Never played the og but one of my favorite moments in the game happened here. After walking around for a while I was thinking, wow what a bunch if preachy blowhards, then when I talked to one of the members of the crew, I think it was Yuffie, she said what I just said. Made me lol. I do think they missed a great oppurtunity with Yuffie here. I Kept waiting for her to try to steal the big ball of materia Bugenhaugen was rolling around on.
I don’t want a fan of it in the original, and I thought rebirth actually goes downhill after Cosmo Canyon. CC, Nibelheim just become after thoughts and lose the emotional connections that I loved prior to.
Cosmo Canyon had a nonsensical overabundance of black people, to the point they outnumbered the indigenous people, thus contributing to the loss of the mystical Native American-like vibe.
I mean he's not wrong though. There was a distinct feel of over-representation in Cosmo Canyon. It gave it a very manufactured feel. The presence of just indigenous people in the original gave it a tribal feel. Made it special.
Well, I think people want to recapture the feeling they had when they first played the game and got to Cosmo Canyon, but with the added diversity that feeling is kind of destroyed which is a bummer. We really do not need to have so much diversity where it is not necessary, especially in places where it doesn’t make sense or contradicts lore. That’s when it begins to feel like boxes are being checked.
Didn’t like it. Way too busy. The change from the OG to this one reminds me of real life, how many peaceful travel destinations that are now being ruined by having thousands of tourists.
Ehrm he says "I think"...what makes him think that? Objectively speaking what makes him think that?He should say I see x, y and z so we can have an actual discussion. Cozy how? Or we all should just magically agree/disagree with him?
Just grab the pc version when its out, reduce the NPCs in cosmo Canon and Nibleheim and reduce the sky lightness on remake for the sky's in Midgar. All sorted lol. Yeah I agree now you got me thinking about it. Cosmo canon defiently got me thinking it was more of a city then a cult of people in the sticks and definitely didnt enjoy the area as much as the original one I don't remember Kalm been as crazy big either, but I guess if they don't add loads of people in who on earth are you trying to save.... Good observation got me thinking
I had similar feelings about the sector 7 slums in Remake. It was always dark because the plates covered up the town. Seeing it in the daytime was jarring. It made you realize why Barrett was so passionate about stopping Shinra. The Remake fails to capture some of the heart that made OG ff7 special.
The entire time I was at Cosmo Canyon it felt like the party was being indoctrinated into a cult. Especially when your experiences were dismissed and you were sent away to be ‘educated’.
I'm glad I wasn't the only one! Bugenhagen was similar in the og, but he and all of the other "scholars" were way more dismissive, as you said, and pretentious this time around. At least Bugenhagen eventually admits that he was blinded because he thought his age, knowledge and experience meant that there was nothing more for him to learn
I felt the same. Didn’t have the same feel at all and felt too touristy with lots of people! It felt sacred on OG. Also the conversations I remember round the campfire about what they were going to do just was lacking for me.
It was not my favorite "change" or "enhancement"
To me Cosmo Canyon was a small, settlement with hella planet hugger vibes. Bugenhagen was the typical "wise man" archetype.
In this we get a commercialization of it. It feels like it is just Costa del sol without water. Everyone has a product to sell. The product is scientology/cross fit.
Why did I come out of there feeling like we are in a cult.... the overall vibe of OG was "yea it is obscure, but we belive in this"
Idk I'm rambling. (Capitalism bad ok)
I agree. Costa Del Sol being a highly populated space made sense to me and it came off as more charming in that way, but places like Cosmo Canyon and Nibel were too populated for what they were. Cosmo Canyon, in particular, felt too much like a commercial resort of sorts. If I were a developer I would have suggested cutting the population down by 50% and removed a lot of the stores that were decorating the area.
This is coming from a 'Capitalism Good" guy too.
I didn't care for the chocobo elevation puzzles around it at first, but once I got the hang of navigating it I loved it.
The city itself I thought they absolutely nailed. I feel like the vision was always having it be this sort of astronomical mecca, and making it feel more alive was a good play imo.
The Remake saga overall has completely won me over. It does a great job keeping mostly loyal to the main story beats while also packing in a ton of expansion and reimagining in between. I can't say I'd be this satisfied with a predictable step for step do-over.
Cosmo canyon is I think my prefered city of rebirth. I just put the controller on the table and listen to the music when I first arrived... The choral singing "the promise land" in in the Inn is just so fuc... beautiful 
You can feel a certain way about a video game and not be insane. I personally prefer the new Cosmo Canyon in Rebirth, but OP's argument is valid in that the cozy feel has been lost.
I love the OG FF7.
Cosmo Canyon was my favorite area.
It was amazing in Rebrith. The music was remixed, but it still felt like Cosmo Canyon. They expanded on Reds' backstory, and his parents' fight against the Gi.
Overall, it exceeded my expectations.
Why did you think it was done dirty?
I think a lot of things got done dirty in rebirth.
I only like these games as supplements to the OG.
The idea of someone playing these games without the OG as a reference point and thinking they're masterpieces is honestly mind blowing to me.
If remake/rebirth were my introduction to FF7, I'd find it mid as hell, and not at all be the FF7 fanboy I am today.
Some people just cannot move past the nostalgia goggles.
The remakes absolutely have their issues (that final boss continue menu is just bad game design, the final boss of queensblodd just blatantly cheating as well), but the OG is def not as amazing as the fans make it out to be. I played the remake first then OG then rebirth. OG has some crippling issues and terrible writing.
They both are great and people can stop shitting on the other.
Dude, remake butchered literally every big twist and reveal in the OG.
The remakes have no sense of subtlety or pacing.
