Board 8 > FFVII Rebirth SPOILERS AHOY

(+) Yeah! (+)

KH3 and 'masterful' in the same sentence doesn't work.

Unless you're talking the data org fights of course

Everyone lives would be bad. Especially considering how powerful the Trials were. After going through that segment I realized they definitely have not forgotten the theme of death and loss. Aerith's trial had me bawling.

Also it could just be me, but I'm seeing a lot more FFX connections in this game. The fact that Aerith LITERALLY did the Yuna sending dancing with the lifestream (Aka the souls of the dead) and the fact that the one SOLDIER who Cloud skewered turned into a fiend after not being sent properly to the lifestream.

Jussayin'

FFX-2 is truly a foundational FFVII game

Leblanc is the reason the world went to shit

...in this essay I will explain how Leblanc became the calamity from the skies....

wg64Z posted...

Aerith's trial had me bawling.

Glad it wasn't just me! The others didn't make me feel a whole lot, a bit too melodramatic. Then I got to Aerith and wow, it broke my heart.

I felt the pain with Red too. I just can't watch dog cruelty.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AoZRDrAeqOQ

Seeya later let's mosey, you will be missed.

Haven't read the topic yet, want thoughts untainted.

TLDR, it was fine, definitely not as good as Remake.

Pros

Surprisingly, the biggest one is this game is legitimately really funny, in a way the first one just wasn't. I think nearly ever joke landed, and some of these scenes were just incredible. Entering the Golden Saucer, Nanaki Jackson....the game through Honeybee quality cutscenes at me repeatedly and I love that.

They cut back HARD on the anime grunts, I feel like someone over there got super self conscious about how much this was memed on in Remake.

The game is gorgeous, no question. The only drive I had in the open world whatsoever was how impressed I was by the details on the environment. I'm sure there must be SOME procedural generation here, but I couldn't see it at a glance. The photoshot requests all legit had me wanting to frame th best picture possible even though it didn't matter.

The gameplay is really solid, Synergy attacks and combos confused me for several hours, but it all snapped into place at once. I like this Sphere Grid more than the actual over bloated Sphere Grid.

I don't like playing as every character, but they successfully made them all feel completely unique. It's not like I didn't expect this, though.

The OST is immaculate. No misses.

Queen's Blood fucking rules. Needs more music, though.

Cons

Man this open world SUCKS. ASS. Even I was amazed how they managed to not make a SINGLE aspect of it outside of the vibes even REMOTELY interesting. I completely quit interacting with it in any way shape or form just a few pips into Gongaga, to the point where I would walk past landmarks I was literally running into, and I cannot begin to express how much better this made the experience. I immediately replayed Remake as soon as I beat it the first time, but I will never play this again, and I have no desire to go back and clean everything up.

How does EVERY sidequest minigame outside of Queens Blood blow? The entire Golden Saucer is a total wash outside of the cutscenes, there's nothing to enjoy here. Every open world quest is bad. Fort Condor is bad. The only minigames that are any good are the ones you do ONCE during the narrative, the parade and the dolphin.

The playable Cait Sith section is TERRIBLE. The playable Aerith section is awful too. Why do I have to sit here and manually absorb this shit? There's actually a lot of stuff that should be automated here. Auto run should be an option. Auto pickup should be an option. So much busywork for no reasons whatsoever.

The plot, uh....not good. I loved a lot of moments in this game, PLENTY of them. The start of Junon to the end of Corel is incredible, even if all the actual gameplay between Gold Saucer and the Dustbowl is an absolute slog. But God these people need to shut the fuck up about Sephiroth. None of this actual narrative works for me. And you know I don't actually care about the original FF7, I am here for just these new games. Remake's ending was wild and interesting to me as this total left field clusterfuck that I couldn't wait to see what they did with. The ending of Rebirth just had me tired. I feel nothing for how it relates to the original and that is irrelevant to me, but I feel like even for this trilogy of games as it's own entity this was just a fucking mess. The only good thing here was that they managed to get Cloud's VA to emote for the first time over 2 full games.

