No other series could sustain the Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy’s sheer ambition

Final Fantasy 7 Remake holds a special place among the sea of remakes and remasters. Where the survival-horror remake Resident Evil 2 sought to add polish, Final Fantasy 7 Remake entirely rebuilt. Where fantasy RTS Warcraft 3 Reforged sought to disappoint everyone, Final Fantasy 7 Remake wants to bring back the feeling of playing the game for the first time again.

Remake and its sequel, Rebirth, are such oddities in their approach. There’s impressive ambition in Square Enix’s complete overhaul of visuals and gameplay, but it’s the confidence in messing with the story that makes it stand out. Clearly, leaning into being more of an adaptation than a remaster has worked in its favor, but it feels like a trick only Final Fantasy 7 could pull off.

Realising a vision

The graphical overhaul that Final Fantasy 7 Remake achieved was not just about creating visual splendor, but about capturing the feeling that Final Fantasy 7 was trying to achieve but couldn’t manage. Final Fantasy 7 was made at the advent of 3D games, the first push for Final Fantasy into this new style, and so had to grapple to solidify its identity.

While the painted backgrounds continue to be gorgeous, the different models between the overworld and combat still felt like they were caught in the pixel era. Square’s ambition was huge in trying to push its cutscene potential, but it was limited by technology and understanding.

That untapped potential makes it the perfect era to remake. The games surrounding Final Fantasy 7 don’t have that same level of struggle. The gorgeous Final Fantasy 6 was pixel artists working at the height of their craft, having perfected their character expressiveness and the intricacies of their boss art. 

On the other hand, Final Fantasy 8 didn’t require much more than a spit and polish with its current remaster, as it had already come leaps and bounds over Final Fantasy 7. The polygonal bonds would later be released with releases like iffy shooter Dirge of Cerberus or the full-blown film Advent Children, but Final Fantasy 7 itself still begged for a full realisation.

Taking a story and twisting it up

Where the Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy is at its most bold is in its changes to the story. Final Fantasy 7 Remake takes what amounts to about two hours of the original and spins it out into a 30-hour yarn. However, it isn’t just plot indulgence with some added filler.

Final Fantasy 7 Remake has more in common with meta-comedy The Stanley Parable Ultra Deluxe than it does with a more usual remake like Resident Evil 4. Final Fantasy 7’s big return is part sequel, part requel, and part metacommentary. 

Game director Tetsuya Nomura, perhaps best known for headlining the confounding Disney crossover JRPG Kingdom Hearts, mischievously and deliberately twists established canon to make a wider narrative point.

There’s plenty of messing around with ideas of fate, time travel, and multiverses, all adding something new and intriguing. It’s a fascinating play, and also lets seasoned Final Fantasy fans get something new out of the plot, rather than just a retelling.

If you were to put out a Chrono Trigger remake and somehow cram whole new ideas and themes into the much beloved plot, you’d likely wind up with something bloated and overwrought. 

Conversely, those playing the Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy are given more room to breathe thanks to Nomura filling in the blanks, fleshing out side characters, and letting the world of Final Fantasy 7 exist in a modern context. In a way, Final Fantasy 7 is too big to fail. 

Letting the moments shine

While the original Final Fantasy 7 was filled to the brim with setpieces, the limits of 1997 console hardware ensured that it was our imaginations that had to do the heavy lifting. 

Though spin-offs and prequels, such as the glorious Crisis Core Final Fantasy 7, gave these setpieces much welcome context, the sprawling, over-ambitious story of Final Fantasy 7 was crying out for reinvention. 

What Final Fantasy 7 Remake can give those moments is space, allowing character moments to grow and rest properly. Intense moments like the dropping of the Midgar plate, the thousands this kills, and its impact on sensitive freedom-fighter Barret get more weight in Remake.

Now, rather than happening in our imaginations, the emotional weight of that particular act of corporate-sanctioned mass slaughter is realized before our eyes. This is the magic of Final Fantasy 7 Remake. 

In Final Fantasy 7, Cloud falls through the roof of a church to meet Aerith, and after a boss battle, they move on. In Final Fantasy 7 Remake, the same event is punctuated by resonant, meaningful dialogue. The two characters share quips back and forth, gently poking fun at one another as they make their way through the slums. 

They bond. Perhaps even fall in love, depending on your interpretation. By giving Cloud and Aerith’s relationship room to grow, Final Fantasy 7 Remake gives us the opposite of bloat. It gives us time to reflect. 

Limit break

What really binds Final Fantasy 7 Remake together is the new chemistry that the characters have been given, and the natural evolution of their personalities. The Final Fantasy 7 characters are beloved by fans, but the Remake really allows them to flourish.

Aerith is full of personality, with much more life than adaptations have allowed her in the past. In Kingdom Hearts, Aerith had decidedly little personality, with an actress that sounded like she was falling asleep, but in Remake, she’s spirited and layered. Similarly, Tifa can kick anyone’s ass, but is allowed to have slower and more vulnerable moments.

They’re both wildly improved and yet still feel like the original characters, because there was already something strong to work with underneath. Games like Golden Sun don’t have quite the right cast for this to work, with its protagonist, Isaac, being a bit too straight-laced, like a lot of early Final Fantasy heroes. 

Cloud might appear like a standard gruff protagonist, but he’s actually awkward and just the right amount of broken to keep audiences sympathetic and invested. 

It’s hard to tell if audiences will be receptive to big swings, but Final Fantasy 7 has such malleability and potential that nothing needs to be set in stone. Other games just don’t have that perfect storm of viability for an adaptation like this, and after the third installment is released, we probably won’t see its like again.

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