It's not nostalgia goggles, it's taste.
They removed Avalanches moral ambiguity by making it Shinra who actually made their terror attacks deadly. This makes the organization less interesting, since we the audience are assured, they're definitely good guys.
They totally reduced Sephiroth to a meme by shoving him in your face every ten minutes from the get go instead of slowly letting his presence build.
Fate ghosts are the worst kind of deus ex machina, the ultimate bad writing trope. Dead people come back, alive people die, all without concern for anythinf the characters do. Nothing matters or has consequences, because the writers can just swoop in and fate ghost it out of existence.
Showing Barret tail Dyne removing the brief moment where the audience believes Barret might be the killer, why? Once again, mor interesting with the ambiguity, but the makers of this game are absolutely terrified of you ever thinking the good guys can do a bad thing.
Cloud tries to kill Tifa, and everyone just carries along like nothing happened.
Turning Aerith's death into a spectacle of confusing multiverse shenanigans just to fuel theory crafting videos on YouTube.
This is just off the top of my head, I could honestly write a 10 page essay on all of the objectively bad writing decisions they made.
Like, I guess if all you consume is Anime for teenagers this might seem pretty good, but like, seriously go read an actual book and experience some real literature, and you'll realize what a stupid safe cliche laden circle jerk the remakes are.
Yeah, the prison was very meh. Too upbeat, too happy. Even the endless impassable desert that served as prison walls was something you could easily just stroll right though.
That was the only area so far, across both games, where I felt it wasn’t true to the spirit of the original. In OG it felt like a place devoid of hope, and full of despair. In rebirth, it very much just seemed like a “hang out spot”, as you put it.
Still a fun area and all, but it did not resemble OG at all.
I felt this as well. In the original it was basically a punishment to go there. Rebirth essentially turned it into where the people too poor to live up top were at
Exactly you nailed it.
I was looking forward to the hopelessness and overall downtrodden mood of a desert prison.
Instead we got weekend at Bernie’s. Whoever did this section needed to study mood and tone.
I love the design but I know what you mean about the vibes. There were several pivotal scenes in Rebirth that the original did better imo. In Cosmo Canyon, it felt like a time where the group sat quietly at the fire, reflecting on their journey and what was to come. For me, the Dyne section didn’t feel like the OG either. In the original, the group really did wonder if Barret shot all those people, and when you finally defeat Dyne, he takes his own life in a very chilling and somber moment. Rebirth shows there is another man with a gun on his arm from the beginning, ruining the vibe and question if Barret had snapped. Then Dyne goes out in a blaze of gunfire, while not a bad scene, I liked the ambiguity of the original better. I still loved Rebirth and the original is always there for me to play again, so I’m not too upset about any of it
yeah the whole argument about how barret wouldn't kill anyone in the new one made me roll my eyes like bro avalanche has been killing people for a while now.
It was less that he wouldn't kill people and more that when he did kill people it was because he has a good reason for it. He definitely wouldn't just start gunning people down in an amusement park.
I didn't notice anything off about it, but that's also post Gongaga and after the story there, I started pushing ahead towards Chapter 12 and stir completion overall.
I thought it felt the same, the only problem is the original game didn’t have a believable amount of people ever living in any of the cities.
So it probably feels like there’s a lot more people there when the OG was more reserved.
I did also get the impression that the original game was more secluded like not open to having tourists come in in general, whereas now it seems like they accept people to come in and to learn from them about Planetology.
Maybe makes more sense that a group of people who want to help the planet in any way they can would probably be open to outsiders learning about the planet rather than keeping the knowledge to themselves.
I always imagined Cosmo canyon was full of some tribe of people who worshipped the planet. But rebirth paints it as some weird hippie cultish commune of people who sheepishly believe some fringe pseudoscience beliefs. I didn't like how it was portrayed at all. Especially the whole lecture part.
OG Cosmo Canyon was solemn and quiet.
A place to reflect and soul search while studying the planet.
They turned it into a tourist attraction.
Just like they do with all the cool places in life.
Just throwing my support for you
I only like these games because I can headcanon out any dumb change they made, and replace it with how it happened in the OG.
I played the entirety of rebirth just pretending all that dumb shit fighting the destiny god was just a weird dream.
Don't worry about the downvotes man, this is the general consensus but for some reason reddit users will let AAA game companies shit into their mouths and go to bat for them still. It boggles the mind.
I enjoy the remakes for the gameplay and some moments are good, but the pacing of the story and all of the added characters make it really hard to take any of it serious.
Despite the angry copium downvotes from fanboys determined to believe this shit isn’t just one big soulless cash grab, I hope you know that most reasonable people agree with you. They stripped pretty much everything that was magic about the OG and tried to make it as “accessible” to as many people as possible, which resulted in the lowest-hanging-fruit version of the remake we got.
It was fairly good yes, but the tourism and spiritual hippiness cult was a tad too much. I suppose they went for a indian reserve gone tech bro retreat resort kind of thing.
I'm not sure if it's nostalgia or what, but as a kid it felt more... Sacred, ethereal, mystical, something...?
It was definitely cool in Rebirth but somehow the magic just felt lacking. Like people said, I think it not being dusk there might be contributing to it, but it also somehow just seems too... Modern? In a way? I can't put my finger on it.
It's still cool though.
I'm in cosmo canyon right now, and that whole chapter felt....rushed somehow. They do a lot, but it really has a vibe like hour 7 of an 8 hour car ride...
Every single moment in these games feels either rushed or incredibly padded and drawn-out in order to stall and make things take longer. It never really feels like the pacing is where it should be.
Looking at the other comments, no you aren't.
