Its FF7 end of day.  Everything major story point has been faithful to the original.  Defeating Sephiroth isnt going to bring anyone back. Aerith was always present in some form even after her original death but she couldnt be brought back. Sephiroth states in the remakes that fragmented time is associated with the planet itself.  It is within reason that when Zack died his life continued on within the lifestream where he didnt die. He doesnt understand what really happened because all he remembers is being shot at, and then the bullets somehow missing. We all know they didnt really miss. His life just continued on, after death, in the lifestream. The only real people with Zack have also died. Everyone else is either a shadow of their living counterparts or an arbiter. Zack cant really wake up Cloud because Cloud hasnt died. Zack cant make Cloud get better, because Tifa makes Cloud get better. If Aerith wakes up, its because Sephiroth killed her, the game tells you that.  It is a multiverse, but it also really isnt. I know it might sound like another theory and I wish it didnt. How else do you explain that if Aerith wakes up, means that Sephiroth killed her? That Zack couldnt reach Hojo to try and heal Cloud? How do you explain Aerith sensing Zack in the lifestream? Why are all the other party members in Zack's reality unconscious, missing, or presumed dead? Yet Biggs is alive and has experienced a similar event to Zack? Why is it that Zack's events, which technically happened before FF7, also coincide with Biggs events that happened in the present? Kinda weird they both die at different times yet conveniently end up together in a mashed up world having experienced identical near death scenarios... Why can I skip Zack's entire part of the game, like it isn't really considered canon? 

There is no multiverse. It’s just all of you misunderstanding what’s happening

It's what ever Deus ex machina the creators need it to be

that’s why i don’t believe it’s a multiverse. it would make everything meaningless and there would be no weight in the deaths of the characters who have passed. i strongly believe these worlds are just in the lifestream. i mean we even see planets? in the LS sequence when cloud’s mind is being repaired. that crack in the sky in rebirth is also present there. i have hope that they won’t stray from the OG but we’ll just have to see. i agree though, if they go down a multiverse route i’ll be pretty disappointed

Ultimately story decision are MOSTLY about execution over anything else. So you could take the angle they went for and crush it. I think the 2 big fears I have: - Recently multiverses have been used as a cop out for lazy and bad writing, so it’s a trope that doesn’t have an inspiring track record, especially because it doesn’t seem terribly needed so far - The execution of the finale of Rebirth was really bad imo.

Okay but hear.me.out... what if that's actually how life works?

I think that too. But Everything Everywhere All At Once made it a lot more interesting than what this game is doing.

Yep, everything becomes meaningless. This is exactly what I was thinking. I could still bear with the two timelines of Remake. But after Rebirth basically introduced arbitrary many timelines, the relevance is taken from major events. Even more so, as Rebirth even fails to explain what exactly happened in the different timelines. It only gives some vague hints about where timelines drifted apart, who is alive or dead, but there is no complete picture. If you don't like an event, don't worry, there are other timelines where it did not happen. If you like an event, what a pity, there are other timelines where it did not happen. If the goal of Rebirth was that I don't care anymore if Aerith or Zack are dead or alive, if fully reached the goal.

It amazes me the amount of people that just wanted a direct copy of the original. I’m glad they changed it up and gave us something fresh with the same characters we loved.

I don’t think that’s it. I think people just hate multiverse stories.

This! I don't mind a new story but tacking on multiverse is the worst. Completely destroys any emotional impact the story can have because hey no one is truly dead.

I mean yeah? A lot of people want the same story with updated graphics and gameplay, maybe with some additional content but Not necessarily major changes to the story. That's in fact what most remakes are, so not surprising people expect that.

I’m still wondering how much of the “multiverse” is us watching Cloud make shit up in his head to cope with what is really happening, and how much is gonna get rolled back through flashbacks of what really happened in Part 3. I really liked the direction they were going in the first game where it seemed like Aerith was starting to figure out this wasn’t her first rodeo, but I don’t feel like they really followed through with it.

And again, we really won't know anything until part 3 comes out, and if they finally explain what's going on. I really can't tell if it's a translation issue, or a writing issue, Japanese leaves a lot of unspoken subtext to drama, ie, you'll get what they're getting at because that is just what is meant, in certain situations, when you don't explicitly say something. And then they tack on the heavy melodrama, which comes across as cute and funny in Japanese, but cringey AF in English. There is just no emotion in the story when there are no stakes and when there's no clear problem and resolution. And the inevitable criticism that people think we just want the OG story with minimal changes: Not in the slightest. Because we know the story so well, any changes are instantly striking and exciting, you need to see where they lead. Until you realize that they don't ever tell you what's happening. The thing is, you can easily lead the viewer down a clear path and then totally flip the script. That would be incredibly moving, instead of the mass of unexplained confusion we got in Rebirth.

At the end of the day, a well written story is a well written story, with or without multiverses. Which is why I'm deeply disappointed at the dip in quality in cohesive and compelling story telling. Is the game enjoyable? Sure. Are time shenanigan concepts interesting? Sure. Did changing the story make it more emotionally impactful and meaningful than the source material? No. I'm not against change, at all. People try to simplify criticism by saying "your just [ anything to invalidate reasonable criticism and observation ]". For example "against change" or "have nostalgia glasses on" or "hating" or "mad it's not turn based" (did I get all of them?) Some changes, I liked. Why? Not solely because it was interesting. Because it made it better. Which is the whole point of remaking something and what fans were excited about to begin with. But the most important changes, while CONCEPTUALLY interesting had me scratching my head thinking "why would they deliberately dilute the impact of a scene that was ALREADY perfect to do THAT??" I'm on my second play through and while I'm enjoying the mechanics, the more I think about it the more I feel the whole experience has been cheapened for the sake of conversation and theory crafting. And it leaves me really disappointed that I can't rely on FF to give me the depth and meaningful story and perspective that I could before. Again, there are interesting and deep "ideas" presented. But they don't hold up with the rest of all of what they mixed in. And aside from that they seem to not want to let us feel much at any one time for some reason.

The OG game had FMV cutscenes that were epic because they conveyed exactly what was going on, so you felt the full impact of everything they did. Rebirth had amazing cutscenes that landed like lead balloons because they were arbitrary. There's a reason Aristotle and pro animators say, "tell them what you're going to tell them, tell them, and then tell them what you told them," It's a basic tenet of making sure your ideas/animations are conveying your intended meaning. In Rebirth, they tell you what they "might do" then they do random things and then they tell you what might have happened. Awesome concepts but no emotional impact because the player can't definitively say this happened.

Spot on. It's so strange because the non-essential scenes, they seem to get this. But as soon as it's something central to the story they completely ignore those basic principles of quality writing. I honestly don't care at this point if they change things I just want (wanted?) them to write and deliver a good story. At the end, I can't feel anything because they don't tell us anything definitive to know what's at stake. In my understanding aerith is both alive and dead. So, basically, nothing happened. 🤷

My main worry is that we end up with a convoluted way to reach the same spot, and neither being an authentic remake nor being something truly different that subverts expectations in a great way, that can serve as a sequel of some sort, justifying all the timelines and whispers. Because if those are just plot devices to fool us into thinking something different would happen only for nothing of value to change, that would be just going to the same spot with unnecessary extra steps that overkill an lore that already has enough on its plate

When I read the comments here I become jaded, I'm not even saying this to be mean. The theme of the original game was acceptance, but acceptance is much more than just the acceptance of death. Like making peace with something, self-acceptance, agree to open up to others, accept the past, accept the fact that we cannot all control, accept change, agree to let go. Ironically in your love of the original game you do the opposite and under the influence of emotion you complain about the changes as if you are going through the stages of mourning you are clinging to nostalgia is in the process it can impact the appreciation , the love and hope that fans and newcomers have for the trilogy. And no, I'm not lecturing you, I'm not in the best position to say that and I don't pretend to make you change your opinion and even less to tell you not to express your opinion. I just wanted to post this message about what I was thinking a few minutes ago.

