Since its release in 1997, the cultural influence of Final Fantasy VII cannot be overstated. Even if you don’t know what a Final Fantasy is, you’ve almost certainly interacted with something inspired by it. The Last of Us TV show doesn’t exist without Final Fantasy VII, because The Last of Us game doesn’t exist without Final Fantasy VII. The video game industry wouldn’t be what it is today without Final Fantasy VII. This interactive epic transcended the confines of video game fandom, etching itself onto cultural consciousness as a video game which had “good storytelling”. Final Fantasy VII is what made the “PlayStation” the de facto word for “video games”.
Final Fantasy VII introduced a new generation of gamers to fundamental narrative ideas. The writers managed to pack so much personality and detail into tiny polygonal figures. Final Fantasy VII dealt with corporate control, identity and environmental crises. For its time, it was groundbreaking to many players. Even now Final Fantasy VII holds up, its pacing is excellent, the characters remain complex and its messages resonate even stronger. Narrative in gaming has evolved and expanded since 1997, but there’s a reason Final Fantasy VII has remained relevant. The characters and world are so well-defined, the aesthetic and characters have influenced every game after it. In the attempts since Final Fantasy leads have never quite topped Cloud Strife. Except for Jack Garland from Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin, he rules, I love my Chaos-killing king.
When a remake was announced in June 2015, it was a big deal; it was the big deal. Even mainstream news outlets gave the announcement airtime, usually reserved for console launches or Grand Theft Auto games. The remake project was revealed not just as one game, but as three; such scope couldn’t be contained in one game. The first part, titled Final Fantasy VII Remake was released on April 10th, 2020. The second entry, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth was released on February 29th, 2024. If I were a betting man, I’d wager the third part will be called Final Fantasy VII Reclaim and will be released on March 20th, 2028.
When I rolled credits on Final Fantasy VII Remake at 9:01 pm on May 24th, 2020, I thought I understood where this project was going. Upon rolling credits on Final Fantasy VII Rebirth at 7:38 pm on April 8th, 2024, I no longer understood.
Remake ends with Cloud, Tifa, Barret, Aerith and Red XIII defeating the embodiment of fate. An embodiment of fate which had controlled the narrative until that point, ensuring events unfolded for the player just as they did in 1997. Through this defiant act, Cloud and Co. seemingly gain control over their coming adventure, wandering into a vast world, and much like the player, not knowing what comes next. This ending breaks the original story of Final Fantasy VII. In that moment Remake revealed itself as more than a retelling, it became a reimagining. In those final moments, the developers’ true question was revealed: “What would Final Fantasy VII be if we made it knowing what Final Fantasy VII became?”
The title Remake was not an indication of what the game was technically, but an indication of what the game was thematically. Remake sought to rebuild the story of Final Fantasy VII, bringing forth ideas and questions which can only be imagined with 23 years of hindsight. The developers at Square Enix knew that remaking Final Fantasy VII faithfully was a fool’s errand. You cannot beat-for-beat remake a game with such importance, doing so would be hollow. The context of what Final Fantasy VII is has changed so much that to ignore it would render the very concept pointless.
Remake sets up a narrative which, in theory, ends with freedom. Freedom from the confines of Final Fantasy VII’s narrative. A limitless space for narrative choice, a chance to do things differently. Until the end, Remake had been a fairly faithful recreation of the Midgar section of the original game. The story beats were elongated, and character moments were expanded, but the overarching narrative was the same. The fate-killing conclusion and the reveal that the villainous Sephiroth is seemingly aware of what happened in Final Fantasy VII blew the doors off the house (figuratively) and sent my mind into overdrive (literally).
After four years of thinking, Rebirth arrived. The title itself made the cogs in my head turn, perhaps Rebirth will be as thematically relevant as the previous title Remake was. Could Rebirth be a game reborn with newfound freedom and purpose? We left Remake with endless possibilities, and the potential to dig into concepts of fate, freedom, and control. Would Rebirth be where we felt the ripples of change that Remake teased? The short answer: Not really? The long answer: Well, yeah, let’s get into that.
If it wasn’t clear yet, I’m going to be talking about the ending of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, so if you want to play it unspoiled, turn around now.
The million-dollar question, perhaps the only question, going into Rebirth was simple. A question that’s been pondered since the very first conversation was had about a Final Fantasy VII remake. A question asked by both the BBC and the front page of the New York Times. Will Aerith die again? Now, not to oversimplify the concept of death, but you’d think the answer would boil down to a simple “Yes” or “No”. And yet, here we are, if someone came up to me on the street and asked “Hey, does Aerith die in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth?” my answer would be “Uhhhhh…. Maybe? Kind of? But not really… Yet, she kinda is dead?”.
Rebirth's answer to this simple question left me with my own quandary: who is this for? Aerith’s demise at the hands of Sephiroth is a moment embedded in the fabric of video game iconography, it is one of the defining moments in video game history. Its impact is incalculable, all we know for certain is that it broke Robert Pattinson’s heart. It’s an important moment, not just as a piece of iconography, but narratively. It’s a moment that needed a clear execution in Rebirth. So, to the best of my ability, I will now try to answer: does Aerith die again?