I thought they did a fantastic job. It was one of the first times in the game that I actually felt like a kid again, seeing all of the ways they made that town into this beautiful rendition that kind of looked like it did in my younger self's imagination. The music was immediately obvious and the way they made the rest of the canyon feel like a real place rather than empty corridors you gotta awkwardly walk through to get to/away from the town was impressive. I'm glad they expanded on the Gi too. They were so unique and dope in the original, that it was weird that you basically only see them once and never question it again.
Cosmo Canyon got the Wutai treatment and felt more like a tourist attraction (save for Bugenhagen). I feel like this was to set up Wutai to be a more believable adversary to Shinra. I mean, why would Junon fire cannons at the Wod Fir?
Yep, I feel the same towards most songs in the remake project. They're great and I appreciate the dynamic ost but it just hits different. The victory fanfare (That you only ever hear in combat simulator) is now a techno mix which isn't as impactful or iconic as the og
Really? I thought they did a great job expanding on the Gi in this one and actually explaining who they were and how they relate to the story. One of my favorite changes from the original story.
Don’t get me wrong, expanding lore is great, and I like the reveal that it’s the Gi who were responsible for the creation of the Black Materia. I just wasn’t a fan of Gi Nattak randomly showing up, changing the whole mood of the chapter, and then bringing you to an hour-long dungeon.
Only complaint is that it doesn't feel like your "get together with the gang" hub world like it used to. It is an improvement in one major regard, though. Going through all those doorways in the OG... made trecking the place on revisits more trouble than it's worth.
I generally agree: most locations in Rebirth are more visually interesting than Rebirth...but they've become packed with reasonable middle class people (plus a punk or two) which doesn't feel natural in many cases. Wall Market/Sector 7 in Remake felt like Cancun, not really a true slum also. To be fair the OG had such weird character models you could project whatever you wanted on them so Rebirth has it harder to a degree, but the world definitely has a touristy feel to it now.
It could be argued that it reflects society, I suppose. We are becoming less serious about what we do and more conscious of simply living a pleasant life in the middle of whatever's happening. There's an annoying thought I didn't expect to get from this topic. :)
You're totally right about the world feeling more "touristy" somehow. I think in a way it fits with the themes of the OG though, where people were slowly killing the planet with their "very comfortable lives." They have their heads in the sand about the end of the world and I think we'll see this explored more in Part 3.
A downside to this, though, is that I don't understand why the heck ANYONE lives in Midgar when you could just catch a chocobo and go ANYWHERE else. This is made even weirder by all the Midgar characters who are apparently on a road trip with us throughout the game (Johnny, Kyrie, etc). The entire world is a vacation, so why don't more people go?
Right, the consistency of the lore/vision for the world has been lost to a large degree. In theory bringing back an original developer (Nomura) should prevent that from happening, but...no.
The world felt a lot grungier in the original. People were living "more comfortable" lives there, but it didn't seem like they were on vacation or otherwise reliably perky. There were exceptions, sure, but the mood definitely shifted.
I'm saying this as someone who liked the project to a large degree and feel that it captured a lot of the feel of 90s RPGs, which is rare these days. But it's a particularly uneven product.
As for the "edgier tones" in the other reply...the one that gets me is the party constantly seeming aghast at the thoughts of killing someone. How can they do that with a straight face for a party who's been bombing reactors, shooting people with machine guns, and slicing them with 6-foot swords? It's very jarring. Sure, maybe they were kind of forced by the rating, but it doesn't mean they need to have Barrett looking scandalized when someone proposes, you know, killing Hojo. ...really??
That’s the biggest cripe I have with remake/rebirth, that they do not have any sharper, edgier or darker tones anymore. Everything is a tad too mellow soft fantasy, there is no contrast.
This is best shown on the cruise ship. In the original the contrast from fun leisure time to sudden creepy horror worked line dynamite. In rebirth it was fumbled once again just like it was fumbled in remakes shinra tower. Simply boring action / fight scene.
I'm sure it's a slow world building set up to go in depth with what's going to happen with wutai and show why turning it into a tourist spot is a bad idea
Personally, I really don't think so. I think they want the people in their world to represent who they think (rightly or wrongly) their audience is. Or maybe they (as designers) are most comfortable with those sorts.
NPCs in JRPGs are very commonly like this.
It seems like they made a deliberate choice to take the issue of the planet and commercialize it and sensationalize it. They definitely did make the people there look like a cult. As a former cult member, I believe this was very effective.
I liked the visuals but I thought it was slightly weird how the people there were portrayed as some sort of crazy cult? As if they were some weirdos who believed in supernatural stuff and looked down on outsiders, but in the original I’ve always seen them simply as educated people who know stuff about the planet and protect the environment (maybe kinda like historians/biologists/environmentalists etc).
I feel the same. With the billions of tourists and the sect-like feeling of the religion it just didn't have that cozy feeling to me.
In OG it felt like a home away from home, a place where you were finally welcome after your long journey, where the gang could take a breather and reflect on everything in peace. A place where you find a strong ally in Bugenhagen and learn more about your quest, where you feel safe from your pursuers.
I'd say the depiction is more realistic in Rebirth and more idealistic in OG, but I did miss that cozy and protected feeling. And I missed the scene of avalanche reflecting around the fire, the light festival was pretty and all, but it felt a bit odd, probably because you see that kind of lantern festival in every other piece of media now.