Uh.....I probably have more to say....but I think I'm good for now.

7.5/10, Remake was better. Can't wait to see how they balance around starting an RPG already having an airship.

Oh, I remember what I wanted to end on.

I think Sephiroth might be my most disliked FF villain now. Everything related to him or with him in this game is soooo lame. I think the stab on Tseng is the only Sephiroth adjacent moment that I thought was enjoyable at all in this whole game.

Sephiroth became like darth vader or pyramid head where the more exposure we got to him, the less impactful he felt

Listen, it doesn't matter if I don't care about FF7, it's fucking Sephiroth. One of the ultimate rules of cools. The guy barely even had an on screen presence in his own original game and he's still legendary. He has one of the most memorable theme songs in all of video games.

I should not be measuring Sephiroth against Thordan and going "Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm well I don't knowwwwwww....."

UshiromiyaEva posted...

The guy barely even had an on screen presence in his own original game

Yeah that's why he was legendary. Sephiroth at his core isn't a very complex character. Repeated exposure was never going to be good for him and the new FF7 games just don't handle him well regardless.

I wonder if you open up the whole Rebirth main scenario script, what the longest word count between mentions of Sephiroth is in the whole game?

By the 4th time Cloud mistook someone for Sephiroth and swung at him I was checked out. Honestly he's such a innescapable presence here that it almost feels like parody, like Sephiroth was gonna show up on the other side of a Queen's Blood table or in a Chocobo race.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

I wonder if you open up the whole Rebirth main scenario script, what the longest word count between mentions of Sephiroth is in the whole game?

By the 4th time Cloud mistook someone for Sephiroth and swung at him I was checked out. Honestly he's such a innescapable presence here that it almost feels like parody, like Sephiroth was gonna show up on the other side of a Queen's Blood table or in a Chocobo race.

He shows up in the Gold Saucer 3D Battle!

Didn't die in the final battle so I didn't see this, but Jesus Christ.

https://twitter.com/transparencyboo/status/1768610568393371903?t=A1lANywqI6DuuAR2wDciCQ&s=19

I did die in the final battle and was equally confused by those options.

The fight didn't need to consist of a thousand phases, doesn't bode well for people with ADHD.

What made Sephiroth so compelling in the OG was 1. demonstrated power that we don't see him execute but clearly puts him above anyone else we've seen (impaled Zolom, the mess in Shinra HQ) and 2. his ability to bring so much action and character out of the rest of the cast. E.g. seeing Shinra's directors quake in fear at the thought that he'd been sighted adds a lot, and so does the emotion he pulls out of Cloud ("Shut up."), or the sacrifice he compels Aerith to make. His actual presence is not that interesting.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

but I feel like even for this trilogy of games as it's own entity this was just a fucking mess.

I feel a lot of people missed when I talked about not liking the changes is because this current iteration of square can't tell good stories. Anything new and different was gonna suck just because of that.

pjbasis posted...

Anything new and different was gonna suck just because of that.

There a lots of good moment-to-moment additions.

None of them have anything to do with the main plot though.

pjbasis posted...

I feel a lot of people missed when I talked about not liking the changes is because this current iteration of square can't tell good stories. Anything new and different was gonna suck just because of that.

I mean this isn't ENTIRELY true for all of Square. Shadowbringers, Endwalker...

......uh...

....Just get Ishikawa to write every game!

UshiromiyaEva posted...

...Just get Ishikawa to write every game!

super down for this honestly

Started listening to the OST on it's own.

https://youtu.be/Z4TjmnoOKfg?si=HlSTW2rEVk0042wh

This is better than OWA.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

Didn't die in the final battle so I didn't see this, but Jesus Christ.

https://twitter.com/transparencyboo/status/1768610568393371903?t=A1lANywqI6DuuAR2wDciCQ&s=19

I am actually impressed that a complete mess like that could make it into a shipped major release. You'd expect even a cursory bit of playtesting to identify major issues.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

Started listening to the OST on it's own.

https://youtu.be/Z4TjmnoOKfg?si=HlSTW2rEVk0042wh

This is better than OWA.

