|
Palmtree Panic posted:In the Nibelheim proto-relic quest, there is the cutscene with Hojo talking about Chadley. Does this get followed up at all or is it just a teaser for Part 3? I noped out of doing the Summon fights for the final proto-relic quest. I think this is going to be concluded in Part 3, Charley does get a scene following completion of all the world intel but it doesn’t deal with the Hojo cutscene.
|
#
?
Apr 28, 2024 12:13
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 27, 2024 07:39 |
|
|
Finished the game. The Whispers are a mess. Rebirth Sephiroth being in part 2 is cool, but also kind of a mess for how much it messes with the emotional throughline of the finale. I'm not crazy about how Sephiroth keeps doing these 3 Stock Final Destination showdowns in both remake games. At this point it feels like Sephiroth in the remake games fills the role that Jenova filled originally, which is that he's a big inscrutable cosmic monster. Maybe that's intentional. The timeline stuff is a mess, and I think it was a misstep not to show Aerith being stabbed--from a purely visual storytelling perspective it is very muddy and hard to decipher. OTOH, Cloud seeing alternate versions of the event is interesting on both a visual and a narrative level, so it's a mixed bag. The idea that Cloud is both 1. having a psychotic break from a confluence of ptsd and mako poising but also 2. genuinely can see realities overlapping -- that's pretty cool as a concept, and I could see them doing some great stuff with it in Part 3. From a narrative standpoint I totally get why they decided that Aerith's death would have to be this way, because it really does leave the player suspending their judgment of what will happen to her until the very end, and allows a sort of expanded emotional tribute to her. The downside is that it almost deifies her by making her death this Christ-like cosmic event. But Aerith is so fully-realized as a character in these remake games that I think it ultimately works. Her standing in the grasslands at the very end is heartbreaking. Those shots where Cloud sees her but the rest of the party doesn't, likewise, are very simple but emotionally striking. I think, after Remake, they had a chance to let Aerith live and take the story in a different direction. I respect the decision to have her die in Rebirth. But, having made that decision, I think it will probably be a bad idea if she "comes back" in any wish fulfillment sense in part 3. All of the timeline realities stuff, Cloud seeing her, etc. should probably be funneled into a narrative about coming to terms and making peace with life and death. I suspect that the "Reunion/Homecoming" theme is going to resolve with Zack and Aerith finding some way to reconnect with Cloud, and he will "come home" in the sense that he accepts the cycle of the Lifestream, and that as long as the planet is alive, they're all home. That seems like the most reasonable way to synthesize the ecological story of the original FF7 with this metaphysical multiverse rebirth narrative.
|
|
#
?
May 2, 2024 04:46
|
|
|
I know this thread has been dead for weeks but I just finished the game and damnit I have feelings. It's been nice to look through the past few months of posts to help solidify my own thoughts about everything. Still have some processing but expect an effort post in the near future. Clarste posted:Specifically the writer wanted to write a protagonist death that wasn't some kind of heroic sacrifice, both to contrast previous Final Fantasy death scenes and to evoke the feeling of hollowness he felt when his mother died. Holy poo poo. I never knew that. I guess teaching an international generation of children about loss, love, and forging meaning from the cruelty of life is one way to honor your Mom's legacy. That does set a pretty high bar for the rest of us.
|
|
#
?
May 8, 2024 19:14
|
|
|
Another element of FFVII's exploration of grief is the idea that even when someone's dead, they're not truly gone so long as they live in your memory. That's the big metaphor the Lifestream is meant to represent and why it's so explicitly made of memories. I really like that as a metaphor.Cephas posted:I think, after Remake, they had a chance to let Aerith live and take the story in a different direction. I respect the decision to have her die in Rebirth. But, having made that decision, I think it will probably be a bad idea if she "comes back" in any wish fulfillment sense in part 3. All of the timeline realities stuff, Cloud seeing her, etc. should probably be funneled into a narrative about coming to terms and making peace with life and death. I 100% agree with this reading. I think my take having digested Rebirth for a while is that even though I think Rebirth also makes some missteps with its timeline/Whispers/etc. stuff, I feel more like it's going in a direction that will remain faithful to the themes and spirit of the original, if not the plot, and that's honestly all I'd really want. The idea of Zack and Aerith reconnecting with Cloud and them all accepting the cycle of the Lifestream, with Zack and Aerith moving on at the end, would be a great way to wrap that up. Harrow fucked around with this message at 19:27 on May 8, 2024 |
|
#
?
May 8, 2024 19:24
|
|
|
Bad Parenting posted:Just finished the game last night and while I enjoyed it, I didn't really like the last chapter/ending. My feelings echo what you wrote here. I just felt such confused whiplash through a lot of the ending that the Strong Feelings I had about Aerith's death were yanked back and forth until I wasn't sure what to feel, or what the narrative wanted me to feel. Also, for two games that spent a lot of time going on about how we'd beaten the whispers and were free to forge our own fate, having Aerith die (even with the question marks the multiverse stuff puts around it) left me feeling like a chump. Honestly, same goes for a lot of the plot in this. For such a long RPG, I sure don't feel like Cloud and his crew accomplished a whole lot in terms of improving things. I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the only way into the temple to get the black materia vis a vis an Ancient? Wouldn't things have been better if Cloud and Aerith stayed home?
|
|
#
?
May 21, 2024 18:04
|
|
|
Baba Yaga Fanboy posted:My feelings echo what you wrote here. I just felt such confused whiplash through a lot of the ending that the Strong Feelings I had about Aerith's death were yanked back and forth until I wasn't sure what to feel, or what the narrative wanted me to feel. No, anyone could get it. The Turks got really far in even if they had to burn through a shitload of Shinra mooks to do it. Aerith made it easier for the party, but the entire reason it became a thing is because the Turks were going for it no matter what. It's also the midpoint of a trilogy (or the story going by the original game) which is almost always the 'down' moment of the story where things look their darkest.
|
|
#
?
May 21, 2024 18:11
|
|
|
ImpAtom posted:No, anyone could get it. The Turks got really far in even if they had to burn through a shitload of Shinra mooks to do it. Aerith made it easier for the party, but the entire reason it became a thing is because the Turks were going for it no matter what. Ah, okay, that makes more sense. Still, I don't feel like the party accomplishes enough given how long the game is. Like, in old school FF games you'd come across 6-8 towns as you travel the world, each with their own problem, and you'd fix up that problem and move on so that by the time credits roll you can palpably feel that you've made changes for the better. In this, most of the places you visit are peaceful towns which are fine before and after you stroll through, or tourist-y areas which, again, are fine before and after your visit. Sure, if you do the sidequests you help a few people here and there but I just don't feel like the characters have enough impact on the world/plot given the length of the game. Also the more I think about it the more I feel annoyed at how much of the game is like "fate isn't set in stone" only for THE big plot point to turn out the way it did. What was accomplished by defeating the Whispers at the end of Remake if A. Sephiroth is like sike they're mine bitch, and B. if we don't actually change fate? Not to mention that the whole "you saved her! You didn't. She's alive! No, she's not. Yes she is! No, she's not?" of Aerith's death felt cruel on the part of the writers. Baba Yaga Fanboy fucked around with this message at 22:46 on May 21, 2024 |
|
#
?
May 21, 2024 22:41
|
|
|
I have a feeling those peaceful places are going to be anything but once meteor is summoned.
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2024 00:31
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 27, 2024 07:39 |
|
|
It's gonna be like day 3 of Majora's Mask all over the place.
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2024 21:41
|
|
