The meaning of the Final Fantasy 7 Remake
- A retrospective #FF7R_1stAnniversary #FF7Remake #FF7R_1周年

Hey everyone! I've been in the FF7 fandom on twitter for some time now and I still see a lot of people being confused about the meaning of FF7R and why they decided to change things. There has been a lot of discussion already and I wanna make a precise thread about the topic now.

I wanna explain the purpose of the game, it's changes and then I wanna give you my idea of where the story might be going. Enjoy and please share #FinalFantasyVII

As you probably know already, today is FF7R's first anniversary. It's a game we've waited for for a long long time and it's finally here. Recently we also got confirmation that the concept of the remake was actually part of the original compilation of Final Fantasy 7.

This game has been planned since a very long time. I want to celebrate this first anniversary by taking a look at the game, it's themes and future. In my opinion, this game completely revolutionized the concept of what a remake can be.

This is one of the most thought out games I have ever played. It's genius. The developers really thought about what it means to remake a game. You can recreate locations, characters and story. But you could never recreate the feeling of playing the game for the first time again.

The emotional resonance just isn't as strong anymore, even though nostalgia can become just as big. For a remake, you have to consider both new and old players. For new players it's simple. Just recreate the game in the best way possible.

For new players though, it's a lot more difficult. That's where FF7R succeeds and every.other.remake fails. It brings back the feeling of the original game for old players by putting another layer on top of everything, changing the story to make it almost more like a sequel.

Let me give you the most effective example of this. Sephiroth. The villain. He's one of the most iconic villains of all time and is a huge part of the original game. What made him so menacing? It was the feeling of not knowing his true nature.

His presence in the Midgar section is literally just a myth, he might not even exist. Throughout the whole game there's just this uncomfortable atmosphere because you can't know his true intentions. Is it really him or is it Jenova? What is the reunion?

Why did he kill that random snake? Sephiroth is always in control to some extent and that's what makes him fun to watch. This is the most apparent in Advent Children. Even after his "defeat" he seems to be in control. That's because as I'll talk about later, he still is.

Now, when you remake the game, all that mystery is gone. People have already experienced his plan. How do you make it interesting again? You can't really introduce a new villain. That's where we get back to the Advent Children part. As you have probably heatd by now...

there's a very big theory going around that the Sephiroth in the remake is actually the one from Advent Children. This is great on multiple levels. For one, it makes the compilation feel worthwhile and ties everything together nicely, but it also gives us questions again.

The remake's main players are Sephiroth and Aerith. They're the ones in control. That's because they're both connected to the ancients and in that way, to the planet. At the end of the original game, both of them end up returning to the lifestream.

From short stories that Nojima wrote around the time of Advent Children, we know that both Aerith and Sephiroth are able to act out of the lifestream. Sephiroth creates his 3 children while Aerith is trying to talk to the planet. They both have power from beyond the grave.

Let's go back to the beginning though. Why would I even come to the conclusion that there are bigger forces at play here? Well when it comes to a remake like this, you have to be very careful when it comes to changing the game. As you already know, the ghosts represent this idea.

Let me give you my full explanation now: I think the Final Fantasy 7 timeline is linear. It goes from point A to point B, beginning to end. Why wouldn't there be different realities? Because of these ghosts. We know that the planet is sending them to protect itself.

They protect the original timeline. There's only one timeline, because the ghosts keep everything in check. There is only one timeline in the world of Final Fantasy 7 when the original timeline ends with Advent Children.

At the end of Advent Children, Aerith and Sephiroth are both in the lifestream again. And they both still have powers. When Cloud beats Sephiroth, his last words are "I will never be a memory." Seeing as FF7R was part of the compilation, I absolutely think that this was a hint.

Let's get to the interesting part. So, Sephiroth is now in the lifestream and still seems to be in some kind of control. This is the end of the timeline. But Sephiroth has an idea. Ofc I can't tell you how it works exactly, but I'm absolutely sure Sephiroth used the lifestream...

to somehow send his spirit back in time to turn the linear timeline into a circle. He's going to the beginning again. Remember, he can't change his destiny. It's like a video, he can skip to every part he wants, but he can't change the video's content. His death is written.

So he goes back to the beginning to mess with the timeline a bit. This is the first time we deviate from the story. Sephiroth is messing with Cloud's head in the middle of the city to lead him away from Aerith. He wants to get him away from here so that they never meet.

Aerith is still waiting there though although she should already be gone. That's because Aerith either has exactly the same power or- what's more likely- she can communicate with the planet to keep the timeline in check. This isn't even new, this has always been established.

You wanna know how? The shot of Aerith summoning Holy at the end of the game is the same shot that starts the whole thing in the intro of the game. It has always been established that Aerith knew to some extent that she would need to sacrifice herself for the planet.