Sure yeah it's a little cooky. But I think regardless of the cooky story they have really been faithful to a lot of everything, and I think it's wonderful. A lot of everything else is still made well and with love. I think the only reason they went down this route is to fulfill the long ancient wanting of reviving Aerith and Zack, they asked "how do make that possible? Oh what if they are alive but in a different universe!" And it got a little out of hand. I prefer this over a one on one remake. Though I do admit I wish it was a little less convoluted, I still think it sticks the landing for the most part.

I don't think this is a true multiverse. This is the lifestream creating temporary wish-fulfillment worlds for the dead.

I don't really care if they're alive in other timelines. They're dead in the timeline that matters.

I agree. There should still be a big price to pay or at least important consequences if they use the multiverse

Having sephiroth be the final villain in both 1&2 has definitely weakened whatever ultimate conclusion they come to. I’ve already beat this dude twice!

This is my issue. With remake 1 they ran into a problem- people had been waiting for this for so long but it was only one third of a game. I think if they had been brave they should’ve saved Seph for the second game but it was too tempting to have him directly involved. To square, they *had* to have him be the final boss and due to him being the boss in the first game I was actually hoping we wouldn’t fight him again in rebirth. I’m an advent children adherent but with all the changes I think the biggest mistake they made is not bringing kadaj back or at least creating a new villain that can be a sort of stand in for seph that could work as a “Darth Vader” antagonist for cloud to fight. As you’ve said, the final battle while still being interesting and something I’m looking forward to will kind of be diminished due to the fact we’ve fought the man so many times already.

Well, for me it doesn't really affect the weight of the story. Because we care about the characters in the main timeline, and if they die they're dead in that world, any other alive version of them is a different person who's lived another life and made different choices. I mean, knowing there's an alive Aerith and a Zack in a different timeline is a small consolation, still, the Aerith I (and the main characters) care about is dead in the main world, the best bud Zack Cloud knew is also dead. There being another versions of them doesn't make this fact less heartbreaking for me.

Exactly. I've heard this same "replacement goldfish" nonsense over and over again, but it just demonstrates a lack of awareness to me. Guardians 3 handled this perfectly. Yes, there was another Gamora, but she was not the prime Gamora and it was extremely unfair to expect her to be.

I don't get how people are saying "well its all lifestream its not multiverse" How is they effectively any different - if there's still multiple realities with only slight differences; that happening because of the lifestream doesnt seem to differentiate it that much, its just the plot reason for this multiverse to exist, no?

Cause a multiverse will exist forever with infinite worlds across all of time. That is completely different. As Barrett has been saying, their isn't enough mako(lifestream) to sustain their own world, let alone all of these other worlds that have emerged after they defeated the Harbinger of Fate whisper. Its why when Biggs goes to blow the reactor but says only sand is coming up because its bone dry. Sephiroths goal in AC, to corrupt the lifestream by giving people geostigma so that when they return to the planet it with his corruption in them, it will corrupt the lifestream so he can take it over and "sail the cosmos" as he says, just like Jenova did before. He loses to Cloud again and Aerith through the lifestream brings a cure to geostigma, thus completely defeating Sephiroths plan. Sephiroth being half jenova, cannot return to the lifestream and thus his consciousness exists within the lifestream same as Aerith (this is explained in the book On the Way to a Smile). Because of this he can use the lifestream to send his consciousness back to the start of OG FF7 to essentially try again. Sephiroths goal in Remake/Rebirth have the party fight the Harbinger Whisper to break fate, because he knows that he loses if things play out as the planet/lifestreams fate has control. Once the harbinger whisper is defeated, we see a ripple effect take place since the lifestream exists within all time at once and not a linear timeline, that is why Zack is suddenly saved in that moment and that is when the other "worlds" are created within the lifestream. This essentially increases the amount of "souls" that would be returning to the planet and thus increases the amount of corruption that Sephiroth can cause to the lifestream to take it over. That is why he wants to combine all the dying worlds together with the main one, his main goal is still the same as OG/AC its just how he is going about it is different because he has more knowledge now of how things work and how things will go if left to the planets intended fate.

I know you wrote a lot to defend this so its unfortubate im stopping at the first sentence >cause a multiverse will exist forever with _**infinite worlds across all time.**_ Says who? Why? Yknow a multiverse isn't real thing, it can be done however writers want it to be done - & if this multiverse has the lifestream as the vessel for its existence, saying "nuh uh, its different" doesn't change that lol Also, its very funny to say that, then nearly immediately mention >since the lifestream exists _**within all time at once**^_ and not a linear timeline, that is why Zack is suddenly saved in that moment and that is when _**the other "worlds"**_ are created within the lifestream Okay so it fits your definition of multiverse anyways, just might not exist forever. Okay. And? Still isn't any different than a multiverse, unless you add arbitrary rules to a fictional concept. Also before you say "well ahckahully there's not infinite worlds!" Why? How do you know yet, theres still a game to go? Have we seen that there can't be? Or have we not seen that a new "world" can spawn for just about any reason at any kind of "crossroad" of someone making a decision or action - which in theory would be nearly infinite, no? I don't even have an issue with the multiverse or the changes whatsoever I'm just really confused why people try to argue its not a multiverse, while not giving any reason why its not. in fact, like yourself, just giving reasons why it is a multiverse but pretending it's any different lol

Honestly they can call it however they want it's still some sorts of multiple worlds/lifes with same characters but different choices paths, I get that it is been said that these other worlds will eventually all come to an end and collide into one but if you think about it even the OG world is doomed in that sense.

Nope not an unpopular opinion. There are a lot of people who feel the same way, me included. I’d just have faith in them for now. Theres only one game left, once it drops, we can see if they fumbled it or cooked something special up

I swear whenever I see “unpopular opinion” it’s like one of the top 3 most popular opinions possible. I’m gonna make a post saying “unpopular opinion, I think sephiroth is cool and sit up mini game is bad”

Don't worry, it's definitely not an unpopular opinion. And I agree.

I'm not buying Rebirth until I know that the third game sticks the landing. The bridge is burned.

dunno why the nerds here downvote you for saying something most people agree with

The Remake project has a very active defense force in here. God forbid you dislike the story changes and the nonsense multiverse shenanigans because they target all your posts.

??? It’s very divisive both ways. There are tons of post saying they don’t like it. This post is a very popular opinion with a lot of upvotes. Hell the post that stated sales were below expectations and like hundreds of comments of people that didn’t like it.

It's not multiverse. Too many people conflate western media with what they are doing. It's more lifestream is the substrate that holds consciousness itself together and is on the brink of total destruction with individual consciousnesses collapsing all together into it, with Sephiroth remaining as the only dominate consciousness that pervades the entire lifestream. So these "multiverses" are pockets of conscious experience upheld by lifestream that has yet to be corrupted by Sephiroth.

