It's finally out!
I'm sure 
But it's made extra special for me for one reason in particular: My wife has never played or heard any spoilers about the original 1997 release!
It's been kind of a point of stress and anxiety for me in all the good ways, helplessly hoping that she doesn't randomly come across anything in particular that happens in this game, a moment regarded as one of the most influential and impactful moments in gaming history.
I'll not spoil it in detail here JUST IN CASE, but I was also worried about the developers changing the game to take that moment away, given the evidence from the first installment of some odd additions that deviate quite a lot from the original, and specifically focus on 'changing fate'. No! Stop changing fate! Fate is how the original game was! Keep it that way damn it!
Where was I... Oh yeah, so she has no idea, which is a really rare special thing to witness somebody go through it for the first time. Truth be told, I don't actually remember the majority of the game myself. My memory is famously shit, and I played that... well, a long time ago. I remember fragments, like colourful chocobos (birds you ride) and a volcano, obviously the big dramatic bits I won't say here, and obviously the music. But I was pretty young playing it and never re-played ever since, mostly due to a lack of access to any consoles.
I had a Playstation 1 at my mum's house but I only ever got to visit her twice a month on weekends only, and we could only afford to rent games out occasionally, so it was slow going for sure.
So yeah, it's almost like I'm playing it for the first time, too!
We're playing together and we're about 7 hours in, but it's been out for DAYS.
Annoyingly, it was my wife's birthday. I don't know why she picked such an inconvenient date. So the parents were up for the first time and we had a good but exhausting time, where I only got brief stints on the game between hanging out with them, cooking Chinese Hot Pot at home and such. As of the end of this work day, I'll be binging the game as much as possible!
First Impressions
So far, I'm almost entirely enthusiastic and increasingly excited about what's to come. For some reason, I got particularly hyped when I discovered they re-introduced the Chocobo (bird you can ride) feature of searching and digging for treasure! This took me back to some of my favourite side-questing days on Final Fantasy 9 and it's been missing for a long time.
I was also pleasantly hyped when I realised it was open world, or at least partially. I had read at some point that Square Enix, the company making the games, had moved forward to linear-only games (which is how the first part of this remake was made, too), and I wasn't sure how they were gonna implement that, but I was disappointed. So now I'm extra pleased!
The graphics are a bit... hmm, washed out? The open world grasslands I'm exploring right now are kinda weird. Some angles the grass looks vibrant and welcoming, but if you move the camera up a bit, for some reason they plummet the saturation to the point the grass is almost grey. It's not bad exactly, but doesn't fall in line with my childhood memories of vibrant pixellated world maps.
I don't like the ragdoll physics of boxes, tables, chairs and other background stuff which you can just charge through without any pushback as a 50kg table flies through the air like a pingpong ball, and the fact you can't jump is compensated for by making you auto-climbing on and over things way too liberally. I've found myself accidentally climbing things almost constantly.
I absolutely love that they've created a whole bunch of needless sidequests like hunting, exploring, racing and the like, which is really what this kinda game was all about and gives much more emphasis on upgradeability than before which is great.
I couldn't help but notice just how much they've ripped from other games.
Three games came to mind: Horizon, Ghost of Tsushima, and Zelda. It's actually really blatant for anyone who has played these games. Really, really on the nose.
Oh, you have yellow paint marking every step and crack you can climb up cliffs? We'll do exactly that too, same colours and all. (Horizon)
Oh, you have items in the field depicted and made visible by a vertical white line topped with a diamond of differing colours depending on item rarity? Cool! Me too. Coincidence? (Horizon)
Oh, you have station towers dotted over the map which, after defeating the surrounding beasts and activating, bursts into fantastical music and a cutscene showing how the signal gets boosted over the landscape? How unique... until now - yoink! (Zelda & Horizon)
Oh, you have foxes in the wild lead you to useful places across the map? How coincidental, we did that too... with owls (Ghost of Tsushima)
I just googled it, and i've never felt so validated:
'Hamaguchi stresses that the team did not attempt to simply copy what other games do, but rather focused on enriching Rebirth with unique elements in terms of side content and activities, resulting in a game with a completely different feel.'
Not sure how successful Hamaguchi was there. But, to be honest, other than constantly thinking 'Hey that's from that other game', I don't have any problem with it. Why not get ideas from what are very successful creations and implement them in your own?
In the musical world, we say 'Good composers borrow, great composers steal', and I can't say I disagree.
The one gripe I have with this, however, is that Final Fantasy was always kinda the pioneer of narratives and worlds. If not leading the way in certain aspects like graphics or whatever, it never felt like they were following in anybody's footsteps. They had their own musical, graphical, narrative styles, and that's always what made them stand out.
Now, it feels a bit like they're trailing behind trying to keep up, cushioned, fortunately, with the already famous source material.
Playing FFXVI before this, it was clearer that they didn't really have as much power to standout as they once did. The game, though enjoyable, had no lasting effects and no memorable moments. It had no presence in the cultural zeitgeist of gaming, the music was cool but forgettable, and it felt like it was almost trying too hard, with the most bombastic, exaggerated battles you can possibly imagine.
FFXV faired little better, a game I can barely remember anything about despite only playing a few years ago. I remember a cool car and some nice european looking town, but I couldn't tell you what the story was even about without a refresher video.
But ask me about the much older FFIX or X and I can almost describe every room in detail despite having played neither for about 20 years (God, I'm old).
Final Gripe
This one is the only one that actually kinda annoyed me, and that's the really cringey fan service. The two female characters, Aerith and Tifa, have for decades been fetishized and unhealthily fantasized among the male audiences, and the female audiences are more than happy to cosplay as them to get some of those fantasy fetish points.
Tifa is most famous for her massive breasts and Aerith for her submissive japanesey stereotype appearance. You get to date one of them by making certain decisions which has come back in the new game too. That's fine with me, but the two characters have seemingly been stripped of all redeeming and identifiable traits in place of just being very flirtatious together towards the protagonist (or, in your head, you), teaming up and teasing him and creating constant sexual tension, both coming across as totally vapid bimbo girls who in today's day would almost certainly have their own OnlyFans accounts.
There's more than a handful of shots already just a few hours in where the camera is on Tifa's breasts, zoomed in like a telescope to the point that you can literally only see a pair of breasts on the screen.
Other frequent shots are with the camera literally on the ground looking up Aerith's skirt.
I mean, I'm all for playing on the romance and all, but don't sacrifice the depth of characters for it, jeeze. I'm sure they'll get serious again a bit later but so far it's just been a bit irritating, especially since I'm playing with my wife.
Anyway...
Thanks to said source material, it's unlikely this game won't be an unforgettable experience, and despite it feeling like it's trailing behind everyone else and pandering a bit too much, it's still exciting to get home to and see how things are done, and I really want to emphasize that it's so far beautiful, well-crafted, and thought-out. I'm already feeling those urges of addiction pulling me home - and I'm not prone to addiction at all.
This game is 150GB, several times bigger than a typical 'large game'. I read this is because every single object and background is bespoke; rather than taking ready-made material and pasting it over the landscape, every pipe and door frame is new and unique to each scenery. That's a pretty impressive feat if true.
Clearly this is a work of passion, and given their so far loyal adherence to the original classic, you can just assume i'd give a positive review later, so I don't need to when the time comes.
Just a few hours of stupid work left until I can get back to it. Feel like a child again more than a married man lol.