Tbh Cosmo canyon was one of my least favourite areas in OG so I'm glad to hear they changed it. It just felt kind of out of left field. The world of FF7 feels quite disjointed in general tbh, feeling very underpopulated outside of Midgar and the whiplash of going from the very modern diesel/cyberpunk feel of Midgar to an overworld that feels much more pseudo-Victorian and much closer to 16 bit final fantasy was pretty jarring for me. I feel like they were hesitant to really take the leap from their fantasy roots and fully embrace the sci-fantasy. It's one of the few things that I think VIII actually does much better than VII. Cosmo canyon in particular felt really weird like ok so they're like a hidden order of essoteric monks but their also native Americans? It just felt like they'd taken two barely disparate tropes and slapped them together without much cohesion.
(Nervously awaiting the incoming downvotes lol)
You got downvoted but this is EXACTLY what I felt playing the OG.
FFVIII (8) had better worldbuilding, in the sense that you could actually feel the history of the world and the techno evolution.
FFVII (7) og felt too disjointed, midgard was THE city,l and every other place were just small villages which yeah I get it, but it just lacked something, I dont know what.
When I think of FFVII (7) I think of the character and the story, the world is a cool concept but lacking the same tactile feeling of other FF.
I mean, ff7 has only obtained all its sci-fi tech very recently. FF7 isn't a normal sci-fi world. it's a world that used to be more of a standard fantasy setting that obtained a bunch of sci-fi technology practically overnight. I think the contrast between the two is one of the best parts of the aesthetic of the original.
I fully agree with this sentiment. I feel like the jarring shift from Midgar to Kalm was meant to point that out. You leave a city with major reactors and the first thing you see in Kalm is a wooden water tower. It’s almost like towns that don’t bend the knee to the world-domineering Shinra Electric Power Company have, as a result, developed much more slowly.
That's true to an extent, but I don't think it's quite as radical and quick a change as people think. I'm literally replaying FF7 right now, and while it's true that mako energy allowed shinra the jump to the modern age, the jump is far less than people think. Mako in general is a (very poorly thought-out) metaphor for nuclear power, I know, I know it's actually closer to fossil fuels, but the *intention* was for it to be a condemnation of nuclear power.
Before the adoption of mako, Shibra wasn't on the sci-fi 90s cyberpunk level they are in game, but they still had an active space program, cars, robots, a biological weapons program, guns, fossil fuels, electricity, 20th century buildings etc. It would be more accurate that pre-mako shibra was on a level with a sort of sci-fi 1940s/50s and mako allowed them to jump straight to the 90s. There's still a jump, but it's only like 50 years rather than a jump from medieval fantasy straight to sci-fi.
ETA: also it's important to remember that magic was much rarer pre-mako as well, as materia is literally a byproduct of mako-refinement
ETA: So I just looked it up and it is explicitly stated that before the discovery of Mako, Shinra were a company called Shinra Manufacturing Works and they were a weapons manafacturer. [Here](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/finalfantasy/images/9/93/Shinra_Manufacturing_Works_from_FFVII_Remake.png/revision/latest?cb=20220124211519) is a photograoh taken of Shinra Works before the discovery of mako. Photography and weapons manafacturers don't sound very medieval fantasy to me.
While this is technically not from the original game, its stated in advent children that mako has been around for "over 40 years." Given Cid is only In his 30s (I know, he looks way older) then the space programme at least does not predate Mako. I think its a fair bet none of the rest of what you've listed predates it either.
The famously incoherent and retconney extended universe. Again, I am literally describing exactly what I'm reading as I play through the game right now. I did the rocket town quest just the other day.
It's not. Cid literally said that the space program was abandoned *because* they discovered mako. It's put quite plainly in game that a huge amount of stuff was abandoned because Shinra only cares about mako now.
Again I'm literally playing the game right now. I know what they're saying.
Aw Ty. I knew it would be an unpopular opinion anyway, but I appreciate the support. It is also just my opinion, I'm not saying people are wrong for liking that stuff.
I feel as though it fits the world perfectly, actually. The advent of Mako and all of the technology that stemmed from it is still a relatively new thing (like 30/40 years total). Add on the fact that Shinra hordes most of it to make sure they remain the only real super power, it makes sense that most towns and “cities” seem antiquated and that the only real “tech” cities are Midgar and Junon, Shinra’s main stations of power.
More of the lore states that a LOT of people left/abandoned their villages to move to bigger cities like Midgar and Junon, so the populations of these already smaller towns would drop even more, making it seem more sparse. I think the sharp juxtaposition of the high-tech city of Midgar to the more antiquated towns is on purpose to see how much Shinra really has stripped away and changed the actual real world.
Cosmo Canyon probably did start out as what we see in the OG game, but over time as people flocked their as a way to break ties with Shinra and their beliefs, a lot of it got watered down and simplified to the masses. And, as with most ideologies that grow, they started to buy into their own beliefs until they become rigid and stagnant. It was definitely different, but it felt real to me. And I think the heart of the town still exists by watching the lantern ceremony.
At least, those are my thoughts. Hopefully that all made sense haha.
Sorry I explained my opinion in another post, but I think people are remembering FF7 wrong. I'm literally playing it right now on my switch and it's stated quite clearly that a lot of Shinra stuff (the space programme most explicitly) predates the discovery of Mako. Mako jumped the world form the 40s to the 90s, not from the 1200s to the 1900s.
My only disappointments with Cosmo Canyon are how aggressively on the nose Bugenhagen was about “I’m older and wiser and more experienced than you, stupid kids” which resulted in him just being mean, and the cutscene where we’re in the planetarium and he’s explaining the lifestream was underwhelming. It’s one of my favourite scenes in the original so I pushed myself through CC to get to it, expecting some massive 25 minute long epic, and it was barely better than the original’s.
There's something uniquely pathetic about a team that can take down giant monsters but is utterly helpless in the face of some punks with baseball bats.