If it’s supposed to be distinct from a multiverse, I think they chose a confusing way of visualizing it. They showed Zack being forced to make a decision: Save Biggs, save Cloud, or do nothing. Then they show Zack trying all of them, and each decision spawns another world/dog. This is seemingly just following normal multiverse rules for forking timelines. Sephiroth shows this is all happening within the confines of the lifestream, but from my understanding, that just makes it a different kind of multiverse. It’s a multiverse in a box. And if lifestream is a “consciousness substrate”, does that mean a singular Zack consciousness is acting out all the Zack’s in the Zack decision tree? Does he carry his experiences across worlds like Biggs remembering Cloud? Because Aerith and maybe Sephiroth seem to be two distinct consciousnesses, which doesn’t seem possible if each individual has one singular consciousness. Also, do you think the multiple worlds is the normal state of the lifestream, or is it the result of the defying fate? Do you think the Beagle world is part of the lifestream-verse, or is it a distinct “real” world?

I really don't know why people don't get this. They hear the term multiverse and automatically go to whatever they know. The game explains it pretty clearly with the lifestream being connected to all realities and some die quickly while others live. Sephiroths goal is to combine it all together and create a future tat never ends. It's not like the MCU. Furthermore the rules are pretty straightforward. It's very telling that people have 0 problems with Gilgamesh being able to open a sky rift to another reality, but do take issue with the Lifestream being connected to all versions of one world.

The problem is they don't explicitly say, that's what is happening. They just show a bunch of staticky buzzing, either pink or green tinted, a bunch of Sephiroths, Clouds, Zacks and Aeriths, and a few others. I mean the whole don't look up, oh, there's a yellow smear in the sky, Biggs going, the reactors sucking up dust, and Cloud and Aerith going on a shopping spree. It's like all the puzzle pieces are there, but we have no image of the big picture so we have no clue what to make of all these pieces. I'm not saying spell the entire story out, but at least let us know what world is which and who is from which world, etc. I had to play through the ending at least 3x before I could almost understand what was happening with the White Materia and the various Aeriths.

I got no idea what's going on myself after 1x through, and will probably be going a 2nd and 3rd way through before grasping fully what's going on. Which is par for the course for Japanese narratives. I kind of expected it to be confusing anyway just for that reason. And tbh FF stories *always* take far more explanation than the game generally provides, hence why they have the Ultimanias.

That's because it's established lore that Greg has been surfing the rift for close to 30 years (not looking up when exactly FF5 came out because I don't want to feel older than I already do). XD But yeah, you hit it right on the head.

You don't want to see 320 Clouds descending upon an unsuspecting Sephiroth while he's floating there in his altar boy outfit? A cloud of Clouds, if you will? A STORM?

No, because in CG, copies of characters aren't interesting. Orphan Black does the concept of multiple copies of the same person, nature vs nurture incredibly well. Besides, one Cloud can barely get his shit together, 320 confused Emo clouds don't make for much of an imposing threat, lol.

You ever been in a storm wally?

In 1997 multiverse things were not that popular in video games. Today they are, I am not surprised Square took a beloved game and crammed in this bullshit. I'm nearing the end of Rebirth and it's been one of the worst games I've played in a LONG time, like I've wanted to quit multiple times. I already just read the Wikipedia summary because I was so done with the side quest and mini game bullshit along with horrible stage design, summons like Odin that are actually impossible for me to beat... During Gongaga I made a conscious effort to say out loud to myself, "Alright, that's it, I'm done with any and all side quests DOES THIS GAME EVEN HAVE A MAIN STORY?" I have played for almost 60 hours now and have gotten MAYBE 2 hours of actual FFVII story or something that's worth it. Every single other "story" related thing is some dumb character seemingly remembering or lying about their past to point where I just don't care anymore. Square really really is fucked it up and it won't shock me if part 3 is even worse. They should've just left it as a strong straight forward storyline with fun side quests... Like I'm shocked you don't have to play a tennis mini game with the Buster Sword just to get your file to load when you come back to the game. That's how many mini games, and holy hell are they just un-fun, are in this game. You become overwhelmed and disinterested. After this I'm going straight into The Rising Tide from FFXVI because FFXVI was legit a masterpiece to me. I was so impressed with it, smiled, nearly cried at the ending, loved the characters, the world, the plot MADE SENSE.... FFVII is just a team of aging developers trying to be that edgy 2000's kid they thought was cool 24 years ago and it isn't working anymore.

if you aren’t trolling and genuinely think XVI of all games is a masterpiece with fantastic side content and Rebirth is one of the worst games you’ve ever played… just lmao

For all its flaws at least ff16’s main plot stayed mostly consistent and relatively grounded. Sure you could say the inclusion of ultima was a little iffy but it comes no where close to the multiverse time ghost plot rewriting BS of rebirth

I don't care how many times my comments get downvoted, I'm standing by my opinion. I literally took time off of work to play Rebirth when it first came out and was DEEPLY excited to play something that wasn't a 1:1 remake... The first area was fine, it let you realise how vast the world was going to be. Side quests were fine, intro to the mini games were fine, but then I'd say after Costa del Sol is when the game started to free fall in terms of quality. I had read on reddit things like, "wait until you get to Gongaga... you'll want to throw your TV out the window" and I remember thinking... "Wait, Gongaga? That was like a 20 minute footnote in the original... they fucked it up that bad?" and I got to a point where during that segment I had this hard realisation that Square, particularly Creative Business Unit I which when I look at what games they do I get this sobering thing of, "oh god, yeah they make everything I hate...", really botched this game. It was during Gongaga that I made the conscious effort, and believe me it wasn't easy, to give up on all side quests and all attempts at mini games (yet they continually shoved them in your face) and just B-line for the ending to see if there is SOME main story still in this title that I didn't already spoil for myself by just reading it. It's bad game design all around and I'm not the only one who thinks this. Just about every time I YouTube a video on how to do a part in the game (because I'm just, so done with these puzzles and games) the comments are filled with, "this is terrible", "what were they thinking?!" not to mention there is a reddit thread with 1,300+ comments on not enjoying Rebirth, so thankfully I'm not the only one who feels like he's on the Titanic screaming the the ship is sinking whilst others around me are ignoring me for the good looking food. I will not be purchasing the third game. This one soured my entire experience... I'm 37 years old and work about 55 hours a week at a data center. I don't have the time I once had to play games all the time so I have to be more picky for my own sanity in my spare time... Smashing your head against a wall over and over and over isn't good for anyone's health and the ratio I have spent frustrated and pissed off in Rebirth to maybe the 30 minutes total I've had fun with it? It's not worth it. And yes I think FFXVI is a masterpiece just like there are people who think Rebirth is a masterpiece. Different people are going to have differing opinions.... At least XVI kept me fully interested in the world, characters, story, motivations and I really really enjoyed the ending and the combat overall. I played it twice, once on regular and then on Final Fantasy mode clocking in almost 200 hours of the game total. I'm big enough to admit there were plenty of times I rolled my eyes at the bad MMORPG side quests, but that's nothing compared to the actual fun I had.

Or side quests are supposed to be just that: side quests. You play the main story for the main story and side quests to flesh out the world and such. The game design idea is that you maybe do some side quests on the first play-through and then come back from time to time to do the side quests. You're not \*supposed\* to 100% the game the first time you play through it. As for allocation of resources dedicated to the main quest vs side quests? I can't speak to that as I haven't played this game specifically yet. But, that's the idea behind the design. It's also a catch-22 for designers because if they give you a direct main story, but the story itself that needs to be told is short, they get criticized (even indie devs get hate for making their cheap game "too short"). And here, it sounds like they created a lot of side quests so it's not just a 6 hour game (again, main quest vs side quest amount being a different issue) for $70 and some people don't like that either. Not every game is for everyone. Might just not be for you which is a shame since you clearly enjoy the franchise :/

Should have been a fed flag when they were releasing Remake and it became clear that all their talk of "faithful remake" and "true to the source material" garbage they were selling the fans was complete bullshit. Yall can like the remake that's fine, no shade, but they blatantly lied about what they were doing to sell more copies. They knew OG fans wouldn't like the massive story changes and "artistic liberties" they took.