Hell yeah, though my guilty pleasure is the Kyrie battle theme, lol.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLFlZRMOUwk

I need the OST to get released badly, I've been scouring youtube the past couple of days and throwing any alleged tracks on a Rebirth playlist, now need to listen to them to filter out the lower-quality-sounding ones.

Like the good news is I stumbled on a (to my ears) perfect-quality final battle song sequence that runs like 32 minutes, but on the downside more than one lower-quality Mt. Corel track, damn. And also can't find a better sounding version of the Kyrie battle theme than the one I posted. I guess we're 2 to 6 weeks away from official release if "April 2024" gets adhered to...

Also of concern is that they don't include a ton of songs and stash them for a "Plus" or "OST part 2" release some months down the line, Remake Plus came out December 2020 and Rebirth just has so many new tracks, even if they do still reuse a bunch from Remake.

I also really need the chill version of the Turks Theme that plays on the colosseum when you're menuing before their fight & someone has to loop it to last 60+ minutes. I'm this close to chapter selecting my way back there and just leaving my PS5 on and listening to it in the background, lol

Edit: inject directly into my veins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YblHB-Ypd0o

No doubt this is one of the best game soundtracks in existence. I was so excited when I first heard this metal chocobo theme.

https://youtu.be/S3tilhcDoU4?si=T2WpelISog7wjo8q

I figured the title would be Metal De Chocobo but apparently that's a different track from another FF.

Trap music Chocobo Theme was one of the most unexpected laughs from a game soundtrack I can remember.

Couldn't help but respect it. They had a lot of fun making this game.

Something I just realized while listening to the Remake Airbuster fight...

Did this game not have any geographically unique boss fights? I don't mean aesthetically, but like actual off arena layouts, obstacles, etc. Remake had a bunch of them, but here's it's just Dyne, right? And his is real basic.

Boy the Rulers of the Outer Worlds combat sim is some bs. At least Gilgamesh is

I was just watching a youtube video on recommended build for getting past it, and it basically boiled down to "make perfect blocks almost every chance you get"

I don't think I've made a perfect block on purpose and I'm passing 160 hours, guess I need to start practice trying... been putting off the brutal and legendary combat sims while cleaning up some other platinum-required items but yeah, almost done, gonna have to get rolling on them.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

Something I just realized while listening to the Remake Airbuster fight...

Did this game not have any geographically unique boss fights? I don't mean aesthetically, but like actual off arena layouts, obstacles, etc. Remake had a bunch of them, but here's it's just Dyne, right? And his is real basic.

Without even thinking about too hard isn't the first actual boss an example of this? The Midgarzormr?

I don't remember that fight having anything like that, but maybe I just did it wierd....

There were trees that protected you from his circular fire attack, as well as little islands in the water you had to stand on to avoid another attack.

Yep, missed all that, whoops!

Wierd because I don't remember having trouble with that fight....but it was like 3:30 in the morning so who knows where I was mentally.

Are any of the gold saucer mini games required the first time through in Chapter 6, or can I just skip to the next story section and ignore the mini games without missing anything?

You have to do the chocobo race (as in the original) and one match of 3D brawler. But they are basically tutorial stages for those mini-games you should have no trouble with.

Thanks!

Holy crap the boss of Chapter 10 was fucking insane on Hard Mode. Like you really need to master Red and dodging that grip move.

oh man... was getting a little cocky since I was clearing the past few hard mode bosses w/o issues (just finished Corel's) but yeah, am not looking forward to the Gi Nattak fight at all. probably #3 next to Rufus and leaps and bounds in first place, Cait Sith vs. YinYang. Hoo boy.

9.5/10 for me, ending was confusing but I am intrigued AF as to how this is all going to wrap up in the third game, which ultimately is kind of the most important thing you can do with a middle part of a trilogy.

LOVE the entire cast now. Even Cait Sith, though Chapter 11's Cait Sith section was definitely the lowest of low points.

Minigames were hit or miss but mostly skippable. Fuck the Chocobo stealth sections though. Singlehandedly brought my opinion from 10 to 9.5.

