Final Fantasy VII Remake Review - Very Fantastic Sweet Nostalgia!

Final Fantasy VII Remake Review - Very Fantastic Sweet Nostalgia!


After waiting for at least six years, finally the super ambitious remake project from Square Enix is ​​now in the grip. Final Fantasy VII Remake is ready to make you feel nostalgic by diving into the new Midgar that is far more charming. Certainly not made in a single day and night, Final Fantasy poured through the sweat and tears of talented talented people behind Square Enix. We have to admit that the hard work paid far above expectations.

Final Fantasy VII Remake Review - Very Fantastic Sweet Nostalgia!

Final Fantasy VII Remake is like a masterpiece carved by artists with great care, compassion, and extra sacrifice. We were lucky to get the chance to taste this game thanks to Sony Interactive Entertainment and Square Enix. Of course you have also seen a little picture of how cool this remake project is. it has now arrived for us to provide a review of Final Fantasy VII Remake, which of course remains without spoilers.

Story

Just like the original version that was launched 23 years ago, Final Fantasy VII Remake has a storyline that is still similar, only now with a much clearer portion. Midgar is a giant futuristic city controlled by Shinra - a giant company that dominates and controls Midgar. As a giant corporation, Shinra dredges the essence of the planet from Midgar to get energy called Mako.

You will still accompany the journey of the figure of Cloud Strife, a former SOLDIER military officer who was once under the auspices of the Shinra flag. Now he became a mercenary hired by a rebellion force named Avalanche. Avalanche itself is a group of rebels who oppose Shinra's actions which are considered damaging the planet they live in.

As expected, this effort against Shinra was extremely difficult and almost impossible. Moreover Shinra has a variety of first-class military troops who are ready to eliminate anyone who gets in the way. Together with Avalanche, Cloud got to know his new colleagues and met Tifa, who was none other than his childhood friend.

Initially Cloud only followed Avalanche's wishes for money and his new reputation as a mercenary. But as time went on and the experience he went through, he felt that his ties with Avalanche and his new friends were getting stronger and he realized to do "more". Besides, Cloud and Avalanche know that Shinra has ambitions that are far more terrible than what was ever imagined.

During the life and death conflict that is being faced, the Cloud must also be faced with problems that hit itself. Where is the figure of a war hero he once idolized - Sephiroth always appears in his head and says things that are difficult to understand. Besides the mysterious abstract-shaped entities also began to show themselves to Cloud and his friends.

Final Fantasy VII Remake will present a story that follows the original plot with additional spices that make it more colorful and "make sense". For those of you who want to reminisce about the story by bringing a far more interactive and in-depth story, then this remake is the answer!

More Immersive, More Impressive!

Extraordinary appreciation is deserved for Square Enix, the old story that is presented now feels far more coherent and deep to be enjoyed. The limitations of the mechanism and visuals in the previous version of the PlayStation One, have now been updated with very neat and create a more immersive and impressive experience. Through Final Fantasy VII Remake, you will be invited to dive deeper into the story, characters, and settings themselves.

The characters now have a redesign that looks much more amazing, Tifa, Aerith, Cloud, and others will now make the players feel at home. In addition to design, they now also seem to have a deeper personality with an increasingly strong emotional side. In the original version, to see the personality certainly feels more vague, given the visual presented can not show expressive facial expressions, not to mention the scene which is only wrapped in silent dialogue.

But now everything is much clearer, you will see Tifa's new personality, who looks friendly and cares about his surroundings. The figure of Barret who is very temperamental but has a personal level of a father who is very fond of his little daughter. Or even the quiet, non-sensitive, sensitive figure, and sometimes annoys the players who play it.

All of the persona of the character now feels more real and more interesting to observe. To further deepen it also shows the quality of voice acting that persona. Both for the Japanese and English versions, both have very neat qualities and fully support various emotions. Throughout the game, we certainly recommend not just trying out one voice option.

Apart from the location itself, you will be taken to the new and more immersive Midgar world. You will be shown how the "supposed" Midgar, a giant city with separate sectors that describes the social status and economic conditions of its people.
This time we ended up stunned, seeing various details that were presented. We can see how the situation and condition of the people in Midgar, starting from the elite class, to those who suffer below the poverty line. Everything now looks more real, giving us a clear picture after looking at situations that were previously drawn to be more vague and limited in the PlayStation One era then.

Gameplay

In addition to visuals and character updates, one of the most striking changes that is no less striking is the gameplay. Now everything feels denser, more complete and fresh, Final Fantasy VII Remake offers an RPG gameplay that feels very new and more revolutionary.

