With a fantastic 92 Metacritic rating, it looks like Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth, the 2nd installment of the Final Fantasy VII “Remake” sequel project, has broken the Final Fantasy curse in terms of critical reception for the series.
A 92 rating (and not a big Sony, or Nintendo title on the 2024 horizon) also means that Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth is an early front runner for the GotY Awards.
So, unless we get another surprise of the Baldur’s Gate 3 variety, it is hard to see Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth losing the award.
Sales Should Be Good
Rebirth will sell incredibly well, and not just because of its “Final Fantasy VII” name tag. It will sell well because critics are loving the game, and critical scores do affect sales (ask Elden Ring, Baldur’s Gate 3 and Tears of the Kingdom). Given Square Enix’s dire financial woes, Rebirth could turn the company’s fortunes around somewhat.
What Rebirth Does and Does Not Do
Rebirth, according to critics fixes most of the issues that kept Final Fantasy VII: Remake from getting into the “90s” Metacritic range. The game is no longer linear, and filled with dumb filler quests. The open world allowed Square Enix to craft something more engrossing and repayable this time around.
To be fair, in terms of artwork and Music, Final Fantasy VII: R was masterful, and the developers understood how to hit all of the nostalgic notes for old school fans while at the same time angering them with the crazy story shenanigans that turned Final Fantasy VII: Remake into a full blown sequel of the original game rather than an actual “Remake”.
Rebirth further strays from the path of the original cannon by embracing the existence of multiple timelines, and even building up to an eventual climax utilizing these timelines.
At this point, for my sanity (and enjoyment of the game), I have accepted the fact that this trilogy (when finished) will stand as a sequel to the original, and that the original timeline remains untouched.
So, those of you who hated the ‘Kingdom Hearts’ like irrational decisions made by Nojima and Nomura on Remake will likely end up feeling the same way about Rebirth, save for the fact that the game appears to be much better than Remake in every aspect imaginable.
However, at least to me, 1997’s FFVII’s storyline is the only canon that matters. Obviously, I am a 1990s kid, and I assume that those of you who didn’t experience the original in the late 90s, will likely think that Rebirth is the greatest thing since slice bread.
That last statement is exactly the reaction that Square Enix wanted to achieve with the development of this “Remake” saga, and on that account they did a great job.
The only other complaint that I have about the game, as demonstrated by its demo, is that the title running on Unreal 4, looks like a good looking PS4 game. This is not the end of the world in the “cross-generation” era that we live in, but the engine is showing its age, and if it wasn’t for the nostalgia, and awesome artwork, I would be making a bigger deal out of this.
Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth Will Win The GotY Award?
In 1997, Final Fantasy VII lost the award to Golden Eye in most of the media’s eyes, but 2024 looks like a weaker year for gaming, and unless a game like Hellblade 2 surprises us, it is Rebirth’s award to lose.
When was the last time Final Fantasy won such an award you ask? The answer is never, Final Fantasy VII won the award in multiple publications, but most (including the D.I.C.E awards) gave it to Rare’s revolutionary first person shooter.
Rebirth, as it stands right now, will take the series to heights that it has never reached since the days of….well Final Fantasy VII. Either way, according to critics, Rebirth will be a great game for JRPG fans – old and new alike – when it finally arrives at PS5’s everywhere tomorrow.
It took nearly 2 decades, but it seems that Square Enix finally made Final Fantasy great again.
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