There are various locations throughout each Remake and Rebirth which you can level to this type of factor; a spot the place the brand new video games lack the chunk of the unique.
The obvious instance up till now’s FF7’s ‘Path of Blood’, a very iconic and creepy sequence within the unique recreation that, within the trendy model, replaces streaks of blood all through beforehand shiny and sanitized company places of work with a type of bizarre glowing purple alien goo. The music is similar, however the temper is wrecked by the change; the sequence undermined.
To be honest, that’s the prime instance as a result of it’s the worst of the bunch. More often than not, Sq. Enix’s cautious recreation of scenes from FF7, even when modified, land completely. The truth is, the second a part of the Remake trilogy, Rebirth, by no means actually misses. With that mentioned, it’s additionally honest to say that on many events, the occasions it depicts lack a few of the heft and punch of the unique.
There’s a raft of recent examples of this in FF7 Rebirth, a recreation that covers a number of fairly traumatic occasions for the solid of FF7. There’s fairly just a few examples that I may discuss – however by means of instance, I wish to zero in on one – the storyline of Barret and Dyne in Chapter 8, round midway by the sport.
Consequently, from right here on on this article incorporates spoilers for as much as and together with Chapter 8 of FF7 Rebirth. You’ve gotten been warned.
The storyline of FF7 is of, course, about saving the planet from evil firms and malevolent aliens, however peppered all through are important character vignettes. Barret’s massive second comes when the workforce visits the Gold Saucer.
En route he passes by his house village, the place he’s inexplicably reviled – after which ultimately comes face-to-face together with his greatest pal, who he lengthy thought lifeless. Via the course of this story we study the origin of Barret’s daughter Marlene (whose being a distinct race to him isn’t up so far addressed), plus study his involvement in Shinra’s destruction of his house city.
It’s an necessary second. We study rather a lot about Barret’s origins, his motivations, and might put a finger on precisely why he’s so offended about Shinra earlier within the story. It’s additionally an emotional story – about brothers who’re torn aside and in the end compelled to combat one another by the forces of evil.
All of those occasions are current in Rebirth – however they’ve been subtly adjusted – and in some ways for the more serious.
Rebirth adjusts issues ever-so-slightly right here. For one, within the unique recreation, the hatred the individuals have for Barret goes unexplained till later. In Rebirth, it is defined immediately, Barret revealing his story to the occasion in flashback. This introduces you to Dyne, reveals he and Barret have been each gravely injured, and likewise makes clear that it was Shinra, not them, who was in charge. The flashback adjustments different small particulars, too; Corel is depicted as a ramshackle mountainside shanty city of kinds even earlier than the catastrophe – whereas within the unique the flashback Corel is visibly a way more affluent city. However the actual change begins to emerge when you arrive on the Gold Saucer.
Within the unique FF7, Barret arrives on the Gold Saucer in a foul temper, having been by a nasty expertise in visiting his ruined hometown and been rejected as a traitor by its inhabitants. Barret storms off with out a lot of a phrase, and the subsequent factor you recognize, you’re listening to a few man with a gun for an arm capturing up one of many zones of the enormous theme park you’re in. The sport teases it out: may Barret have accomplished this? Has he snapped and killed a bunch of harmless individuals? In our hearts, we all know the reply – it’s unlikely an RPG occasion member would flip so completely and so rapidly – however a flicker of doubt is there.
On this, Rebirth suggestions its hand subtly; the sides should be sanded off this narrative. So in Rebirth, we see a cut-away scene of Barret discover one other man with a gun for an arm within the Gold Saucer, earlier than we study concerning the slaughter. Barret follows the person. When information of the mass capturing breaks, the occasion worries that Barret is accountable, however we as an viewers already know the reality: it was this different mysterious dude.
That man seems to be Dyne, Barret’s lengthy misplaced pal from his hometown. The damage that led to Barret’s arm being amputated and changed by a gun was additionally suffered by Dyne, in mirror – Barret misplaced his proper arm, Dyne his left. Each independently had weapons grafted to their our bodies for a similar purpose – to hunt revenge. It seems that Marlene is definitely Dyne’s organic daughter, adopted by Barret within the wake of the catastrophe that destroyed the city of Corel, and left everybody else in Barret’s life – most notably Dyne, Dyne’s spouse, and his personal spouse – lifeless. Because it occurs, Dyne did survive.
In each video games, the Dyne we meet within the shadow of the Gold Saucer has misplaced his grip on sanity, ruined by the lack of his spouse, daughter, and residential – and by the brutality of the years since.
Within the unique, nevertheless, Dyne has a clearly acknowledged purpose. He says he desires to “destroy every thing” – and that’s why he heads as much as the Gold Saucer and slaughters a bunch of random innocents. He’s appearing out, mainly. When Dyne finds out Marlene is alive, his thoughts goes to just one place: his daughter has to die. She ought to, he causes, be together with her mom – and it’s Dyne’s obligation to “take her” to her late mom. That is in the end why Dyne assaults Barret, and why Barret counters – Barret stands in the way in which of Dyne killing Marlene.
