re trying to tell. Instead we get shots focusing solely on Barret and Tifa. While the Remake couldn’t find any time to develop Cloud and Aerith’s relationship at the Shinra Tower (even though the OG certainly did), it did find time to add a new scene where Tifa saves Cloud from certain death, while referencing their Promise.

A lot of weird shit happens after this, but it’s pretty much all plot and no character. We do get one more moment where Cloud saves Tifa (and Tifa alone) from the Red Whisper even though Aerith is literally right next to her. The Remake isn’t playing coy at all about where Cloud’s preferences lie.

The party order for the Sephiroth battle varies depending on how you fought the Whispers. All the other character entrances (whoever the 3rd party member is, then the 4th and Red) are essentially the exact same shots, with the characters replaced. It’s the first character entrance (which can only be Aerith or  Tifa) that you have two distinct options.

If Aerith is first, the camera pans from Cloud over to Aerith. It then cuts back to Cloud’s reaction, in a separate shot, as Aerith walks to join him (offscreen). It’s only when the player regains control of the characters that Cloud and Aerith ever share the frame.

On the other hand, if Tifa is first, we see Tifa land from Cloud’s POV. Cloud then walks over to join Tifa and they immediately share a frame, facing Sephiroth together.

Again, this is not something SE would expect the player to notice the first or even second time around. Honestly, I doubt anyone would notice at all unless they watched all these variations back to back. That is telling in itself, that SE would go through all this effort (making these scenes unique rather than copy and pasting certainly takes more time and effort) to ensure that the depictions of Cloud’s relationships with these two women are distinct despite the fact that hardly anyone would notice. Even in the very last chapter of the game, they want us to see Cloud and Tifa as a pair and Cloud and Aerith as individuals.

Which isn’t to say that Aerith is being neglected in the Remake. Quite the opposite, in fact, when she has essentially become the main protagonist and the group’s spirtual leader in Ch. 18. Rather, her relationship with Cloud is no longer an essential part of her character. Not to mention, one of the very last shots of the Remake is about Aerith sensing Zack’s presence. Again, not the kind of thing you want to bring up if the game is supposed to show her being in love with Cloud.

What does it all mean????

Phew — now let’s step back and look and how the totality of these changes have reshaped our understanding of the story as a whole. Looking solely at the Midgar section of the OG, and ignoring everything that comes after it, it seems to tell a pretty straightforward story: Cloud is a cold-hearted jerk who doesn’t care about anyone else until he meets Aerith. It is through his relationship with Aerith that he begins to soften up and starts giving a damn about something other than himself. This culminates when he risks it all to rescue Aerith from the clutches of the game’s Big Bad itself, The Shinra Electric Company.

This was honestly the reason why I was dreading the Remake when I learned that it would only cover the Midgar segment. A game that’s merely an expansion of the Midgar section of the OG is probably going to leave a lot of people believing that Cloud & Aerith were the intended couple, and I didn’t want to wait years and perhaps decades for vindication after the Remake’s Lifestream Scene.

I imagine this very scenario is what motivated SE to make so many of these changes. In the OG, they could get away with misdirecting the audience for the first few hours of the game since the rest of the story and the reveals were already completed. The player merely had to pop in the next disc to get the real story. Such is not the case with the Remake. Had the the Remake followed the OG’s beats more closely, many players, including some who’ve never played the OG, would finish the Remake thinking that Cloud and Aerith were the intended couple. It would be years until they got the rest of the story, and at that point, the truth would feel much more like a betrayal. Like they’ve been cruelly strung along.

While they’ve gone out of their way to adapt most elements from the OG into the Remake, they’ve straight up eliminated many scenes that could be interpreted as Cloud’s romantic interest in Aerith. Instead, he seems much more interested in her knowledge as an Ancient than in her romantic affections. This is the path the Remake could be taking. Instead of Cloud being under the illusion of falling in love with Aerith, he’s under the illusion that the answer to his identity dilemma lies in Aerith’s Cetra heritage, when, of course, the answer was with Tifa all along.

Hiding Sephiroth’s existence during the Midgar arc isn’t necessary to telling the story of FF7, thus it’s been eliminated in the Remake. Similarly, pretending that Cloud and Aerith are going to end up together also isn’t necessary and would only confuse the player. Thus the LTD is no longer a part of the Remake.

If Aerith’s impact on Cloud has been diminished, what then is his arc in the Remake? Is it essentially just the same without the catalyst of Aerith? A cold guy at the start who eventually learns to care about others through the course of the game? Kind of, though arguably, this is who Remake!Cloud is all along, not just Cloud at the end of the Remake. Cloud is a guy who pretends to be a selfish jerk, but he deep down he really does care. He just doesn’t show this side of himself around people he’s unfamiliar with. So part of his arc in the Remake is opening up to the others, Barret, AVALANCHE and Aerith included, but these all span a chapter or two at most. They don’t straddle the entire game.

What is the throughline then? What is an area in which he exhibits continuous growth?

It’s Tifa. It’s his desire to fulfill his Promise to Tifa. Not just to protect her physically, but to be there for her emotionally, something that’s much harder to do. There’s the big moments like when he remembers the Promise in Ch. 4., his dramatic fist clench when he can’t stop Tifa from crying in Ch. 12, and in Ch. 13 when he watches Barret comfort Tifa. It’s all the flashbacks he has of her and the times he’s felt like he failed her. It’s the smaller moments where he can sense her nervousness and unease but the only thing he knows how to do is call her name. It’s all those times during battle, where Tifa can probably take care of herself, but Cloud has to save her because he can’t fail her again. All of this culminates in Tifa’s Resolution, where Tifa is in desperate need of comfort, and is specifically seeking Cloud’s comfort, and Cloud has no idea what to do. He hesitates because he’s clueless, because he doesn’t want to fuck it up, but finally, he makes the choice, he takes the risk, and he hugs her….and he kind of fucks it up. He hugs her too hard. Which is a great thing, because this arc isn’t anywhere close to being over. There’s still so much more to come. So many places this relationship will go.

We get a little preview of this when Tifa saves Cloud on the roof. Everything we thought we knew about their relationship has been flipped on its head. Tifa is the one saving Cloud here, near the end of this part of the Remake. Just as she will save Cloud in the Lifestream just before the end of the FF7 story as a whole. What does Tifa mean to Cloud? It’s one of the first questions posed in the Remake, and by the end, it remains unanswered.

Cloud’s character arc throughout the entire FF7 story is about his reconciling with his identity issues. This continues to develop through the Shinra Tower Chapters, but it certainly isn’t going to be resolved in Part 1 of the Remake. His character arc in the Remake — caring more about others/finding a way to finally comfort Tifa — is resolved in Ch. 14, well before rescuing Aerith, which is what makes her rescue feel so anticlimactic. The resolution of this external conflict isn’t tied to the protagonist’s emotional arc. This was not the case in the OG. I’m certainly not complaining about the change, but the Remake probably would have felt more satisfying as a whole if they hewed to the structure of the OG. Instead, it seems that SE has prioritized the clarity of the Remake series as a whole (leaving no doubt about where Cloud’s affections lie) over the effectiveness of the “climax” in the first entry of the Remake.

This is all clear if you only focus on the “story” of the Remake -- i.e., what the characters are saying and doing. If you extend your lens to the presentation of said story, and here I’m talking about who the game chooses to focus on during the scenes, how long they hold on these shots, which characters share the frame, which do not, etc --- it really could not be more obvious.

Does the camera need to linger for over 5 seconds on Cloud staring at the door after wishing Tifa goodnight? Does it need to find Cloud almost every time Tifa says or does anything so that we’re always aware of his watchfulness and the nature of his care? The answer is no until you realize this dynamic is integral to telling the story of Final Fantasy VII.

I don’t see how anyone who compares the Remake to the OG could come away from it thinking that the Remake series is going to reverse all of the work done in the OG and Compilation by having Cloud end up with Aerith.

Just because the ending seems to indicate that the events of the OG might not be set in stone, it doesn’t mean that the Remake will end with Aerith surviving and living happily ever after with Cloud. Even if Aerith does live (which again seems unlikely given the heavy foreshadowing of her death in the Remake), how do you come away from the Remake thinking that Cloud is going to choose Aerith over Tifa when SE has gone out of its way to remove scenes between Cloud and Aerith that could be interpreted as romantic? And gone out of its way to shove Cloud’s feelings for Tifa in the player’s face? The sequels would have to spend an obscene amount of time not only building Cloud and Aerith’s relationship from scratch, but also dismantling Cloud’s relationship with Tifa. It would be an absolute waste of time and resources, and there’s really no way to do so without making the characters look like assholes in the process.

Now could this happen? Sure, in the sense that literally anything could happen in the future. But in terms of outcomes that would make sense based on what’s come before, this particular scenario is about as plausible as Cloud deciding to relinquish his quest to find Sephiroth so that he can pursue his real dream of becoming at sandwich artist at Panera Bread.

It’s over! I promise!

Like you, I too cannot believe the number of words I’ve wasted on this subject. What is there left to say? The LTD doesn’t exist outside of the first disc of the OG. You'll only find evidence of SE perpetuating the LTD if you go into these stories with the assumption that 1) The LTD exists 2) it remains unanswered. But it’s not. We know that Cloud ends up with Tifa.

What the LTD has become is dissecting individual scenes and lines of dialogue, without considering the context of said things, and pretending as if the outcome is unknown and unknowable. If you took this tact to other aspects of FF7’s story, then it would be someone arguing that because there a number of scenes in the OG that seem to suggest that Meteor will successfully destroy the planet, this means that the question of whether or not our heroes save the world in the end is left ambiguous. No one does that because that would be utterly absurd. Individual moments in a story may suggest alternate outcomes to build tension, to keep us on our toes, but that doesn’t change the ending from being the ending. Our heroes stop Meteor. Cloud loves Tifa. Arguments against either should be treated with the same level of credulity (i.e., none).

It’s frustrating that the LTD, and insecurities about whether or not Cloud really loves Tifa, takes up so much oxygen in any discussion about these characters. And it’s a damn shame, because Cloud and Tifa’s relationship is so rich and expansive, and the so-called “LTD” is such a tiny sliver of that relationship, and one of the least interesting aspects. They’re wonderful because they’re just so damn normal. Unlike other Final Fantasy couples, what keeps them apart is not space and time and death, but the most human and painfully relatable emotion of all, fear. Fear that they can’t live up to the other’s expectations; fear that they might say the wrong thing. The fear that keeps them from admitting their feelings at the Water Tower, they’re finally able to overcome 7 years later in the Lifestream. They’re childhood friends but in a way they’re also strangers. Like other FF couples, we’re able to watch their entire relationship grow and unfold before our eyes. But they have such a history too, a history that we unravel with them at the same time. Every moment of their lives that SE has found worth depicting, they’ve been there for each other, even if they didn’t know it at the time. Theirs is a story that begins and ends with each other. Their is the story that makes Final Fantasy VII what it is.

If you’ve made it this far, many thanks for reading. I truly have no idea how to use this platform, so please direct any and all hatemail to my DMs at TLS, which I will then direct to the trash. (In all seriousness, I’d be happy to answer any specific questions you may have, but I feel like I’ve more than said my piece here.)

If there’s one thing you take away from this, I hope it’s to learn to ignore all the ridiculous arguments out there, and just enjoy the story that’s actually being told. It’s a good one.

[scottymcgeesterwrites]

Final Fantasy VII Remake Review

Year: 2020

Platform: PS4

I finished this game shortly after posting all my main single-player series Final Fantasy reviews. I was still digesting it and thinking about it to put together my review.

Synopsis:

The Shinra Electric Power Company rules over the city of Midgar, and the eco-terrorists AVALANCHE stop at nothing to try and prevent the life essence of the planet from being used as energy. Barrett, leader of AVALANCHE, hires a mercenary named Cloud Strife for their bombing mission on a Shinra Mako Reactor. Cloud doesn’t care much for the greater cause and only wants his pay. But then, after a mission goes awry, he meets Aerith, a flower girl who is the descendant of the Ancients. He quickly finds himself wrapped up in the greater conflict against Shinra.

Gameplay:

Final Fanatasy VII Remake has one of the best gameplay styles of any Final Fantasy game. It’s that good. It seems like after all these years, this is what Square really wanted to do. Since this was released after Final Fantasy XV, it’s pretty much the successor to its gameplay. While Final Fantasy XV has you more or less spamming the attack button with occasional spell casting and item usage, Final Fantasy VII Remake has you much more involved with the Materia system, abilities, and guarding/evading. One notable example is that Final Fantasy XV always told you when you should guard in order to counter, but Final Fantasy VII Remake has you figure that out on your own.

The abilities are so goddamn flashy and cool during gameplay. Tifa’s moves are quite possibly the most awe-inspiring.

My only complaint is locking onto the enemy during battle. You have to press down on R3 to lock onto an enemy, and I sometimes found that jarring with the camera controls. Sometimes I accidentally disengaged from an enemy and missed an attack. Since your moves are dependent on an Active Time Battle system, you can waste a turn if you get hit while conjuring a spell or taking out an item. That sometimes made me go “REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!”. But in the long run, those were very small gripes. The battles are so much fun.

Since the game follows only the Midgar portion of the story, it’s linear. But you reach sections where you are free to roam around and do sidequests before continuing with the main objective. I’m sure the later releases of the remake will feel much less constrained. But this remake does a good job at expanding upon Midgar without feeling too redundant.

Graphics:

Jesus Christ. This game is gorgeous.

Both in-game graphics and pre-rendered cutscenes. The switch between a pre-rendered cutscene and in-game cutscene has become much more seamless than ever before.

If you remember my Final Fantasy XV review, I mentioned how NPCs and other in-game animations seemed stiff and stilted. Final Fantasy VII Remake takes steps to remedy that. Characters have more fluid movements and everyone’s lips move a lot more. However, lip movements can come off as awkward. My friend was watching me play, and during one in-game cutscene they said “Something looks weird with their lips.” At times, lip movements seem too dynamic when the character is standing relatively still, which comes off looking like Mr. Ed the horse trying to talk.

Despite those small awkward things, the rest of the game is extremely polished. Remember how blocky Final Fantasy VII was? We now finally see these characters and the world of Midgar brought to life in beautiful HD graphics.Like holy shit. Everyone looks so beautiful.

Before I played this game, I was a Tifa stan, but now, ho man, they made Aerith so much more appealing.

SO.

MUCH.

MORE.

APPEALING.

And Tifa shines better than ever. I’m very tempted to just gush about her but here is just a couple enticing gifs.

Imagine playing this game and still thinking gamers are oppressed.

Story:

Final Fantasy VII Remake follows from the start of the original game up until the party leaving Midgar. Square plans to release the rest of the remake later.

I have to say, they made the story a lot more engaging than the original. That may seem like blasphemy, but the dialogue and voice acting was just so damn good. Some of my favorite moments included the banter between Aerith and Cloud. Like I said, I wasn’t into Aerith that much until I played the remake. She’s just so damn cute and charming. One of my favorite parts was when she said, “Shit” and almost fell, after mentioning how she didn’t need help climbing a ladder. Her voice is so lovely and amusing to listen to. The growing romance between her and Cloud doesn’t come off as forced or cringey, because we now spend so much time with Aerith.

Biggs, Wedge, and Jessie have much more important roles in the story. This gives us a greater sense of Avalanche as a ragtag group.

Entire chapters focus on them, especially Jessie. I cringed a bit at Jessie to be honest, despite her popularity. She now comes off as a copy of Aerith in the sense that she comes on strong to Cloud. But really strong. Like “I want that D right now” strong. Cloud has officially become your usual anime boy who is good at everything that can make any woman magically fall in love with him. So that whole thing made me roll my eyes.

There are some new characters inserted, such as the SOLDIER Roche. I thought they were going to do more with him but, apparently not. The new characters can be a bit “meh”, such as Chadley. Johnny isn’t a new character but may as well be since his role is so expanded. He was probably the most annoying, constantly calling Cloud “bro”. That gave me some bad flashbacks of Prompto’s modern-speak in Final Fantasy XV.

