Final Fantasy VII Rebirth (Remake pt.2)

El Gato De Negocios

Just finished Remake last night and started intermission, gorgeous looking and fun combat but as many have said, an awful lot of bloat, those motor bike sections for example I HATED. I had gotten it via PS+ as generally I don't like paying top dollar for remakes but I'm really torn between not getting Rebirth and having a significant itch to play it following reading this thread.

McFly85

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121847448#Comment_121847448

I’m only on chapter 4 but Rebirth doesn’t feel as bad for bloat, although you will notice it. I find having open areas balances it out - story bits can drag on, so it’s nice to just hop on a Chocobo and go explore and do some side quests and mini games for a while. Or just play queens blood for hours and forget about anything else!

Sephiroth_dude

Was very happy with the Kalm flashback scene, thought they did it justice.

RedXIV

It arrived!

one armed dwarf

I generally disliked Remake aside from its combat and high points and Rebirth in comparison is close to one of the best FFs I've played. It's like a modern version of the 32 bit era games. Even the 'bloat' feels somewhat vindicated by the fact that there are 7 characters to play who all have different interactions with each other and impacts on party composition, and a lot of high difficulty summon fights to test that on should you want. As well as arenas etc, and then tons of minigames which impact progression

McFly85

I know they were made by different teams, but the improvement against 16 last year in all areas is significant.

Combat, exploration, side quests, are all significantly better. Really enjoying it!

Zero-Cool

It's gas when you meet Chadley and walk through all the combat simulations to think ah how bad could Titan summon be 😂 At least it looks like you can fight lesser versions of summons by exploring the open world which is a clever mechanic.

Sephiroth_dude

Some of the mini games are class, the card is brilliant, the fort condor game is class if a bit hard. I'm stuck on a combat challenge though atm where by you have to prevent two owls from healing, really annoying, think I'll skip it.

Necro

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121850921#Comment_121850921

Yeah just find the divine shrines and it lowers their power. I find two normally does the trick. Chadley also chastises you if you haven't done stuff in a previous region I found out this evening 😂

There's an impending apocalypse but no Chadleys research is more important apparently!

Retr0gamer

What the **** did they do to the moogles 🤮

https://twitter.com/tkn0801/status/1764858453984731640?t=SvbRn3l1ur8l2IGYZAJVCg&s=19

Zero-Cool

Yupp, original Sonic movie vibes.

RedXIV

Only had time to get into this properly last night for a little bit but I get the Queen's blood love now.

Also, I'm thoroughly enjoying myself and I'm only half way through chapter 2.

Zero-Cool

I can't seem to get out of chapter 2, keep going around doing Chadley busy work which I'm loving but hope i don't tire myself out. Not sure whether to clear out the region before moving on or push on with the story and come back.

Necro

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121855828#Comment_121855828

I'd say push on personally, you can always come back at a later date. I had to backtrack for a certain card game that will remain nameless and ended up finishing off everything in the region😂

RedXIV

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121855828#Comment_121855828

Makes me feel like I'll be there for a while, I only just got out of kalm before calling it a night :D

I can see myself following your lead

Necro

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121855848#Comment_121855848

Oh you'll 100% spend some sessions just doing some busywork in the regions, I think I advanced the story by about 5 mins in total the last two days😂

RedXIV

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121855878#Comment_121855878

I'm reading (in as spoiler-free content as possible) that the busywork in the regions is where all the fun is so I can see myself completely falling for this :D

brady12

Chapter 4- savage . Red XIV in chapter 5- hilarious 🤣🤣. Onto chapter 6 now . I think i'm loving this a lot more then remake !

RedXIV

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121859387#Comment_121859387

Aw shucks, I appreciate the vote of confidence :D

Sephiroth_dude

The "Busy work" is actually not at all that bad and same with the side quests, they did a better job than what they with did remake anyway when side content is concerned.

Necro

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121859924#Comment_121859924

No it's annoyingly addictive 😂 I'm loving it so far every bit of it

Underground

I’m on chapter 4 and the bloat is still there for me albeit not as bad as the first instalment, at least so far. I’m enjoying it.

The battle arena with the summons is still very enjoyable but after that the Chadley stuff is mostly not very compelling. It is side content fodder in fairness, most big games suffer the same problem. I haven’t tried the card game yet, must give it a go.

brady12

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121859915#Comment_121859915

🤣 you are welcome

brady12

I don't like card games . Iv skipped or bluffed every game so far in game . Can some one give me a guide for dummies to queens blood cos I want give it a fair crack of the whip . I don't not understand it at all!