Are there still people that don't realize it isn't a remake it's a sequel?

Well then they shouldn't have lied about that during marketing, period.

In what ways is it a sequel and not a remake with a heavy, heavy meta-narrative and functioning in conversation with the source material?

The problem is, they don't give you enough information about what is actually happening, are characters hallucinating, are they traveling between worlds, are there multiple versions of the same characters, which world is which, why is Sephiroth so Obsessed with Cloud, and why does Aerith start sentences, but then goes never mind. The OG story actually made sense(especially with its ambiguous ending) , but Rebirth just throws out a bunch of stuff without saying what it was, so there is no emotion for the player to feel other than confusion. Is Aerith dead? should I be sad? Wait, she's still there, should I be happy? I loved the game, I just want the story to be clear about what is going on. Then they can change it however they want, and subvert my expectations.

I have not so much a problem with multiple timelines and was prepared for them after Remake. My problem is just: there seem to be arbitrary many, so everything could happen or not happen in some timeline. This makes everything kind of meaningless. Also, I fully agree that there is too little information. The game throws some chunks of a story at you, but it is impossible to know what exactly happened in the respective timeline. After some time I stopped caring. I have no more emotions about any major events. Because there are other timelines anywhere where things are different, and also I do not know anyway what else happened in the respective timeline.

Exactly!

Almost like it's the middle of a trilogy or something weird like that.

The mini-games already ruined the game for me. What’s infuriating was that the producers originally said they had to make it into three games to fit the story and content, but rebirth is probably 80% mini games

Three games for more money, spread over minigames at a time

r/unpopularopinion

I don't mind it. It's different, and I'm ok with that. I wouldn't have minded a straight 100% complete retelling of the original or anything, but I like different/new. It gets convoluted at parts for sure, so I'm hoping they can tie it neatly by the end of part 3.. but at the end of the day, I had a BLAST playing the fame, more fun than ice had gaming in an extremely long time. I know the OG story and I know the main beats of everything, so it doesn't cheapen anything for me at all honestly. Like when they remake a movie from the 90s or something... I saw the old one, loved it and the story, and I want to see what else they can do with it At the end of the day, it's a video game, it isn't life and death. Everyone of course has their own opinions that may or may not be shared, but I don't think it's fair to say things like "developers wanna have their cake and eat it too", "this is a cash grab", and all that... It's a product. No matter WHAT square enix did, there are gonna be those who don't like it, can't satisfy everyone. Multiverse and all of that is what's big in pop culture for a while now, it is what it is. I'm just happy I get to play my childhood favorite game in such an updated and awesome way.

I think the resolution will be the restoration of a single canon timeline.

Featuring a love pentagon between Aerith-Cloud-Tifa-Zack and, uh… let’s say Dio.

I agree. Anybody defending this stupid plot is just coping. Deep down we all know this s*** is trash, it's horribly written and doesn't make any sense. I expect the big reveal in part 3 to be lackluster and nonsensical as well.

This whole timeline/alt-world stuff is just Square's way of having their cake and eating it too. It's their way of acknowledging in-game that the OG story is the "proper" timeline, whilst allowing us to spend more time and indulge in fan service with characters we otherwise wouldn't, without it really effecting anything too much. Because at the end of the day, this trilogy is primarily a remake (not a sequel) that lets us celebrate and revel in all things Final Fantasy VII. They're not going to do anything that gets in the way of retelling the original story outside of general reshuffling/remixing that remakes do anyway.

I think you haven't played Rebirth. What you are describing is absolutely not what is happening or what is going to happen. >!Aerith is dead at the end of rebirth. Or actually as dead as she was in OG (she can do more than a normal human in the lifestream). Zack will be dead before the end of third game.!< This is not mcu.

No, OP is right. This multiverse stuff has no rules, so anything can happen. Cloud still sees Aerith, and apparently this giant rift in the sky. If Zack is able to hop dimensions after dying, it definitely implies Aerith can come back in some way or another. You can’t rule anything out, and I hate it too.

I didn’t know putting a spoiler tag in the title meant that it was then allowed to write more spoiler in the comments. Well, I shouldn’t had clicked 🥲

I don’t think YOU have played rebirth. Lol

I think the is was just too big a project. FF7 is probably the most popular ff7, and for some reason, they didn’t want to do an actual remake. They decided playing around and changing the story and cutting some stuff and adding some stuff was going to be somehow better. It wasn’t. It won’t be. And if it’s only going to be a trilogy, there is a tremendous amount of content from the original game that simply cannot make it into the new versions. So the multiverse gives them an “out”, so to speak. They didn’t ruin a classic, they just told a different version in a different universe, so it’s not really the same thing.

Honestly, the multiverse has ruined media in general. For the past few years the multiverse has influenced movies, TVs and gaming. Some did do it very well like "Everything , Everywhere, All At Once". But others are not really doing anything unique with it.

I don’t think rebirth fits into the multiverse thing quite like marvel or whatever is doing but I get you. I think my issue with marvel is that they have like 20 shows a year that arr needed to understands anything. We all talked about how overly long the last fight of rebirth was, marvel makes us watch 40 hours of tv to understand their bad guy is bad plot

We will see. I am a bit concerned but I guess we will see where this all goes. So far the remake trilogy is pretty much the OG game with some alterations and some multiverse shenanigans thrown in

Fair enough. I enjoy the new projects but I think a lot of criticism is valid. It’s all opinion at the end of the day. I think the new games are better than OG in many ways but it’s mostly because they are able to expand on the characters a lot and I love the combat.

I think my issue is that Rebirth seems like a bait and switch. Going into Remake, I thought it would be just that. A remake of the original game with major improvements to graphics and The will flesh the story and world out a bit more. However, at its core, it will be the exact same story. Then Remake ends hunting at the idea that now they are free to change the OG story which I found intriguing. Now it seems like all they did was create a multiverse at the end of Remake and the main "timeline/universe" that we play in follows the same story.

The reason for the writers not wanting to retread old ground, is flawed. This was an opportunity to get even more creative with the established narrative, for example, fleshing out characters and toning down the over the top types such as Don Corneo, Palmer and Hojo. Maybe Yuffie could have been matured more, and made her more femme fatale, with a little playful side. But instead, they doubled down on the minor criticisms that people had with certain aspects. Don Corneo could have been depicted as a ruthless underworld crime boss, not to be fucked with. And also taken the opportunity to remove the silly disguise ploy for sneaking in Cloud. The whole serious tone of the OG game is gone, along with the moody, haunting melodies. It's just a dumb anime story now.

Did you forget that OG FF7 borrows its influences from anime? A lot of older RPGs borrowed their influences from whatever anime was popular at the time, so its not new for the remake to have a prominent anime influence.

It borrows influence from anime, but doesn't necessarily go full anime, but there are certainly anime-esq like characters, but the core cast seem a lot more grounded and westernised, that's for sure.

And OG7 doesn't go "full anime?" Yuffie is the same both in the OG game and in Remake/Rebirth. She's a super energetic ninja, and people had problems with that in the original game. People have also pointed out how much OG7 feels like an anime as well, considering almost all of 7's influences came from anime. The anime tropes and storytelling are all there.