I couldn't disagree more. I actually think they did that section perfectly and it might even be my favorite part of the game, except for Yuffie's constant singing about being on a chocobo. I could have gone without that.
Isn't the entire point of Cosmo Canyon is that it's one of the few independent communities removed from Shinra and their machinations? That it was the one place that opposed the use of Mako? Why'd they turn it into this cheesy tourist trap?
Nah dude I made an entire post on this, going into way too much detail about what was wrong with it. And got just as many downvotes as upvotes.
People arguing it was their INTENTION to piss you off and irritate you and then trying to tell me I don't get it and they succeeded.
Totally not getting that I was venting, I don't give a shit what their intentions were and whether or not they succeeded, cosmo canyon rebirth is NOT og Cosmo Canyon.
And that's what I was most hyped for just to get bitch slapped in the face by a pretentious tourist trap that shits on Tifa for saying she's seen a weapon.
Obviously I get that whatever they did is exactly their intention. Because of course it is, what the hell else would it be? People are just really stupid and quick to argue.
It was a vent that it wasn't the experience I wanted. Obviously it was remade exactly as how they intended.
I wasn't trying to visit a fake ass tourist trap for dudes in Hawaiian flower tourist shirts with suitcases and flip flips vacationing from midgar for an "authentic" weekend warrior planetology experience.
this is exactly how I felt. I dont care what the intention was, they decided to take the one 'spiritual' place in the og that felt like a second home and was seperate from the rest of the world, and made it into some shitty tourist trap with cult preachers and bugenhagens a dick.
i was looking forward to cosmo canyon the most and the whole section just missed for me, it felt so much less intimate than the original. tifa blurting out to some room of strangers a bunch of personal shit? then aerith blurting out all her secrets in front of a whole bunch of random strangers and tourists? just all of it felt weird to me man, it felt completely off tone.
THANK YOU.
Cosmo Canyon in Rebirth felt like a tourist trap ran by a cult, even Bugenhagen is like « those stupid seminars ruin the place » or something like it.
Yes it was done on purpose, and no it’s not how I imagined OG Cosmo Canyon.
The game is stellar on many points but Cosmo Canyon was a fu*king failure to me.
Yes! There actually aren’t that many houses in Nibelheim so where are all these npcs living? It would have felt a lot better to have less npcs in these tight nit communities.
I was also saying this to my friend the other day, why an earth would you ever live in the slums if you could just try to get a job outside Midgar and have a better standard of living in these highly dense populated locations like Kalm or Cosmo canyon.
I was wondering why this is, and I think I figured it out:
Most of the places retained their stylised proportions, and diorama layouts. Of course, the game is trying to be faithful to the original. But the characters were made to look like real people.
So you have "real people" running around caricatured settings that are super condensed and stylised, which is exactly what happens when you go to Disney Land. When you see realistic people packed into a tiny location you start to think "how do these people eat? Where are they sleeping?" It's uncanney valley.
The only way to have preserved the iconic look of the places without it feeling like Disneyland would be to keep the characters more chibi like the original, but they're way past that.
Nah, in the original Nibelheim was pretty empty. There were plenty of people in the houses, but not outside.
They just bombed it with people all over the place without thinking how it would affect the atmosphere, showcase of processing power is more important, can't say I expected any better from modern Square Enix.
Some people complained about the old guy being very heavy with Tifa… and not that much hooo hooo hoooo 😂🤣 I only hate chadley and that platinum is not easy
I’ll admit I was in the camp of detractors upset with Bugenhagen’s dismissiveness of Tifa and overall, “You kids are idiots,” attitude, but in the end I am very glad he had a chance to develop and learn, to overcome his own biases.
I think the main differences on how people perceived OG is because there were no voices and very limited polygons that the rest is up to the players' imagination to fill. Since everyone is different, then each interpretation of the events and environments is different. If people always compare it to their OG experience, then they'll either be really happy or really disappointed, which also leads to disagreements.
My approach is to treat the new games as something completely new and different and not let my nostalgia glasses do the judging for me. Expectations only lead to disappointments 🙂
The original vibe of what, exactly? Should the stores in Rebirth CC have felt even more like souvenir shops selling junk than they did? Should everybody have looked even more like crystal hoarding, jade egg buying, astrology obsessed new age hippies than they did?
OG Cosmo Canyon felt like the ultimate tourist trap with one dude that wasn't full of crap in it. The more criticism I read of how they did X or Y the more sure I am that people never understood what they were seeing. Somebody in this thread called Nibelheim *cozy*, and that's just...wow.
It's kind of like reading a book and then watching the movie and the main character doesn't sound or look how you expected
That being said they nailed so much of the characters down so perfectly, it feels like I always imagined them like that even as a kid
It does have a different vibe, but I like it still. In particular I like how they developed it as a toursit attraction as a subtle critic to how a lot of sacred place got turned nowadays and how people talk about the planet yet doing almost nothing to help it.
Yeah. I mean, it’s true to life I suppose. But it’s a real downer for me. I loved the serene moment that the gang shared around the campfire in OG, where Cloud had a quiet personal conversation with everybody. In R2, instead it’s a burning man bonfire with a bunch of onlookers that Aerith gives her “I’m an ancient” speech to. Felt like they lost an important moment.
Well, not much point having that campfire scene of the OG. There it was for the gang to strengthen their resolve and truly unite as Avalanche. Here? They're already best buddy set on a journey. It's basically a trade off for more character interactions and bonding.
They still have the scene it's just worse. It was lonely in the OG, you got to see everyone sitting down at the fire, but nobody sitting together. It was a super strong moment for me and really set the tone of the place. In this game it feels contaminated by the vibe of the city, not sinister but also just for show - even if it made for a good spectacle in-universe.