The remake adds a certain new plot element that you’re not sure at first where it’s going until it’s revealed at the very end. The ending can be a bit out there, as the original storyline is changed significantly. SIGNIFICANTLY I was curious if this game would make sense to first-timers, but, probably not when you reach the end. The ending heavily relies on you knowing the original game.

My only complaint about the story was how they started the motorcycle chase cutscene. That was my favorite cutscene of the original game, with Cloud driving down the stairs and the group getting into the car. I liken it to the barrel scene in the original Hobbit novel. But like the Hobbit movie, they made the motorcycle scene pretty outrageous. Like so over-the-top that my initial reaction was to scoff at it. It also struck me as awkward, because there were many moments when the bad guys could have shot them but just. . .stood there watching Cloud kick their asses.

Some people may be upset by how the remake ended, while others find it cool. I thought it was cool. But at the same time, now I want an official “remastered” Final Fantasy VII too. Just a game strictly like the original but with vastly improved graphics.

Music:

The music was pure eargasm. There were many moments when I fanboyed screaming “THIS IS THE SONG! YESSS!” They remixed the songs so well, from the battle theme to the Shinra theme, and the Wall Market theme. Everything you loved about the original soundtrack but MORE gusto, more pomp and circumstance.

A couple complaints though.

1 – I think the focus on making the music more orchestrated takes away the mood of the original music. I missed some of the synth and electronic from the original game because it related well to the technological city of Midgar. The synth and electronic featured in the original game gave off a brooding, darker mood.

2 – I didn’t like what they did with the Crazy Motorcycle music.

Notable Theme:

It’s difficult to find pieces of the original soundtrack as of today, because Square is taking them down from YouTube. Still, some people have managed to keep up some of the coolest tracks from this game. Unfortunately, the videos have gameplay footage, which could be spoilers, technically.

I’ll just leave it as this:

The Jenova battle theme is a much longer piece in this game, but it pays off at the final quarter of the song.

Trust me.

Verdict:

The remake does the original justice. We waited so long for this game and it delivered, unlike Final Fantasy XV.

I don’t think a first-timer would really appreciate it though as much as a fan of the original game would. Sure, there’s nothing stopping you from just going into it without knowing the original game, but there are things that one wouldn’t understand unless you played the original game. In that sense, the word “remake” is a bit misleading. Maybe they’re “rebooting” the entire Compilation of Final Fantasy VII? It seems like they’re going for what they did with the newer Star Trek movies, if you catch my drift. But I can’t say for sure exactly where they’re going with it until the next game comes out, but it seems that way to me.

[silver-wield]

body language analysis: tifa and cloud train scene!! go!

Oh, Nonny, you made my morning with this!! I mean, it's not like I haven't touched on Cloud and Tifa's body language in gif reblogs, but an actual post dedicated to one of the best moments of the game? YAY!!

Ok, spoiler warning for ppl who haven't played (I tag FF7R spoilers as final fantasy 7 remake spoilers) and it's gonna be a long one so prepare to scroll.

Also, this is one person's interpretation of the scene, so if you disagree that's cool and we'll agree to disagree.

You're also gonna have to excuse the janky quality on some of the screens, I'm grabbing them from Youtube and it's frustrating af trying to get the exact moment I want.

Other analyses if anyone's interested.

Shinra HQ vision scene (Cloti/plot analysis) 

Chapter 3 (Cloti reblog) 

Tifa character analysis 

Aerith Resolution (plot analysis) 

Train graveyard (not really an analysis, but I got some sweet screenshots of Cloti) 

Now, strap in and enjoy the ride.

So, the corkscrew tunnel scene – or clotiscrew tunnel as I've seen it called – begins with Avalanche caught by the sensors on the train. After a timed fight – which, yes, it's possible to lose, but it's also clear this is a “bad ending” where you've made Cloud look like an incompetent dick who can't even handle a few drones – we see Barret mustering his courage and leaping from the train (he's so damn cute sometimes, I'm gonna have to do a post about his development with Cloud at some point).

The action then cuts to Tifa, frozen in front of the door, too afraid to jump (you can hear her whimpering). Cloud calls her name, deals with the last drone and comes over. Now, in the OG, obviously they all jump one after the other because polygons and popeye arms would've just looked like a total mess and Square admitted they neglected Cloti to highlight all the relationship development between Clerith since she dies later.

Cut to 2020 and we get this. Damn, Square, if I didn't already love you for pretty much my entire life already I'd have fallen for you all over again. In fact, I think I probably did.

Ok, I'm done gushing. Kinda.

I think the first thing I have to point out is that Cloud, at no point, needed to do this. He could have verbally encouraged Tifa to jump without the need for physical support at all. After all, the train's slowing down and she was fine in the OG, so who's to say she wouldn't be fine now, too? By calling her name and fixing her attention on him he's actually stalling her jump.

You'll notice that Tifa doesn't take her eyes off the tracks (before this screen obvs since I can see that’s her feet, work with me here), which is fitting since she's zeroed in on that fearful moment and actually can't move without help. Cloud's face in this is displaying typical tension you'd expect in a high energy scene. He's concerned for Tifa, but he's also focused on dealing with the mechs, which he does very quickly. Now, you could argue he did that to get on with the mission, or you could argue he did that because he saw Tifa needed him and his focus shifted to her. And watching the seconds following him turning to look at her, I'd say there's evidence towards the latter because he's actually lost focus on the last mech and it attacks him first causing him to block and parry.

This is the first instance of touching in this scene, and until this point, Tifa hadn't moved or acknowledged Cloud. He needed to physically draw her from her thoughts and you'll hear a surprised exhale from her as she turns to look at him, showing she was lost within herself until he drew her out. Cloud is obviously looking at the tracks, judging his next move. He's already planning what he has to do to keep both of them safe, which is clear from his decisive nod, along with a reassuring, but grim, smile, before pulling Tifa out the door. Remember, I said he could’ve verbally got her attention. He didn’t. He chose touch.

See what I mean about janky quality? Anyway, this is clear concern about Tifa's safety, but also, remember, Cloud is on the mission because Tifa said she felt trapped and he's related that back to their promise that she needs a hero. He's being her hero.

Okay, we're getting to the meat of things now.

First, fucking ouch, he definitely looks pained, meaning that whole manoeuvre wasn't as smooth as he pretended. As they slow down, he puts a bracing hand against the ground to prevent him rolling onto Tifa (because he's a gent and also toting a sword that weighs more than Barret lol).

What's interesting is where his left hand is in this. Make a note: middle of her back. Tifa's head is tucked into Cloud's neck – safety move, so nothing big there. I've seen some people note Tifa's leg is between Cloud's, but I'm gonna discount that as the way they've locked together during the roll. It's unintentional.

Oh, but this isn't! Cloud has absolutely no reason to put his hand back on Tifa. He could leave it lying flat on the ground. You could argue he needs both to help her get off him, but she's on top. She can do that herself. He has no further need past the initial save to have his hands on her, unless that's what he wants. Obviously we can't see his face in this because of Tifa's hair, but this, combined with the next screen tell a very definite story.

He moved his hand! That left hand, he didn't need to move it up in such a caressing gesture. Coupled with the very intense gaze he gives her, I was swooning like a maiden wearing a too tight corset lol

Now, you could argue he's just concerned, it's a high tension situation. Well, I argue that every single trope using this kind of scene results in sexual tension/flustered characters and/or a kiss. Remember, right at this second, he has no reason to still be lying with her like this. In fact, him moving his hand further up her back is a bracing gesture that would keep her close, not release her. Tifa's fists are balled against his chest, which signifies she's protecting her hands – she's a hand-to-hand fighter remember -- but her face is relaxed. She's not feeling awkward or eager to escape.

Eye contact!! Can I just leave it at that? No? Cloud isn't actually the type to keep prolonged eye contact. Oh, did you think I was about to say something else? Well, for literally anyone who hasn't paid attention to him, Cloud often looks away when he feels awkward, flustered, unsure, basically any negative emotion. The only time he looks anyone in the eye is when he's confronting them or at ease. Remember, even when Jessie teased him about smiling during chapter 4 he looked away, embarrassed. Cloud doesn't handle eye contact well. Which is why this is such a huge deal. He's keeping prolonged eye contact with Tifa. He doesn't look away from her eyes when he asks if she's ok. And that question – ah my heart! So soft and tender. You can hear the care and concern in his tone. It anchors the entire scene from start to finish. Everything he just did was because he cares about Tifa and wants to look after her. He wants to make sure she's ok, even if it means he suffers for it. Pretty sure some people will disagree with this, but the damn man wore a dress and went through a humiliating dance routine – humiliating for him, I fucking loved it – just to save her. His first words in Wall Market are he wants to save Tifa, but Aerith cuts him off before he can finish the sentence.

These are the moments that I have to go back over a million times to catch. Check the tiny eye narrowing and uplift at the corner of his mouth. She said she's ok and he's happy about it. He's her hero – in not so many words. Tifa's shaky reply and pale face confirm her shock and fear, but also you can see an easing of the tension in her. There's a subtle softening of her muscle definition and facial expression that displays the trust and belief she has in Cloud that he'd look after her. This is a very mutually appreciative moment between them. Definitely not one sided.

And then the moment is over, without any flustered blushing or stammering, and thank God there wasn't because that would be so ooc I just can't with it. Cloud, despite being an awkward af dork who doesn't know how to deal with women hitting on him, doesn't turn into a flustered 14 year old trying to tell his crush he's leaving Nibelheim whenever they have contact. We've already seen smooth!Cloud giving Tifa a flower and complimenting her like a cheeky bastard. He can handle being around her because he feels comfortable. He can compliment her because of that, too. He might be slightly separated from those childhood feelings, but they're in there and they're motivating him to be outgoing towards her. To show her the cool SOLDIER he became that's worthy of being beside her.

But, yeah, back to the point. The moment is over. Or is it? Because that is some very further prolonged eye contact between them when there doesn't have to be. Tifa moves back, Cloud moves forward, they're both getting up and yet, they're both looking at each other. I don't know about you, but I find it easier to look where I'm going when I've fallen on my ass and need to get up. I sure af don't stare longingly into someone's eyes like I can't bear not to.

And now it really is over because right after this the mechs arrive. But before that, some more prolonged eye contact. There literally is no need for them to do this at this point. Tifa looks pensive, but I think that's her default tbf. Yet, at the same time, there's an intensity in her gaze like she wants to say something – maybe it's just a thank you, that would turn into a flirty conversation of some sort “you didn't need to do that,” “I wanted to” kind of deal – so it makes sense they're interrupted because Square said they didn’t want to overdo the amount of Cloti content they added and this is already a very charged scene.

Meanwhile, Cloud is looking at her like she's his entire world and he's just waiting for her to realise it. There's an aura of expectation in his pose and face. They're both crouching in mirrored poses, which as some of you may know is what you do when you're trying to build rapport with someone. It's basic body language building blocks. Toddlers do this. They're both on one knee, slightly leaning forward. Now, if there was no rapport between them, if they wanted to end the moment, one of them would stand up, breaking the mirrored pose and cutting off eye contact. This would put one above the other and show an imbalance in their relationship. This doesn't happen. They both turn at the same time, rise at the same time and fight pose at the same time.

Conclusion:

Seriously? After all that you can't draw your own?

Ok, I'll be fair to the other side. Let's take away Cloud's history with Tifa – since that's the biggest argument for them: the childhood crush trope.

If Cloud and Tifa weren't friends, just colleagues on a mission, this scene would still be hella charged with sexual tension and implication that Cloud has a thing for her. Even if it's just basic sexual attraction, that's still attraction and a marker on the pathway to a relationship.

But, they are friends, so moving on.

Tifa is the more reserved one in this dynamic. She's naturally shy – it's canon – but even with that, she's affected by Cloud. She holds that eye contact. Her voice is equally soft as his. She mirrors his pose. She doesn't try to get away the second they stop moving. Cloud is the one to move things along, without awkwardness because he's comfortable with Tifa. He's not out of sorts having her lying on top of him – which you can argue means he's not interested, but I literally just pointed out all the ways in which he is into her. Being comfortable in someone's company doesn't mean a person isn't attracted to them. If I had to stick a pin in Cloud's sexuality I'd say he's on the demi scale, meaning he needs to have a deep emotional connection to whoever he's with before he falls in love with them. He's not a love at first sight kind of guy.

This fits with the childhood crush trope. Cloud's known Tifa for years and developed an attraction to her that still lingers, making a reconnection between them easier. He's not slobbering over her because he's Cloud and very stoic – I know people say his true self isn't like this, but it is only with more insecurity and desire to prove himself. He's still a very reserved guy with a dry sense of humour. He's prone to melancholy and self doubt, which is why his friends bolster his confidence so much.

Point is, everything in this scene showcases a deep and meaningful relationship between the two of them at its best, while at its most shallow it shows Cloud is sexually attracted to Tifa, which is something that could develop into a more meaningful relationship later. Either way, it's a marked moment in their interactions that Cloud's non-optional choices led to it. There's no either/or within this. It happened.

[iaintyourbro]

Mental Gymnastics and the Sanity Question

I wrote this on June 2, 2020 and put it in my drafts. I don’t think I was brave enough to post this because it states how I really feel about things and at times that can be met with resistance. Almost three months later, after more research, talking to others in the fandom, and putting everything together, I’m going to share it now. I also know how to properly add pictures in a post so I’m gonna do that too.

Obviously, this is my opinion on it. Clearly from a fandom perspective, I love Cloud and Tifa as a couple. However, I’m ultimately a “canon-y” person. I do not ship couples without knowing the whole story. I ship after I know what happens. FFVII’s OG... I wasn’t too invested in, so I didn’t really do anything with fandom. I was online for FFVIII, Xenogears, and Gundam Wing. Anything FFVII related was Vincent related. 

***

Oh shipping, something I learned about recently. As a person who played FFVII at the age of 12 (well, started it) and then actually completed the game at around 13 or 14, the bulk of it went over my head. FFVIII was a clear cut romance, and probably why it was my favorite FF for 20 years. That being said, FFVII does have an ending, and does have a pretty clear relationship build between two of the characters. That’s then followed through in the additional media for the compilation. 

So why is there a fight? I honestly don’t know, and this post isn’t going to answer your questions, probably. I am going to give my opinion on why there is a fight, but I’m not a psychologist. This is how I personally feel about the entire FFVII shipping war and the impact it has on people - especially during the COVID quarantine in many areas. 

I played FF7R and was pleasantly surprised. I actually was scared to play it - scared it would change something I enjoyed as a teen. I was one that hoped for a 1 to 1 remake to keep the story solid. The reality is... the OG story is bare bones, which is why they ended up putting out multiple other pieces in the form of games, books, and movies. This bare bones story seemed to also create a war on who our protagonist loves. You realize how bare bones it is after playing the remake. 

That’s not to say it’s not a good game or good story. The OG is a fantastic game. It’s a fantastic story. It has the same issues every other RPG has where it has major gaps in the plot due to timing, money, whatever. The difference I’d say with FFVII and the others is the story is MUCH MORE COMPLEX and MUCH MORE MATURE. The closest I’d say is Xenogears, which literally was cut short due to time and money. FFVII and Xenogears also share a lot of similar themes, which makes a lot of sense when you know the “scrapped” FFVII ideas were repurposed. 

Most of us were kids or young teens when that game came out. We probably played it and understood about 60% of what was going on. We remember Cloud cross-dressing, we remember Aerith dying, and we remember Sephiroth. (And if you’re me you remember Vincent.)

The first part of the game, you’re given multiple choices on how to respond to things. This ends up being part of a “date mechanic” later on in the game. Feels like you have control, right? You’re the one who is going to determine who Cloud gets to date at the Gold Saucer! Who his life partner is! 

Wrong. 

Yeah, you make choices and it does determine who you go on a date with. However, you find out much later in the game that Cloud isn’t really Cloud. There are multiple hints early in the game that something isn’t right. It builds up until you literally see a ghostly figure of child Cloud standing there as Cloud beats the crap out of Aerith and gives the Black Materia to Sephiroth. Cloud hears voices during multiple scenes in the game, but meh, whatever. Seeing his child form, though, you’re like UM OKAY. 