Had zero technical or performance issues playing on a new PS5 slim, digital version of the game. No crashes, absolutely flawless even before this new patch?

Was Rufus generally considered a tough fight in Dynamic mode for people? I actually thought he was easier than his Remake fight.

Honestly, what gave me the most trouble for main story fights was the 2nd Roche fight. He kills you in like 3 attacks and does those attacks almost immediately, you barely have any time to respond. And whenever you try to counter his attacks, he'll just not attack or use a non counterable one.

Maybe I just got unlucky a few times in a row from what his AI did but man that felt like bullshit lol.

None of the other main story fights gave me any issue really. The Cait fight was fine for me because I main Cait so I didn't really have troubles, but I could see people who never really used him struggling for sure.

Oh i can tell you Dynamic is no indication at all about how tough a fight will be on Hard. Rufus will prob be stressful cus of his phases with and without Dark Nation and the fact you have to do Elena/Rude first without a break in between. Idk where the retry would place you.

BK_Sheikah00 posted...

Oh i can tell you Dynamic is no indication at all about how tough a fight will be on Hard. Rufus will prob be stressful cus of his phases with and without Dark Nation and the fact you have to do Elena/Rude first without a break in between. Idk where the retry would place you.

I was more or less referring to Martin's post since he posted which fights he's worried about when he gets to them in Hard which made me wonder which fights were ones that people struggled with in Dynamic, if any. I figured Hard Mode certain bosses are much more challenging yeah.

Personally I didn't have any issue with normal Rufus (didn't play Dynamic though), but I was watching a streamer try to fight him in hard mode and having a ridiculously hard time. looked like virtually no pressure time to work with and hitting the Braver-Stagger felt like it needed pinpoint accuracy. like you needed to predict when he's going to reload and Braver before he even does it, lol.

I actually got really lucky with the YinYang fight somehow but I'm terrified I won't be as fortunate next time. What really chewed me up and spit me out were the Adjudicator fights and I imagine they're even worse in hard mode.

Junon Roche took me a good 4 tries. Zolomy is also very dangerous. The first side quest in the Grasslands for the Ranch girl is stupidly overtuned. From the boat ride until Gold Saucer is then pretty smooth sailing.

Once you reach Dyne though, every boss starts getting extremely punishing. Normal battles should never be a major issue, but bosses are a different story.

BK_Sheikah00 posted...

The first side quest in the Grasslands for the Ranch girl is stupidly overtuned.

dude, what were they THINKING with this one. I forget how I eventually got past it, if it was Magnifyra or ATB Boost-Magnifyga and 1x or 2x, I remember some physical cleanup of the stragglers but damn. Anyone who runs into that and doesn't insta Game Over on their first attempt, I would be so shocked.

The wolf, right?

I mean once you know what to do it's manageable but there is absolutely zero reason you'd know what to do on the first attempt lol.

You'd think you ran into an early game superboss. Level 81 Xenoblade monkey shit.

nah not the wolf, the one where you're getting flowers for Billy's sister and there's like 20 mandrakes that (almost) immediately and repeatedly blast you with these needlestorms that interrupt you and shred your HP

lol first hit on a youtube search has a red-tinted thumbnail, nice

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7OlDbkXmwI

Edit: omg that video reminding me again how good the "Hollow" battle theme is, need the OST so badly!!!!

The wolf if you have at least level 2 Elemental is not too bad.

But the Mandragoras lmao they can easily deter anyone from going through with hard mode. But it's very much an outlier with how bs it is.

I'm partway through Chapter 13 on Hard Mode and I'd say the Cait Sith solo section and Rufus have been the hardest things so far. Rufus has a great learning curve though - to the point where you can get quite easily do it without taking much if any damage once you learn the tricks. Abuse the command menu's instant pauses to get a read on when he Reloads, block his close range "shotgun" for free ATB with Steadfast Block, and Triple Slash into a bunch of damage/ATB whenever you catch him Reloading. Make absolutely sure Cloud ends the fight with the Turks at high HP/MP - I had to redo that battle because I left him low.