Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth Is So Much Bigger Than Remake
With the help of a fellow covert revolutionary, Cloud and the gang vacate the premises just as Shinra’s goons raid the breezy town of Kalm. They slip out through an underground tunnel and step into the Grasslands, one of the several regions that makes up what I remember of Final Fantasy 7’s overworld. As their eyes adjust to the sun’s blinding brightness, Aerith runs forth stunned at the sight of a vast, lush, and beautiful landscape full of life, unlike anything she’s ever seen from her time stuck in Midgar’s slums and city streets.
“Wow… Just look at it all… It’s so green. A living breathing planet. Even after everything we’ve done to it, it’s still going strong,” Aerith says. Not necessarily being pessimistic, Red XIII knows the planet’s beauty is only skin deep, replying, “It may look that way. But in reality, it’s barely hanging on.”
This is a revelatory moment for Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth and its characters. After reliving Cloud’s hazy memories of the tragedy at Nibelheim five years prior and enjoying a brief reprieve in Kalm, this is the game showcasing its scope and scale. A massive open environment ripe for exploration, a far cry from the corridors and alleyways of Midgar from Remake. And from the jump, Rebirth re-establishes its core message of environmental preservation to remind you that in chasing Sephiroth and fighting Shinra, these characters are striving to save their dying planet. It was my favorite moment from the four-hour preview demo I got to play because of how it captured the essence of Final Fantasy 7 in such a short scene.