In FF7 Rebirth, the scene is markedly totally different. Dyne assaults Barret in the end as a result of he’s simply mad about what occurred previously. He additionally sees Cloud’s uniform and errors him for a Shinra SOLDIER, which riles him up extra. Barret and Dyne. It’s solely after they’ve fought that he even finds out Marlene remains to be alive.
The sequence actually unravels for me from right here. Instantly, Shinra troopers present up en masse. At first I assumed this was to provide the remainder of the solid a distraction to maintain them away from Barret and Dyne’s showdown. It does serve that goal – however the troopers additionally they make their strategy to the gun-armed duo, too. An emotional scene between two damaged mates is undercut by a platoon opening fireplace on them.
In the long run, Rebirth’s Dyne takes a load of bullets from Shinra troopers – and basically saves Barret’s life, as when the troopers present up Barret’s gun arm is unequipped, having been knocked off of their duel. In that sense Dyne goes out in a blaze of glory, to some extent. Plus within the unhinged state the sport presents, and together with his hatred of Shinra, he would’ve attacked these troopers anyway, to save lots of Barret or in any other case. The unique recreation’s Dyne has a really totally different finish; coming considerably to his senses, he causes he’s accomplished an excessive amount of evil, his fingers too bloodsoaked, to ever reunite with – or not be a hazard to – his daughter. Dyne then jumps off a cliff to his loss of life.
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What’s attention-grabbing is that the Rebirth scene actually isn’t unhealthy. John Eric Bentley, the voice actor behind Barret within the English model, turns in an unimaginable efficiency right here. As Dyne lays dying, Bentley’s Barret lets out a gut-wrenching cry that offers strategy to sobs; it put a lump in my throat. The cutscene course is gorgeous. The dusky time of day the occasions happen in is ideal for a wild west showdown between two gunmen. It’s actually good. However it’s not as good, you recognize?
By no means thoughts that the very subsequent factor that occurs after that gut-wrenching scene – actually a minute later – is a boss combat towards a comic book aid villain in an enormous frog-like mech. The scene itself simply feels undercut.
I can see why the builders would possibly’ve taken a step again and determined that having an tried infanticide be a serious plot level won’t be one thing they’d wish to do in 2024. Likewise for Dyne taking his personal life versus having it snuffed out by enemy troopers in a determined final stand. However, being actual, and for all that I really like concerning the new scene, I nonetheless suppose the unique, extra uncooked model is in the end higher.
I really feel equally about a variety of moments within the recreation – like how the spooky setting of the occasions with Jenova on the cargo ship are changed with a extra bombastic rush and a collection of escalating battles. It’s a largely cold affair – although I say this figuring out that the cutscene instantly earlier than the boss combat there’s, I feel, one of many single greatest within the recreation.
Just like the trial of blood in Remake’s nerfing, or the watered-down physique horror components of Jenova’s existence, a variety of this seems like a choice to keep away from something within the recreation being too uncooked. Ultimate Fantasy 16 would possibly’ve been a bloody M-Rated affair, however FF7 Remake and Rebirth are T for Teen throughout. That’s for good and for in poor health.
Not directly, FF7 Remake’s bosses have defined this, too. Talking throughout a latest BAFTA occasion, unique FF7 director and Remake collection Producer Yoshinori Kitase truly purchased up scores – and aiming for one thing extra extensively acceptable – as a key goal for Rebirth.
“I am not criticizing this in any respect, I feel you very a lot do want these sorts of extra excessive expressions of issues, and depictions of issues that are a bit of bit quirky, a bit of bit bizarre,” Kitase says of extra expressly violent video games. “However I feel to be extensively accepted by mainstream tradition we’ve got to go for the center floor as properly and have extra generic, extra mainstream depictions of issues that are simply regular and common, and attempt to make these portrayals as sensible as doable.”
“That is one thing that we’re striving for in Ultimate Fantasy. Once more, all that excessive, on the market stuff – that is all nice and we want that too. However we have to have a bit extra of a stability as properly.”
Kitase’s phrases make good sense. And actually, it doesn’t damage Remake or Rebirth that a lot within the grand scheme of issues. On the similar time, nevertheless, I do mourn for the unique variations of scenes like Path of Blood, the Cargo Ship, Barret and Dyne’s showdown, and others. I additionally surprise if a growth workforce as laser-focused on the mainstream would’ve even be capable of make a recreation as texturally wealthy as the unique FF7.
Occasions have modified, and I really like what we’ve received – however nonetheless miss what we’ve misplaced – and it’s an ideal reminder of why the unique will all the time be untouchable.