Final Fantasy VII Rebirth [PS5] - Winter 2023

[Hatredsheart]

[Rusty]

Blummin' mericuns. Is that date 10th April or 4th October? Guessing the former.
When's it on PC?

[Hatredsheart]

I think it's still April 10th, PS4 release first then other platforms during this year.

[Raid]

The big problem with the release date is that it's Good Friday and there won't be any post delivered on the day. I'm going to be really miffed if my super duper collectors edition doesn't get to me until the next week.

[Raid]

So a demo for this dropped last night, I have it downloading now, though I'm only really interested in seeing what it's like on a standard PS4 (I assume everything we've seen so far has been from the Pro); I don't want to play much of it.

[Raid]

So yeah, it's pretty good. I beat the first boss and decided that was enough to whet my appetite. The combat system works really nicely from what little I've played. The standard battles I could beat just with regular moves (effectively the Attack command from the traditional ATB days), using spells just for distant targets. I love that you can just hold a trigger to access your ally characters ATB menus without needing to switch to them completely. There's a guard button that you can hold to minimise damage when not attacking, but it's not Dark Souls and it's a basic damage reduction rather than parrying.

Cloud has two modes, one where you can move freely and have light sword slashes, and a heavy attack mode where you move very slowly, but do tons more damage on attacks, and counterattack when you guard against a melee move. Barret has a strong attack that recharges rather than different modes, but it fills the ATB gauge more quickly.

It looks great even on the standard PS4, in fact the only real difference I could see other than the resolution was a bit of dithering on Cloud's hair.

I suspect many will hate Barret's voicing, but I think it fits the over-the-top animations his character had in the original game. He basically does that anime dub voice of yelling every line and grunting a lot. Most of the rest of the characters I met are much more restrained; there's a very brief cutscene with a Shinra agent of some description which wasn't as subtle. It's not amazing, but it's hardly the worst dub I've listened to. I'm hoping there's an option for Japanese voice acting in the main game, so I can at least try it (though I suspect I'll be happy enough with the English cast).

[Mantis]

Just finished the demo and am looking forward to the full release very much now. That was excellent, quite clearly a lot of attention and care has gone into recreating those environments and the added dialogue is all great.

[Raid]

Yeah, it's only enhanced my excitement for the full release. I guess the fact that they've put out a demo a whole month before release shows how confident Square Enix are on this one; I really think they've done this justice.

There was a slightly disappointing bit of news delivered alongside the demo. Red XIII will not be playable in this first installment; he'll be present in combat but you won't be controlling him. They've said this is because he'll only appear right before the end of the episode, and they didn't want to introduce brand new mechanics that late in the game. They've not confirmed that he'll be playable in the second installment, but they'd be mad not to.

[Mantis]

That is pretty poor. Another reason to dislike this whole episodic approach they've taken. I'd have been happy with them not turning each section into it's own 40 hour game and just taking a bit longer to make the whole thing.

I'm surprised at how tactical the combat actually is. I think I was spending more time issuing commands with the action paused than just hammering the attack button during that boss battle, a far cry from how FF15 plays.

[Raid]

I watched Eurogamer's livestream of the demo earlier, and people in the chat were pretty unhappy with the decision also.

Personally I think the biggest problem with the episodic nature of the game is that they're going to be straddling two console generations. Either they're going to force people to rebuy the first episode if they want a complete experience that doesn't change visually, or they're going to have to put in extra work to upgrade the first episode in a next-gen update.

[DjchunKfunK]

Tried the demo and wasn't impressed. For reference I never played the original and I'm no fan of the FF series. Initial impressions of the combat were pretty good but I thought the boss fight was bad. The game feels like it is trying to be an action game but when it comes to the boss fight it isn't really that as most damage is unavoidable despite having a dodge and it just becomes an exercise in out-healing the damage which doesn't feel good in what seems to be trying to be an action game. Doesn't help that the boss has a ton of health, in the end I just gave up and uninstalled the demo. On top of that I think the writing is really bad in places.

Ultimately it feels like an old game that has had some modern bits bolted on to it. I'm sure it will be fun for those who liked the original but as someone coming to it fresh there isn't really anything for me here. It's not modern enough to be a game that I would want to play in 2020 and with no nostalgia for the original it all falls rather flat.

[DjchunKfunK]

Reviews are out, mostly they are from people who loved the original so not much help for those of us who don't have any affinity for the original game. Despite that Ars Technica's write-up is pretty good.

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/04/ ... ud-gaming/

[Mantis]

Got my pre-order down ready for the weekend. From what I've heard so far the attention to detail in terms of fleshing out tiny little parts to keep it consistent with the original will make any dedicated fans incredibly happy, yet apparently there's a huge change to the story at the end which potentially may have huge ramifications to the whole plot. I really hope it doesn't butcher it but am determined to avoid any spoilers to find out for myself.

[Raid]

Square have seemingly shipped my First Class edition but it hasn't arrived yet (and they don't give out tracking info, which is mildly irritating in this day and age).

I'm deliberately avoiding reviews and other information, but I've seen comments that suggest there are significant alterations to the story. This is hardly surprising given they're quadrupling the runtime of this part of the original game.

[DjchunKfunK]

Don't worry, in the seven years it will take them to make part 2 they will have plenty of time to course correct the story.