So, you build up your relationship with Aerith. You say all the right things. You get the date with her, she says she wants to meet you. Then you go to the Temple of the Ancients, a cute little part with Cait Sith giving a fortune that you and her are meant to be... and about 10 minutes later you beat the living shit out of her and hand over the Black Materia to the enemy. 

At this point, you realize something is seriously wrong. Aerith disappears. The next time you see her, she dies. 

Then the focus is only on getting Sephiroth. Not just because of Aerith, but Cloud is being summoned by him - you just don’t know that until you get there. Cloud realizes that he wasn’t pursuing Sephiroth, he was being pulled to him. I mean, Aerith dies and isn’t mentioned for quite some time. There isn’t any point after she floats down that they really mourn. They go snowboarding and go after Sephiroth. 

Then Cloud completely breaks... when TIFA questions what she remembers and can’t give Cloud a clear answer. And this may come as a shock to somebody who was trying to woo Aerith. Why does Tifa matter so much? Cloud didn’t break due to Aerith dying, Cloud broke because Tifa didn’t know how to tell him that he wasn’t in Nibelheim 5 years ago (that she knew of). 

They don’t really build the relationship up between Cloud and Tifa until pretty much after this point. They talk about the Promise, they talk about some other quirks, they infer that Tifa has a crush on Cloud. 

You really aren’t aware that Cloud has a crush on Tifa until The Lifestream, when IT ALL COMES OUT. To be fair, Cloud didn’t show romantic interest to either girl in OG prior to the Northern Crater, honestly. More so until the Lifestream.

The Crisis of Losing Control 

You also lose the ability to make choices at this point in the game. 

During the first part, you are acting almost as Cloud’s false persona. The cool SOLDIER Cloud that makes nice or nasty choices towards other characters. You determine, to an extent, how Cloud is. But it’s an illusion. 

And Aerith tells us this in the Remake - that whatever you’re feeling now isn’t real. This isn’t a love confession, this is a warning. If you played the OG, you know she’s referring to his false persona.

The reason I think this gets so heated is because of the loss of control, the feeling of betrayal that the one you thought was supposed to be the one is gone, and all along Cloud held deep feelings for Tifa. You’re also probably young and inexperienced when this happens. The romantic notion of Romeo and Juliet, if you will. 

I think it also depends on how you deal with Aerith’s death. Personally, it wasn’t a huge deal to me. I was like damn did that just happen? I wouldn’t say I was sad, though, or upset. More shocked? Sadly at this point in my life, I’d already lost family members, and moving on is very important. I also didn’t notice Cloud doing ANYTHING romantic in the OG. It felt one sided all around until much, much later on. So I didn’t see it as Cloud losing the love of his life. I actually had no idea why he was upset except they were friends. 

There’s a clear end to the potential romance between Cloud and Aerith - she dies. Now in the world of FFVII, Aerith is a Cetra and has the ability to communicate with the planet and apparently those that are still living once she dies. However, that doesn’t mean that Cloud is going to pursue a relationship with her... that is... crazy, right? 

Apparently.. Not? 

This is where I start having an issue with shipping. The story clearly shows that Aerith dies. The story clearly shows that Cloud harbors deep feelings for Tifa during the Lifestream scene. Both of these events are set - there are no alternatives, no optional scenes. At no point during the Lifestream is anybody else mentioned as a romantic interest. Tifa dominates this guy’s subconscious. But to some, there does seem to be an alternative.

The most extreme I’ve seen is that Cloud should kill himself to be with Aerith. This is disturbing on so many levels, so I’m not going to talk about it much. This not only misses the point of one of the big themes in FFVII, but also just shows how desperate people are to get what they want.

The other is that Cloud actually only loves Aerith and Tifa was his living rebound. The story doesn’t support this. Watch the Lifestream scene and it’s obvious. Once again, we have no mention of anybody else during this. 

The mental gymnastics it takes to put Cloud and Aerith together as the canon couple blows my mind. 

***

And that’s where I stopped. I had noticed at the time there was major pushback on anybody who denied romance between Cloud and Aerith. I guess I just wasn’t ready to deal with it nor did I have the confidence I suppose. Now I’m confident in that after three months of observing, learning, and contemplating.

So I’ll finish with a few thoughts because apparently in fandom land three months is a long time.

COVID-19 Quarantine

The majority of the world went under quarantine earlier this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Personally, the last time I saw my cubicle was March 9. Not that I’m sad, because I do enjoy working remotely. But it’s not just my cubicle, restaurants, zoos, everything was shut down and is slowly opening up but I’m not exactly keen on going somewhere unless I absolutely have to. 

This gave me a ton of time to do other things. FFVII Remake came out, so I played that and, yeah, I got really obsessed and went into this depressed void of what the fuck am I going to do until the next part comes out? Hello, online fandom. Hello, insanity. 

I’ve learned that the FFVII online fandom - specifically the shipping fandom - is crazy in good and bad ways. This, of course, was reignited by the Remake’s release, but most likely really amplified due to people being under quarantine. This is an escape from reality for a while. An escape from the constant depressing news cycle.

Before I discovered fandom I was obsessed with COVID-19 information. I watched all kinds of new broadcasts, Dr. Fauci, random people on YouTube, and it was overwhelming after a while. Remake saved me from that. I played Remake before I went into fandom. I played it as a non-shipper. I was slammed in the face with how amazing they portrayed Cloud and Tifa. 

Self Insertion

The other piece that seems to be apparent in angry shippers is the idea of self insertion. This simply means that you put yourself in the place of the character, so you begin to take things personally. If a person self inserts as Cloud, and their personal preference is Aerith, they become angry when Aerith dies and we find out who Cloud TRULY loves. If somebody self inserts as Aerith, they’re upset that they were never a real love interest. 

Most people go “oh okay, I see.” and move on and/or move to fanon if they truly wanted those two together. 

Then there’s the people who, for 20+ years, spread false information, attack, stalk, and go ballistic anytime there’s any type of evidence that they were wrong. 

The Big Ego

Nobody likes being wrong. FFVII has a major twist in it that causes you to go into a daze, and I do think they do a great job with that. Aerith isn’t it. Her death isn’t the big twist. It’s Cloud that’s the big twist. Going through the Lifestream (and even prior at the Northern Crater) reveals like ohhh shiitttt everything you know about Cloud is a lie.

And he even tells us it’s an illusion. Imagine that?

I am very strongly swayed by evidence from official resources. I suppose I take a scientific approach to this. I cannot find canon evidence that Cloud ever held any romantic feelings towards Aerith. Therefore, to me, Cloud never held any romantic feelings for anyone but Tifa because that’s what the game and resources tell us. 

Luckily, the Remake is making things clear. The devs are being more direct when answering questions. 

There was never supposed to be ambiguity or “player choice”. The fact that you lose player choice at one point and there are fixed events in the game (The Lifestream) that cannot be changed should have been evidence enough. The fact that there are not multiple endings should have been a clue. 

With all of this being said, it shouldn’t matter what I say if you want to ship a fanon ship. I do not see any romance between Cloud and Aerith and I never have. There is no supporting evidence of it. I generally am boring - I don’t try to fanon too much stuff that I have other evidence for. I’ll do it in jest. 

My opinion on Cloud and Aerith in general is I don’t think they work or ever could work. That shouldn’t stop you from enjoying the ship. You cannot claim canon on a ship though unless there’s evidence. There’s way too much twisting, lying, and deletion to justify certain ships. This is one of them.

[yue-muffin]

Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War Review

It took months for me to complete, but at least I can finally say that I have played this game. Of all the older Fire Emblem games (pre-3DS era), this is the one that I have wanted to play the most and whose story intrigued me the most. It is, probably, now my favorite game in the franchise, and this review is the really, really long why.

Gameplay/Story Integration

Before I even mention the story, it’s important to address the mechanics that both make this game a wonderful experience of gameplay/story integration...and make it rather annoying, depending on your perspective. This game’s greatest flaws are also its greatest strengths, which makes me glad that it was produced so long ago. I still love modern games, and most have come a long way in making the player experience much less painstaking to an annoying degree, but there is also a lot of charm in older games like Genealogy, where the player is definitely made to suffer a little.

Like all Fire Emblem games, Genealogy is about a war involving dragons, invading nations, and legendary weapons. Unlike most Fire Emblem games, this one went out of its way to make the player feel like they are embarking on a campaign across a continent, spanning multiple years of nonstop fighting and traveling. Most FE games choose to focus on one battle per chapter, with the story segments in between explaining how we progressed from point A to point B. Genealogy chooses instead to make you move your entire frontline across a HUGE map, from castle to castle, crossing distances that span countries.

It’s a unique feature of this game, and I loved it, no matter how annoying it got to lug the army from the south to the north and back down again to defend a previous position from attack. It made you feel actively engaged in the progression of the conflict, made it easy to track your journey back to the beginning and see just how far you traveled. The tedium makes it feel, in the best way a mere video game can, more realistic.

By far one of the weirder and more annoying aspects of the game is the inability for units to trade money and goods between each other. In most games, there is a single pool of money and anyone in the party who purchases an item draws from that fund. In Genealogy, each unit has his/her own money, which cannot be shared with another unless that person is a spouse or the resident thief. This does make some sense because your army is basically a volunteer army built from people of multiple nationalities and affiliations. Many make it clear they’re here to lend a hand, not join you forever, so it makes sense that they don’t all fork over their money for the army to use. Still makes this part of the game annoying if you are micromanaging the army.

It was fairly difficult getting used to this game’s mechanics, which are way, WAY different from any other in the franchise. But I value the attempts made to integrate story with gameplay (another example is the ability to fix/repair broken or damaged weapons for a price, instead of them disappearing into the ether) far more over the frustration it caused me along the way.  

Story

Finally, the actual story! **Spoilers onward**

The story of this game is initially no different from any other Fire Emblem game, and it’s similar to many fantasy stories. A main character’s homeland is invaded by the bad guys, main character fights back and eventually leads a resistance force against the masterminds behind the conflict.

Genealogy turns that story progression on its head in the first half, then plays it straight in the second half. The second half is undoubtedly the weaker of the two, but it’s not bad - just not quite as interesting compared to the absolute curveball the first half throws at you.

I don’t think I’ve ever played a game that had the guts to do what this game does. The closest example is Aerith from FFVII, but at least that was one character, not the entire playable cast. This game would be devastating if it had more room to develop its characters. Honestly, it does a really good job with the limited “screentime” its characters get. Most of them are given reasons for joining that are sensible enough. The game makes sure to lay out the stakes and consequences of the choices the characters make (at least in the first half).

I think one of the reasons I like it so much is that it makes sure you feel the heavy costs of a conflict like the one unfolding in the game. It makes you feel the loss, and not only through the permadeath mechanic. Let’s be real, many players reset if they lose a unit. But even if you reset, or just are good at the game and don’t get anyone killed, the game still makes sure you see the consequences of war.

Actually, it makes you see the consequences of a simple, well-intentioned action. If makes you see how a conflict can quickly snowball out of one man’s control.

The second half of the game is, admittedly, way more typical and less impactful. The world is suffering because of the failure of the first cast to resolve the conflict, so now it’s up to the main cast’s children to finish it.

There are interesting tidbits revealed randomly and at the very end that give the story more life, so I wish they would’ve utilized these parts a little more.

Characters

A lot of people find Sigurd, part 1′s main character, kind of boring. And that’s fair. He’s a typical noble knight, very loyal and an all around good person. And he falls in love at first sight. His ultimate flaw is...well, that he is a bit too trusting or just lacks foresight.

Which is all true of our main character. But he’s also a good example of a tragic hero. His greatest strengths are his nobility and sense of justice. He starts the story only aiming to rescue a childhood friend from the invaders who have kidnapped her. But those are the same things that lead him far from home, on a campaign that snowballs out of his control and soon comes to look very much like a man working on conquering the continent, putting him in conflict with the major power on said continent who doesn’t like what he sees is happening.

He also falls into a love that will lead to disaster, so. Very tragic hero-y of him.

But I lowkey love Sigurd. I love that moment he looks back and realizes oh shit, he’s way in over his head but he literally can’t turn back anymore. The only way out is forward.

I think Seliph, Sigurd’s son, is largely forgettable. The revelation at the end, and implication that he hasn’t truly chosen his own path this whole time but was led down it was a plot point I wish was expanded on, as well as his own feelings about it all. But it kind of fits that he...doesn’t have much substance to him. In the end, he really feels like a pawn, which makes that lofty title he later gains feel all the stranger in retrospect.

This game is good at making its characters feel small in the larger setting of its world. I appreciate that. 

It has a large and largely forgettable cast of named enemies and npcs. I think it helps make the world feel lived in, rather than an empty place run by like 20 people. idk, I’d rather the world feel more realistic than every named character standing out like a sore thumb. 

The game gives you a lot of units, some more memorable than others. This is where a remake could really help flesh out these characters, but I felt that in most cases their motivations and personalities were realistic and believable. The downside, on the gameplay side, is that mounted units really do dominate this game. The few units on foot that stand out are the ones with outstanding performance in one aspect or another, while the rest just fall by the wayside since it can be so difficult to get them to join the action.

However, I am a boring person who loves mounted units, so. I was very happy.

Overall

As you can tell, I loved this game. It can be a bit janky in some aspects, but it’s definitely one of the more adventurous of FE games (seeing as it came out before the series really settled on a “style”). It’s not a game for beginners, I would say, given its somewhat odd mechanics that aren’t explained very well from the outset. The pacing can be feel rather long and arduous, which is on purpose, but also keeping in mind that you can save at the start of every turn - it wasn’t designed for you to bang out a chapter in a single sitting but come back to chip away at your progress.

[zachsgamejournal]

COMPLETED (for now): Final Fantasy VII

Midgar section complete, and at just under 6 hours.  Boom. It was a fun ride.

So, in the prison cells. Aerith talks about her planned date with Cloud, and Tifa hears. it’s a brief moment of love-triangle-ness, but Tifa and Aerith move past it quickly. Aerith and Tifa don’t quite get the bonding that they do in Remake, but they’re not quite the rivals I assumed them to be. Barret is trying to keep track of how everything is so much bigger than him. This is interesting. I think Barret had a singular vision--get revenge against Shinra (and maybe save the planet). Now he’s learning there’s more factors at play, and his goal isn’t as clear.

Then he calls Red XIII “boring”. Haha. Cloud wakes up to find his prison cell door open. Checking outside, the guard is dead/knocked out. Spooky. I liked this moment, but Remake kinda skipped over it. Instead we got stupid destiny-ghosts and long-ass Hojo dungeon. Following the trail, it’s interesting how the monsters are different. Hojo experiments or Jenova spawn? Speaking of Jenova, she escaped. Curious how it got out. In Remake a Sephiroth “clone” rescued her. But here...maybe she saved herself? Then made a Sephiroth sword to murder President Shinra?

Anyway, I love finding dead President Shinra. It’s interesting to have Shinra boast in front of the team after capturing them, then to have all his dreams whisked away. It creates a fragility to his sense of strength and power. While he may have had massive influence over the world--he’s still just a mortal human. Maybe that’s why the designers wanted a bigger enemy (Sehpiroth/Jenova). But them not being Ancients weakens that for me. I do love how Barret asks if Sephiroth is a “good guy”. But Cloud sets him straight. This is a weakness in this game’s story. Out of nowhere, Cloud is dropping a lot of Sephiroth bombs and no one has bothered to ask Cloud who this guy is or why Cloud hates him so much. I know we get the details in Kalm, but I wonder...if this back story was presented before the attack on Shinra--would the Sephiroth sword in Shinra’s back have been even more alarming? I think it could have created some great context for this moment.

Rufus shows up and he’s a total jerk. We’ve changed antagonists, but not really. Rufus makes a good switch because he’s younger. It makes sense that he would want to chase Sephiroth across the world when his father would likely have preferred sending proxies. I do love how everyone introduces themselves: Ex-Soldier, from Avalanche, flower girl, and science experiment. 