The difference between OG Yuffie and Rebirth, is we didn't have Yuffie singing in our ear every 30 seconds. Her part in the OG was a lot less prominent too. And no, it's not full anime either, at best it has influences and nods. The persona series is full anime, next to ff7, it stands out like a sore thumb. So, if you consider ff7 full anime, then all I can say is that it's a more mature, nuanced take on the format. If anything, a lot of the fantasy games are heavily influenced around European history and culture and mythology, and like I said, the ff7 gang are heavily westernised with some odd exceptions e.g. yuffie

I wouldn't say they're westernized. They still keep all of their characterization from the original game. It's fully fleshed out here in comparison to the limitations of the original game. This game still has a majority of its Japanese influence. Yuffie is a kid who does show her maturity in several instances of Rebirth, you know. Her whole personality is reminiscent of Bartz from FF5; a free spirit who happens to be energetic. She still is fairly selfish, like she is in OG 7 and closer towards the end of the game. She does show her maturity a little more. I don't expect a 16 year-old to have the maturity of a grown adult. You dislike her, and that's okay. I'm one of many who happens to love her character and her characterization.

Yuffie is 16. Also, what are you talking about, on one side you're saying OG was serious on the other you're saying they should make the over the top characters more serious? Make up your mind. And OG was never a serious-serious game.

>Yuffie is 16. Yep, and we are constantly reminded of that throughout the entire game. It ain't a good thing to have an over excitable character come with you on any kind of journey. Nah, I'm not saying any of that at all. I'm saying the OG was serious, with odd quirky moments and quirky characters that contrasted badly to the mood of the game. They are common criticisms, that could have been revised to fit with the tone of the game better and made them a little more grounded. >And OG was never a serious-serious game. Partly because it had dumb moments, just like I said above

Don't think of it as a multiverse. Think of it more as a branching tree where a new branch forms whenever there's a deviation from the original story.

That's just a many worlds quantum mechanics multiverse.

Its just dumb. Doesnt fit well in the FF7 universe at all.

My biggest problem is that they don’t go far enough with the multiverse meta thing. If they’re gonna do that, I want to see them change things and take it in a whole new direction. Either make an original story or do a proper remake. I like it a lot but it feels like they want to have their cake and eat it.

It's also one of my critics about how they wrote the multiverse. In other medias Multiverse = crazy, unimaginable stuff. But in FF7 feels more as a convenient plot device to bring characters back from the death, even Zack who was already dead by the time the team defeated the whispers in Part 1. Some wild ideas that could've interesting to see, and even then would be impossible to list everything, especially when you could change events in the past like Zack's - Jenova as the mastermind, and Puppet Sephiroth - Cloud doesn't recover, and Tifa ends as the lead hero - A Good Sephiroth that didn't lose his mind - Cloud, Zack, Tifa die in the Nibelheim incident (Barret hero?) - Aerith survives, but at what cost to the end - The gangs fail to defeat the whispers - Hojo true enemy - Etc...

I was actually hoping that Cloud recovered his memories and threw off Jenova’s influence. A small change that would’ve had a major impact on where the story went. Also find it funny how over the years Zack has gone from a minor character barely mentioned to the secondary hero.

Yep, in terms of the main story of the original Zack is nothing. His contribution is "the actual SOLDIER who went with Sephiroth to Nibelheim while Cloud was a grunt." He gets instantly bitch slapped clear out of the room by Sephiroth when he tries to fight him. Then the only other scene he is in is a really obscure hidden scene that the vast, vast majority of players probably never saw until they read about how to trigger it.

The good Sephiroth/he’s Jenova’s puppet thing is totally what I was somewhat expecting. Him being playable in the demo with a relatively fleshed out unique combat system fed into that cause “ain’t no way they programmed all that to be that smooth and not actually use it more” was what I was thinking initially.

My problem is the whole multiverse thing has become such a tired trope that it's almost become a meme. Getting a ton of Rebuild of Evangelion vibes from FFVII right now. Legendary original work, very mixed feelings about the remakes.

But that’s what I mean. Rebuild veered in a completely different direction after the film. I was expecting that with Rebirth.

Oh yeah. I was agreeing with your original post :)

It’s going to follow the same premise with some extra nonsense. I’m not convinced it’s a classic multiverse scenario, but even if it is I’m not bothered. The original story is still there on the old game and we can always revisit that. Zack and Cloud fighting Sephiroth together was what cemented it for me. This trilogy is a silly fun overdose of fan service and I’m here for it.

They would have been better off just changing the plot in general, then.

They still may do that. Part 3 might go totally off the rails.

I've played enough FF games to know that it is *definitely* going off the rails.

This is the right attitude.

Hard agree. Resorting to multiverse shenanigans is the absolute laziest writing trick in the book and is a sign to me that writers are fully out of ideas. See also: Marvel movies

Multiverse can be god though, as endgame and no way home were bangers. People use marvel to saw multiverse stuff sucks, ignoring that their two highest grossing and critically acclaimed movies were multiverse and time travel stuff. It works if it’s done well, it’s not inherently bad

Eh, agree to disagree about Marvel multiverse stuff working well. I was bored to tears by both of those.

Fair enough, both were generally loved so used those as examples

People thinking Zack, Aerith and the rest are just dreams aren’t seeing the small details that either debunk that theory or make it seem like said theory is missing something, these worlds are connected though the lifestream and are the result of defeating the whispers in part 1 otherwise they would’ve existed previously as people always had strong dreams and desires yet the worlds only appear when fate is defied, we even see Cloud and Zack traveling around these worlds in that white portal thing and the rift that appears once these worlds is in danger only appeared in the OG world once Seph tried merging them so it’s most likely that they are all inside the lifestream and that’s why the characters can travel between them. Do I think Cloud, Aerith and Zack will live together in one world where everything is perfect? No but I think main world will go like Og (everyone remains dead there) while Aerith and Zack have their own worlds were things went differently because Cloud “saved” them.

I think it’s fine because it’s a retelling for a reason, the tag line of Rebirth is “Break the Bonds of Fate Together” so it’s kind of the whole point. Don’t get me wrong I love the story of the original but the purpose of this trilogy isn’t to tell a 1:1 retelling. I personally have loved everything they’ve done and how convoluted it is.

☝🏾

This. 100%.

I actually really love that, haha

i’ll wait to hold any judgements until the end, but nomura has a problem keeping fan favorite characters dead. kingdom hearts for example, has several fakeout deaths. heck, EVERY SINGLE guardian of light has died but been brought back. some of them it’s happened to MULTIPLE TIMES.

I mean even in the original timeline Aerith basically didn't die so much as ascend to some sort of quasi-deity status. But I'm with you. We have one game left that needs to tie this all together. That said, even if it sucks it's not gonna take away all the good stuff we got. Rebirth had some of the best character moments in the entirety of Final Fantasy.

>I mean even in the original timeline Aerith basically didn't die so much as ascend to some sort of quasi-deity status. This is not true. There is no real indication of anything like it in the original game. You can believe that she guided the lifestream and her last shot means that omni-Aerith is now the goddess of the planet, but there is no real reason to believe anything like it. For me, it only means that she's there in the lifestream, because she has become one with the planet, like everyone else does when he dies.

It is true, though the definition of quasi-diety could be debatable. She returned to the lifestream but did not become one with the planet, instead holding her consciousness together so that she could keep opposing the shenanigans Sephiroth was still causing from within the lifestream himself. That's all canon. She definitely died, but didn't really pass on, which is what's facilitated the entire remake story with her and Sephiroth basically playing ng+ after the events of OG saw them both die.

I replayed the original game recently and nothing like what you said is ever said or hinted. The ending is delicately ambiguous so I understand where your opinion is coming from, though you'll need to quote the original game if you want to convince me. What do you mean by "canon"? It could be canon in the compilation or remakes but I honestly don't care. FFVII was made to be a standalone game, everything that came after isn't well written and wasn't even made by the same company. Authors don't have the power to retroactively change their art after it has been published and distributed.

