Final Fantasy 7 Remake: A thorough and complete review
By Byron Smith
Chapter 2: The Story – Part One
The world around us is a very confusing and problematic one.
Giant corporations run everything and essentially make the rules of life, the planet is dying at the hands of man and quickly, the class divides have never been more pronounced and divisive, propoganda is unavoidable, and the people of the world are getting stir crazy for change. Of course, in real life, change requires time and the unification of people across the world, including leaders and politicians.
Final Fantasy 7 Remake thematically matches the modern world but gives these problems more observable forms and easily graspable metaphors. The world of Final Fantasy 7 Remake is dying at the hands of man through the harvesting of Mako and experiments of Hojo. The higher the class, the higher the person lives in Midgar, but the struggles of all classes outside of the top few are evident as well. Propaganda is everywhere and serve as obstacles for the players.
The people are stirring and ready for a change, except in Final Fantasy 7 Remake, making change happen is very different. It does not require millions of people demanding change and persisting and not settling for only gradual political change. Change did not require any compromises, any deals, or years of patience.
No, making change happen requires is a few committed fighters, a gun arm, and a really big sword.
The game throws the player in the middle of a resistance movement called AVALANCHE, a group that wants to save the world from Shinra.
Shinra is the corporation that built and runs the city of Midgar, a huge, heavily populated city, powered by Mako Energy, an energy made from the world’s lifeforce. Their goal seems simple: make money, stop all who oppose them, and become as powerful as possible. They use their power and status to control the population of Midgar, using their extensive police force to intimidate and their control of the media to put out propaganda and mislead.
The battle between Shinra and AVALANCHE has been waging for some time, and at the point that the game begins, AVALANCHE is ready to ramp up the battle. Battling in the streets and changing the minds of the masses has proved has proved pointless and wasteful when up against the bottomless pockets and endless resources of the Shinra corporation. AVALANCHE changes their focus from attacking Shinra head on to cutting off their resources, specifically the most dangerous and valuable resource they have: mako energy.
The player is put in control of Cloud Strife, an Ex-SOLDIER First Class turned mercenary hired by AVALANCHE to help them handle their next plan. Cloud has elite combat skills, utilizing a gigantic sword and various magic to slay any enemy in his way. His time as a SOLDIER may have taken it’s toll on Cloud’s social skills and made him emotionally unavailable, but that just limits the people in his way to get the job done.
AVALANCHE needed Cloud’s knowledge of Shinra facilities and inner working for their next mission, which consisted of infiltrating the mako reactor harvesting mako energy in sector 8 and detonating a bomb within it. AVALANCHE hoped this would incapacitate the reactor without causing too much damage to the nearby residential areas in sector 8. The group planned on using stealth and the element of surprise to avoid confronting any of Shinra’s guards or security measures.
That plan came straight from the leader of AVALANCHE, Barret Wallace (his last name is no where to be found in this game, so we are going to assume it is the same as the original Final Fantasy 7), a mountain of a man who has a massive gun in place of his right arm. Barrett is a well educated man, having spent years studying planetology and planning on the best way to save the planet from the devestation of mako harvesting.
Along with three other members of AVALANCHE, Biggs, Wedge, and Jessie (these three characters will be discussed in length in the writing section of this article), the AVALANCHE task force starts the extremely dangerous infiltration of the make reactor. Things start quietly, but soon all hell would break loose.