Ok I just finished watching a playthrough that someone put up on youtube. Since I watched it and didn't play it I won't comment at all about the gameplay and instead just focus on the story and how it relates to the original game.


Oh and if you havn't finished the game or played it yet at all probably won't want to read.

(SPOILER)
All in all the FF7 remake just has a weird story. They took a section of the first game that only took about five to eight hours to get through and turned it into about a thirty hour long game. I'll get to the characters later and I did somewhat enjoy the added depth they gave the characters because it was a longer game however unfortunately the main way they were able to turn this beginning section of the original FF7 into as long as game as they did is largely through extra long dungeons and way too many sidequests.

The pacing is just absolutely terrible. You will be introduced to some of the major characters and then all of a sudden they will vanish for about 10+ hours of playing the game because you will have to trudge your way through dungeons that are far too long and sidequests that really take the momentum away from the main story. The original game had sidequests as well but most of them were in the second cd where the story was moving slower and was affording you time to go around and explore the world. In this game they try to cram all those sidequests and extras right in the middle of the bombing missions plot. It really makes the game feel like it doesn't have much focus and it often feels like you are playing an Elder Scrolls game where it is all about taking missions from NPC's instead of a game that is supposed to have a serious and timely story going on.

I liked how they expanded the character of Jessie. They expanded the characters of Biggs and Wedge as well but of the three Jessie definitely saw the most additional development. However at the same time the problem with that is they practically just dropped her and she saw virtually no screen time again after having that initial development. Other than Cloud Jessie was probably the most developed character during the first five or so hours of the game but then you don't see her again for probably about fifteen hours and then probably around the twenty hour mark or so she appears for her death sequence.

Though they toned it down in the second portion of the game for the first half however the flirting was just really in your face. There was a bit of flirting in the original as well but it was often subtle flirting. Not in this game. Jessie was acting like she was constantly wanting to jump Cloud's bones right then and there and Tifa was far more flirtatious with Cloud as well than she was in the original game. It was getting to the point to where I really wouldn't have been all that surprised if Jessie or Tifa asked Cloud to go to bed with them. During the first five to ten hours of the game members of Avalanche seemed more like a group of horny college kids who had Friday night orgies with each other than an underground group trying to overthrow a government.

The ending just seems really out there. It was clear that they were trying to make the ending of the game seem like a finality when the ending of the Midgar arc was just getting the game started. The simpler version works better in my opinion.

All in all it was very obvious they were trying to adapt a video game story that was over twenty years old. The FF7 story was groundbreaking when it was released in the late '90's however at the same time games were only beginning to have detailed stories back then. The bar for video game stories is much higher now where some games truly feel like cinematic movies. Even though this game has ps4 graphics I still feel like that if someone wants to experience this story for the first time they need to play the ps1 version. I think you need to have sense of nostalgia for these characters to feel like the story in FF7 remake is all that good. The story in the remake just doesn't flow that well by todays standards.