Same thing here. Aerith has at least some knowledge of what's going down. This is revealed at the end when Sephiroth opens the other dimension and Aerith tells everyone what they need to do. She might not be the Aerith from the end of AC, but she knows because of the planet.

They're the two forces that make the game so interesting. Because Sephiroth is in control again. He changed the story multiple times but the ghosts always revert it. He's fucking with everybody, just like in the original game and we don't know where it's going.

What's his plan though? Well, let's look at the game's finale. Sephiroth wants to survive. Destiny is hindering from winning so he has to change it. He can't do it himself. So what would you do? You need the original crew to defeat destiny so that you can win again.

There's no reason for them to change destiny though. They win in the end, even though they don't know that yet. Sephiroth uses exactly that to make them defeat destiny for him. He gives them visions of the future: Aerith's death, meteor and Red XIII at the end of the game.

As Red XIII says, for them that's the future if they fail today. Sephiroth succeeded in making them think that the original game's ending is their defeat. So they fight destiny as 3 creatures of the lifestream to protect the future.

Notice how they look just like Sephiroth's children and use the same weapons? That's because they're both creatures of the lifestream.

Eventually they defeat destiny. And we see that it doesn't just affect the present, but the whole timeline, the whole circle. Every point in the timeline can be changed now. How do we know that? Well guess who shows up and survives his battle because of the missing ghosts...

In the present, Sephiroth uses this opportunity to fuck with the crew again and lead Cloud into following his future plans. Remember: Sephiroth lives because Cloud remembers him. That's what he feeds off. Also, he's literally Advent Children Sephiroth, there's no denying it.

They're literally fighting on the Advent Children buildings and all that 7 seconds before meteor hits earth. This shows just how much (metaphorical) power Sephiroth possesses now. Also the game needed a cool final boss lmao

The last scene pretty much gives away his goals. They're at the edge of creation and Sephiroth wants Cloud to join him. Sephiroth says that they will become "part of it" someday. Without the ghosts, parallel universes can exist in the FF7 world. They're just not part of them yet.

We know that they're not connected yet because Zack's timeline shows up again at the end. Aerith can feel it because she's connected to the planet, but he's just out of reach. Sephiroth will try to bring these realities together in the next game. 100%.

The seeds for the realities merging have already been planted. Jessie wanted to be the princess at the gold saucer but she never got the chance and her father got ill. She then dies at the tower. If realities start merging, we will definitely see her again in the gold saucer.

It will be a huge wtf moment, I can already see it. The next game is gonna be crazy. So that's where we're at rn.

That's the genius of the remake. On the surface we'll still play through the events of the original game but with some changes here and there and this extra layer to make it interesting for the established fanbase. Don't lie to yourself, it definitely worked.

And with that, I come to my conclusion. Aerith will still die. C'mon everyone, you gotta think about the new players. They would never remove the most iconic death in gaming history because of that stuff. It's actually the opposite. How can you recreate the feeling of her death?

You need to give people hope again. That's what Sephiroth does and that's actually also what Square does, too. All this multiverse stuff is to get hopeful again so that when Aerith eventually dies again, people will be suprised and heartbroken again. You could've saved her.

Are you confused? I'm sorry, here's the short overview.

The original timeline plays out. Sephiroth loses but hints to the fact that he lives in Cloud's memory or more than that. In the lifestream, he is able to return through some Cetra/Jenova shenanigans to the beginning of the original FF7.

He tries to distract Cloud from meeting Aerith but that's not possible because the Whispers are protecting the timeline. Aerith can see them because she's connected to planet. She knows about Sephiroth coming back as seen at the end of the game. The planet has a plan.

Over the course of the game, Sephiroth manipulates the party to think that the original's ending is their defeat so they fight against the arbiters of fate and defeat them, creating a multiverse of sorts and making Sephiroth able to win again.

Cloud has seen the future now, so he tries to use Omnislash on Sephiroth but fails miserably. "Not yet." Sephiroth wants to get these realities together so that he can be omnipotent. Because of the party defeating destiny, Zack and Biggs survive. Aerith can feel his presence.

The next games will go through the major plot points of the original game just like this one. The Sephiroth from the present is still in the North Crater and the story will still follow that. But this layer of destiny will become bigger and bigger until Aerith dies again.

Cloud and Zack will team up and they'll either have to get back to the original ending or they create a new, better ending. That's the point of the Final Fantasy 7 Remake. Retell the story for newcomers while also making it a sequel for veterans. That's why I love it so much.

I hope you enjoyed this thread and thanks for reading #FF7R_1stAnniversary

I forgot to mention it but this is why Sephiroth has to be from the future. He knows how to counter Omnislash and even says "Not yet." He knows