As the continuation of the Remake series of FF7 games, the sophomore entry is wildly more ambitious than Remake and successfully navigates an open world, a bigger party, and grander storyline but loses something in the process.
Overall - the gameplay got a massive boost by the addition of Synergy Skills and Synergy Abilities, showcasing the party growing closer and more willing to work together in an interesting and engaging gameplay mechanic. Air combat is far more tolerable with Cloud being able to ascend at will and intentionally and use ranged magic sword attacks when you want to maintain distance. Newcomer Red XIII is engaging and fun to play as, with an interesting feature prioritizing blocking to build meter then spending that meter in a support role or to self-heal. The other new playable character, Cait Sith, leaves a lot to be desired. He seems tuned for expert players to exploit his odd mechanics, but feels too slow in such a blazing fast game which makes playing as him feel quite dull.
The music features loving renditions of the original FF7 tracks we love, and absurdly catchy new songs that stay in your head (Bow wow wow...)
Graphics are a double edged sword. The world looks great, and the character models look great, but very often the lighting can make them look like shiny toys instead of people, and entering or exiting a building can lead to insane dark or light levels making it impossible to see anything at all. Overall, the sheer scope of the game and how good it looks 90% of the time makes it quite a spectacle.
The storyline is once again the classic FF7 story with a twist and lime, that is - more fleshed out with something new to spice it up. I'll say without spoilers the game kept me engaged and interested the entire time I was playing the main storyline, and while I thought the ending fell a bit flat, it wasn't enough to hamper my enjoyment of the story told overall.
A lot has been made of the insane amount of mini-games in Rebirth, and there truly is a crazy amount of them. Thankfully, you can choose which ones you want to engage with for the most part, only being forced into playing them on occasion. Personally, I found most of them pretty enjoyable for their own merits, and a fun breather from the combat heavy gameplay.
Overall, I thought Rebirth was an incredible game to be made in a short amount of time (reports are 3 years). It has upheld both the OG FF7 and the Remake legacy, and is very much worthy of being in the series. The open world necessitates a large amount of side activities, and it's very easy to stall the momentum of the game by engaging with all that's on offer. There are people who can play a few side quests, do some activities, and move on. There are also people who feel compelled to complete everything in an area before moving on to the next. I fall into the latter camp, and as a result, felt that stalled momentum and feeling of checking off chores from a list. I think the tighter pacing of FF7 Remake made for a better overall product, but I still love Rebirth for expanding on Remake in every way.
Overall - the gameplay got a massive boost by the addition of Synergy Skills and Synergy Abilities, showcasing the party growing closer and more willing to work together in an interesting and engaging gameplay mechanic. Air combat is far more tolerable with Cloud being able to ascend at will and intentionally and use ranged magic sword attacks when you want to maintain distance. Newcomer Red XIII is engaging and fun to play as, with an interesting feature prioritizing blocking to build meter then spending that meter in a support role or to self-heal. The other new playable character, Cait Sith, leaves a lot to be desired. He seems tuned for expert players to exploit his odd mechanics, but feels too slow in such a blazing fast game which makes playing as him feel quite dull.
The music features loving renditions of the original FF7 tracks we love, and absurdly catchy new songs that stay in your head (Bow wow wow...)
Graphics are a double edged sword. The world looks great, and the character models look great, but very often the lighting can make them look like shiny toys instead of people, and entering or exiting a building can lead to insane dark or light levels making it impossible to see anything at all. Overall, the sheer scope of the game and how good it looks 90% of the time makes it quite a spectacle.
The storyline is once again the classic FF7 story with a twist and lime, that is - more fleshed out with something new to spice it up. I'll say without spoilers the game kept me engaged and interested the entire time I was playing the main storyline, and while I thought the ending fell a bit flat, it wasn't enough to hamper my enjoyment of the story told overall.
A lot has been made of the insane amount of mini-games in Rebirth, and there truly is a crazy amount of them. Thankfully, you can choose which ones you want to engage with for the most part, only being forced into playing them on occasion. Personally, I found most of them pretty enjoyable for their own merits, and a fun breather from the combat heavy gameplay.
Overall, I thought Rebirth was an incredible game to be made in a short amount of time (reports are 3 years). It has upheld both the OG FF7 and the Remake legacy, and is very much worthy of being in the series. The open world necessitates a large amount of side activities, and it's very easy to stall the momentum of the game by engaging with all that's on offer. There are people who can play a few side quests, do some activities, and move on. There are also people who feel compelled to complete everything in an area before moving on to the next. I fall into the latter camp, and as a result, felt that stalled momentum and feeling of checking off chores from a list. I think the tighter pacing of FF7 Remake made for a better overall product, but I still love Rebirth for expanding on Remake in every way.