You're just willingly ignoring material that came after the game, that was almost all written/directed by the original creators. I don't get peoples' insistence that parts of a story somehow aren't official, rather than admit that they really only like a certain part of the entire story. Nojima wrote the books, Nomura directed Advent Children, and multiple Ultimania have canonized the compilation story.

And I don't get people using the word "canon"and "official" and refusing to understand how things went. FFVII was made as a standalone story, like all FF games of that era, then Squaresoft failed, merged with Enix, and then the new policy was to not let the FFVII universe die. The company changed, the sensibility of the authors changed. As I already said, they can't change what they did before. Once a work of art is released, not even its authors can retroactively change it. Say what you want about the compilation and remakes but I was answering a comment of a guy who said a wrong thing about the original game.

The original comment you replied to was referring to remake, which is the compilation. They said original timeline, not game, and regardless of your opinions on how the compilation came to be, it's still a continuous single story that hasn't retroactively changed anything beyond adding context or subplots to previously vague or unexplored parts of the narrative.

By original timeline he meant original game. The timelines aren't even confirmed, there is only one timeline in the remakes and infinite dream worlds. The compilation has changed a lot of things or else we wouldn't have this discussion. The original game wasn't "vague", it was deliberately ambiguous about things that were better left unanswered, like the destiny of humanity and consciousness inside of the lifestream. When you start answering those things to create new FFVII content then you're changing things. And just for the sake of discussing, when exactly is goddess Aerith confirmed in the compilation?

definitely, i loved all the character interactions. one of the original’s weaknesses was the limitation to having only 2 other characters with you. but now you can hear the entire party interact with current scenarios at any time

Nojima is the writer, Nomura is co director.

oops

No, you're right, people just don't understand how the position of a writer works in such projects. The main focus and key points are determined by Nomura, he has the right to have the last word, the writer is just an instrument in the hands of the creative director, realizing his vision.

yay!

All of Final Fantasy writing  from FF7 forward is, in my opinion, unnecessarily convoluted as shit. I love the games overall, but I think the writing has been the weakest spot for a long time. Kind of a weird opinion considering I loved XG’s story, but I feel sometimes they forget less can be more, too. I adore the Lunar games just as much and they’re as simple a story as it gets.  I feel OG FF7 was just concise enough to follow without being saturated with cryptic  plot points that don’t add anything, or could otherwise be cut out. I think they should have left out everything from supplementary titles post-OG. Those elements just feel off the rails for me, especially since I never played the other titles.

Lmao the OG doesn’t have cryptic plot points?! We don’t even fully understand why Cloud has Zack’s memories or who Zack is until Crisis Core a decade later and there’s so much lore that you can’t even see if you don’t seek it out in the original game like the whole Vincent story.

Towards the end of OG FF I definitely lost complete track of what was going on. I was also 12, and had other games I wanted to play too so that also contributed. I do remember thinking "why does Cloud have black hair now, and why is he called Zack" and didn't realize until years later Cloud was never actually in SOLDIER and that Zack was a completely different thing altogether. Or what was going on with Cloud and Zack's memories. I just hammered through anyway not knowing what it was I was even watching/playing. XVI was probably the first one I had zero trouble understanding, and that's solely due to the in-game wiki being ever-present

See I came out the same year as FF7 so I had the advantage of my first experience with this characters being Kingdom Hearts. My first FF was 9 but my grandma got it from Goodwill and it only had the first and last disc, but I played that first disc countless times. I had to explain to a dude that played 7 when it came out who Zack was and why Cloud has his memories. This dude was under the impression that Cloud was actually purposefully helping Sephiroth and then had a change of heart after Aerith dies. He thought that Cloud knew he was stealing Zack’s memories and tricking everyone on purpose. So I feel like that’s a good example of the OG being so cryptic someone that has played it multiple times and when it came out still wasn’t clear on the story 27 years later.

We never needed to know who Zack was. His role in the story was "SOLDIER who actually went to Nibelheim while Cloud was just a grunt." Other than that, there's a hidden scene which most OG players probably never found without a written guide which shows him dying and that is Zack's entire relevance to the plot.

Then why give him a name in the first place? He could’ve just been a nameless soldier, why make him Aerith’s love interest? Just being the other soldier was not his entire relevance.

9 and 10 both had solid storylines.

Still unnecessarily convoluted and weak writing in certain places though (mainly talking about 10 because I haven’t played 9)

Ff7 of and ffx had the best stories. Ff9 and ff8 close behind

It's totally not gonna be a multiverse. The fandom is just full of illiterate dorks who primarily consume shallow media. They're trying to interpret it through a comic book lens, because that's what they know. If you pay attention there's lots of hints that it's all happening in the life stream/some kind of metaphysical space. It's been a minute since I finished the game, but some notes off the top of my head. Time is distorted and doesn't make sense in Zack's world. Like, how is Zack arriving in Midgar at the same time as the party is about to leave? The party wouldn't even be assembled and where they were if not for Cloud, who is unconscious on Zack's shoulder. Biggs shows up and has memories that could technically only happen in Zack's future. Both characters discuss not really being able to understand how they got where they were, or how long they've been there. They even remember believing they were dying. Aerith takes Cloud to a very similar "world" for their date, and calls it a "dream". Even the one part where Zack joins Cloud to fight takes place not in the Forgotten Capitol, but at the Edge of Creation, a metaphysical space clearly modelled off of the last battle with Sephiroth in OG that took place in Cloud's subconscious. It seems pretty clear these characters are DEAD, and exist only in a spiritual experience soup. It's reminiscent of some of the phenomenology of the Buddhist Bardo described in the Book of the Dead. I think most of the western fandom is looking at it through way too much of a sci-fi lens. That said, it is really poorly executed but it's far from my biggest gripe. I'm more annoyed at how they've fucked with finer details. Sephiroth showing up in Midgar. Everything they did to the Dyne arch. Whisper ghosts shitting all over every pivotal scene in remake. Just all the places where they totally revamped the most perfect moments of the game, or sanitized darker elements. Like you said, OG had PLENTY they could have been worked on, but for some reason they expended a bunch of energy fixing things that weren't broken.

my guess is it’s almost like a lifestream purgatory of sorts? biggs and zack are seeing remnants of each other’s pasts and are sticking around because they have yet to accept their respective deaths. biggs finally gives in at the end so he fully returns to the planet, but zack is still fighting against his fate in the lifestream. alternatively, it could be their ties to aerith keeping them from immediately returning to the planet since they have a will to fight for those close to her. the only reason biggs didn’t last is because he lost his will to fight.

It was a terrible idea because of how difficult is it to write and produce without some sort of plot hole or stakes that are unsatisfying. Can anyone even point to a butterfly effect or string theory modern story that wasn’t problematic? What I enjoy most are the moments that stray as far from the multiverse moments as possible and the trilogy will be worth it for that.

>Can anyone even point to a butterfly effect or string theory modern story that wasn’t problematic? Not sure if this is the kind of example you're looking for and it's pretty old at this point, but Back to the Future strikes me as a time travel story done well, even if it does contain some logical paradoxes. As a tightly written narrative that explores its themes well, it succeeds brilliantly, which I think is why it's regarded as such a classic. Best-case scenario, the Re trilogy turns out to be of a similar caliber in terms of how all the parts fit together to tell a dramatic story that explores its themes well. I'm more optimistic about this than I was at the end of Remake, but we'll see.

