Note: SPOILERS for the PS4 FF7 remake.
My post queue is a bit behind, so forgive me for reaching back a few controversies, but as you're probably aware, questions as to whether or not Tetsuya Nomura could be trusted with a PS4 remake of FF7 post-Kingdom Hearts were answered...as one might expect. Folks seemed pretty happy with the visuals and characterization...until we hit the revelation that this version of FF7 has two Sephiroths, one of whom came back from the future in an alternate timeline where the events of FF7 and all its sequels and ancillary properties have already happened in an attempt to make everything go his way this time. Also, there are time ghosts who attempt to interfere with events whenever they veer off the original plot, Nomura's stunning and subtle metaphor for the fans who can't appreciate his vision. (Nomura makes the time ghosts major enemies; sitting through a main plotline dedicated to this self-indulgent concept must be incredibly patience-trying.) These are incredibly stupid ideas straight out of the fanfics I read as a teenager on AOL about Kain becoming a Paladragoon and teaming up with Cecil and Crono to fight the Profound Darkness. They have all the hallmarks of bad Kingdom Hearts writing: needless time travel, complexity for its own sake, hollow platitudes about "defying fate" - because, certainly, if FF7 is about anything, it's railing against death.
My feelings aside, a lot of people really loved Final Fantasy VII, and a lot of people really wanted a remake to happen. Square marketed something that played to that and delivered a very different story - a very different game, in fact; an alt-universe sequel instead of a remake. Everyone knew that some things were going to be changed - that was part of the appeal of the project, right? That stuff that couldn't be realized in the mid-'90s would be fully fleshed out with today's technology. Instead, a writer infamous for taking a very accessible concept (Disney x RPGs!) and making it notoriously both fatuous and completely impenetrable has used that license to remake FF7 in that headache-inducing image - to make it a game, essentially, for him and him alone. You'd think he'd have a modicum of respect for the work that put him on the map. I understand there's a lot of good stuff in the remake! It could have been present without...the other garbage.
In response to this, someone posted a poll of potential plot changes that got passed around on Reddit asking, in effect: how much more can they screw this up? So let's take each item (minus a few of the baser ideas and suspect spelling) and discuss, in fact, how much more they can screw this up.
Thank you for being my partners.
Finished, at last, after delay from real life and...well, a reluctance to continue after the culmination of Cloud's plot. But, at last, the full story can be told - in two parts!
Well, some of it. The rest has limited appeal, though.
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