The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

John 1:5 (ESV)

On April 9th, 2020, I placed my order for a digital copy of the upcoming Final Fantasy VII: Remake game for Playstation 4. The very next day, it was downloaded and ready for me to play. At long last, the Reunion was at hand.

I mentioned on a previous entry that Final Fantasy VII was not a game I necessarily grew up with, but one that I rather fell into by chance. The more I learned about this world and the characters that inhabited it, though, the more I wanted to dive further into the story.

I think a lot of fans, even fans that grew up with the original game when it was first released, may have felt the same way.

That’s why when the Remake was first announced, we were ecstatic. We would finally be able to play the game with high definition graphics and a deeper look at the nuances of what made the original great, and possibly a deeper story that we could sink our teeth into.

It was a dream come true being able to revisit this wonderful world. But did the hype live up to its expectations? Or are there enough problems present that could hamper players’ long-term enjoyment of the game?

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One of the first things that really stood out to me while playing Final Fantasy VII: Remake was the sense that everything was made to be bigger and better from the get-go. I felt that Square Enix pulled out all the stops when it came to expanding the character development of not only our beloved characters, but also side characters that may have had only one or two lines in the original game. In some cases, new characters were created to help add to the story and give the player another sense of depth of the world around them, which helps bring the massive city of Midgar to life.

Some of these side characters that I appreciated being fleshed out more were the other members of Avalanche, the eco-terrorist group that you are hired to team up with from the beginning of the game. Biggs, Wedge, and Jessie are given much more focus, and you get to know them more as people, not just as foot soldiers. Their characters are fleshed out throughout the story as you begin to see how they really matter to the denizens of Sector 7, and you can understand their motivations for why they are doing what they do.

Barret Wallace for me was by far the character that impressed me the most in the Remake; in the original game, he is the leader of Avalanche, but always wears his heart on his sleeve. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but the limitations of the original Playstation console at the time mixed with the poor translation kind of presented him as a bit of a fool; he tended to act rashly full-speed ahead without thinking of the consequences.

Barret in the Remake keeps his impulsiveness, but I buy the fact that he is also a pragmatic leader who is well-respected by his teammates compared to in the original. His plans have actually strategy and logic here, and he is actually a charismatic leader, able to encourage his team when they begin to falter.

I enjoyed his bantering with Cloud much more here, due in part to how natural the dialogue was. He’s still a very emotional character, but is able to channel those emotions and keep them in check when he needs to, which tends to pay off in more powerful moments of the story. Specifically, his scenes with his adopted daughter Marlene and their relationship together are by-far some of my favorite in the entire game, and actually managed to tear me up a few times.

Going back to dialogue for a moment, I would say that the writing for these characters have to be some of most organic I’ve seen from a Final Fantasy game lately. Final Fantasy tends to be a bit of a mixed bag as far as vocalizations and dialogue is concerned; they can sound very corny and anime-ish in some instances, which distracts me at times. Japanese media in general (whether its anime, films, or television shows) tend to be more over-the-top, and Japanese video games are certainly no exception. I usually am not one to mind, but I think depending on how it’s done, a character’s dialogue in a game that tends to be more anime-ish if it has a more realistic presentation tends to take me away from the experience a bit. There are some elements of that still present here, but they are much more subdued than some of the other entries in Final Fantasy.

I felt that the main voice cast did an overall solid job, and any doubts I had about any of them were quickly laid to rest once they began to speak and converse with each other. They all melted into their roles naturally, and gave them the nuances and emotional range needed to reflect what was happening in the scene.

What the character is able to see and react to is what we as the player also have to react to. If player is able to buy the reaction, then the actor has done their job successfully. I didn’t feel any of the main cast was awkward or didn’t fit their role quite right; they all suited the cast well, and I enjoyed seeing how the characters reacted to certain scenes, now that there was a voice reacting through them as well.

This is more of a minor criticism, but the NPCs’ voices on the other hand were a bit more of a mixed bag; I loved being able to walk by and hearing dialogue from them about the game’s events as the story was unfolding. It’s great world-building when you’re able to see and hear the folks around you reacting, almost in real-time, the events that you partake in. The voices though ranged from being subdued and realistic, to grating and cartoonish. Sometimes immersed me more into what life was like for these people, but it also sometimes took me away from it.

