I don't know if there is a good way to name the second part of a trilogy of games based on an original title which is the seventh in a series of games. But this one is called Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth.
Renaissance takes the characters and the world reintroduced with Remake and does a better job of expanding everything. Instead of a single metropolis, Midgar, this time it's a world tour. There is also an expanded roster of playable characters, almost doubling RedoIt's total, each with a unique style of play once again.
The vast new world is finally enjoying PS5 hardware. Renaissance it looks like a fantasy world and Square Enix managed to combine exploration in a Final Fantasy title with rich, dense cities and settlements, more akin to its Golden Age RPGs. Of course, Final Fantasy XVI Gave me a world to explore, but there wasn't much to a lot of it. (Even if there were narrative excuses as to why.)
The Gold Saucer is a multi-story Disneyland with mog and chocobo characters everywhere, theme park rides, travelators, holograms and shiny surfaces. Meanwhile, Cosmo Canyon looks like a treehouse that took a hundred years to build, filled with tourists and woo-woo hippies. There is even a hippie circle where you can share your truth. (Oddly enough, there's an Ayahuasca-style vision sequence in the game, which has nothing to do with Cosmo Canyon – which is a bit of a waste.)
Rebirth's story follows protagonist Cloud and the rest of his group as they pursue antagonist Sephiroth, angering the sinister mega-corporation Shinra along the way.
Cloud seems more and more unbalanced as Sephiroth seems to force his way into his head. It's a slightly different journey from the original game, adding an extra layer to the missed memories and unusual origins. In fact, in the second half of Renaissance, not only does Cloud become more and more unlikeable, but I start to hate the rest of the group for not reporting him for his bad decisions and strange behavior. Tifa, childhood friend? You are a facilitator. My discomfort with the main characters unfortunately persists until the end.
The group hops between towns, boards ships, or finds different breeds of rideable giant birds that can cross mountains or shallow water. These are the areas outside of city centers where exploration, battles, and side quests take place. So many side quests.
Redo there were annoying side quests – lots of fetch quests seemingly there to extend play time. Renaissance suffers from this too – they're not quite Witcher-level side quests – and I think it's exacerbated when you're playing a game whose story beats you somehow know, because you will feel turned away from them.
As you enter new regions, new points of interest will populate your map. These can range from natural springs to artifact hunts (with an iconic mainstay from the Final Fantasy series) which could include holographic battles, a new tower defense game and a card game which I was more than willing to invest a little too much time into.
There are also plenty of items to collect, reminding everyone of the collecting and crafting headaches of many current-gen games, from Baldur's Gate 3 has Horizon to…most open world games, to be honest. Luckily, despite my apprehension, you don't have to collect All. The game provided enough items just during my normal exploration to create the items I wanted. Particularly powerful accessories and items are usually locked behind an item that only the most powerful monster in a certain region drops.
At least the lion's share of side quests, games, and challenges are optional. If you're not interested in finding a route to a rock outcrop to defeat a monster, then you really don't have to. You can just head straight to the next main objective and see where the story goes.
Renaissance does not answer all the questions you might have about this Remake trilogy. You will have to wait for the third part of the story, and I also don't want to spoil the story for fans who have waited decades for this project.
There are occasional flashes…sideways, to an alternate timeline where most of the original group died in an accident, but the spinoff protagonist, Zack, another SOLDIER like Cloud, is still alive. Her death in the original game was a major story moment, alongside another: the death of the main party member, Aerith. Will she survive chapter 2? Will it be Final Fantasy 7It is The Empire Strikes Back? I can't say, but there is a particularly satisfying final battle.
Some side quests caught my attention. If anything, I sometimes got so distracted that I lost track of the story's twists and turns. Renaissance boasts a rich collection of characters both from Redo and the original, helping to add interest to what are sometimes just simple item collection quests.
