Rebirth thoughts - spoilers through Chapter 1

[Del Murder]

Pulling a BoB here and making a separate thread by chapter. Will include any spoilers through chapter 1.

The prologue was surprising. I thought it was a flashback but turns out to be some other timeline or something. I like that Zack's voice is pretty reminiscent of Crisis Core.

I like that you can skip most of the dungeon crawl tutorial section of the flashback if you played the demo. I did not like that you couldn't skip the slow crawl through the fire. >< Other than that, all the main points of the original flashback were hit pretty well. I love Cloud's wide eyes at Sephiroth, also that Sephi comes off as a decent guy before he goes crazy, also Barret's interjections.

One thing though, why the hell did those villagers with guns just stand there while Sephiroth hacked them down one by one? Is this meant to be part of Cloud's bad memory? Gee guy, once he cuts out your legs you may want to start shooting?

Although this is getting into the next chapter a bit, Kalm is beautiful.

[Loony BoB]

Really enjoying the game and I echo your general thoughts (aside from demo-related ones as I didn't play the demo). Very much enjoying everything so far. Currently in chapter 4 already so oops on thread-making... oh well.

[Del Murder]

I will probably not post more of these for a while since I decided to go back and finish FFXVI first. Interesting contrasts between those games.

[Loony BoB]

Yeah, big contrasts for sure. From zero minigames to So Many minigames! No shock on which game I prefer of the two, although I enjoyed XVI it did feel very lacking in things to do and I prefer the characters/atmosphere in VII Rebirth too. But glad you're enjoying two fantastic games back to back either way!

[Del Murder]

The graphical polish is so much better in XVI but that is hardly a top factor for my enjoyment of a game. I think Rebirth looks good.

The combat in XVI is much more fluid, maybe too fluid as it has become very easy. In Remake and Rebirth it is somewhat annoying that you need to wait for the ATB bar for items and spells and that is a shared meter for abilities.

[Gold_Moogle]

The combat in XVI is much more fluid, maybe too fluid as it has become very easy. In Remake and Rebirth it is somewhat annoying that you need to wait for the ATB bar for items and spells and that is a shared meter for abilities.

I really like the ATB aspect because it does force you to use some regular attacks without ability spamming (although it's still can happen). I find Remake/Rebirth's combat a bit more difficult specifically with blocking/countering and dodging. I find myself getting hit more frequently, and harder, in VII than XVI

[Shadowdust]

I'm really enjoying it. I like not knowing 100% what is going to happen compared to the original. The only critique I can give is that there's a few too many mini-games. I enjoyed them until the final Fort Condor mini-game and then I was done. I mostly just skip them now and I just got to Nibelheim.

[Example]

I have to agree with everyone on there being way too many minigames even when compared to the original FF7. While the minigames in OG were janky as hell at least they (mostly) tied into the main story, while in Rebirth most of them diverted AWAY from the main story including the ones mandatory for the story to progress, such as the Queen's Blood tournament and the entirety of Costa del Sol, which results in the game's pacing grinding to a halt for overly long tedious stretches.