Textures in various locations could also be low and in poor quality in some instances. It’s possible that it may be fixed in future updates to the base game as time passes, but for now it’s mildly distracting when an object or landscape appears fuzzy or of low resolution thanks to poor textures. I would have also enjoyed an option to zoom in first-person, just because there were times where I wanted a closer look at some feature (such as an Easter egg) and really take a look at the details they show.

That being said, I love that the areas you can explore in are expanded here compared to the original. Sure, this can make traveling from Point A to Point B of an area a lot longer than it needs to be. However, compare that to the original game, when we had a panned-view above Cloud, guiding him to where we wanted him to go next. It didn’t take as long to do, but there was not as much investment in the location we were traveling through either.

The Remake is still linear at times, which to be fair, was a common complaint in the first game as well, and it’s still a bit slow to get going up until Aerith joins you. The fact that the main story has been expanded in Midgar to at least 30 hours might drive some fans up the wall (there’s so much more to the story of Final Fantasy VII aside from Midgar, after all) but there really is a lot more to do. While the side quests here are nothing special, it was fun getting to know the people of Midgar on a closer level and learning more about their lives than we ever could before. Some of these quests actually made a difference later on in the story when some of the choices made were based by how much I was able to help the people of the Sectors I visited, so that was interesting to discover and will definitely give the player some replay value.

I think having the game reimagined to contrast with the original while still remaining familiar, and the possibilities the developers came up with is Final Fantasy VII: Remake‘s biggest strength. This shows from the expanded characters and their development, the locations you can visit…and the music.

Final Fantasy VII‘s music is beloved, and having Nobuo Uematsu back on board along with Masashi Hamauzu and Mitsuto Suzuki helped recreate these celebrated tracks by shaping them with a mix of orchestral scores blended with the techno beats. The result is a soundtrack that is able immerse the player into this high-definition techno world that they’re becoming a part of.

The songs you know and love are back, and while they’re not exactly the same, they’re implemented beautifully into each appropriate scene, with some new tracks created specifically for this new Remake series. Even days after finishing the game, I was looking up tracks from the game, appreciating each one for what it was and how well it was crafted.

The gameplay is vastly different from the original turn-based system to something that requires you to think on your feet more (although you can still pause and plan out your strategy). Everyone in the party has a role to play, and abilities that prove useful in battle; as you get to know what everyone can do, you can freely switch between them and have fun taking down soldiers or machines with combinations of materia spells, summons, or simple combat. It’s especially been much more engaging hearing banter after each battle and see these characters grow closer together as you level them up.

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What made me fall in love with Final Fantasy VII in the first place (and really Final Fantasy as a franchise) is that it is an inherently a hopeful game. Midgar itself is a dank and dangerous place to live in, and corruption is rife. There is very little kindness in both words and actions for one another, and it’s very much a dog-eat-dog world. It’s telling that in the opening shot of the game alone, Aerith (who’s a representation of the kindness and purity the world has abandoned) is knocked down, and one of her flowers that she peddles is crushed in front of her.

Cloud Strife and the group of Avalanche are not innocent by any means, and even resort to violent and terroristic means to have their voices heard. Yet, they are the first to realize that there’s a grave danger present if mankind continues on its course, and that there’s a greater evil at hand that means to doom the world and everyone in it. They are not good people, but want to do good so that good will prevail.

Looking towards the future of this series and seeing where it takes Cloud and the others, I can’t help but see a lot of similarities between their world and ours. Our world can be dark at times, and scary. People tend to be cruel and manipulative, and violence can permeate the news cycle, creating an air of hopelessness and darkness.

Yet, when you visit Aerith’s home for the first time, you see that the people that live near her are happy and smiling. Flora is growing on buildings, and the grass turns greener as you get closer to her house…until you finally are gazing upon a great number of flowers and clean water flowing through. It’s a peaceful and tranquil area in contrast with all the rest of Midgar that you see.

Aerith shares her flowers with others, but she also shares also her hope too. She’s able to cultivate relationships with others just as she’s able to cultivate her flowers, and bring life to them.

We can do much the same for our own relationships, and everyone we come across in our lives. It is a dark world, but we are called to bring hope and light to others that need it.

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I hope those of you who play Final Fantasy VII: Remake, or at least are thinking of giving it a chance, will appreciate what fans these past few decades have come to love about this series and these characters. They are iconic and beloved for a reason, and I can’t wait to see what direction Square Enix will take in the next Final Fantasy VII: Remake game that follows this one, and what adventures Cloud and company will experience next.