Cloud takes on Rufus, while Barret, Aerith, and Red XIII fight TWO bosses back-to-back, and Tifa waits in the lobby. Knowing what to expect, I equipped the Barret team well enough for their fight. Super easy. But the Rufus battle was more worrisome. I set the battle speed to max. I really like it. Seems like I’m never waiting for ATB bars to fill. But also with bosses, it means I’m constantly getting bombarded with devastating attacks. I opened with poison on Rufus, which was wise. But they kept hitting me back-to-back with attacks, so I got to 50% health pretty quick with a filled Limit Break Bar. I opted for the Limit Break, hoping that between that and the poison, it would be enough to end the fight. Soon, I was down to 25% with two foes. I was just able to give Cloud a Hi-Potion before they could kill me, and it only took one hit from my Fire-Elemental sword to end the battle. Thought I wasn’t gonna make.

Barret, Aerith, and Red are in the lobby. Not sure how they’re gonna get out. I guess it made sense that Remake boosted this scene a little bit with Heidegger. But I was so ready for this game to be done, I couldn’t enjoy the smallest of “improvements”. Tifa gets the team together to hop in a car. It’s a fun little cinematic with some glass busting action!! Now we’re off to one of my favorite mini-games:

The Motorcycle sequence! I was blown away as a kid playing this game, even  more blown away thinking they could have gotten away with something simpler--but they actually invented a whole gameplay mechanic just for this one moment. That’s what I love about FF7--how they find ways to switch up the conventional RPG formula with neat mini-games that often help better serve the story!

Maybe cause I was playing on my phone, but I didn’t defend my team as well as I usually do. They got a little beat up. Weird wheeled-robot boss fight and boom, done with the Midgar section.

No stupid fight with Destiny. Though, I do like how Remake brought Sephiroth into play here. For this game, though, it makes sense to have a somber moment post Motorcycle chase. It’s been pretty non-stop with huge plot twists, new characters, and four boss fights. The players deserve a break. And they’re gonna get plenty of Sephiroth in Kalm, five minutes from now. 

It was interesting hearing the characters’ motivations. Cloud wants to settle the score with Sephiroth. You’re not supposed to know what that means, but apparently Cloud thought he was dead. Now that he’s “not”, he wants to get this resolved. He’s also aware of Sephiroth’s murderous schemes. Cloud, in his commitment to saving Aerith, has committed himself to being a hero. Feels clear to me now. He seems quite willing to align with others that have a similar goal. This isn’t just revenge, but it’s also not NOT revenge. Barret, seeing Sephiroth as the greater threat to the planet has shifted his focus. But Also, President Shinra is dead. While Rufus is terrible, and Shinra is still very much alive...to know that the one person most responsible for your pain and misery is now dead has got to be a little disorienting. A little bit, here, Barret is also becoming a hero.

Aerith admits to having never left Midgar and says there’s things she wants to know. Cloud asks if it’s about the Ancients, and she says “many things”. She’s actually a pretty complex character. I think she has feelings for Cloud, which is somewhat mixed up with her feelings for Zack. She knows Shinra is a threat to the world but also seeking her out personally, so she’ll never truly be safe or carefree. And she’s a pretty decent person that wants to do the right thing. She has a lot riding her shoulders that she didn’t ask for. I think she’s interesting in that she wants to live in her small bubble within Midgar, but her destiny and fate are tied to much bigger things!

Tifa--sadly, Tifa doesn’t have a lot going on right now. I really love her in Remake, but much of that felt added. I think she’s similar to Barret in that she suffered a great loss because of Shinra and wants revenge.  But she’s not as aggressive and violent as he is. Clearly she’s a bad ass. I think this is the one place where Remake has the edge over the original--they did a better job with Tifa.

Then Red XIII. He just kinda wants a lift. Hah!

Well, I wanted to replay the Midgar section as a compare-and-contrast with Remake, and that task is done. I often play this section (once or twice a year) never quite committing to playing the whole game. But it seems I tend to gloss over the dialog (I know this already). But I made myself read it, even talk to most of the NPCs, and it’s just a great game, story, and world.

To say Final Fantasy VII hasn’t aged well is ridiculous. Nothing truly ages well, especially a work of media that represents a growing and evolving craft. Tons of RPGs were inspired by gameplay and technical feats attempted and pioneered by Final Fantasy VII, and the game’s legacy is still strong. The graphics aren’t great by today’s standards, and they were a little weird by 98′s standards, but they still helped tell a great story and provide iconic gameplay moments. And those moments are timeless. Even if the translation is bad. Even a modern Remake can’t erase the original’s greatness.

I’m still a fan!              

[13gatonegro13-blog]

Final Fantasy VII: "Ideal" vs "Real"

First of all, English is not my mother language, any suggestions or corrections are welcome, I want to learn. 

Second, this is just for entertainment purposes. I have a little free time and I want to distract myself from work. This it is merely theoretical

Third, if you disagree with something here, you can approach me in a kind way/ or feel free to ignore me.

Now… I don't know much about Body language so I won’t relate actual scenes here, but what I do know is about writing, I have a degree in Literature that includes, Audiovisual Media Script and Discursive Analysis. With that said, I want to proceed to develop certain aspects of FF7 story using a symbolic approach.

Let’s begging in the fact that one of the most common resources to convey real feelings in a story, for readers/viewers, is to take reference in personal feelings or seek inspiration in other people. Without this, representing a feeling successfully would be extremely difficult and possibly the same result will be superficial. FF7 not only takes inspiration in real emotions but also gives them preference over other feelings. With that clear, let’s start off the assumption that the entire plot of FF7 pushes us to meet and cherish reality. This is mostly represented in the REAL being hidden in the protagonist, but also in the events around him, including dreams and aspirations of other characters, to obtain one of the most basic emotional conflicts: "Life is what happens to you when you're busy making other plans”.

The story is about finding ourselves and what we want. This is why the concept of "Reunion" becomes a pivotal element throughout the entire plot. The path we walk shapes us and shows us the truth, finding parts of ourselves, and losing others. Yes, is about what happens when we lose someone we love, but not only in a tragic way but in the aftermath: How these losses are also part of us and help us to discover and reconnect with our true selves and with people around us at the moment we live, is about forgiveness, second chances and to appreciate what we have, while we still have it. 

The story shows us different examples of how sometimes in the constant search for this “IDEAL”, we forget to live the present and value who we are and what we have: Sephiroth, was this great soldier loved and respected by everyone, but he abandoned all this, in his ambition to become a god, while Shinra, is this company with a dream, of bringing the promised land to earth, even though in search of that dream, they were destroying the world that will become this Paradise; even Avalanche tried to save people from living in a land without future, in their path affecting the people they wanted to save. Although their actions seems to be justified, but that's another subject. There are more examples of this kind of behavior, but now we will focus on Cloud:

Cloud left his hometown to become worthy in the eyes of others and the girl he always wanted, but more importantly to become worthy in his own eyes. Tifa didn't believe he wasn’t good enough; it was he who didn't feel good enough for her. Cloud didn't appreciate himself enough to see what he already had, and in his quest to become this IDEAL man, he ended up losing everything, including himself. This is one of the reasons why Sephiroth is the main antagonist of the plot, he represents the ideal Cloud wanted to pursue, his dream was to be like him, and that’s the reason why Sephiroth moves in those instances around him, as something effusive and deceptive, that drags him away from that he loves, and from himself. He represents something unreal.

The meteor is one of the strongest symbols in the game. Everything that descends from the sky has a sacred implication, however in the simplest way; a meteor is a shooting star. The “shooting star” is the "idealization" the “illusion”, but in fact, a meteor is a visible passage of an incandescent rock breaking into pieces at the moment it contacts with Earth's atmosphere, that's all it is. So Sephiroth summoning a meteor to destroy the earth makes perfect sense. He is the representation of those false "ideals", what is "wrong" and false. This shooting star that holds dreams and aspirations, and was so beautiful and striking from afar, can be transformed into something violent, and a force capable of destroying everything we have and cherish. A wish is a driving force, for better or worse.

In another hand, shooting stars also represent change and spiritual destination, a reminder of connection with the universe. In one symbolic approach, stars are the representation of the union between soul and matter; so it's not weird that one of the strongest meanings of a shooting star besides luck and dreams is the rise and fall of a human soul. In certain cultures, the shooting stars represent a human soul that left the physical world, but is still connected to earth through the spiritual world, and seeing a shooting star is a sign that that person is still around looking for a way to land. So yes, it's also about landing and destination. Cloud being deceived and trap for his dreams, and later reuniting with his former being, mind, and body, and accepting himself, is the point of the whole story. He becoming REAL. 

And of course, the reality is different from dreams. In the real world, not everything is easy, not everything is happiness, he will feel pain, sorrow, and grief, love would be complicated, but it will be real. By this time he will know to value this reality the way it is, not the way he wanted it to be. This will not only lead him to face his fears, and realize his own worth. But also will lead him to face the pain of what he lost and eventually to heal.

I have read many people saying that Nojima's words: "Perhaps things would have gone well with Aerith" (comparing the relationship with Tifa) it's proof that if Aerith lived, Cloud would choose her instead of Tifa. But I must disagree with that, and to justify this, I want to leave any visual facts or personal toughs aside, and focus on what it works for the plot only and concerning the aforementioned. Although the author wanted to imply a kind of "ideal" in the relationship between Aerith and Cloud that doesn't mean she is the person for him for purposes of the story. Yes, perhaps with Aerith everything would be easier —but that's the tricky part here— in the REAL world, not always the person who is the "ideal" for us, is the one we want. Real love is not "easy", it's complicated and we must do our part to forge it, it doesn't come night to morning. Cloud choosing Aerith over Tifa would destroy all this wonderful work in the plot, it would be Cloud throwing the real love of a girl who always wanted him, and was his link between reality and his true self. And it's telling us, not only that the person he was before was not worthy of love, but also, that if you want to get "the good stuff" you have to give up to yourself and despise everything you already have, because “isn’t good enough”.

Nojima's complimentary words "But Aerith's responsibility is big" also could/seem to imply something about Aerith’s character, not as Cloud's love interest. Meaning that her "responsibility" is not the reason why she and Cloud cannot be together. Even if she and Cloud relation would be ideal, the role of Aerith in the story is more important.

In the plot, Aerith not only fulfills the role of being the last Cetra of the world, but she also has the function of showing other characters to appreciate what they have, at the moment they have it. In the end, Aerith is the protector of the real world, a flower that although fragile and perish is beautiful and attached to the earth, she saves the life in the world from the meteor, which symbolically represents something hard and alienated from ourselves, these desires Sephiroth transformed into something grotesque and harmful.  

But Aerith also represents herself something utopian, which although beautiful is not compatible with the real world completely. She represents hope, and eternal reunion in the Promised Land with those we lost, those we will lose, and love. And that’s the reason why she can’t stay in the real world either.

Even if Aerith lived, Cloud would still choose Tifa, for the simple reason that Tifa is the person he always wanted, the person he loves. Tifa is his redemption. It will be ups and downs because this time will be real; but it will be better, something intense and tangible, not something that only sleeps in his mind. He will get that by being himself, and by appreciating the person he really is. This will be his second chance and his TRUE opportunity of REAL happiness.

[noirwomaninred]

Grunts, gasps and moans of Final Fantasy 7 Remake review

My absolutely spoiler free review / thoughts about the game followed with under the cut spoiler “review” where I give my thoughts on the story which I absolutely forbid you from reading before you are done with the game.

Do realize that the under the cut spoiler section will have full spoilers not just for the remake but for the original Final Fantasy 7.

However the initial spoiler free review will go in depth to the game systems, so if you want to learn those on your own you would better skip the whole post.

Meat of the game (Combat system)

The game has an active battle system similar to Final Fantasy XV or Kingdom Hearts games but feels much more refined. You can play the game as hack and slash on easier difficulties, but the normal difficulty (with hard being unlocked ones you finish the game) tests your knowledge of the system at times.

By landing hits on enemies or just by waiting you fill your ATB (Active time battle) gauge and once you have enough of it you can do special attacks and use spells or items. This makes some moments quite tense when you are on low health and need to fill ATB by rushing in and lands bunch of hits in quick succession to be able to heal your character before they get killed.

You can also skip the active time battle by setting the difficulty to “classic” when the AI takes over your characters who automatically attack, dodge and guard against attacks while you can focus on just giving commands on what abilities, spells or items they should use when ATB meter is up. If you think your the AI isn’t doing good enough job you can take control at anytime and the overall difficulty of “classic” mode is same as easy.

You can equip skills, spells and active buffs by equipping materia, which are items that grant these skills. The characters aren’t able to use those skills if materia is unequipped, so you have to choose what works best for you.

On top of the materia system you have different weapons that give your characters different abilities. Using the said abilities they can learn them and can then use them even when the weapon is changed.

You take control of multiple characters and you are able to switch between them on the fly whenever you wish in combat. Each character feels different to play and have their own strengths and weaknesses.

Only negative I would have is that targeting system can be at times a bit fickle and camera occasionally can be fighting against you when trying to hit enemies who are above ground level. This is more of a nitpick than a real problem.

The combat system is great and has enough depth to carry a full game.

Grunts, gasps and moans (Audio)

This game suffers the same problem as most of the console games. There isn’t really a sweet spot for audio to be perfect. Music can swallow the dialogue or the other way around, the side dialogue can swallow the main dialogue etc.

If you haven’t guessed the title of my review comes from the audio problems the game has. The grunts, gasps and moans can at times be way too loud and just distracting. For example when character is clearly far in the background you can hear them grunt as if they were doing it right agaisnt your ear.

From let’s plays (and my own experience) the side dialogue heard by random characters on the streets are a bit too loud and distracting. None of these things isn’t anything that ruins the experience but it is a bit annoying.

What did you expect (Music)

Music is done by Nobuo Uematsu, along with Masashi Hamauzu and Mitsuto Suzuki. It is amazing and among one of my favorite video game soundtracks.

Everyone is so pretty and hot (Graphics / visuals)

Graphics of this game are unreal, every character is so pretty, lighting is on point and the art direction is great. They made trash look interesting in HD and that is saying much.. Though there are few times when you see low textures or even the infamous doors that are impossible to miss and look like they didn’t load correctly or just miss proper textures. This again is more of a nitpick and not a real problem.

Everyone is so nice and wholesome (Characters)

All the characters are likable and charming on their own way. The banter between the cast members is done really well and no one feels under utilized. Some side characters may be way over the top and anime if you don’t like that kind of thing but that again is down to your own taste. At first I had a bit of a trouble accepting some but I grew to like all them in the end.

Good guys are good and villains are villains. I like them all.

Final thoughts

The game is quite amazing on all fronts but at times it can feel a bit bloated and drag on during some sections though this is mostly down to your own opinion. Personally I didn’t feel the sections drag on in more than two points of the game when I felt the pacing was a bit too slow for what was going on (The other case being just feeling that area was stretched out and other a pacing issue for what was going on with the story).

I overall recommend the game if you are s fan of JRPGs, but as a remake of FF7 it is quite different and can be good or bad depending on how you like it. Though I will say that if you expected the marketed remake of the original story with expanded bits.. It simply isn’t it.

With that out of the way under the cut is the spoiler review and my thoughts on the story of the game. Do not read it unless you have played the game or just don’t give a f*** about full spoilers.

Here I will put up my thoughts on the full story and go deeper into certain scenes that has been added or altered from the original. Please know that these are my personal opinions and if you disliked something that I liked or that I disliked something you liked is fine, no hate coming from me so don’t toss it my way! Feel free to hit me up in instant messages if you want to discuss stuff.

The Avalanche gang

The side characters from the Avalanche have been greatly expanded upon and all of it is good, while Jessie got the most of it and I honestly don’t mind that.

We get a whole new side adventure with the gang which makes sense as part of the bigger plot and gives the characters time to shine. This also makes the emotional punch later on feel much more effective.

