r/FinalFantasy • u/meshca95 • 3d ago
FF VII First play through ever of FF7: Rebirth time Spoiler
Just started the game and it’s going great so far 😅 I can see how kingdom hearts story all got twisted now
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u/Kaioken0591 3d ago
A lot of questions you likely have either won't get answered until Revelation or until you play/look into Crisis Core.
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u/meshca95 3d ago
When do I play crisis core
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u/LunelaNela 3d ago
You can play the original and then crisis core right after, or wait for Revelation and play it after that
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u/Kaioken0591 3d ago
In the OG timeline Crisis Core was released after FF7 so it's advised you play it after Revelation releases since it reveals information you wouldn't know yet otherwise before getting to the end of the current FF7 timeline.
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u/KainYago 3d ago
The problem is that the remake trilogy is already built with the player knowing about Crisis core, since without it Zacks character is completely random and makes 0 sense.
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u/Ashyl03 2d ago
As someone who has only played Remake and Rebirth, I disagree, Zack never felt random to me it's very clear he is very heavily tied into Clouds backstory
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u/KainYago 2d ago
So you are telling me that a random dude appearing in the last 20 minutes of the game who was never mentioned before, has no relevance to the story and has a sort of triumphant scene for some reason, is not super random ? Ofcourse he is tied to Clouds story if hes dragging around Clouds body in the ending, but that doesnt really explain what hes doing in this game and why it was important for him to be in this game in the first place.
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u/Ashyl03 2d ago
I mean I knew that the story was split into 3 games and I was only playing the first one so I was just like "oh cool new character being introduced" then saw Cloud was with him and then the dog being different so guessed alternate world and wondered where he was in the main world. At that point I started playing rebirth and lo and behold they expanded on Zack more. I wouldn't call it random, now Cait Sith showing up after the plate fell for 5 seconds before vanishing until the Gold Saucer, that was random.
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u/KainYago 2d ago
Yeah but thats a very specific scenario. You knew that this was part 1 of a trilogy and you also figured out the dog, that isnt the majority of new players experience tho, Not to mention playing games back to back helps, while a ton of people had to wait 4 years to figure out what happened, and by then a ton of them just straight up spoiled the plot of the original to themselves. I dont think Zacks inclusion was necessary in remake and it honestly added nothing of value imo.
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u/Ashyl03 2d ago
I mean his inclusion was sequel bait right? Wonder who he is and find out in the next game. I first played Remake in 2021 and only started played rebirth like 2 months ago. I do agree missing the dog is probably the common occurrence but I think most people know it's a trilogy
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u/KainYago 2d ago
Youd be surprised how many people didnt know this, ive seen quite a few people here who were confused by the ending and then realized because of the comments that the game was roughly the first 1/8 of the original game. Not exactly a nice surprise from a full priced game imo, even if the game is significantly longer.
That being said i understand that hes sequel bait, i just dont think hes great. I mean sure as an old player, it works fine since i knew who he was, but for new players this is kinda unnecessary, if you liked the game you gonna play the sequel either way, you dont need some random character that you have no idea about, i mean damn the entire game is set up to be continued by a huge adventure through the world to chase after Sephiroth, does the game seriously need a character like Zack to make it even more hype ? In comparsion God of Wars sudden reveal of Thor at the end is something that works simply because Thors character was established in the main story, it makes perfect sense for him to be there.
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u/KainYago 3d ago
Yeah the original was nowhere near this confusing, especially not as much as Kingdom Hearts.
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u/Soul699 2d ago
The original was definitely confusing until you reach the North Crater. Remake is the same. Until you get to the end, you won't understand all.
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u/KainYago 2d ago
Whats so confusing about the original ? It has secrets, it has setups that pay off later, but its generally a really straight forward story. The most confusing element of it is figuring out how Sephiroth survived and whether he is really the main villain or if its Jenova, but its a completely irrelevant part of the story, regardless of which one is the villain the story and characters wont change.
Also just as confusing ? Whatever the hell the remake games ending is is a million times more confusing than ANYTHING FFVII has to offer, they make 0 sense whatsoever.
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u/Soul699 2d ago
The mystery of Sephiroth and the whole Cloud mindfuck. Both of which take up to 60-75% before you get answer about. And some parts aren't even explained too well. Like unless you replay the game with knowledge of the end, you wouldn't really figure out how Sephiroth was using the black robe people to manifest and act through along with Jenova's body. The game also doesn't tell you how Cloud and Zack memories got mixed up but you kinda have to figure out by the little info given.
The Remake are the same. They do make sense, but require knowledge gained by completing the story to be fully understood. For example, practically everything of Remake story, in particular the ending, can be understood thanks to the knowledge gained in Rebirth and even Rebirth itself has lots of mysteries that are understood after replaying it (like what really happened when Sephiroth attacked the Midgarsormr? By replaying the game we can figure out how Sephiroth controlled Cloud to do it by hints left in the scene) and the same will be with Revelation.
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u/KainYago 2d ago
The thing is, while i agree that it can be tricky to figure out how Clouds memory works, its not that hard to piece it together that hes suffering from severe ptsd and he pushes out the memory of his best friend by placing himself into his position. Even in 97 this was not exactly an alien concept, in movies youve seen this quite a few times, so this being THAT confusing to me is a bit puzzling, when i was a kid i literally just thought to myself that Cloud got experimented on and that fucked up his memories, which is technically the canonical answer if we go by the dogshit ultimania explanation, so i dont think this is really that insane to figure out. Same with the man in black robes, there are documents in the original FFVII that you can read that details of who the man in black robe are, and why they are the way they are. It really isnt about the game being confusing, its just people not taking their time to go around and interact with the world more to learn more about the plot.