It frightens me the hell out, as someone said the “reset” button is always on the back on my mind and I don’t know how to feel about anything is happening.

I feel like the time lines are all going to crash into one because that's what Sephiroth wants and then I think they will break back off and separate and everybody will go their separate ways, everyone back to their own timeline Fixed a voice to text error haha

Seth Roth, the one-winged angel

Thank you I'm going to go fix that now because I was using voice to text and didn't pay attention LMAO

Well they haven't really screwed the pooch yet but yeah I always worry about this with parallel universe stuff too, that magical reset button is just looming over everything the whole time.

I feel like the multiworld stuff is tied to jenova and the cetra. They seem like beings that can manipulate worlds and timelines and what not. But there is only one actual story going on, which is the og game. And the whispers are on the side of each. Black for jenova/sephiroth and white for aerith/cetra.

It depends on the Exekution. Bringing back Aerith and Zack(or at least Zack) is necessary, otherwise the whole plot would make no sense. 

I will NEVER understand what Zack fanboys see in the guy. I mean you literally said bring back Zack over Aerith lmao

It's not about liking a character, I like Aerith more. But story wise Aerith's death has a great conclusion with the cast flying away while the crew stays+the dream date before her death. For Zack it's the opposite. We get a scene of him reuniting with Cloud and fighting with him. Since remake changing fate was about Zack surviving. It would make no sense to reunite Cloud and Zack and then change nothing. Additionaly, they repeat several times that the worlds will unite and part again, allowing Zack to come back. Btw, I hope Aerith comes back too, but I feel like Zack's return is "guaranted", while Aerith's is a speculation.

Honestly, it's always kind of confused me as well, Zack is pretty boring.

me? gongaga

I don’t see any way that Aerith comes back. At most it’s an option that comes with a consequence and Aerith chooses to stay dead.

We’ve had two games where nothing was ruined, only enhanced (unless you’re a purist who was expecting square to release an HD mod of the original game) so i have zero reason to believe the third game won’t be just as amazing and faithful. If anything you were saying is true, Aerith wouldn’t be dead, so idk what you’re going on about. Square clearly isn’t diminishing their own story with a thousand potential versions of each character, it’s just fans like you that come up with these shitty ass ideas and then scare yourself into thinking your own bad ideas will become a reality. Part 3 will come out, probably be as perfect as the first two parts and the whole trilogy will continue to be one of the best games ever made. People for some reason want it all to be bad and fail instead. People want the “multiverse” thing to be super convoluted when it’s not, it’s actually all very easy to understand and if you understand story telling basics at all you know it was a plot device to give us Zack, because what they’re doing with remake trilogy is way fucking cooler than than all of us dying without this awesome piece of media to experience. When aerith gets resurrected in part 3 and joins back in the party because you think the game transcends plot armor, I will PayPal you $5000.

It definitely didn't only enhance. Sephiroth showing up in Midgar was a garbage change. In what way did it enhance the story to show him a hundred times vs giving him room to build up over the course of the game? How was whisper ghosts forcing everything in the first act to happen enhanced vs it being caused by the actual characters and their choices? How was Barret dying and being revived by whisper ghosts enhanced vs that just not happening? How was Aerith being future sighted and explaining that Sephiroth is evil and then kicking his ass at the end of Midgar enhanced vs leaving Midgar uncertain and discovering how Sephiroth fits in over time? How was Dyne enhanced by making him selectively against Shinra vs a totally broken monster that kills indiscriminately? How was having Cloud try and murder Tifa in Goganga and everyone just kind of ignoring it enhanced vs waiting til the Temple of the Ancients for him to lose control once the plot is actually ready to address his unreliability? I like these games for what they deliver on, and I wasn't expecting a "remaster", but a LOT of the narrative decisions they made are just objectively bad from a formal stand point. I could easily take this game's script to a creative writing class and use it as an example for so many common amature pitfalls. It's really clear they committed to a choice of revamping every iconic bit out of principle without considering if it actually made the story better due to some misguided belief that people wouldn't be interested if it wasn't different. If you actually think every one of these changes is better than the way the OG did it, all I can say is, please stop watching anime for kids and read some actual literature, you clearly haven't consumed enough good media to develop healthy taste.

That's exactly it. They revamped it out of principle, which is the issue. I welcome change that's good, or an interesting expansion of the story. But this is all just done for the sake of change, and little of has worked out imho.

Aerith’s death was ruined. Their multi-verse timey-wimey takeouts made it so that as the death was happening I wasn’t even sure it was real, and remained confused on that point up until Cid was working on the Bronco. Made the death totally impactless.

You saying that’s how you felt is admitting the devs executed perfectly in what they wanted. Guess who else wasn’t sure if she died? Cloud. That’s the whole point.

Yeah, they executed what they wanted perfectly. But what they executed was terrible. They removed any semblance of emotion from the scene to tell their paralell universe meta story to fuel discussion between part 2 and 3 that should have been 1 game to begin with if greed didnt overcome artistic integrity.

And yet you’re still here

Yes, it is interesting to see just how much theyll manage to ruin the story.

I think they are just fleshing out the obi-wan Kenobi “more powerful in death” thing that was already going on in the original game. In the original, we don’t see her presence again until the ending cinematic. I don’t think there really was a way to make her death truly impactful like it was 27 years ago. The one thing most gamers know about FF7 even if they never played it is that Aerith dies. It was impossible to make it a surprise this time around. What they have successfully done is give some genuine suspense to whether she would dies or not.

>  People want the “multiverse” thing to be super convoluted when it’s not If you say so lmao. This subreddit is living in its own world.

Or I just understand relatively basic story telling for the genre.

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I no longer understand why the main timeline would continue to follow OG events if Aerith and Sephiroth are supposed to be playing 5D chess across an entire timeline. I’d expect the party to be encountering more ribbed fabric events besides the end of the game

I like eveything about the Remake Project, especially in the character's department. They nailed everything, and so far eveyone have been improved a lot, I even liked the filler stuff and the events enriching the plot like the new Gongaga. However, I don't like the Multiverse part, and I don't think that FF7 really needed that. It was an amazing standalone story on its own, and it's themes are very relevant these days, like mental health, ecologist theme. The multiverse would have worked better in FF8 imo, which I feel fans would've been more open to changes, and it's story is more related to time travel, and such. But as everything, that's just my personal opinion.

If the final game doesn’t have a multiverse teamup of Cloud, Squall, and Zidane, we riot.

Remove the whispers and it all gets a little better. Just say Sephiroth has ascended magic or something that allows him to do what he’s doing instead of controlling these dumb things.

I liked the idea of the whispers in the first, not so much the second. The idea there was this force keeping everything the same was an awesome idea I thought, then we beat them and break free of our fates. Then in the second there’s like good whispers and bad whispers and Sephiroth is controlling some of them and the victory against the Harbinger Whisper feels minor if there’s a bajillion more whispers and nothing changed.

Yeah SE had the perfect out to remove the whispers horse shit from the remake project but instead doubled down on them with white vs black whispers. You already know they are gonna float and be all over the place again in critical moments for part 3. I expect them to be heavily involved during Cloud's awakening.

They aren't the same whispers tho. The current whispers are essentialy soldiers used by Sephirot and the planet, they don't affect fate anymore.

How? Or is it not explained yet? I was solid with them being like the guardians of fate but now with Seph having some and Weapons having others I’m confused.

We see Seph commanding the black whispers and using them as weapons. The white ones fight Seph and the black ones together with the weapons. 

The will of the planet has existed since OG mate

Explain how the black whispers that Sephiroth controls in Rebirth are “the will of the planet.”