Train graveyard and spooky ghosts

This part that is added with Aerith’s backstory being expanded by just a small glimpse and having the characters run around with spooky ghosts is good.. But it is placed in the worst place when considering the full narrative.

At this time the characters are running towards Sector 7 to prevent the plate from falling on +50 000 people and to have a prolonged part with ghosts makes takes away from the build up and the agency of the moment. If this spooky ghost part would have been done in any other point of the story it would have been fine but now it drags on the part of the game that should feel intense.

Use of Sephiroth

PTSD / ghost appearances

I was all aboard for Sephiroth being a haunting ghost for Cloud with the worst case of PTSD. The only scene I would have cut from him would have been the first meeting with Aerith where he feels really out of place for me and the “you can’t save anyone” taunt talk would have been better used right before the plate fall instead of being used as a “hey, you remember Aerith is gonna die” moment that is just eh.

I especially loved the moment right after the plate fall when Cloud freaks out as Sephiroth taunts how he just let all those people die and all the others see is him freaking out because of nothing.

Final moments

To have him as a final boss of the game is just... Please, can’t you save anything at all for the end of the story? We already had our final boss of the whole remake story I guess. Overall in the end when they stopped using Sephiroth as a haunting ghost and turned him into a random big bad of the story, where he literally has no place in even with the changed narrative, is just quite lame for me personally and it felt like he was overused.

Shinra board of directors

All the villains are great. None of them is toned down and they clearly love what they do just as they did in the original game. Scarlett was a bit over the top but to be fair I always got the insane dominatrix vibes from her so it works. Hojo is absolutely delight on how creepy and off putting he is.

The changed story with them using the reactor bombings and the plate fall not to just turn the people against Avalanche but to sell a war to their civilians against Wutai is really well done and I’m excited to see where it goes.

The TURKS

The TURKS are all portrayed as they have always been. Great stuff.

Roche

Roche is a bit too over the top but he is way too fabulous not to like as a frenemy. It took a bit for me to warm up to him but I think he is a great addition. Though I think it is a missed opportunity not to have him have a second appearance at the very end during the motorcycle escape.

The Honey Bee inn

The Honey Bee inn might very well be one of my favorite gaming moments of my life. It is whimsical, way over the top and fabulous not to like. What I like the most of it is the fact they didn’t turn it into a harmful scene or a joke that might hurt the people who crossdress or fight with their gender identity.

I love the fact that they go as far as have the character in game state that one should always be who they are without fear and the beauty is something that the gender does not apply to.

However the cat calling on the streets for Aerith and Cloud was a bit too much and uncomfortable and the follow up sleeping gass scene, that was added instead of having the charcters just lead to the basement, was too real.

The plate fall and the aftermath

The plate fall event was quite spectacular and great overall. However I do think that Square has lost their touch on what the tone of certain scenes should be with the random appearance of Cait Sith (that will be just wtf moment for new comers who have no context for a cat with a crown) when everything goes down. It is really short glimpse but it was more than enough to take me out of the emotional impact and just make me groan.

It also took me a great attempt on suspension of disbelief to have Wedge survive the ordeal, but I managed it and accepted it. However as much as I wished for Biggs to survive I can’t suspend my disbelief so much. They had him die in front of the gang and if he somehow just passed out and they were silly enough to leave him behind (which I doubt they would have done) they had him be on the pillar that was destroyed beyond any recognition.. So yeah.. It truly does a disservice for the whole emotional impact of the plate fall and overall experience when the plot armor is so damn thick.

I mean right now I’m at the point of thinking that Jessie is alive because she “died” just like Biggs and if he survived so should she, right?

I really wish they would have had the guts to pull the trigger on the characters like they did in the original or at least write sensible ways to have some of the characters survive.

Jenova

I think they downplayed the horror aspect of Jenova and revealed too much too soon. There is no more a nightmare fuel scene in the game where you get to go through the eerie quiet Shinra building with bodies here and there with a blood trail and claw marks on the walls. Now it is simply reduced to following a spooky juice that might be purple glowing blood.

As fun as the boss battle against the Jenova was it felt out of place and confusing. I generally feel that the creators thought that they just had to cram Jenova fight in there and couldn’t wait for it to happen later or have Jenova get their proper introduction later on.

Rufus

Rufus, while he looks absolutely stunning, is downplayed. Now he is simply reduced to a random boss battle that is sudden and he has no real character introduction like he did in the original. Even his lines were given to Heidegger who had at this point been well established so this choice just feels bizarre. I realize he wouldn’t have much of a role here anyway but now Rufus didn’t even get a proper introduction for going forward.

Last bosses and Zack

The whole section that starts from the moment the gang stops on the highway and have Aerith give random speech how Sephiroth is bad and they should stop him and all, even without establishing why he is bad or who he is in the remake or how Aerith knows about him at all. Going forward it becomes a confused mess and the boss feels so out of place by being something that should have been in Kingdom Hearts instead of FF7 which is (or was) grounded on reality rather well up until the ending parts of the game.

They also give rather confusing scenes of Zack at the end with no context to anything that is happening until the very last scene of the whole game which I don’t mind.. But have Zack appear out of nowhere and not explaining it at all feels like a chep try for nostalgia and not much else.

However have him appear and walk past Cloud and Aerith as they head out of Midgar was great and could have worked if there wasn’t any additional scenes of him. To have this mystery character with Cloud to head towards Midgar at the end of the game would have been a great hook for the new comers but now it is just... It is what it is, I guess.

Constant spoilers

The game is littered with scenes of Cloud seeing to the “future” (who know how that will go now). Some of these are more subtle than others but some scenes are flat out spoilers that aren’t difficult to figure out by new comers.

I just don’t agree with this spoiler culture and it took me out of the experience at times, though I think that new comers have less of a problem with that if they won’t figure out what certain things mean..?

What absolutely felt too much was flat out showing Aerith dead in a flash forward, the meteor and destruction of Midgar of all things. Just stop.

The whispers

I absolutely hate this addition and before anyone loses their mind let me explain. The floating cloak people make some scenes cringe worthy (like them kidnapping Cloud and Aerith to have them fly away from Reno in comical manner) and they add absolutely nothing to the flow of the story.

For example the whispers prevent the characters from stopping Rude and Reno from making the plate fall... There was no need for them. They could have just had them fail without some “propfetic ghosts who make sure people die because that is how the story must go”. All the moments they “forced the story” to go certain way could have literally happened without them and without them it would have flowed much better.

They have Barret die for a moment just to bring him back by the whispers because his part in the story isn’t done yet. This is a cheap attempt for a tear jerker and takes away all the worry if he will be okay or not going forward for the new comers to FF7 since they wouldn’t raise him from the dead just to kill him off later.

They save the gang during the motorcycle scene multiple times just to make sure to dissolve whatever tension there is left by reassuring us that “hey our gang is safe because that is how the story goes”. They could have had them survive on their own.

Overall every time the whispers were on the screen they took me out of the experience first by just having me react by going “wtf are you doing here” and just made intense moments feel less so.. And now that I know what they were supposed to do I just think “all that would have gone down anyway” and “You literally gave plot armor a living form”? Not to mention that how they were included, would I agree or not (which I don’t) on their inclusion, they are written in the most cringy and poor fanfiction-y kind of way.

They apparently are the arbiters of fate which protect the original story of FF7 and by defeating them we can propably now have Aerith live and change everything. They are just used to give Square a permission to not just remake the game with modern gameplay, graphics and expand the original story but to flat out remake the whole story to something else. I can’t get over the fact they added time travel of all things to FF7.

I can't stand the fact that the whispers don't add anything to the narrative since without their involment everything would have happened naturally anyway. On top of that because of their "involment" to the story the narrative of FF7 Remake doesn't stand on its own by for example showing Zack with absolutely no context to anything, that even ruins his most iconic scenes that are used in the remake and Sephiroth ends up being "this bad guy who killed Cloud's mom and wants to destroy the planet for reasons that aren't explained at all and he apparently knows everything about the timeline" so even him being the big bad of the remake is just nonsensical when he isn't given proper context for anything that is going on. We simply have Aerith go "Sephiroth is bad and should be stopped" and we don't even get reasons why Aerith knows about him at all. The newcomers to the series have a remake of a game that doesn't stand as its own story without them knowing everything about the original game. They are just an excuse to have a justification for Square Enix to change the story going forward to whatever they want and after seeing how cringe worthy the whispers were I'm legit afraid the follow ups will be bad case of fanfiction.

I really, really hate that after playing through a long and arguably an amazing remake I’m left with bad taste in my mouth which stains all the great moments I had with it as all I will remember is how bad the ending turned out to be.

...I really hate to say this but the whispers act like a marketing scam. The game that was sold to us was a remake of a classic with expanded story but now what we have is retcon / reboot to turn it to who knows what going forward. Maybe what we will have in the future is amazing but I’m a bit sore after this.

Final Fantasy 7 Remake is a game that I loved 90% through but unfortunately I loathe the last 10% which is enough to take me out of the experience. Not to mention that 10% is more imporant to the mess of a story we now have than what happened in the rest of the game and it has such great implications on what will happen to the future parts of the remake.. So yeah.

...I just don’t agree and I legit have a fear this will turn into bad fanfiction going forward. I hope this will turn out not to be that way but the fear of it is real.

[kasunex]

“I Choose this Fate of My Own Free Will” - What Persona 3 Means to Me

As a forward, I decided to write this post after finishing my fifth replay of Persona 3. I didn't want to go too in-depth, but rather to focus on what particularly stood out to me as the most important elements: gameplay, design, and story synchronization, and the characters of Makoto, Aigis, Junpei, Chidori, Takaya, and Shinjiro. With that out of the way, I hope you enjoy!!

Persona 3 is a game unlike any other that I have ever played. When I began it for the first time on December 25th, 2012, I was in a pit of confusion and fear, struggling with abuse, isolation, depression, and anxiety. By the time I finished the game, on January 2nd, 2013, I was overwhelmed with emotions that would bring about the biggest change in the way I see the world any work of fiction has ever led me to. Even six years later, when so much media is unable to elicit response from me, it’s Persona 3 that drives me to tears again and again.

At first glace, Persona 3 wouldn’t seem much more than an edgy escapist experience for nihilistic teenagers. The emo design of the protagonist, the often rude and even callous dialogue options, the coffins, and most notably, the mock suicide used by the characters to fight. Yet, this initial impression hides behind it a genuinely heartfelt and anti-nihilistic message, hinted at from the start. The first screen of the game gives us this cryptic statement. “Time never waits, it delivers all to the same end. You who wishes to safeguard the future, however limited it may be, you will be given one year. Go fourth and do not falter, with you heart as your guide.” This is presented without ever receiving much explanation, but it sets the tone for what is to come. All throughout Persona 3, the shadow of death is present. The obvious places to point are Pharos’ visits to remind the player the end of the world is near, or the evokers and their aforementioned suicidal imagery. But it also does so in more subtle ways as well.

The theme “Mystic” plays at the beginning, when the player agrees to Pharos that he will “take responsibility for his actions”, and is reminded that “nobody can escape time.” From then on, Mystic plays in the background of the Tartarus themes. The theme of the first block is subtle, mysterious, and eerie. As the player climbs, the omniscient atmosphere grows. By the time of the final block, the music has taken on an intensive and foreboding feel, the shift building towards a gradual climax. Pharos’ statement that one can’t “close their ears or cover their eyes” is one the player is reminded of time and time again, and it can be felt that things in Persona 3 are building towards Makoto’s doom from the very start. While I can understand the oft repeated criticism of Tartarus as grind-heavy and somewhat generic randomly generated dungeon, it being a tower is the perfect way to metaphor for this inescapable fate. Each step up the stairs of Tartarus bring the player one step closer to their ultimate fate, one that, fittingly, can only be death. After all, what else does life amount to but one step forwards to death with each moment we all live? The game over screen serves as yet another reminder of this: “Death is not a hunter unbeknownst to its prey. One is always aware that it lies in wait. Though life is merely a journey to the grave, it is not one to be undertaken without hope.” Tartarus is the ultimate symbolism of this concept, even more so with the appearance of the Reaper. If one stays on a floor of Tartarus too long, they are reminded to keep moving forward, lest death take them before they have accomplished their mission.

Makoto Yuki is a unique protagonist. A mix of Japanese and Western RPG tropes, he is both his own character, and yet also an extension of the player. In many ways, Makoto has an individual personality that is portrayed subtly throughout the game. This can be seen in his design, in his unchosen reactions, in the range of options provided to the player, his turbulent but close friendship with Junpei, and in his bond with Aigis. Yet, the game also goes out of its way to reinforce the player’s identification with Makoto. In another oft criticized choice, the player is unable to directly control any character but him, even in battle. This forces the player to identify themselves as Makoto in particular, rather than as the puppet-master of the entire party. As mentioned before, his dialogue and certain actions are often controlled by the player as well. In this space the player is given to input themselves on to Makoto, the game ensures that we remain in his shoes, while also ensuring that the narrative purposes ultimately override player choices. In this implementation, the game is given unique control over its audience for narrative purposes.

From the start, the player is encouraged to expressing an uncaring worldview onto Makoto. When Pharos first states that the end of the world will soon come, one of the options is “I don’t care”. Indeed, why would the player care? Regardless of their thoughts on such a thing happening in reality, there seems little reason to feel invested in the fate of a fictional one. What more is the player there but to fantasize about being a hero, right? It’s natural to look at SEES and romanticize their struggle. In some ways, Persona 3 would seem to encourage this viewpoint, but it also questions it. Much of the game is focused on the motivation of the characters, on their varying opinions on the Dark Hour and on their lives in general. The player is given many views at which to approach the situation and of course, many options to express their own stance. Yet, the player can’t deny that their role is in that sort of escapism. The most on-the-nose comment is given by Junpei, trying to understand why he is angry at the thought of the Dark Hour vanishing, despite it putting a decent amount of people in a coma. “I talk a big game about fighting, but hell...it’s all I’m good for. If it weren’t for that...I’d be worthless.” Junpei cuts through the audience’s defenses with this statement. Despite their proposed hatred of the Dark Hour, many of the characters do feel a sense of purpose in their powers that is missing from their daily life. But can the players say much else for themselves? Even if it’s just a simulation, a game, why would one play it if not to fulfill something missing in their real lives? Would we really react much differently in their shoes?

It’s not until October that the game truly begins to turn this sentiment on its head. After a boss fight, Shinjiro is shot and killed. Killing a party member so soon after their active addition is an uncommon choice, in part because it essentially leaves any effort that the player puts into leveling them null. The most notable example is certainly Aerith from Final Fantasy VII, one that has become infamous for the reaction it invokes in fans of the game. Killing off Shinjiro makes clear that the game is willing to kill off major characters, and it breaks through preconceptions about plot armor, all the more prevalent in games, to remind the player that there is true danger in this situation. Shinjiro’s death also highlights the disconnect between those who have lost loved ones and those to for whom death is just a statistic or a news story. The other students are apathetic at best and disrespectful at worst. They don’t act unrealistically, or even too unsympathetically, but they clearly don’t grasp that Shinjiro was more than a punk. He was someone with friends, dreams, and a future. And can any of us really say we would think any differently? When we hear that some number of people died on the news, do we really see these people as individuals? I can attest that I at least would reasonably see such things in a very abstract way. The other students are not vilified, their comments are nothing that seems unlike what we ourselves might say. The fear of their own mortality leads them to distance themselves emotionally from Shinjiro, writing him off as a delinquent so as to paint him as "the other". But we knew Shinjiro, and so we see their comments in a different light. Makoto is given the option to tell the students badmouthing Shinjiro to shut-up, with Junpei joining him. It’s here that Persona 3 demonstrates a remarkable ability to shift itself away from the nihilistic view of the world that it once seemed to foster, while still demonstrating a balanced understanding of that view. This is reinforced again later in the game, when Junpei, the person who clung to the Dark Hour for his sense of purpose, loses Chidori to its violence.