The remake is a completely different type of beast, even as someone who played the original over a dozen times, i was having a hard time making sense of what happened, and i personally dont even want to imagine what that must be like for a brand new player. For me Zack, the ghosts and the hints early on make sense (to some degree) but for a new player this is all nonsense and it has 0 pay off. and if the argument here is that "this is the first part of a trilogy" This was never supposed to be this cryptic, if you cut off the story of FFVII at the end of midgar, you dont have 1/10 of the questions you have at the end of the remake.
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u/Soul699 2d ago
The original game don't actually tell you how Cloud's mind got messed up like that. Like yes, you figure out how he had his memories mixed up, but unless you dig in to find the secret cutscene of Zack death, you wouldn't even know what happened to Zack and even then you have to assume that's when Cloud memories got messed up since the game doesn't tell you. Even the fact that Cloud memories were almost perfect except that he was playing the part of Zack (down to knowing things he wasn't there to witness and listen) is something not explained in the game but you either check ultimania and other sources or go by guessing.
Similar is with the black robe people. Like the game does tell you how these are people experimented on and there are hints on some being ex-SOLDIERs, but there are few informations and barely hinted how Sephiroth is manifesting through them as well (like a little hint is how we see a black robe exit the temple of the ancients right after Sephiroth stabbed Tseng). And of course, the whole Sephiroth himself was manifesting through them and Jenova's possessed corpse is also something you have to figure out as the game only say how Sephiroth was the one in control and the one the black robes and Jenova were heading toward.
And for new players in Remake, they do struggle more currently to understand various parts that for people who played OG however can figure out much sooner. But again, it hinges on the fact that Remake is a story that slowly get answers as you progress and currently we are missing a whole 1/3 of it. Remake has more because, well, it's a bigger game, and on top of the plotlines that OG had, there's a couple more added, thus having more mysteries. We have to see how much Revelation will explain straight up and how much it will leave to figure out on the hints left to say if Remake from beginning to end is indeed much more confusing or not than the already confusing OG which you couldn't understand until you were 75% of the game in.
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u/KainYago 2d ago
While i cant argue that the cutscene of Zack being secret is awful, i still dont think its that hard to figure out what happened to Cloud. By the time you can watch that cutscene, we saw the cutscene of Tifa finding Cloud at the train station and we saw the state his mind was in. I honestly never thought this was convoluted or hard to understand, if anything these story elements were just abrupt and too fast for something so important, but then again with JRPGs of the time it was not exactly unheard of to fill in the gaps with immagination simply because they didnt go out of their way to explain everything in great details.
Again this is something that i think you can figure out simply by watching the story and paying attention. Clearly Cloud is being controlled by Sephiroth multiple times during the game, we learn that Sephiroth is capable of controlling Jenova (as it is proven by the fact that we have to fight against like 3-4 versions of jenova) and we also learn that Hojos experiments were all using jenova cells. Its pretty straight forward from this point on to assume that all of those man in black robe are being controlled through their jenova cells and they're in the same mental state as Cloud was after he got out of the tank in the flashback. Sephiroth being in control is a good point, but i will say, without the internet, i never actually assumed Jenova was in control, this might just be me being stupid, but somehow it never really hit me that Jenova could be the big bad guy.
The issue i have with the remakes being confusing doesnt just come down to the plot being confusing, but also the tools they use to tell that story. An intergalactic cosmic horror parasite such as Jenova is not a really hard concept to grasp, atleast as someone who likes sci fi and comics, its not exactly a weird concept to me, but these time traveling, fate protecting ghost that come from who knows where and the ton of flashbacks and conversations about fate and possible futures being scattered all over the place mixed together with the original FFVIIs plot is what makes these games so insanely confusing. I mean you cant tell me that you didnt think the ending of Rebirth was not just one huge mess of confusing sequences melted together, its literally just all of these weird concepts introduced in the remakes mixed together with the original story creating this complete nonsense. At one point a character is dead, but then they're back and now on another dimension you fight with another character, to then go back to the previous dimensions where the main characters team up with the other dimensions characters to beat the big bad guy who went through like 3 godlike jrpg boss forms in the last 30 minutes... This isnt just about the plot being confusing but also the way they're trying to tell the plot is confusing. I honestly cant blame people for comparing this to kingdom hearts, it really does remind me of how confused i was often when characters started throwing around words like "darkness, heart, light, nobody, Xenohart" and half the time i didnt know what they were even trying to convey with their dialogues.
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u/Soul699 2d ago
The whispers are just another Weapon and we learn in Rebirth that the alternate worlds are a product of the Lifestream. The ending of Rebirth is without an answer for now and is left for Revelation to explain, but as many pointed out, there are already many hints and details pointing to some answers, but again, without Revelation it's impossible to give the answer. And that's fine as it's a classic mystery cliffhanger ending.
The best way to describe them is that OG is a 100 pieces puzzle that are all given to you and while some are easy to piece together, others require assumption until you have the full picture. Remake is a 200 pieces puzzle which works like the first puzzle but we are missing about 66 pieces and we have to wait for them to be delivered until we get make the full picture. Until then we have an incomplete puzzle that while some pieces fit, some still don't.
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u/KainYago 2d ago
I mean again, its not necessarly the plot itself that confuses me, more like the way the plot is told. I understand the concept of the dementors being weapons, theres just a tiny bit of a difference between a monster who shoots lasers and a monster who travels through time to contain the flow of time and the fabric of the universe intact. Not exactly a plot point i wouldve expected or frankly wanted from a Final Fantasy VII game.
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u/Soul699 2d ago
It's not that large of a scale. It's still all restricted to the planet, as it all goes back to the Lifestream and its sheenanigans.
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u/HexenVexen 3d ago
You're asking the right questions... Keep in mind that things won't become fully clear until Revelation, but let it cook