More often than not, I was happy to be distracted because the art direction and environment design was just beautiful. Everything seems bigger and better than Redo, no more skies and horizons in two-dimensional wallpaper. From the top of Cosmo Canyon, you can still see the Cosmo area fans, there for your flying bird exploration.
During my playthrough, there were some questionable graphical textures, especially in the overworld, but Square Enix released a patch to fix most of these issues a day before this review embargoed. Although I'm not obsessed with pixels or FPS, before the patch I had found Performance mode (FF7 Rebirth once again offers a high image option and a high resolution option to play) a little too blurry. I hope future updates will resolve this issue. Despite all that, it's often the prettiest PS5 game since Horizon Forbidden West.
Once again, Square Enix has incorporated a soundtrack filled with new tunes and even more remixes and reimaginings of the core MIDI originals from 1997. My pick: the new Cosmo region world theme, which screams Beck. A musical reference also from 1997.
This game is delightfully stupid in places, intentionally so. There's a sense of humor that gets as ridiculous as any other Like a dragon side quest. Segways? Yes. Ninja clones of the most annoying character, yes, a cat-dog riding a giant bird, yes.
The combat system takes what Redo introduces and adds other cooperative attacks and skills. There are synergy skills, instant and free attacks, and defensive moves that combine your control character with party allies. Then there are (completely different) synergy abilities that develop over the course of a battle, as you use your more typical attacks and spells. Rather, these are special attacks, which often allow you to defeat difficult enemies. In addition to damage, they will offer a buff, such as faster attack gauges, unlimited MP or an increase in character level limits for even more powerful ultimate moves.
This seems, at first, excessive, and I am someone who has a $150 Polygonal Figure of Cloud in Dress. The entire system (including pressure and stagger, elemental weaknesses, status effects, buffs, debuffs, limit breaks, and an active time combat (ATB) meter needed to do anything it is substantial with your players) represents a lot.
Even if you come from Redoas I did, The Renaissance the combat system can be overwhelmed at first. Although the game introduces these new synergies in simpler two-player battles, it never offers a good enough explanation for its use in the early battles. As I mentioned in my preview, there's a new aerial combat system, but other than Cloud, I have no idea how to launch other characters into the air without exploiting dedicated synergy abilities.
Fortunately, the combat system as a whole, aside from the muddy learning curve, is fun. And extremely satisfying once you understand the patterns and behaviors of certain bosses. I admit: I have died several times. But I never felt frustrated.
I really enjoyed the combat challenges in RedoAnd Renaissance apparently has just under a hundred, spread across battle arenas, holodeck battles, and rare monsters in the wild. I'm already fascinated by the Queen's Blood card game. The card games have their own side story, but the best parts are the card “puzzles” where you really have to figure out how the more unique cards work to win.
Other highlights, however, include a number of reimagined mini-games beyond Queen's Blood. SO. A lot. Mini games. There is a new Fort Condor tower defense game, the bike battle of Redoa holographic Great punch-out-style game, a Star Fox-style shoot-em-up – in fact, Super Nintendo seems to have heavily inspired the game selection of Renaissance'Gold Saucer Amusement Park. There's a lot to do, and while there are certainly repetitive elements, it feels like the game is offering them to completionists, not everyone.
I completed all side quests in two areas, playing the game in a new dynamic difficulty setting, where enemies will not reduce their level while you play, but they will increase, meaning you won't run the game if you have already worked a few levels. Of course, there is also a standard difficulty. This will definitely be a difficult game if you haven't played Redo. And don't worry if you don't have the original 1997 game: Renaissance ensures that both die-hard fans and newcomers can follow along, with plenty of Easter eggs for the former if they pay attention.
Renaissance is the difficult middle chapter. Redo on PS4 showed that it was possible to imagine a PlayStation game for the modern era, with deeper combat and great graphics, but perhaps not quite the weight to create FF7, the world. That's what Renaissance seems to succeed. Looking back Redo now, set entirely in the city of Midgar, it seems claustrophobic in comparison.