Then there is Takaya, the man directly responsible for Shinjiro’s, and later Chidori’s deaths. Takaya is someone who has fully embraced the Dark Hour as his purpose in life. He is unable to let it go, and he doesn’t care who has to die to protect it. Takaya’s views are extreme, but hardly unrealistic. Much like a drug addict unwilling to accept the damage of their addiction, Takaya downplays and even justifies the Dark Hour as being benign. To him, that feeling of abstraction towards the death of others has become prevalent enough that he only seeks to protect what he believes makes his own special. When he discovers the world is soon to end, he is enthused. This sentiment is echoed by Ikutsuki, many NPCs, and is implied to have been a driving force behind those that created the Dark Hour. Predicting and even anticipating the apocalypse has been in vogue for generations now, and even my own Father once spoke of this to me: “When I was a teenager, people talked about nuclear war between the US and the Soviet Union. There was a part of me that found the thought exciting. The world ends for someone every day, but what a way to die in the absolute end of humanity.” My memory of this statement has allowed me to understand Takaya’s sentiment. When someone becomes disconnected from the world around them, from the mortality of themselves and others, they don't care about the consequences of their actions. Suddenly, the end of the world seems exciting rather than horrifying. Just before the final boss, Takaya forces the party once again to face the reality that their views were originally not so different from his. There is truth in this, as even Aigis admits, yet, they have realized then that they took their lives for granted.

January 31st is the first time that the player is given a choice of their own. Ryoji reveals that the end will soon come with the return of Nyx, the result of so many wishing for an end to the pain of life. He gives Makoto the option to killy him, erase his friends’ memories, and let live them in ignorance of their coming deaths. To refuse this offer is to face Nyx without any hope of success. It’s clear through the party’s gradually unanimous support for fighting Nyx where the game’s writers sided. However, Ryoji once again shows their ability to portray the opposing view in a sympathetic light. Ryoji genuinely cares for his friends and wholeheartedly believes that erasing their memories will save them from unnecessary suffering. In any case, there are many ways to interpret this question. The first time I played the game, I saw it as similar to my own thoughts on whether or not to give up on life and commit suicide. Did I want to struggle against my social, mental, and familial problems that seemed insurmountable, or did I want to give up, and go for one last hurrah before the end of my life? Death awaited either way. The only change was the what my life would amount to. The choice was mine - just as the game had said at the beginning. Whichever outcome resulted in the game, as in real life, was my responsibility to make. At the start of the game, I picked "who cares" as my response to Pharos. Truthfully, at the time, I may well have said the same thing in real life. And, in a decision I would have considered unthinkable when I began the game, I decided to let Ryoji live.

The heavy atmosphere of the game’s final month serves as a constant reminder of the decision made. It is during this time that my favorite Social Link unlocks - Aigis. Her Link focuses on in-depth exploration of what her arc had touched on throughout the previous months. As she had found greater emotional fulfillment in her life in the ability to make choices for herself, she had awoken to the fear of death, and of loss. To find the meaning and purpose she longed for in life was to also be aware of her limitations. Aigis is tormented by her inability to protect her friends, and her feelings of inadequacy as a lover to Makoto. Aigis’ struggle shows that to live with purpose is to live with awareness of how fragile and fleeting life is. To enjoy life, to love, is to open oneself up to the fear and pain of loss. Yet, is to live without enjoyment and purpose any life at all? This dilemma was faced earlier by Chidori, who had lived with apathy and detachment similar to Aigis’ before meeting Junpei. And just as Chidori was forced to confront a fear of death in her newfound love for Junpei, so to is Aigis in her love for Makoto. Ultimately, Chidori pushes Junpei away in an attempt to protect herself from these fears, as Aigis is similarly indecisive for how to approach them. Yet, in Junpei’s near-death, Chidori decides to sacrifice herself to protect him, ultimately deciding to accept and face her pain in order to live.

When the party reaches the height of Tartarus, they face Nyx Avatar. Here, the dialogue explicitly targets the audience. Mitsuru calls Nyx “what awaits all living things from the minute they are born.” Indeed, Nyx Avatar proclaims in the final stage of the battle: “it matters not who you are. Death awaits you.” There is no escaping that this applies as much to the player as to anyone else. When the fight against Nyx Avatar concludes, Makoto ascends alone to fight the true Nyx. With a remix of Mystic playing, he rises through darkness towards a bright light. This scene is reminiscent of the concept of one’s soul rising to heaven, as well as the description that to die is to see “a light at the end of a long, dark tunnel.” Finally, Makoto is face to face with the true Nyx, a ball of glowing light with outreaching skeletal arms. The symbolism makes it clear: the protagonist is facing the very incarnation of death itself. This is what every step up Tartarus, every second of the story has been building up to. Makoto stands alone against his doom. And yet, his friends’ cries of support reach him and give him the power to resist. Eventually, the protagonist gives up his HP to seal away Nyx. The metaphor is heavy, and yet, it is effective.

The ending of the game is, fittingly, where the message is truly brought home. In many ways, it seems almost euphorically happy. The characters regain their lost memories, and Mitsuru jumps off stage in slow motion as upbeat and cheerful music plays. The foreshadowing is there, however. The music that begins when we cut to Makoto with his head in Aigis’ lap is somber, and sorrowful. This scene gives us Aigis’ final resolution. She accepts her fears of losing Makoto, and promises to protect him and stay by his side. Just as nearly losing Junpei had done for Chidori, nearly losing Makoto allowed Aigis to realize the depth of her feelings for him. Aigis has firmly embraced that life is precious and worth living, rejecting her earlier fears that it may have been better to live without emotion. Of course, unbeknownst to her, this realization has come to late. Makoto succumbs to his exhaustion and falls asleep in her lap, never to wake up again. The ending song, Memories of You, expresses Aigis’ resolve to remember and love Makoto for the rest of her life.

Killing a silent protagonist is a rare choice. I have only personally played three other games that do so, though I’ve heard that a small handful of others exist. The belief that the main character of a story should be all but unkillable is a popular idea even outside of gaming. But when the character is meant to have an element of player insert, to kill them off is normally seen as too intense, and too on-the-nose. In Persona 3′s case, it is exactly what is needed to drive home the point. Much like the main character of fiction, it is easy to feel that we have something special about us keeping us alive. Indeed, we are the main character of our own tale, and for as long as it lasts, so do we. But someday our luck will run out and our journey will end, just as Makoto’s did. Makoto’s death reminds the player that nobody is immune to death, and our time will come as well. Nonetheless, Makoto is enough of his own character that we are also able to see his death from a more traditional viewer’s perspective. And in that, the joy of the party, the seeming upbeat nature of the ending, and Aigis’ promise to protect and stay by Makoto makes the loss all the more effective. The ones we love could be gone at any moment, and making it come for the party when they seem so close to a almost cheesy happy ending reminds us of this somber fact.

As Aigis expresses, the ultimate message of Persona 3 is that one can’t find meaning in life as long as they live in denial of the mortality of themselves and their loved ones. Doing so puts people on a path to self-destructive behavior. It is only by accepting the inevitability of death that one can realize just how precious and meaningful life truly is, and only by this realization can that we find true happiness. We see this truth firsthand in our own simulated experience. This is what makes Persona 3 so brilliant - it brings the player into the story in such a way that only a video game can. Say what you will about books, movies, television: for all the advantages these mediums have over video games, only a video game can show a player a fate that is of their own choosing. Yet, no matter how much pain the ending may cause them, it remains undeniable that the player has, in a sense, contributed to the very sentiment it seeks to deconstruct. It’s what drew them to the game in the first place.

Persona 3 develops from a story that uses suicidal and edgy imagery for the adrenaline rush into one that heavily deconstructs and averts these very concepts. By doing so, it encourages the player to re-evaluate these ideas. At the very start, Mitsuru gives a speech telling the students of the schools to dig deeply and re-evaluate their convictions. During my first playthrough, I did just that. In the days, weeks, and months following, my suicidal thoughts dropped drastically and gradually trickled down to nothing. January 2nd now serves as a constant reminder of how I make the choice, of my own free will, to live. So many still see Persona 3 as a depressing and bitter story, like the emotionally disturbed younger brother to Persona 4′s unabashed positivism. It is anything but. Rather, Persona 3 is the most candidly and genuinely optimistic game I have ever played, and it is thanks to it that I was able to find the courage and the hope to move forward from the darkest time of my life.

[the-sapphire-general]

My Thoughts and Feelings About Lunafreya Nox Fleuret

It has been quite some time since I made a post like this, so I did not write the future posts I have been planning, but I wished to write this post before the others. It is an unexpected one since the idea was never one that I considered, but I now desperately want to reveal my own views on Final Fantasy 15's main heroine, Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, Princess and Oracle of Tenebrae. It will only be a single but lengthy post, so prepare yourselves for it. Major spoilers for both the game and the movie Kingsglaive will be included, so if you are unfamiliar with FFXV, stop here and watch the movie and play the game (in that order) to understand everything. Note that this will be a rant to an extent, so either be civil or leave. You have been warned, and I will not be obligated to repeat it again. This post is dedicated to @cellarhapsodos.

Lady Lunafreya, or simply Luna, is the Princess of Tenebrae, which was conquered by none other than the Nifelheim Empire. Her mother Queen Sylvia was killed in the process and has since been imprisoned for twelve years. Ravus, her brother, joined the empire thinking that King Regis Lucis Caelum abandoned him and let Tenebrae be claimed by the enemy. Growing up, Luna knew that she had a purpose just like her beloved, Noctis, Regis's son, and was determined to fulfill her goals as the Oracle to heal those from the Starscourge and assist Noctis into becoming the True King of Light to end the darkness that threatens to fall over Eos.  

Now this all seems intriguing, but this is only scratching the surface. I am not going to just discuss her story. I will be discussing about Lunafreya herself. I will begin by explaining my reasons on writing this post in the first place. Apparently, Luna is hated by who knows how many people, their comments ranging from she is a weak and bland character, is completely useless, and has no purpose but to be Noctis' love interest. The list goes on, and I want to say something. Lunafreya does not deserve such hatred. Cue the dramatic gasps from the majority of Luna haters! Yes yes, my opinion differs from yours. Keep yourselves under control and let me continue. Luna has been accused of being a horrible Final Fantasy heroine, some saying she is the worst. Ummmm...What? How is she the worst character? Well, their arguments are these: She is useless, irrelevant to the plot, bland, robotic, has little screen time, sexist, weak, passive, and a damsel-in-distress. First of all, people can have their opinions, but they treat their opinions on Luna as if it is pure fact simply because they did not like some aspects about her. Though not all are like that, so I should not phrase it like that. Second, some also tend to go overboard with these opinions, implying that Luna should be despised by everyone. 

Luna was responsible for her part in trying to save Eos from the Starscourge. She was the one who prevented it from getting worse while alive, and she healed those that were tainted by it. She, as the Oracle, helped those who needed her and without her, so many people would have been dead and the nights would have become longer and longer. And that happened when she died in the hands of Ardyn in Altissia. Darkness fell upon the world for the past ten years and people died and daytime no longer existed. Worse, some people turned into daemons! So when Luna died, the Starscourge advanced to such an extreme, nobody was safe.  

Also, Luna had the Ring of Lucii, and she took it with her from Insomnia to Altissia despite the dangers of doing so just for Noctis to take it and fulfill his destiny as the King of Light, but guess what? It was her duty to take it to Noctis, and if she had not done her part, he would have never gotten the ring. When King Regis insisted on having her meet Noctis, Luna declined by saying the empire would follow her wherever she went. She protected Noctis from Nifelheim, even though she longed to see him after twelve years. More on this later.

Another thing to point out is Luna spoke to the gods. It is obvious that she did considering the vision of her standing before Titan. Before Noctis and his friends met them, Luna was already ahead of them so Noctis could participate in their trials. Awakening the gods, however, took a toll on her for it was killing her. In fact, healing people infected with the Starscourge must have done the same thing. But despite the possibility of death, Luna stayed strong and continued on her own journey to not only assist Noctis but to play her role in saving the world from darkness. Ravus even redeemed himself because his love for his sister was stronger than his hatred for losing his home to Nifelheim, and he wound up helping Noctis as well.  

An Oracle is not an easy role to fill, and Luna knew that when she was young. She knew but did not express fear. Her fate, the loss of her mother, the twelve years in the lands of Nifelheim, did not phase Luna, and remained brave through and through even if it meant she might die. It was her duty to protect her people and restore light into the world. Even after she died, she still healed Noctis so he could survive Leviathan's trial. So if you remove Luna, Noctis does not participate in the trials, or if he managed to do so, he would have died by Leviathan and the world is doomed. Game over.

Next is Luna's personality. Arguments include she is robotic, emotionless, and bland. Clearly, they did not read or watch Twilight! Bella Swan fits that description, not Luna. Luna is kindhearted, compassionate, and selfless from beginning to end. She kept herself away from Noctis to protect him from Nifelheim. She helped Ravus change his affiliation from the empire to Noctis. She healed her people and gave them hope. She loved Noctis and healed him so he could survive. Luna placed everyone's interests before hers because she cares about them and assisted Noctis into fulfilling his destiny. She expressed subtle fear and doubt, but did not let it overcome her, and she did whatever it took to achieve her goals and assist Noctis. She was even a bit reckless, such as jumping from a crashing ship. People say she and Regis knew of a possible future. Personally, Luna would have made it alive if Nyx did not jump, but again, as Oracle, Luna knew about the future. That is something an Oracle can do if I am not mistaken: see the future. Or maybe she saw bits of it. Either way, Luna knew what she was doing. She was not a suicidal person. A suicidal character like her would not have waited for Nyx to help her. She would have fought back regardless if her opponents were dangerous, and she would have risked her life and possibly died too soon. She would have gone to Noctis even if Nifelheim would follow her and put her beloved and his friends in grave danger. She's stubborn and careless, but also clever and intelligent.

Speaking of Noctis...This sparked a lot of hatred, and I want to say this. Her goal is NOT just related to Noctis! People say she only exists to support Noctis. Noctis this, Noctis that! Luna did not focus entirely on Noctis if you paid attention to the movie and the game. She wanted to protect people, and she did everything she could from healing to preventing the Starscourge from advancing. She wanted to stay strong for everyone so she could fulfill her own destiny as the Oracle. She did not do all this just for Noctis. All of this was her choice aside from it being her duty as the Oracle because she was a good person who cared about others. Assisting Noctis and wanting to be with him were her secondary goals. What is wrong with wanting to help the one you love??? You would do the same would you? And what was bad about her wanting to be with him?? Luna kept in touch with Noctis for twelve years by writing to him. They knew each other as children prior to the invasion, so the romance was not forced in my book. Now if they never knew each other, then it would have been, but it is not. Although the marriage was intended to be an arranged marriage, that did not make a difference. Luna loved Noctis already, and he loved her back. They would have gotten married anyway even if it was not arranged. So Luna's desires to see Noctis again is not a weakness, it is not anti-feminist, and it is not bad. I mean, how would you feel if you had not met your beloved for years? Would you want to see them again?? Luna longed to be by Noctis' side, and she placed those interests aside to help those in need even if it hurt, and never had the chance to be with him until the afterlife. Those who say that love and romance make a female character anti-feminist or whatever should reevaluate their views or else it could make girls and women believe that if you are in love, you are not strong. That makes no sense. Yes, if a female character focuses only on her love for a man and that is all that defines her, then that is bad. But Luna?? Noctis does not define her. She does, and she has shown it countless times and people still are unable to see that.

I confess that I used to hate her. I really did. I was influenced by ridiculous feminazis like them, and I kept seeing her the way they did. Their arguments were my own, but just like with Ardyn, my friend (who I mentioned in the very beginning) convinced me that she was not the way I thought she was, and she was right. I reevaluated not just how I see Luna, but all my feminist beliefs in general. To put it this way, I now see the light. Lunafreya Nox Fleuret is a proactive heroine because of everything she had done. She is similar to Aeris Gainsborough, not entirely but there are some similarities? Like they love flowers, they are kind, compassionate. And I used to hate Aeris as well, but my friend made me rethink that as well. Like Aeris (or Aerith), Luna is a heroine in her own right. Though Aeris had more screen time and such...Well, I never said they were identical. lol?