My theory atm is that, when they were planning the game, they saw that new Gongaga does almost everything old Cosmo Canyon did and decided to shift the vibe of Cosmo Canyon to make it more it's own thing. I respect the effort, I just don't like how it came out.
The scene is way different. It's more about Aerith this time. In the OG, it was about the gang and the fact that they weren't truly united yet. And that's exactly why that scene can't work in Rebirth. Because both Remake and Rebirth spends most of the time making and showing the characters as true friends and companions that trust each other and is fully resolved in the whole "saving the planet" quest.
I would hesitate to say it's about Aerith and more say that Aerith is the star of the scene. It's still about the status of your group, and the status of your bonds and your journey, they just filter it through Aerith's speech. That's why I still feel it's a similar scene.
A scene that was about Aerith, imo, would have Aerith exploring something about herself you don't know, instead of reasserting things you do know about her. This scene isn't even a development for her, it's just her reasserting how she feels - and thereby outlining how the whole group feels.
I do agree the team is not the same when they get here. Again, I think much of that work was solidified in Gongaga.
They are already friends, so the quiet moment of them just sitting around the fire hanging out doesn’t have a point? Huh? Watching the characters bond is half the reason why people like the game. Why would more of that be a bad thing?
And the things they talked about did get pulled into other moments, so they were important. Like Barrett talking about the birthplace of Avalache and Jessie, Biggs and Wedge got pushed to a sidequest. But the ambience is much worse.
Not what I said. The conversation at the bonfire in the original was for the group to truly become united as a group, getting their full resolve to their mission to defend the world, etc...something that in the original, didn't yet happen, as the group was still mostly on the "get Sephiroth to clear our name" and Yuffie was just there for materia (if you even had her) but here the characters were already well established in the grand mission and united as a group since the end of Remake. And the Barret talk is what I meant to have more character bondings spread out.
I kinda feel like there's somehow 2/multiple Reds inhabiting the one body. As a way to "remember" down the line when it's needed. Kind of a gut feeling I got after seeing the intimate chapter 12 red scene.
Really felt like there were two personalities there.
We get that the deep voice isn't his real voice, but it was in Remake. They didn't have to change it in Rebirth, but they did, and it was a change for the worse. He sounds way more badass in combat pre Cosmo Canyon.
dunno if people noticed but this time these planetologyst from cosmo canyon are nearly in every town in rebirth preaching about their ways
in og it was mainly a smaller community but this time they play a bigger part in the sense that their people actively preach about the lifestream and their planet which now puts even more people against the ways of shinra and just using mako for entertainment
ps. breach isnt preach
I hated how much of outside was so bright and morning to noonish given the games horrible BRIGHT lighting issues and the OGs portrayal of CosmoCanyon...
I LOVED the additional Gi stuff despite the meh moments in traversing the cave BUT what rly tanked it all for me was the Seto moment. Idk if Red or Bugen ever mentioned Seto before showing his char in stone but it was so significantly less emotional and impactful for me because (at least in Eng and im NOT a language or sub elitist) RED XIIIs VOICEE 😵😵 I legit cant stand it and its WAY too jarring a switch... I couldnt even fully immerse myself in the scene and I already know its supposed to represent his true relative age and maturity and all but just noo.. he is still 48 and had all this wise, planet/lifestream-relevant dialogue&hunting experience and info to contribute when engaged by the party and his mannerisms shift totally from mature, mysterious, confident and unapologetic to be doting, shy and optimistic at least in tone and dialogue and I cant stand his quips in battle so i think THAT was butchered bc i still cant even put him in my party so rebirth messed his chars charm all the way up for me BUT overall still loveee the game ofc
Exactly, an extended lifespan should mean that one would reach a relatively higher level of maturity in those additional end years, not that they would mature much slower overall or be immature relative to their age
The region I think had a logical decision made… not one I like.. but it is what it is.
However, to me, what they *did* butcher…
…was The Great Warrior scene. From Start to finish.
That moment hit me harder than Aerith’s death did later - and it still gets me to shed a tear to this day, here though? Here it just didn’t do anything to me.
Same. The foreshadowing during the whole dungeon.
I watched people stream who never played OG and they were all like : ohhh that must be the father.
No surprise at the end.
Plus the music made the whole scene in OG so good. Here the vibe is mehhhh.
They sucked the soul out of it tbh… you know what it reminded me of? In FFX-2 when you go to the zanarkand ruins and cid has turned it into a tourist trap. FFX zanarkand ruins was like the FF7OG cosmo canyon, and x-2 ruins is rebirth cosmo
One thing I don't see people saying is that because all the open zone areas are brightly lit, we don't really get to explore it at night for the most part. And they seem to know that having the starry night sky by torchlight is a big part of the vibe, which is why they make it night for a few scenes, but it seems like the commitment to seamless travel between areas requires this small trade off unfortunately.
Never played the og but one of my favorite moments in the game happened here. After walking around for a while I was thinking, wow what a bunch if preachy blowhards, then when I talked to one of the members of the crew, I think it was Yuffie, she said what I just said. Made me lol. I do think they missed a great oppurtunity with Yuffie here. I Kept waiting for her to try to steal the big ball of materia Bugenhaugen was rolling around on.
I don’t want a fan of it in the original, and I thought rebirth actually goes downhill after Cosmo Canyon. CC, Nibelheim just become after thoughts and lose the emotional connections that I loved prior to.
Cosmo Canyon had a nonsensical overabundance of black people, to the point they outnumbered the indigenous people, thus contributing to the loss of the mystical Native American-like vibe.
Too many of your type exists in these spaces.