Final Fantasy VII Remake Gameplay

Discarding turn-based classic gameplay, now Final Fantasy VII Remake feels more action-oriented with the taste of hack n slash. The entire battle is now running more intense and more interesting, you will now be direct attacking action-packed. But even so, the game still presents a classic flavor by inserting a command list base.

When the battle is going on, you can do a super slow motion to determine what attacks or abilities you will do. In the middle of the battle, you can also change the characters in the party with just one tap. Just like the original series, the characters have their abilities and special moves. But his invention is now shown to be more intense and neat.

Spell, ability, and special move systems are still present and use the ATB system, where to launch an action, you must wait or issue a standard attack to meet the ATB bar. The limit break is now back, too, for those of you who are unfamiliar, it is the ultimate attack that can be launched depending on how long you are in an intense phase of battle.

The stats of the characters can be increased through leveling up, types of weapons, weapon upgrades, and attachment material. To upgrade weapons, you must get the points obtained by increasing the level. The weapon upgrade also serves to provide a play style for your character, whether you want to attack offensively, defend with support, or be balanced. Of course, from parties consisting of 1-3 people, each member will be more efficient when giving their respective roles.

The potential of the characters for each role can be maximized with material features that are now also returning. Material itself is an attachment in the form of a solid ball that will give certain abilities to each user. Starting from raising health, giving attack spells, giving healing spells, and many others. Characters with long-range attacks for example can be given material that is more inclined to support, as well as attacking, can be given an appropriate attack spell cast attachment.

What's interesting about the most interesting, of course, the presence of material summon. These special materials allow you to summon special summon with fatal attacks that will help your fight. To summon, you must first survive a certain amount of time from a battle. Usually to fight the boss you will be "required" to summon the help of summon.

Even though you have a new gameplay with a strong hack n slash aura, you still have to keep playing using strategy. Many enemies must be subdued with special strategies, such as kroco and boss battles for example which we will also discuss later. Each enemy has their weaknesses through certain elements. To find these weaknesses you can use the abilities of Assess material. If seen in general, enemies with the element of fire will be weak against the element of ice, and vice versa.

Talking about the level of difficulty, Final Fantasy VII Remake provides a difficulty level of classic, easy, normal (and hard, which is unlocked after finishing the main story). To get a commensurate experience, we will recommend you to play at the Normal difficulty level.

More interestingly, as an RPG game, you don't need to do grinding here, because everything has been made as parallel as possible following the story progress and the enemies that you face. So, to enjoy a challenge that feels genuine worth, you must fight various enemies and bosses to follow the storyline. Here grinding can be said to damage the game experience, in addition to having to be faced with a decreased level of difficulty. To do grinding you also have to load the place where the monsters are taking uploading time.

Boss Iconic Battle and Stay Challenging

One of the main attractions of Final Fantasy VII in the past is the myriad of interesting boss battles encountered. The original boss battle series, now present and ready to provide a more tense challenge. If you play in the normal plus difficulty level without grinding. Then the boss battles that are there will be ready to give you quite challenging challenges, many of which require quite a long time to be subdued.

Of course, here every boss battle has cool and terrible abilities respectively, which of course also comes with certain weaknesses. It takes a special strategy and a solid party combination to defeat each boss. Always prepare adequate material and items before facing the boss, don't forget to give the appropriate role so that the strategy can run more effectively.

Destroying certain body parts or parts is one important key in defeating large-sized bosses. This method is more effective to make them stagger without having to be more troublesome. For bosses on a human scale, of course it will also provide more different challenges. Where they have a faster attack with a hitbox that is less. All the bosses present were truly able to raise challenges that would give satisfaction when successfully subdued.
Final Fantasy VII Remake Review Boss Iconic Battle

With a variety of new gameplay available, Final Fantasy VII Remake feels revolutionary as an RPG game. The combination reminds us of the combination of original Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy XV, and Final Fantasy Crisis Core. All of these combinations look very solid and cooler than what is imagined.

Semi-open

Looking at screenshots and gameplay that have been circulating, you might wonder, is Final Fantasy VII Remake an open-world game? The answer is no, as Square Enix has previously emphasized, Final Fantasy VII Remake does not carry the concept of the open world. But that does not mean this is a linear game, Final Fantasy VII Remake still has a world that can be explored.

Carrying the concept of per-chapter, each chapter, sometimes you will be taken to a different location setting. Many of them offer an open side of the world that can be explored freely. Not as big as the expected portion, of course, but each world which is called a sector has its uniqueness and is certainly always interesting to explore.

Has a Myriad of Extra Attraction

All the remodeling that was presented by Final Fantasy VII Remake feels very fresh. Many old things are re-designed in today's packaging. Angry, sad, happy, and laughing can create emotions that become one. For those of you who have played the original version, guaranteed this time you will find a variety of extra surprises and updates that look more interesting.