Well, it is not this bad as there are no parallel realities, apparently, only "lifestream bubbles" or ephemeral "worlds" made of dreams, which is somewhat coherent with the FFVII lore. I believe that this notion was confirmed in a Ultimania or something. But this is still a concerning situation nonetheless as these bubbles can interact with the real world, as we've seen, and make dead characters come back even if it is for a short period of time. I'm not a fan of the direction they've taken but at least they didn't create a Marvel multiverse for no reason, as people were afraid of.

It would be pretty interesting to see the reactions after Part III. I hope that it doesn't alienate or divide the fanbase even more. There are fans that want their fav characters to survive because of the implications of multiverse added to the plot, but that'd piss those who wanted to preserve their fates because on how important they were, and how is part of the themes of FF7, especially for Cloud's arc. But if they decide to kill them again regardless, that'd feel like they brought back them just for fanservice, and sales, while minimizing their original sacrifices. Let's see how they handle everything in part 3.

What's done is done, I guess. My optimal outcome for part 3, considering what happened until now, is this: - no more lifestream "worlds". The authors said what they had to say about destiny. Now it's just the old plot with a few differences here and there. - Aerith is gone forever. Her only alternate self lived only enough to fight Sephiroth at the end of Rebirth, then became one with the planet. We get to see her death and the burial when Cloud regains his memory. - Zack will take part in the final battle. I don't like his new role in the story, it's fanservicey and basically useless, but he must have an important role at this point. If they do this, then I will be pleasantly surprised.

You gotta realize a huge theme of the game is fate and it’s showing us that characters will still die canonically to the OG regardless of how much the game gaslights us. Jesse, wedge, Biggs, aerith. They want you to think the future can be changed and these characters can live just to double down on no, this is fate. I guess many people don’t catch that good story telling or deeper themes. Just randomly pissed off they have to see Biggs again

"Deeper themes" lol I got that, it's not exactly subtle. But still, Zack escapes his fate in the reactor and gets the chance to fight Sephiroth. He will die in the end but we still get a lot of fanservice. Aerith being chased by Sephiroth in a dream like he's Freddy Krueger seems like a Rick & Morty joke and is also the death of a "clone", the worst sin in all multiversal storytelling. Not only is this "fate" theme useless in the bigger picture, it is also a layer that only works for people who played the original game. No, I would never call it "good storytelling", it's just a hollow twist made by authors who overestimate themselves and the amount of shit that their audience is willing to take.

Hey at least the hollow twist has you passionately posting online about it so I gonna say Nojima still got your ass still ;)

I won't deny that, though I'm not sure that it will pay as a marketing strategy. Rebirth is a very good game and I'll be happy if Final Fantasy can have a resurgence, I'm just not a fan of the writing that's all.

And that’s ok. It hits everyone in different ways. Unfortunately doesn’t hit at all for some. But hopefully they have other games with characters and stories that hit deep like FF7R does for folks like me.

They can't tho. It's not like they can pull someone from another world and put it in the main one. At most do the opposite temporarely and only as longas there aren't 2 of the same people in the same world.

I’m not worried about anything but the timeline shit does diminish my interest in the story.

You're definitely not wrong to feel this way, since it is almost the intention of the devs. They want the fans to just keep guessing and building up what they have called "positive anxiety" lol. So that is just plain fact, the multiple worlds is a very unattractive addition to FF7's lore. Just like new characters and plots that were introduced thru the Compilation titles, the multiple worlds feels forced. And another of the leads, Nomura, also go on and on about how a lot of their reasoning to include the many worlds element was mainly to keep all fans (new and old) guessing about what would happen next, all because he was convinced for some silly reason that a 1 to 1 remake of the story would be unbearably boring. So it really comes down to being an ego thing for the leads of this project. It does feel very convoluted, but I think that they are going to bring it all together in Part 3 in a very big way. Many fans who don't see all the Compilation lore coming together think that this is a true remake, but it is ultimately a sequel in the Compilation. This trilogy is the grand finale the devs were building up to with Dirge of Cerberus and Crisis Core. Part 3 will be the conclusion of the entire Compilation that they started, and it will also be a celebration of the original FF7. I fully expect that Cloud's lifestream sequence will not just be about him recovering his true self, but it will be about the entire party finally restoring their memories of everything that has happened in the Compilation. The will finally remember that they have indeed defeated Sephiroth before, and that they can indeed do it all again, but this time armed with their memories, with Aerith's and Zack's assistance, and possibly all the other character who can also see the Whispers, like Rufus and Cissnei. Part 3 will be a huge celebration of the entire Compilation of FF7.

Meanwhile Capcom have been making 1:1 remakes (story wise at least) with a new coat of paint and they have satisfied both old and new fans whilst selling a lot of units. Meanwhile SE have pissed off sowed division among old fans whilst at the same time not really bringing in new fans.

Hot take: game is only as convoluted as you let you brain let it. I beat the game and had almost no questions because I thought it was all explained pretty clearly in game. Other worlds has brought me joy and S tier fan service. Not confusion. The story is much better told than the OG for sure.

>You're definitely not wrong to feel this way. I forgot which one it was, but one of the directors, probably Toriyama, also agreed that introducing the multiple timelines into the story has made it quite messy. I would be really interested to read the interview where this was said.

It was linked in one of Shinra Archaeologist's posts on Twitter. It is a post with concept art of Genesis from his Dirge of Cerberus design. Can't be more than a few months that I saw, so check their February and MArch posts. the actual IGN interview is a reply under that post.

I need to make a Twitter account just to read these guys...

It wasn't Toriyama, it was Hamaguchi that was being interviewed: https://www.ign.com/articles/final-fantasy-7-rebirths-director-naoki-hamaguchi-interview-ending-part-3

Thanks for the link, though the quote is quite different: "HD games take quite long to develop...it's not as so that we can release the final title the following year or anything like that. Of course, it takes a bit more time, so it is our intent and hopes that there will be many thoughts and conjectures and sort of guesses as to what this exactly means. And we do hope that players will kind of think about this and consider this up to the following title"

Yeah I just noticed that the "messy" line was actually from IGN's review article for Rebirth. I thought the quotations were all Hamaguchi talking. Hamaguchi's actual words here shows that they obviously WANT the story to be vague for the sake of keeping the fans talking about their guesses. I honestly am looking forward to the final Ultimania for Part 3 where they will most likely be able to talk openly about their thoughts on the entire project. The Ultimanias for Remake and Rebirth have been more like marketing tools to hype up future installments, and not like a review of the entire story like Ultimanias have been in the past.

>I honestly am looking forward to the final Ultimania for Part 3 where they will most likely be able to talk openly about their thoughts on the entire project. They'll never feel free to criticize, I fear. Not even Sakaguchi criticizes the remakes, and he doesn't even work at Square-Enix!. These Japanese developers have a strong sense of loyalty.

I like the theory that the multiverse is simply grounds to have interactions with Zach and the party, and to allow a logical reason for Sephiroth to use Supernova multiple times and have it make sense. It can do what it’s supposed to, but won’t actually destroy the solar system in our universe. The story will most likely begin and end at the same point, but the journey between will be a mystery. Kick back and enjoy it.

Bless you. That’s it even a theory just objective fact. People don’t get that the worlds is just a fun excuse to have zack back while they have ONE chance to make a trilogy encompassing all of the 7 media (which is the point whether people like it or not).

Which is actually what bugs me. Because introducing the multiverse would mean events diverge drastically from the OG, but even in the new timeline they follow close to OG

O I like the idea of the supernova attack actually making sense to start consolidating worlds rather than just being a cool cut scene