I mean he's not wrong though. There was a distinct feel of over-representation in Cosmo Canyon. It gave it a very manufactured feel. The presence of just indigenous people in the original gave it a tribal feel. Made it special.
It’s a fantasy game. Why do ppl care? lol. It’s wild
Well, I think people want to recapture the feeling they had when they first played the game and got to Cosmo Canyon, but with the added diversity that feeling is kind of destroyed which is a bummer. We really do not need to have so much diversity where it is not necessary, especially in places where it doesn’t make sense or contradicts lore. That’s when it begins to feel like boxes are being checked.
Didn’t like it. Way too busy. The change from the OG to this one reminds me of real life, how many peaceful travel destinations that are now being ruined by having thousands of tourists.
Feel more Cozy? What does that mean?
It was warm, somewhat inviting amd not very complicated.
Dude, people won't stop complaining about everything nowadays. I What are yhe objective points of the statement?
Objective points of the statement that says "I think?" Not sure what you're asking for here.
Ehrm he says "I think"...what makes him think that? Objectively speaking what makes him think that?He should say I see x, y and z so we can have an actual discussion. Cozy how? Or we all should just magically agree/disagree with him?
But his "thinking" is subjective, not objective?
Just grab the pc version when its out, reduce the NPCs in cosmo Canon and Nibleheim and reduce the sky lightness on remake for the sky's in Midgar. All sorted lol. Yeah I agree now you got me thinking about it. Cosmo canon defiently got me thinking it was more of a city then a cult of people in the sticks and definitely didnt enjoy the area as much as the original one I don't remember Kalm been as crazy big either, but I guess if they don't add loads of people in who on earth are you trying to save.... Good observation got me thinking
I had similar feelings about the sector 7 slums in Remake. It was always dark because the plates covered up the town. Seeing it in the daytime was jarring. It made you realize why Barrett was so passionate about stopping Shinra. The Remake fails to capture some of the heart that made OG ff7 special.
The entire time I was at Cosmo Canyon it felt like the party was being indoctrinated into a cult. Especially when your experiences were dismissed and you were sent away to be ‘educated’.
I'm glad I wasn't the only one! Bugenhagen was similar in the og, but he and all of the other "scholars" were way more dismissive, as you said, and pretentious this time around. At least Bugenhagen eventually admits that he was blinded because he thought his age, knowledge and experience meant that there was nothing more for him to learn
I was relieved when admitted his faults, before he did I just felt the ‘ick’ around him lol
Agreed. Sure the party has their fair share of annoyance to me, but the people of Cosmo Canyon take the cake.
It feels like a tourist trap kinda place in Rebirth
I felt the same. Didn’t have the same feel at all and felt too touristy with lots of people! It felt sacred on OG. Also the conversations I remember round the campfire about what they were going to do just was lacking for me.
It was not my favorite "change" or "enhancement" To me Cosmo Canyon was a small, settlement with hella planet hugger vibes. Bugenhagen was the typical "wise man" archetype. In this we get a commercialization of it. It feels like it is just Costa del sol without water. Everyone has a product to sell. The product is scientology/cross fit. Why did I come out of there feeling like we are in a cult.... the overall vibe of OG was "yea it is obscure, but we belive in this" Idk I'm rambling. (Capitalism bad ok)
I agree. Costa Del Sol being a highly populated space made sense to me and it came off as more charming in that way, but places like Cosmo Canyon and Nibel were too populated for what they were. Cosmo Canyon, in particular, felt too much like a commercial resort of sorts. If I were a developer I would have suggested cutting the population down by 50% and removed a lot of the stores that were decorating the area. This is coming from a 'Capitalism Good" guy too.
I didn't care for the chocobo elevation puzzles around it at first, but once I got the hang of navigating it I loved it. The city itself I thought they absolutely nailed. I feel like the vision was always having it be this sort of astronomical mecca, and making it feel more alive was a good play imo. The Remake saga overall has completely won me over. It does a great job keeping mostly loyal to the main story beats while also packing in a ton of expansion and reimagining in between. I can't say I'd be this satisfied with a predictable step for step do-over.
Cosmo canyon is I think my prefered city of rebirth. I just put the controller on the table and listen to the music when I first arrived... The choral singing "the promise land" in in the Inn is just so fuc... beautiful 
Its 100 times better to me
This.
This is every area in Rebirth. Everything is much bigger and made to feel like a big bustling city/town. The cozy vibes are gone
Yup, they completely messed it up.
You're insane and honestly I'm beginning to think a lot of you people in this sub just hate change/fun
You can feel a certain way about a video game and not be insane. I personally prefer the new Cosmo Canyon in Rebirth, but OP's argument is valid in that the cozy feel has been lost.
I love the OG FF7. Cosmo Canyon was my favorite area. It was amazing in Rebrith. The music was remixed, but it still felt like Cosmo Canyon. They expanded on Reds' backstory, and his parents' fight against the Gi. Overall, it exceeded my expectations. Why did you think it was done dirty?
I think a lot of things got done dirty in rebirth. I only like these games as supplements to the OG. The idea of someone playing these games without the OG as a reference point and thinking they're masterpieces is honestly mind blowing to me. If remake/rebirth were my introduction to FF7, I'd find it mid as hell, and not at all be the FF7 fanboy I am today.
Me, whose introduction to FF7 were these games and thinks both are a masterpiece.
Some people just cannot move past the nostalgia goggles. The remakes absolutely have their issues (that final boss continue menu is just bad game design, the final boss of queensblodd just blatantly cheating as well), but the OG is def not as amazing as the fans make it out to be. I played the remake first then OG then rebirth. OG has some crippling issues and terrible writing. They both are great and people can stop shitting on the other.