In addition to playing missions, there are a myriad of side missions that you can complete in certain chapters. And it must be recognized also that the side mission appears so attractive and more interactive. Everything feels interesting to follow with each unique story. Some of them even offer a portion of humor that is guaranteed to shake your stomach.

In addition to the side mission, the Final Fantasy VII Remake world also provides an interesting mini-game in it to relieve boredom. Many of these mini-games feel fun and have an entertaining sense of humor. In addition to temporarily releasing fatigue, some of these mini-games also offer attractive rewards.

Stunning New Visuals

Presentations are in a modern console format, so visual presentations are much better for him too. Square Enix can present it very nicely into Final Fantasy VII Remake. Through Unreal Engine Songkongan, we think Square Enix can pump it to the maximum level, especially for PlayStation 4 which is now at the end of its age.
The visuals presented are truly amazing, you will be brought into the new Midgar world which is far more impressive. Something that was once only seen with low pixel visualization with a limited number of polygons, is now presented with visualizations that spoil the eyes. Through this livelier visualization, we can see a variety of very detailed environments.

A densely populated city in a sector with rapid development, for example, will show an accurate modern world. Likewise, slum sectors for lower-class social strata, will it be shown a simple life complete with a more seedy visual perspective that supports. Various aspects such as texture, shadow, fog, reflection, lighting, etc. can present an immersive visual session.

In addition to the environment, visual quality also makes all the characters look more attractive as we explained before. The expressions of each character are now able to be detailed and clear, able to describe the emotional situation they feel, and of course we end up feeling as well as a player. Something that has not been presented optimally in the original version.

Gaming Movie Experience

As we explained before, Final Fantasy VII Remake has a very charming visual quality. Through this visual quality, they succeeded in presenting the experience of playing video games with the sensation of watching a film. Many emotional cuts and action-packed emotional are served as a film.

For those of you who have watched Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, of course see how cool the visuals and intense actions are presented. Super-fast sword battles, acrobatic actions, explosions, and battle effects mesmerize him look spectacular. And in Final Fantasy VII Remake this time, Square Enix also presents something similar and the same epic.

Even crazier, 90% of them are rendered cutscene, meaning that the cutscene presented is not in the form of video, but rendering directly from the game's visual engine itself. Something that we think looks neat and full of precision to be created.
In addition to the cutscene, the battle also looks very cool, some of them even show a direct battle with a cinematic dressing in the style of a cutscene. The fight against the boss battle will usually trigger at certain moments and will show a direct action that looks more cinematic and cool.

Final Fantasy VII Remake More Immersive, More Impressive!

Cool Soundtracks

The news was both shocking and encouraging, when he heard the legendary composer - Nobuo Uematsu returning in this ambitious remake this time. We know that it was his reliable hands who previously created a myriad of memorable soundtracks in the original version of Final Fantasy VII.

In the midi format that is limited to PlayStation One, he is still able to create a myriad of soundtracks that continue to be known to this day. And through this remake he was once again able to show his capacity, Final Fantasy VII Remake can appear with a row of cool soundtracks that are ready to pamper your ears all.

Various scenes can be wrapped with a soundtrack that feels very fitting and strong. Tense moments against boss battles for example, will be wrapped with epic music that is ready to make your adrenaline pumping fast. Emotional scenes will be wrapped with music that reinforces the emotions of the characters who are intertwined. Likewise, various "dime" scenes will also be wrapped with music that feels more "fun". All soundtracks feel very appropriate.

Interestingly again, to give the impression of a deeper nostalgia, many soundtracks which have a touch of old typical version. It's just performed with a variety of more modern instruments. Surely this will give you a sweeter sensation of nostalgia while you see Midgar's more enchanting new world.

Conclusion

Through his years of hard work, Square Enix was finally able to present a masterpiece of remake that far exceeded expectations. The myriad of evolution presented looks epic, bringing your experience in a deep nostalgic hole that feels fantastic and unforgettable.

We now understand very well why Final Fantasy VII Remake will be divided into two or even three parts like the original series. Everything that Square Enix has worked on this time feels very detailed and full of struggle. Throughout the game you will be confronted with nostalgic aspects in a format that feels immersive and impressive. From the gameplay itself, Final Fantasy VII Remake offers a lot of revolutionary things in it. Making it the solution if it applies a new high-class RPG standard that could be the new foundation of other RPG games in the future.

To be honest, we are very difficult to find the shortcomings of this remake, all of which look stunning and far from what we imagined before. Final Fantasy VII Remake is the right answer for you old gamers who are looking for fantastic nostalgia and also for those of you who haven't had a chance to taste the original version. There is nothing we can add anymore besides recommending you to try this masterpiece yourself. Welcome back sweet memory in Final Fantasy VII Remake!