Aerith is praying to save the world by summoning the (good) magic from the Earth to protect itself from a meteor that Sephiroth has summoned using (bad) magic. Cloud approaches her alone and almost kills her under Sephiorth’s influence. He successfully breaks from Sephiroth’s influence. Sephiroth then appears dramatically above Aerith ready to kill. At first, Cloud successfully stops the fatal below, then the screen gets all funky and we flash to a reality where, oops, Cloud didn’t stop it. We see a blade covered in blood, then the same blade not covered in blood. Cloud cradles Aerith’s motionless body on the ground. The screen flashes to a different (?) Cloud holding a different (?) Aerith who is maybe alive? Sephiroth says: “don’t weep, your tears are empty just like you,” because he’s always got to have something sassy to say. Aerith says “it’ll be okay”, we flash between a version where there is blood pooling around her and one where there isn’t. The rest of the gang, Red XIII (a dog), Cait Sith (robot cat) Barret (climate activist), Yuffie (magic ninja), and Tifa (the best) show up. Tifa maybe sees both realities for a second? Cloud lays Aerith’s body down (sans blood) while whispers of fate appear. Sephiroth chimes in again saying “You’ll never see the truth with such clouded eyes,” and calls Cloud a puppet. Everyone sans Aerith fight a battle against Jenova who is sort of Sephiroth but also Sephiroth’s mum and siblings, while Aerith’s beautiful theme music plays. Cloud then fights Sephiroth (in space?) with Zack, Aeirth’s first love, who is dead, but this Zack is from a reality where he isn’t dead and isnt’t dating Aeirth. I simply cannot get into Zack right now. Sephiroth uses his sword to slash reality in half and sends Zack back to his world. Cloud 1v1’s Sephiroth for a bit until Sephiroth goes into More Jenova Mode. While that happens, we do more fighting against Some More Jenova as Tifa, Barret, and Cait Sith. Back to Zack, who is someplace fighting Even More Jenova which again, I just can’t. Now it’s Yuffie, Barret and Red XIII against All The Jenova. Cloud then meets Aerith again, but from another reality. We go from space (?) to a white void with a watery floor. We fight against Sephiroth with an Aerith (which Aerith is unclear). Sephiroth just straight-up gets bored, chuckles, and flies off. Aerith and Cloud hold hands, and she vanishes. Zack vanishes back to his reality where there is an Aerith who maybe is the one who we were fighting with, but also maybe one who died, or is in a coma. The group huddles around Aerith’s body, they look sad, and whispers of fate whirl around. Cloud asks Aerith to wake up, and HER EYES OPEN??? We then cut to the group looking defeated about Aerith’s death, because THEY THINK SHE IS DEAD, but wait, she’s still here? Oh no, only Cloud can see her. But is it our Aerith? Or an Aerith from another dimension? I couldn’t tell you. By my count throughout Remake and Rebirth, we see seven (maybe?) different realities. So that’s the answer to “Did Aerith die”.
A question that in 1997 was answered by saying “yes”.
It’s at this moment that Rebirth squandered Remake’s narrative set-up. The bulk of the game’s narrative until the final act is slow, a pitfall of adapting a section of the story which lacked narrative thrust. The choice to commit so faithfully to the original narrative is thematically at odds with the ending of Remake. So at odds, that I assumed the last act would delve into why things were playing out so faithfully.
This is all to say, that the narrative doesn’t decide if fate is something we can fight and change or if it is ultimately set in stone. It’s not that the lack of an answer is unsatisfying to me, it’s the fact that Rebirth is disinterested in THE question, or in any question for that matter. Remake had a narrative drive, a purpose which it fulfilled by the end of the game. Rebirth plays it so narratively safe for the majority of the game, building to a moment we all know is coming. A moment which it can’t commit to one way or the other.
Rebirth so desperately wants to kill Aerith in a new way, that it keeps her alive. It completely undercuts its own stakes by doing so. What was the emotional moment of Final Fantasy VII is completely broken by a desire to expand infinite possibilities. It sounds counter-intuitive to complain that a lack of definitive answers is at odds with narrative potential, but the truth is Rebirth has an ending that doesn’t satisfy any narrative thread or thematic idea.
The confused multiple realities take away from any power the narrative had. The harbingers of fate appear so briefly and in such a confused manner throughout the game. It’s implied earlier in the story that fate has split in two, essentially one branch of fate wants Final Fantasy VII to happen, and the other doesn’t. This is Rebirth trying to appease both sets of fans, the ones who want the story they love to play out the way they remember but with modern updates to graphics, and those who found the potential changes enticing. The weakness of this choice, the lack of integrity in the conclusion of the game leaves both sides dissatisfied. Too many changes have already been made for it to be faithful, but not enough has been impacted for it to be interesting.
In an effort to both have cake and eat it, Rebirth renders itself futile. In a world where anything and everything is possible, experiences become meaningless and emotions weightless.
Great article ✍🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