Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is the sequel to the Final Fantasy VII Remake and is the second game in the Final Fantasy VII Remake Project. Starting immediately following the events of Remake this game follows Cloud and the party from leaving Midgar to the events in the Forgotten Capital. Before I get into more of my feelings and opinions of this game, it’s clear that the developers of the Remake Project expect players to have if not played the original and Crisis Core that you at least know the full story going in as there are things that might be confusing otherwise. At this point I will be discussing mild spoilers for the game.

You start playing this game as Zack who has just arrived at Midgar and is trying to find and save Aerith. From there we jump to Cloud and the rest of the party who are trying to track down Sephiroth to stop him from destroying the world. The game progresses like this where you occasionally play as Zack and try to find out what is going on with the timelines. Personally, I believe that there are three timelines/universes at play. We have the original game timeline where I think Sephiroth is from as there are times he knows or mentions things that he should not know or have a connection to, then there is the main Remake timeline with Cloud and the party that is more or less following the events of the original game but Aerith knows something about the Whispers and changing fate, and finally there is the timeline where Zack lived which is very different. Zack and Cloud in that timeline appear in the aftermath of the battle with the Whispers in a world that it seems like the battle was lost and most of the cast is now dead and the world is also dying.

Overall, I love this game and these characters. I terms of game play it’s mostly the same as Remake but there is added Synergized mechanic for team attacks and the Folio system to unlock new moves and other attributes. We also get new characters in Yuffie, Cait Sith, Cid, and Vincent. However, like Red XII in Remake Cid and Vincent are not playable. The other thing that I love is the emphasis on learning more about the characters and their back stories both in the main plot and in some of the side mission/content. This is one of those games that you can decide how much of the side quests and mini games that you want to do but I feel like it truly fleshes out the world. I didn’t enjoy all of these specifically the card game, Queen’s Blood but when I replay it I do plan to get through more of the side content.

Personally, I can’t wait for the next game and I hope we get answers to all the lingering questions about Aerith and Zack and the timeline changes. While this is a game for fans as long as you’ve played Remake you could play Rebirth without having knowledge of the original game but there are emotional scenes that will not have the same impact as those who know everything going in.

Crisis Core Final Fantasy VII Reunion is the remastered edition of the original 2007 PSP game Crisis Core Final Fantasy VII. Story wise this is the exact same game as the original with update graphics, models, new voice acting, and changes to the controls which make it look and feel more like the Remake project.

The story is a prequal to the original Final Fantasy VII, set seven years before, following SOLIDER Third Class Zack Fair as he wants to achieve a higher rank and become a hero. We find out early on the First Class Solider Genesis has left Shrina and that he is attacking the company for some reason. As the story progresses we see how Zack meets Aerith and Cloud and the events that led up to the Nibelheim incident. I don’t want to say more about the story as I feel like it should be experience without many spoilers and will have an impact of the future of the Remake project. Square Enix has made it clear with the ending of Final Fantasy VII Remake that Zack has a bigger part to play but to truly understand everything you need to see his story.

I loved this remaster not just because I love Final Fantasy VII. I did play the original Crisis Core on the PSP but I never finished it. I wanted to finish it for the story but in the original I never found the controls intuitive and would get to a point where I would just give up. Though this remaster hasn’t changed much the changes to the game play that make it more inline with the FFVII Remake makes it so much better to play. The game is set up with a liner story that will just take you from beginning to end. However, the game also allows to you take on missions at every save point and the is where the bulk of the game play is and how you level up.

I loved this game but I also love Final Fantasy VII as a whole. Crisis Core Final Fantasy VII Reunion is a game that I feel many will enjoy and those interested in the Final Fantasy Remake Project should play.

Final Fantasy VII is a 1997 Japanese role playing video game where you play as Cloud Strife, a mercenary who has joined an eco-terrorist group to stop the evil Shinra corporation. As the story progresses Cloud is joined my a group that is on a mission to stop the Solider Sephiroth from destroying the world. There is much more to the story but given this games popularity and the remake I feel like most readers of this review will have some base knowledge of the game.

Before I talk about my experience with the game, I don’t consider myself very good a most video games and I play more for stories and characters than gameplay mechanics. I have played parts of Final Fantasy VII before but I never made it past the half way point before. While I love the story and characters, the game play and graphic have aged to the point that I can see some not enjoying the game.

The version I played was the Playsation 4 version which did have some cheats added in such as speeding up time in the battles, turning off random encounters, and a setting which heals the characters and gives infinite limit breaks. However, I didn’t use the cheats though most of my playthrough but I did play around with them at times and if I got stuck I did use them so I would actually finish the game. Final Fantasy VII has a lot of content and side mission which I didn’t do all of. I mostly skipped the Fort Condor battles as they just annoyed me and the one section I absolutely hated was the mini game with the submarine while trying to obtain the Huge Materia. For me I had know idea what I was doing or the best way to control anything.

Overall, while I enjoyed my playthrough so I could finally see how the story ended I don’t think I will go back to the original now that the remake is coming out. I can’t wait to see what they do with the different characters stories and different game mechanics in the remake. The original Final Fantasy VII will always have a place in my heart since it was one of the first stories that really sucked me into video game even though I didn’t finish the game until years later.