Sephiroth_dude

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121865089#Comment_121865089

I'm in junon region now and I was bluffing my way through each player as well but now I can't beat 2 guys and I can't get past the fort condor level 3 game either.

RedXIV

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121865089#Comment_121865089

OK so you probably understand the fundamentals but just to be sure:

Three rows in play, and you need to get the most points on a row, for the points to get counted towards your total. So if the rows end up:

4====4

7====0

2====5

then the top row gets discounted on BOTH sides, on the middle row, you get 7 points, on the third row, the opponent gets 5 points, and the 2 for you are ignored as you didn't win "the row".

The real trick in the game is getting control of the squares so you can place your cards. you want to balance between extending your reach early enough to have options and to have a sneak attack or two so if the opponent stretches too far, one of your cards can cancel out the spot they've claimed.

This gets a bit more complicated with the idea of cards needing different amounts of pawns to place them. You generally need a bunch of single pawn cards to get going and you want the more costly cards to appear later in the game. To get them on the field, you need to be thinking about which combination of cards will leave a space with multiple pawns on it. And the other thing to be aware is the power of each card, that's what contributes to the numbers at the edges of the field.

This is the basics, if you get that you'll probably be ok for some of the games, where this gets more complicated is when you add in things like abilities that can add or subtract from power values.

Basically each time you take a turn, you're looking for one of the following:

Can I remove a spot the enemy can use?

Can I get control/Add a pawn to an existing square?

How many pawns do my cards need? Do I need to make sure I can add more pawns to squares to use them?

That last point is where the deck building comes in. I'm only a little into the game but if you're not really feeling it, go safer and have 70%/80% of your cards need 1 pawn, 20%/10% needing 2 pawns, and then the rest. The more pawns a card needs, the more you have to work to get it on the battlefield, and that usually means keeping multiple steps ahead of what you want to do and how to counter the opponent.

Not sure this helped at all, but thought I'd give it a stab :D

Necro

Tbh I have only a basic grasp of the fundamentals and have largely stuck with the same deck since the beginning (changed out maybe four cards in total) and have been able to beat most first or second go.

Only had one issue with one of the challenge games in Golden Saucer where I set up a second deck for it. It's not an essential part of the game but what I will say is that it's worth sticking with if you can at all, after you start rising a few levels it gets... Let's just say it gets interesting 😁

brady12

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121865288#Comment_121865288

Thank you

brady12

Christ almighty Tifa at the beach 😍

one armed dwarf

I beat this a few days ago. Without a doubt, I still consider this one of the best Final Fantasies. It has this moreish quality to it and feels like it was designed on purpose to capture a specific feeling present in late disc 1 FFVII where you wander around the world and get lost cause the next story quest is unclear. It engages in dialogue with that original game in a much more interesting way than Remake did, I find.

It has its issues though, there are some story segments which are done bad by Rebirth. Some embellishments and character interpretations are excellent enhancements, they are laying interesting groundwork for part 3. But the new stuff that isn't good tends to stick out. The ending is also terrible, I really hate it. It doesn't ruin the game for me but it made me feel very bitter and annoyed by the whole thing for a few days. Rebirth in general is hard carried by strong moments and memories of the original but they still don't have a good method for carving this game up in three and having these stories work independently. The more wanderlust middle chapter is supposed to complement the pressure cooker of the Midgar chapter, and the fallout and multiple crises of the last chapter. They don't work when you cut them up, and a lot of the new invented plotlines run roughshod over the themes of the original in a way that I find impossible to be ok with

So I have to compartmentalise my feelings about how poor a job they do with that stuff, and recognise that the other 95 percent of the game is an unmitigated triumph and the fullest, most complete feeling Final Fantasy game since the 32bit era and a much, much better game than Remake. It's what I wanted that game to be. Even though it's a fairly cookie cutter ubisoft template, the strength of the combat mechanics and the interweaved progression between its quests make it not feel like such empty calorie gaming, cause you're always going to get a new materia which introduces a new approach into your party compositions, or learn a new thing about the world or its characters. That said, it's easy to fall into a zombie mode spiral and clean up icons and feel bored by it, but even here the game's systems are so well organised to pull you from out of the Ubi-coma cause you can go play cards, which requires you to activate the brain cells a bit more. Or exercise a different skill entirely with the minigames, a lot of which I enjoyed (I'm not really on the same page as others wrt the minigames being excessive, though some are rubbish). 

I beat all but one of the queen's blood players last night. I'm not exactly sure what beating the last one gets you, but this player is the Emerald Weapon of card players, you have to really explore your options and do all those puzzles to get a strong deck to theorycraft a solution, which I love. I reckon I'll get it done tonight, then I guess I'll focus more on protorelic