The only argument I can agree with the fandom is that Luna does have little screen time. I see that, and I want to see more of her because she is a great character. She did so much between her departure of Insomnia and her arrival to Altissia, and I am curious about what happened during that time period. Yes, she died, but that does not make her weak either. She died for a bigger cause. Even after death, she still helped. She fulfilled her calling as the Oracle until the very end, and she did not want to die at first, but she accepted her fate for all of Eos, not just for Noctis. I nearly cried when she did when she was talking to Ravus about wanting to be with Noctis. Seeing that scene again to check out the additional content in one of the latest updates of the game made me feel the same way. Despite her little screen time, Luna was still interesting. So if a character has little screen time despite everything they have accomplished, they are terrible?? But what about, say, Rose Quartz from Steven Universe? She has little screen time, but she is still compelling. But Luna is not? That is rather hypocritical to me. Luna will have more focus on her! She is getting her own DLC. May I remind you that FFXV was in development for ten years and they wanted to release it already? They released it even though it was not finished. Why else are we getting DLC and additional cutscenes and such for the game??  

Yes, she was not shown fighting during certain times where she could have. But think about it. When she was kidnapped, Luna waited for Nyx because if she were to fight, she would risk her life and her goal to not only take the ring to Noctis but to prevent Eos from falling into eternal darkness and dooming the entire world. And I admit, Luna's decision of letting Luche put the ring on was clever. She never even warned him about the consequences. It was gruesome, but clever. And no, she did not just stand and let him take the ring. She tried to run, so she is not passive. Now she did not fight. Like I said, she did not want to risk her life. She was clever enough to let him put the ring on because she knew what would happen. Though not fighting is not always the solution in her situation, so it is obvious that she will fight in her DLC.

What I hate is people judging Luna over petty things, and what set me off and leading me into writing this post is because someone said she could not be redeemed. Luna may not have been shown more often, but it is her goals and actions that matter. Luna is strong, and she does not have to be physically strong, speak loudly, and not show emotions to be strong. That is something that annoys me, and although I was saving this for my future posts regarding feminism, I will say this now. A strong female character is not an overly masculine, emotionless, weapon-wielding, butt-kicking woman who should not be interested in a man or show vulnerability or else it disempowers her as a character. Nowadays, female characters HAVE to be this way just to be strong, everybody is forgetting that female characters come in all shapes and sizes and that strong female characters mean compelling and well-written characters! And these same people believe that if a female character shows any feminine qualities such as kindness, optimism, wisdom, dresses, pink or purple or any feminine colors, make-up, jewelry, hearts, and so forth, then they are automatically weak and terrible. 

None of those things are bad in a character. You just insulted a majority of women, real and fictional, who happen to be kind and optimistic, enjoy these things, and being involved in romance by calling them weak. Rose Quartz is feminine and her theme color is pink, yet people like her. Hypocritical much? Hate to break it to you, but Luna's appearance, personality, and relationship with Noctis does not make her weak. And just because she was in danger a few times, it did not make her a damsel-in-distress. There is nothing wrong with needing help to achieve her goals. I am still surprised that she did not show fear several times, especially when guns were aimed at her. I would have panicked, so I envy her for not even flinching or screaming. She's a strong-willed, independent, kindhearted, determined, and selfless woman that wants nothing but to protect others from darkness and reunite with the Prince she loves with all her heart.

Now not everyone hates Luna to the extreme, and not every one of those who are not fans of her are feminazis. But there are people who are like that, and I am simply stating that people take things out of proportion. I am not trying to generalize anyone or anything. People may say that she is weak or whatever it is I have mentioned, and that is alright. Their opinions are valid and I do not expect to change everyone’s minds because things do not work that way. Excuse me if I sounded as if my opinion is the correct one. It is not, but it is an opinion I wanted to share with others and it is an opinion that some can agree with, so please do not be offended. I like Lunafreya just like many others, others hate her, others have mixed feelings, and others are neutral, but it does not matter. We all have our opinions, so please let us respect them.

[silver-wield]

I literally just finished the game and I really don't get what people are bitching about with the changes. Some stuff was obviously done to intro themes and ideas in the first part, so that's fine, it's a change of pace and offered some neat new scenes and battles. The storyline... I mean, really, I don't see why people are so mad. It's got scope for so many possibilities. If I had to compare it, the closest would be ff13-2's multiple time lines, but that's not right either. This is definitely something else and I can't wait to see it!

From what I saw, time remains linear, however certain events are fixed and others can be tweaked. The OG timeline, a lot of good people died and the planet was still sick after everything. Were biggs, wedge and Jessie supposed to live? Why? They're minor players OG, unless they would have had a bigger role to play later. We'll maybe see that now, although that would mean hopping from the main team to midgar at different points. I'm ok with that as long as it's plot relevant. Just hopping back and forth for a cameo would get annoying.

In the alt2 timeline where Zack survived, I'd love to see how that changes things, too. Then again, since we're in alt1 would there be a point in seeing it besides satisfying curiosity? There's no way for alt1 team to meet zack since he's dead in their time. That's not the game we're playing although I'm thinking the reason we saw him at the end was to show the ripple effect of our current team's actions. Every change they make will make things better for the next alt team until the planet gets the result it wants. Kinda like with the Good Place where a small kind act can eventually make a big difference.

I don't think we can save Aerith in this version either. I also don't want to. She's been dead canon in all media, so if she was gonna come back Square should've done it before now. What I do think we'll see is her influence more in events via the lifestream after she dies, which I'm excited for as a new angle to the story. And as a ripple effect, the team that comes after might be able to save her, so really, she does live, just not in the alt1 timeline.

I also low-key want Square to end the shipping war because it's fucking ridiculous to see grown ass 30-40 year old men bitching people out for not supporting their choice. Honestly, out of everything, this is the thing that had me headscratching the most. Like, are things that different if you favour one over the other? I'm wondering if we played the same game because the evidence people used to support their side wasn't romantic. Stuff like him offering to save Aerith, where he had to be told to save Tifa. Well, Aerith was literally in a Shinra stronghold, which is a bit different to a low level gangster. Also, Aerith is more of a damsel and needs saving. Whereas the second Cloud saw Tifa he caught the carriage and was gonna stay with her until she told him to go because she can kick ass. Cloud wavered, then showed trust towards her and let her go. Because they know each other and he believes in her. Only after Aerith made him extra worried did he go after her and went to extremes of wearing makeup and a dress to get into corneo's to save her. And he was hella embarrassed for her to see him like that, which gave me life.

I like Tifa, always have. She's a great all round character, so obviously, I favoured her and loved seeing the development of hers and Cloud's relationship over the course of the game. There was no doubt that he has her in mind pretty much all the time, unless Sephiroth showed up, natch. I'm not discounting he became friends with Aerith and agreed to go with her bec she's after Sephiroth, but his focus was mostly Sephiroth in that scene.

If Cloud and Aerith get more scenes or something if you favour her and that's why people are saying their relationship was growing in a romantic sense I can understand that, but honestly, he barely gave her a second glance in my playthrough and that was only when she had that red dress on lol.

So yeah, overall I loved the game and new storyline tweaks. People bitching about the scrapyard being flat or whatever need to get a life and stop staring at scrap. I admit a slight disappointment to some of Red's early intro movement. He looked stiff, but that didn't last long and as a guest character I liked not having to switch to him to do attacks late in the game when it's all fights one after the other. I'm excited for the new direction the game's heading and I'm only really disappointed it's not out yet cause I wanna keep playing!

so i’m going to just keep on spitting out FF7R theories that will probably all end up contradicting one another, but this is my attempt at organizing my thoughts and hopefully eventually coming to a conclusion.

for those of you who are new to this blog, i am sorry. for those of you who have been with me since the days of TEW1, you know that this is just how it be. i’m gonna slap my keyboard around with a bunch of different shit until something actually useful comes out. so strap in folks.

but i just watched an FF7R ending video that actually got me thinking.

this video pointed out:

1. the whispers are in the scene where zack fights the shinra goons

2. that aeris says that the OG/compilation is not the future that the planet wants

3. that the remake basically ends up in the same place that the end of midgar in OG does and that everything else that happens is just extra detailing

4. only aeris can see visions of zack

now, it’s 3am (i must be lonely~) and i’ve been twisting my brain around a lot about this ending literally all day so my thoughts aren’t super together on this but

those three points could indicate that there is no actual branching alternate universes or timelines. we could be dealing with a singularity and linear time travel, and that time travel could very possibly be only a meta device that’s used by the whispers.

so, what i’m saying with this is that sephiroth is not time traveling. aeris is not time traveling. zack is not in an alternate reality/universe. the only ones who time travel are the whispers – specifically, the three that you fight at the end.

the whispers in the zack fight scene are manifesting in the same area and in the same way as they’re positioned in the real-time events in the remake. so, basically, the whispers are breaking space and time. they’re fighting so hard in the present that zack can see them from the past.

if the OG/compilation is not the future that the planet wants, then that’s actually kind of understandable. because in OG, meteor gets summoned and actually does wipe out a whole bunch of people, the last cetra dies, and AC confirmed that sephiroth’s consciousness is still poisoning the planet. of course the planet would not want that.

it does make some sense that the planet can see beyond the fabric of space and time. in OG, sephiroth gains a bunch of fuckin weirdo knowledge from the lifestream (as he says when you see him at the end of the temple of the ancients). so, i can buy the planet being somewhat omniscient.

but the whispers (an allegory for the fans, remember!) don’t care what the planet wants. the whispers want the OG timeline to continue. they want it so badly that they’re compressing space and time into a singularity, which is why zack can see them in the past.

while the whispers (the fans) pull out all the stops in an effort to keep the OG plot on track, space and time is compressing, which is how you get future whisper versions of cloud, barret, and tifa trying to stop the cast from changing the fate. because the whispers don’t fuckin give a fuck what’s actually best for the planet, and i’m sure that AC-era cloud, barret, and tifa feel they did the right thing.

so. that in mind. this theory is predicated on the idea that there are some things that the planet CANNOT control – and that one of these things is jenova and her influence. if the planet truly wanted to stop the OG from happening, it would’ve stopped sephiroth from coming into contact with jenova in nibelheim and kickstarting the events of OG in the first place. even better, the planet would reach out to the cetra of the past and help them defeat jenova during the original crisis.

but the planet doesn’t do that. the planet reaches out to aeris instead. so, it’s safe to assume that the planet can only control things that are native to the planet. it cannot stop jenova’s influence. so, jenova is inevitable.

so, considering the fact that the planet’s influence is limited and some things are inevitable, some things end up corrected upon defeat of the whispers, and some things are not. when the whispers get defeated, the gold glitter rain subsides, and we’re back in reality, some things have been changed.

but some things have not.

the planet was able to save zack from shinra goons in the past, save biggs (and possibly jessie) from dying during platefall, mitigate some of the damage in sector seven, and change the appearance of stamp the dog (because i guess the planet doesn’t like beagles). and that’s really it. (for this theory to actually work, i’d say stamp is merely a visual symbol to indicate that some things have been corrected/changed.)

but jenova is inevitable.

so even though the planet saved zack from shinra grunts, it cannot save him from jenova. this is why cloud is still the main character with the buster sword in hand and not zack. and if we compound this with my previous “zack is the man in the black cloak” theory, this all starts to make sense.

so, my theory is basically: aeris is getting messages from the planet, and the subsequent games in the remake series will deal with changing things in chunks, a little bit at a time, in an effort to correct the timeline in a way that the planet wants.

but jenova is inevitable, so there’s only so much that can be changed. even though the remake floated the possibility of saving aeris, i don’t think that we will ultimately be able to. why? because it is due to jenova’s presence inside of cloud and inside of the men in the black cloaks that she dies. she may not die the same way, but there likely will be no way to actually save her. and aeris seems to know this? that this part of her fate is inescapable? because she warns cloud about it if you get her scene in chapter 14. and if you buy the theory that the “seven seconds” line that sephiroth has to cloud during the ending is in reference to saving aeris, this also works – because sephiroth might also know that jenova is inevitable, and this could just be a taunt.

SO YEAH. this is my 3am (i must be lonely~) theory as to how the ending could make sense, indicate the direction of future games, and do so without adding actual time travel/universe hopping like so many people think it does.

tell me what u think guys

[thegamefulguru]

Gameful Guru Review: Final Fantasy XV (PS4, XBONE, Square Enix)

Genre: Action RPG

Difficulty: Moderate (Story) Moderate to High (Sidequests)

Plays Like: Xenoblade Chronicles (Wii), Kingdom Hearts (various)

Gameful Skills Built: Independent Decision Making, Curiosity

“A Final Fantasy for Fans and First-Timers.”

These words spread across the screen in front of me as I prepare, after ten years of waiting, to embark upon my latest adventure in the Final Fantasy series. I am a fan, to be sure. Despite not playing many of them to completion, I’ve explored many a Fantasy in my time as a gamer, and have often been enamored with their characters, their holistic design, their worlds. When I was not quite a teenager, I fell in love with Final Fantasy X’s Spira, its tale of hope, despair and sacrifice, and the way its creators brought that world, and that story to life. Final Fantasy 9, though I have yet to completely finish it, captured my heart and compelled me thoroughly with its humor, pathos and sense of wonder. Final Fantasy XIII, for all its flaws, gripped me with its beauty and its willingness to approach hard emotional territory. My love for RPGs has never wavered, though my devotion to Final Fantasy has waned over the years.

Final Fantasy XV will cause me to fall in love again. I just don’t know it yet.

~

Despite being conceived more than ten years ago, Final Fantasy XV feels very much on the cutting edge of what Japanese RPGs are and are becoming. In the decade since the story of Prince Noctis was first teased, under the title Final Fantasy Versus XIII, RPGs from both sides of the pond strayed from their roots in intriguing ways. Being a JRPG fan, I have paid more attention to the way that Japanese developers have looked to the games being produced by western companies for inspiration, and have created fresh, fabulous games accordingly. We saw Japanese developers embrace open world gameplay with Xenoblade Chronicles (Wii), to great critical acclaim. We have also seen companies like Mistwalker, headed up by ex-Final Fantasy director Hironobu Sakaguchi, create linear but ambitiously designed games like The Last Story and Lost Odyssey, to similar reception.

All the while, Square Enix remained, undeniably alive but docile, a drowsy Titan of the gaming industry. They released a trilogy of Final Fantasy XIII games, two versions of Final Fantasy XIV, and numerous Kingdom Hearts spin-offs and prequels–and many of these releases were met warmly. But there’s been a creeping fear among diehard fans that Final Fantasy, in the face of a broadening RPG landscape, might be losing its footing, its seat at the JRPG throne.

Final Fantasy XV may not be perfect, but for me, at least, it does a lot to assuage these fears.

There are a lot of things to love about this game, not the least of which is the excellent ensemble cast and the myriad ways that the game, with great success, gets you to care about them. There’s an ongoing debate among RPG fans–and Final Fantasy fans in particular–about which kinds of stories make for the best games. Many people engaged in this debate focus on the tension between a story being “character-centric” or “plot-centric.” Most games are a mix of both, and Final Fantasy XV is no exception, but as we know from the way Final Fantasy XII’s overtly political narrative was received, when a game veers too far toward one end of the spectrum, fans opinions tend to polarize.

The delicate balance of developing characters while progressing the plot forward in interesting ways is not one that Final Fantasy XV always nails, but for the most part, no matter how the plot threads have tangled and frayed, the player has an anchor in the core four protagonists: Prince Noctis Lucis Caelum and his retainers, Gladiolus Amicitia, Ignis Scientia and Prompto Argentum. We meet this band of brothers pushing their broken down, but still luxurious car down the road of an as-yet unknown countryside, and immediately dynamics reveal themselves. This is not a ragtag bunch of strangers pulled together by fate. The familiarity and the increasingly familial bond these characters show does much to endear the player to them, and consequently, the game’s greater world and plot concerns. As the game progresses, we see them fight, laugh, eat, grow and even cry together. By the end, if you’ve truly taken your time with the game’s adventure, the player is left with a sense of having known, having lived with these characters, even if not many of the game’s supporting players get as much time in the spotlight.

