#ff7r #ff7spoilers #rufusshinra {MASSIVE SPOILERS FOR REMAKE AND OG GAME}

THREAD COMPARING RUFUS SHINRA IN THE REMAKE VS THE ORIGINAL GAME.

#ff7r #ff7spoilers

[1/?] rufus from what we’ve seen in the remake so far is 100% more interesting than he was in the original. in the original game, sephiroth/JENOVA infiltrates the shinra building and murders everyone inside.

[2/?] then sephiroth/JENOVA stabs president shinra and leaves his body at his desk. palmer, who had witnessed the entire thing, calls rufus (in junon) for backup. rufus responds by boarding a helicopter to come assume command of the company in the wake of his father’s death.

[3/?] rufus arrives just as the protags discover president shinra’s body, and they rush out to confront him. rufus doesn’t know who they are, so he asks. he then responds with “what a crew” which is A RLY GOOD LINE I’M SAD ISN’T IN THE REMAKE.

[4/?] the part where the party reveals their ‘occupations’ is instead given to heidegger. an interesting divergence from the original then happens in the remake. in the original, rufus begins his inauguration speech.

[5/?] he begins by talking about how shinra used to work, and the player starts to think “oh good, maybe things are about to change for the better. maybe he’s a good guy!” WRONG.

[6/?] rufus then drops the bombshell that he has no intention of being ‘better’ than his father—in fact, he’s /worse/. while his father used money to rule, rufus will instead rule with fear.

[7/?] i’m not sure why this speech was cut from the remake, but my guess is that they’re going to keep it for a later instalment because it’s just a+ in terms of setting up just how cruel rufus actually is.

[8/?] cloud in the original then asks barret to take aerith and escape the building (present in remake) because “this is the true threat to the planet” (not present in remake). when rufus and cloud are alone, rufus asks, “why do you want to fight me?”

[9/?] cloud responds, “you seek the promised land and sephiroth.” rufus’ last line before the boss battle is “i see. i guess this means we won’t become friends.”

THIS IS A RLY INTERESTING LINE which is not in the remake because OG!rufus and remake!rufus are quite different.

[10/?] in the original it is implied that rufus was planning to team up with cloud, or at least gain their support since they’re both going after sephiroth. it’s only after cloud refuses his offer that they fight, and the fight was more of a story fight than a true challenge.

[11/?] HERE IS WHERE THE REMAKE DIFFERS RE: RUFUS.

remake gives us a short scene with the turks thinking back on their actions wrt the sector 7 pillar, before tseng gets a phone call from rufus and says, “the vp needs us.”

[12/?] the first time rufus is seen is when the AVALANCHE helicopter is shot down, and reno asks, “you sure you want to do this personally, boss?” to which rufus smirks. in the original, rufus arrives at the shinra hq because he heard that his father had died.

[13/?] in the remake, rufus was already on his way to midgar when his father dies. why is this? an important clue comes from the turk-centric game Before Crisis, as well as the actual boss battle vs rufus himself.

[14/?] Before Crisis reveals that rufus had previously planned to assassinate his father with the help of AVALANCHE, but was found out. this assassination attempt is confirmed to be canon within the remake from one of heidegger’s lines early in the game.

[15/?] president shinra placed rufus under house arrest in junon, but still retained him as VP (even if in name only). while fighting rufus in the remake, he tosses two coins in the air and the camera gives us a closeup shot of them. on them reads “Shinra Inc.” and “A New Era”.

[16/?] players of the original will know that A New Age is how rufus brands his version of shinra, particularly during his parade in junon. remake!rufus has already managed to have his new currency minted BEFORE HIS FATHER EVEN DIES.

so what does this mean?

[17/?] it means that what’s likely to be the case in remake is that rufus calls tseng to come pick him up BECAUSE HE’S STAGING ANOTHER COUP. he just happened to arrive at the same time as sephiroth/JENOVA and the protags, and his father had just died.

[18/?] rufus in the original didn’t show any sadness about his father dying, but remake rufus appears to have taken that one step further in that he was preparing for another attempt, and had already had his new currency minted in preparation for his success and ascension.

[19/?] it’s interesting also to compare president shinra and rufus. president shinra is very much tied into the corporate structure—he rules using his wealth, he’s very business minded, and his closest allies are his execs.

[20/?] rufus on the other hand prefers to use fear and black ops to get his way, which is shown by how he has a much stronger relationship with the turks. the remake showcases this internal conflict rly nicely with a brief scene near the end.

[21/?] in this scene, heidegger slips up and calls him “mister vice president”, which rufus ignores. tseng then walks in and says, “mister president”, and rufus replies, “that’s right.” tseng smirks at Heidegger as they leave.

[22/?] this shows how heidegger (and the other exec’s) control is being usurped by the turks. i'm interested to see how the shinra power struggles are going to be further explored in the remake, because it's one of my favourite parts of the whole game.

[23/?] wrt the actual boss battle itself, it’s very interesting how much stronger they’ve made rufus in remake. the original boss battle was very easy and was more of a story fight than a true fight.

[24/?] rufus in remake is one of the hardest bosses because he just fucking counters EVERYTHING you do. he’s DESIGNED to be irritating as shit to the player. furthermore, the way rufus fights is incredibly flashy—spins and twirls, shooting coins, etc. it’s all a dance to him.

[25/?] in the original, rufus fights cloud because cloud refuses to let him leave, cloud having recognized him as a real threat. in the remake, rufus HIMSELF chooses to fight cloud. he willingly gets out of his helicopter to confront cloud BECAUSE HE WANTS TO.

[26/?] reno even points out that rufus doesn’t have to do it personally, but rufus craves a fight with cloud. rufus in the remake fights cloud for SPORT, and takes great pleasure in doing it as well.

[27/?] in the remake he comes off as a highly dangerous opponent who is both smart AND a capable fighter, giving cloud a run for his money, while in the original he was pretty much just trust fund kid with shotgun and dog.

[28/?] remake!rufus and dark nation/darkstar combo off each other incessantly, implying that they’ve been fighting together for a very long time. rufus also CONSISTENTLY taunts you throughout the entire fight, while cloud (and the player) are getting really annoyed at him.

[29/30] all of these elements set rufus (and by extension, new age!shinra) up to be way stronger and more dangerous opponents than they were in the original game, where after the beginning midgar portion they were pretty much just joke opponents vs the real threat, sephiroth.

[30/30] i'm REALLY interested in this reimagining of rufus and shinra, and i can't wait to see more of them in remake.

THANK YOU FOR READING ALL THESE MUSINGS ON MY FAVOURITE CHARACTER IN FFVII. i’d love to hear any other thoughts you guys have!

the end.

this thread is getting traction so i'm adding an addendum: why can rufus seemingly see the whispers?

[1/?] the whispers are said in the remake to be drawn to people who attempt to alter destiny's course, and ensure that they do not.

[2/?] rufus seems to be able to see them but tseng cannot, and is confused by it. i'm assuming what this means is that rufus' actions have already defied fate in some way. nothing of what he did on-screen really changed the original game's timeline, so i think this means

[3/3] that he has done something off-screen that we the player hasn't seen yet, but had timeline changing effects. the next installments of remake will hopefully give us some clarification! and i'm super excited for it.