The Opening Cinematic has been officially released!

[Aulayna]

I was expecting the opening to be changed somewhat as the ~60 seconds of the panning back and forth over green dots until Aerith's face appeared from the original was a bit drawn out even back then.

To me what's more jarring is how different the art style for that "slice of life" stuff seems compared to the more true to the original section. Obviously one is during the day and one is during the night, but there's a very different visual feel to them beyond that - It's kinda cool to get an impression of Midgar during the day and the wastelands devoid of life on the outskirts of Midgar, there's just something about the movements of the children that feels "off." If I wanted to be very critical of it then I'd say that, for me, the fully pre-rendered "slice of life" stuff goes into uncanny valley pretty damn quickly - I think it's just the heavy white lighting used on it, IDK. That being said, a lot of it seems to be alternate camera angles of the cinematic they made for the E3 2015 reveal so I'm guessing they made this ages ago and didn't want to leave it on the cutting room floor as cinematics like that don't exactly come cheap.

But smurf nitpicking. Overall: I have goosebumps, I am hyyyyyyyyyyyyyyype! The transition from the playground to Aerith appearing; I squee, when the logo appears and the music swells up; I'm a awe-struck 14 year old all over again, and the use of the steam from the train breaking to blanket the screen and transition from pre-rendered to the more in-engine stuff is legit. I can't wait!

(ALSO, I want to ride the Tube in Midgar...)