There are many great reasons to take your time with Final Fantasy XV, not the least of which is the fact that its world map is huge and rich with rewarding sidequests and secrets. Apart from the quest line that makes up the game’s main story, there are countless mini-games, optional dungeons, monster hunts and other diversions to keep you busy, and although some of them feel like tedious fetch quests, the game finds ways to curb this sense of tedium.

A lot of these ways involve the skills that each of your party members develop simply by engaging with the world. From Gladio’s Survival skills, which develop the more you explore the world on foot and can net you some pretty sweet free items from battles, to Ignis’ Cooking, which enables you to create stat-boosting meals whenever you camp outside, to Prompto’s Photography, which chronicles your adventure and gives you something to reflect on at the end of each in-game day, there’s ample reason to tromp around on foot and go searching for trouble. I was surprised to find Noctis’ Fishing skill to be particularly rewarding to build, as the fishing mini-game has plenty of depth and can be a relaxing break from monster hunting and loot finding, as well as a source of valuable cooking ingredients for Ignis’ gourmet seafood dishes.

Much of your travel across the sprawling map of Lucis takes place with the help of the Regalia, the group’s trusty steed which just happens to take the form of a sleek luxury vehicle. Without the Regalia, traveling from outpost to outpost and quest to quest would eventually grow to be an unbearable slog. Luckily, the Regalia can serve as a waypoint and a means of fast traveling to and from far off locations (for a nominal fee of gil) once you’ve been there before. If you want to explore new locations, however–and you will–you will spend some time traversing the countryside in real time, either in the Regalia, on foot or, after completing one of the game’s more memorable side missions, on the backs of chocobos. On long car rides you can listen to a selection of songs from various Final Fantasies past, purchased at various outposts across the map, and while riding chocobo-back you are treated to the latest variant of the chocobo theme music that is as ubiquitous in the series as Phoenix Downs and guys named Cid.

On foot, and in battle, however, Final Fantasy XV’s musical score truly shines. Yoko Shimomura, already revered by fans for her work on the Kingdom Hearts series, has truly created a masterwork of modern video game music. Exploration themes evoke feelings of tranquility and adventurous mystique, while battle themes lend gravitas and nervous tension to even the most minor of enemy mobs, especially in dungeons, where enemies often appear out of nowhere. Battling and exploring aren’t the only places where Shimomura’s talents are on display. True to Final Fantasy tradition, and fitting given Final Fantasy XV’s dual engagement with the epic and intimate, some of the most memorable tracks are reserved for key moments in the game’s story. There may not be an iconic answer to Final Fantasy VII’s Aerith’s Theme, but there are several songs that in my playthrough, I wanted to just stop everything and listen to.

Of course, this was not always possible, as the battle system in Final Fantasy XV rewards aggression and quick tactical moves. A departure from turn-based and active-time battle systems of games past, gameplay in Final Fantasy XV feels much more like Kingdom Hearts than Final Fantasy proper. Though it lacks much of the nuance and challenge that has made Kingdom Hearts, over time, grow to be one of the more beloved action RPG series, slaying daemons with Noctis and company is often satisfying and only occasionally frustrating. The game attempts to add depth to the combat through various abilities unlocked and refined through the game’s growth system, but I found myself using many of the same tactics and techniques I used in the game’s early chapters well into the late game.

Final Fantasy is a series known for being a leader in cinematic storytelling in games, with nearly all of them challenging the graphical limitations of the systems they reside on, so no one should be surprised that this game is visually gorgeous. But in a gaming landscape where nearly every major game company has a handle on creating hyper realistic graphics, Final Fantasy XV stands out. The game’s world is well-realized and believable, and though it never reaches the grandiose scale of Skyrim, this is not a bad thing. Even after 45 hours of non-stop exploration and questing, there were still corners of the game’s world I hadn’t seen, and as a gamer who often is intimidated by non-linearity, I was excited to get a little lost in the game’s weeds.

The main trouble with Final Fantasy XV’s story–and the game as a whole–arrives in the latter third of the game’s story chapters, which for me accounted for a very small fraction of my overall playtime. Although you are given opportunities to return to your earlier questing grounds, retaining all current equipment and abilities, you do so risking ruining the narrative tension being built by the game’s final act. As far as final acts go, Noctis’ tale has its flaws, to be sure: large events take place between chapters and are quickly recapped in passing or through newspaper clippings found on train car seats, and the joys of exploration experienced in the first chunk of the game are traded in for drab corridor strolls peppered with light stealth and puzzle sequences. The game’s story builds to a satisfying conclusion, but the path to the end feels much less fleshed out than the earlier chapters, and much of how one experiences the finale of the game relies on how one spent time in its beginnings.

In many ways, Final Fantasy XV is more of a response to Final Fantasy XIII’s reception than even that game’s sequels. By beginning the game with giving players agency and freedom to explore (within certain limits) Square Enix bucked the potential critique that they cared more about their story’s transmission than about making a gameplay experience that each player could make their own, and so, too, avoided accusations often cast at Japanese RPGs: that they’re too linear, unchallenging and don’t give players much of a say in how they play out. It doesn’t completely avoid these criticisms–I only had one Game Over in my entire playthrough and it happened largely due to some screwy camera in a timed mission–but this is a Final Fantasy unlike any I’ve played before. The game tries to have its cake and eat it too, by narrowing the focus of its latter chapters, while also giving players the option of removing themselves from the game’s plot for a while to return to the side quest grind. The problem is, the most fun parts of the game have little to do with the plot and much more to do with spending time with the game’s main characters and exploring the game’s world. Even if you are fully invested in the game’s main story progression, it’s an odd feeling to reach the final boss of the game and feel over-prepared.

Fortunately, there is a truly robust amount of content that becomes available to you after you complete the main story, including more challenging bosses, sidequests and a few dungeons that have to be experienced to be believed. Square plans to release DLC and free patches to the game in the coming months, adding story and gameplay content, and this intention is heartening to say the least. After such a long development cycle, one is led to wonder what content was left on the editing room floor, and what of that content we might one day get to have our hands on.

Until that DLC starts rolling in, gamers have access to New Game+, where they can replay the game retaining certain achievements and with the addition of items such as the Nixperience Band, which prevents you from leveling up when you rest, that can offer some much needed challenge to completing the game’s main story. The hope seems to be that Final Fantasy XV will be an entry that will keep gamers playing for months, even years to come. I, for one, am excited to see what Square comes up with to fulfill that hope.

~

The game has reached its close, and I am at a loss for words. Even knowing there is more adventuring to be had, I am in awe of what I have already experienced and more than a little heartbroken that, to a certain extent, the tale that I began tens of hours ago is over. Maybe it happened when I reassured Prompto about his worth to me, or when Gladio challenged me to a footrace in the sand at dawn, or when Ignis invited me to help him prepare breakfast, but I fell in love with this game. I have so many people I want to thank for this experience, and more than that, there are so many emotions I have to process. I take a few days to collect myself, leaving Lucis to explore other worlds. But then I return, determined to carry on loving and living in this virtual world, if only for hours at a time. I am pleased to find I am welcomed with open arms.

There is word of earthquakes taking place near Hammerhead. I begin my journey anew.

[scottymcgeesterwrites]

Final Fantasy VIII Review

(A serious review this time, without spoilers.)

Year: 1999

Original Platform: PlayStation One

Also available on: PC, PlayStation Store

Version I Played: PlayStation One

Synopsis:

Squall Leonhart is a new recruit of SeeD, a mercenary team protecting the world. Rinoa is a resistance fighter against the Republic of Galbadia, led by the Sorceress Edea who is suddenly hellbent on conquering the neighboring nations. Squall and his team attempt to assassinate Edea, but the mission goes awry.

Gameplay:

Final Fantasy VIII throws nearly every previous battle system out of the window. It’s nearly as radical as Final Fantasy II’s battle system. Enemies around the world map average their levels according to your average level among your characters. You only need 1,000 EXP (experience points) to rise to each level, unlike the other games where the EXP needed rises after each level. But that doesn’t mean your character levels up all their stats – that all depends on the summons, known in this game as Guardian Forces.

 Unlike other games, summons are crucial to the gameplay, despite not being crucial to the story itself. The Junction System has you “junction” each character with a GF, allowing you to assign different battle commands (Item, Draw, Magic, GF, etc). If you don’t assign a character a GF, all they can do in battle is “Attack.”

That gets super annoying when you’re moving around GFs between characters a lot but you forget to assign that one character a summon right before a major boss battle, so then they can’t do shit.

The drawing system is my favorite aspect of Final Fantasy VIII’s gameplay. Instead of harnessing magic by a points system (such as MP), you draw magic from enemies. Magic is only limited by the number of spells. For example, you fight an enemy and draw 5 Curas from them. You now have 5 Cura spells. You can hold up to 99 of any spell. You don’t have to worry about ethers or running out of MP. I guess it’s an incentive to battle enemies, as they are resources for magic.

But the way the GFs work annoy me the most. You to call upon GFs at any time in any battle for an infinite number of times. This doesn’t give you any incentive to even try battling. If something annoyed me, I just said, “Fuck it” and spammed GFs. Not only that, but you have to sit through the short cinematic sequence of your summon every time you call them. I must have viewed Shiva’s summoning sequence ten-thousand fucking times before finishing the game. This makes battling feel repetitive, tedious, and unenjoyable. Battling was a chore.

The Junction System overall is so complicated that you have to go through a tutorial within the first twenty minutes of the game. It’s aggravating enough already to sit through Quistis going, “Blah, blah. blah” but it’s actually super important because if you don’t pay attention then this game will be tedious.

The final battle though? That shit was epic. Hard. But epic. One of the best final battles.

Graphics:

This game took a different route in giving realistic proportions to its characters. While that’s a cool idea on paper, the overall effect is. . .boring? Almost every other Final Fantasy game has a cast of very distinct characters, like various species, age groups, or wildly different clothing. To suddenly play a Final Fantasy game with what looks like real people – like Bob, Joe and Jill – seems drab. Selphie by far has been the least interesting character to me. When your characters look and feel like NPCs, it’s hard to become invested in them.

I wasn’t a fan of many of the backdrops because for whatever reason I had trouble discerning some doors. I couldn’t tell what I was looking at in the background sometimes, like if there was a switch or button that I had to press.

The cinematics are great though – some of the best in the series. It has the most memorable opening sequence of any game – the duel between Squall and his rival Seifer. The cinematics were a MAJOR step up from Final Fantasy VII.

Story:

Oh hey, so here’s a serious, non-spoiler, non-inflammatory review of Final Fantasy VIII.

Put this story side-by-side with Final Fantasy VII and you can see how they carried on the inspirations. Once again, the story is set in a more modern setting with cars, trains, etc. Squall is Cloud. Rinoa is Aerith. Etc., etc.

Squall Leonhart is the epitome of angst. You will spend the entire game rolling your eyes at Squall’s angsty introspective thoughts about the situations he’s in and people around him. Squall is essentially a bad version of Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy VII. Take Cloud but only take his cool design and angsty responses. That’s Squall Leonhart. Squall literally has no interesting qualities about him other than his physical design. He can rock that jacket and that scar on his face. Squall’s “romance” with Rinoa Heartilly is also a cardboard copy of Cloud and Aerith’s romance. Squall meets Rinoa by a chance meeting at a military ball. She serves as the optimistic, lively counterweight to Squall’s stoicism. But there’s hardly any depth other than Squall finding her pretty and Rinoa thinking he’s cute and handsome.

The cast of characters is bland, to say the least. They are composed of other students (Quistis being an instructor though) at Balamb Garden (except Irvine, who is a student of another Garden). They look boring. Their introductions are boring. Balamb Garden sounds like a cool idea – a mercenary school – except it plays off more like a poorly written high school anime drama, which is lame. At one point, Squall’s friends – Zell, Selphie, Irvine and Quistis – all try to conspire to get him to talk to Rinoa. You actually have to play through that of the plot and watch it unfold. But Squall tries to understand Rinoa’s upbeat attitude with lots of question marks in his thought bubbles and mumbling, “Whatever”. It’s jarring to sit through four discs of this over and over.

The plot is a butchered mess. After Disc 1 is when the plot gets strange like a fever dream. Plot twists happen left and right after Disc 1 without any rhyme or reason. Very little is explained and many twists are too convenient. Seifer is introduced as Squall’s rival and Rinoa’s original love interest, but then he inexplicably turns evil. In no dialogue or plot points do we ever learn why Seifer switches sides. None at all.

There’s a particular interesting fan theory that actually makes infinitely more sense than the story that Square gave us. Here’s a hot tip – when fan theories start making perfect sense, you probably didn’t write a good story.

The best part of Final Fantasy VIII is actually Laguna Loire. Throughout the story, Squall and his friends pass out for mysterious reasons and you are introduced to Laguna Loire and his two buddies, Ward and Kiros (who are reminiscent of Biggs and Wedge from Final Fantasy VII). They partake in events set in the past. Laguna Loire hearkens back to the pre-Final Fantasy VII heroes – heroes like Bartz and Locke. He’s funny and charming. I wish the game was about him and his friends instead of angsty Squall and his cardboard friends.

 So, for four discs you play through these parallel plots and then they merge by the end. The payoff isn’t so amazing. I expected something better. Time travel is involved, albeit in a way that doesn’t make sense. Time compression! The ability to compress time into a singularity because . . . because why again? I guess you don’t have to wait for the next season of Game of Thrones anymore. Is that what that means?  

Other notes I want to mention – Balamb Garden is an awful, clunky airship and the world map is the least interesting world map in the entire series. The only remotely interesting place is Fisherman’s Horizon.

 Final Fantasy VIII’s story is the second most radical departure from the series, the first being Final Fantasy X, which I will get to later. However, Final Fantasy VII lacks any meaningful depth or existential crisis for its main character to explore. There’s no grand critique on the meaning or life or anything like that. There’s one slight existential question that Rinoa faces near the end but it’s practically nothing. I admire what they tried to do but it fell flat on its face. It’s dull and insipid with its characters and the plot doesn’t steer in a clear direction.

Overall, I admire what they were trying to do by adding time travel to the story. But it became such a warbled mess that it failed to deliver. They took all the cool parts of Final Fantasy VII but didn’t bother to give them depth.

Music:

The music is the biggest highlight of Final Fantasy VIII. Laguna Loire’s battle theme is sexy as hell. It made me so sad to return to Squall’s timeline, because I wouldn’t get to hear that music again for a while. The world map theme irritated me. It has a jingle that didn’t jive well with wandering around. It probably also didn’t help that the world map is dull to run around in.

The game’s theme, Liberi Fatali, is damn epic. Liberi Fatali does have actual lyrics but the famous lines “Fithos lusec wecos vinosec” is actually nonsense. Maybe that nonsense reflects the nonsense that is the actual story. It would have been nice if they had actually incorporated those words into the story somehow, like some magic spell like “abracadabra”.

The love theme is Eyes on Me, performed by Faye Wong. It’s the first time that Uematsu composed a pop song for a Final Fantasy game. Its lyrics are nice and of course fitting for the love story. I like hearing it.

There are no other character themes in this score. The focus was all on Squall and Rinoa having their silly angsty romance.

The final boss theme is actually one of my favorites. It starts out eerie with the chorus singing “Fithos lusec wecos vinosec” but in this drawn out, ghost-like manner. Then the music picks up sounding like a typical Final Fantasy battle theme, then goes crazy from there on out.

Notable Score:

Liberi Fatali.

 Verdict:

My least favorite Final Fantasy game. I would place it right at the bottom tier. The story is absolute gibberish. The gameplay could be fun once you wrap your head around it, which I didn’t and so it was a pain in the ass for me. Finding all the Guardian Forces can be fun. Laguna Loire is the best part of the story, and that’s really it. At the end of the day, probably put this one off until you play the better, more important Final Fantasy games. You are not missing anything if you never play this game.

Direct Sequel?

No.

Keep it that way.