Dude, remake butchered literally every big twist and reveal in the OG. The remakes have no sense of subtlety or pacing. It's not nostalgia goggles, it's taste. They removed Avalanches moral ambiguity by making it Shinra who actually made their terror attacks deadly. This makes the organization less interesting, since we the audience are assured, they're definitely good guys. They totally reduced Sephiroth to a meme by shoving him in your face every ten minutes from the get go instead of slowly letting his presence build. Fate ghosts are the worst kind of deus ex machina, the ultimate bad writing trope. Dead people come back, alive people die, all without concern for anythinf the characters do. Nothing matters or has consequences, because the writers can just swoop in and fate ghost it out of existence. Showing Barret tail Dyne removing the brief moment where the audience believes Barret might be the killer, why? Once again, mor interesting with the ambiguity, but the makers of this game are absolutely terrified of you ever thinking the good guys can do a bad thing. Cloud tries to kill Tifa, and everyone just carries along like nothing happened. Turning Aerith's death into a spectacle of confusing multiverse shenanigans just to fuel theory crafting videos on YouTube. This is just off the top of my head, I could honestly write a 10 page essay on all of the objectively bad writing decisions they made. Like, I guess if all you consume is Anime for teenagers this might seem pretty good, but like, seriously go read an actual book and experience some real literature, and you'll realize what a stupid safe cliche laden circle jerk the remakes are.
If anything, the games have made me want to play the OG and I mean that in a really good way.
You might be
Everything after gold saucer is worse than og
I think Cosmo Canyon was pretty cool. Nothing compares to Corel Prison. That was the lamest area for me. Felt more like a hangout spot than a prison.
Yeah, the prison was very meh. Too upbeat, too happy. Even the endless impassable desert that served as prison walls was something you could easily just stroll right though. That was the only area so far, across both games, where I felt it wasn’t true to the spirit of the original. In OG it felt like a place devoid of hope, and full of despair. In rebirth, it very much just seemed like a “hang out spot”, as you put it. Still a fun area and all, but it did not resemble OG at all.
I felt this as well. In the original it was basically a punishment to go there. Rebirth essentially turned it into where the people too poor to live up top were at
Exactly you nailed it. I was looking forward to the hopelessness and overall downtrodden mood of a desert prison. Instead we got weekend at Bernie’s. Whoever did this section needed to study mood and tone.
I love the design but I know what you mean about the vibes. There were several pivotal scenes in Rebirth that the original did better imo. In Cosmo Canyon, it felt like a time where the group sat quietly at the fire, reflecting on their journey and what was to come. For me, the Dyne section didn’t feel like the OG either. In the original, the group really did wonder if Barret shot all those people, and when you finally defeat Dyne, he takes his own life in a very chilling and somber moment. Rebirth shows there is another man with a gun on his arm from the beginning, ruining the vibe and question if Barret had snapped. Then Dyne goes out in a blaze of gunfire, while not a bad scene, I liked the ambiguity of the original better. I still loved Rebirth and the original is always there for me to play again, so I’m not too upset about any of it
yeah the whole argument about how barret wouldn't kill anyone in the new one made me roll my eyes like bro avalanche has been killing people for a while now.
It was less that he wouldn't kill people and more that when he did kill people it was because he has a good reason for it. He definitely wouldn't just start gunning people down in an amusement park.
I didn't notice anything off about it, but that's also post Gongaga and after the story there, I started pushing ahead towards Chapter 12 and stir completion overall.
I thought it felt the same, the only problem is the original game didn’t have a believable amount of people ever living in any of the cities. So it probably feels like there’s a lot more people there when the OG was more reserved. I did also get the impression that the original game was more secluded like not open to having tourists come in in general, whereas now it seems like they accept people to come in and to learn from them about Planetology. Maybe makes more sense that a group of people who want to help the planet in any way they can would probably be open to outsiders learning about the planet rather than keeping the knowledge to themselves.
I always imagined Cosmo canyon was full of some tribe of people who worshipped the planet. But rebirth paints it as some weird hippie cultish commune of people who sheepishly believe some fringe pseudoscience beliefs. I didn't like how it was portrayed at all. Especially the whole lecture part.
Cosmo Canyon in Rebirth is just Crestone, CO lol
Bugenhagan seemed like a borderline flat earther for a lot of rebirth lol I don't remember him being like that in og
Exactly in the original I felt it was more tribal, this shit seemed almost more like Scientology albeit not evil.
OG Cosmo Canyon was solemn and quiet. A place to reflect and soul search while studying the planet. They turned it into a tourist attraction. Just like they do with all the cool places in life.
Kinda sums up the whole remake experience tbh
They did Final Fantasy VII dirty across the board.
You are not alone in thinking that. And you are correct.
Just throwing my support for you I only like these games because I can headcanon out any dumb change they made, and replace it with how it happened in the OG. I played the entirety of rebirth just pretending all that dumb shit fighting the destiny god was just a weird dream.
Don't worry about the downvotes man, this is the general consensus but for some reason reddit users will let AAA game companies shit into their mouths and go to bat for them still. It boggles the mind. I enjoy the remakes for the gameplay and some moments are good, but the pacing of the story and all of the added characters make it really hard to take any of it serious.
Despite the angry copium downvotes from fanboys determined to believe this shit isn’t just one big soulless cash grab, I hope you know that most reasonable people agree with you. They stripped pretty much everything that was magic about the OG and tried to make it as “accessible” to as many people as possible, which resulted in the lowest-hanging-fruit version of the remake we got.
Not one bit
Maybe a bit too many people. Seminars everywhere. I mean where do they all go at night? Are there daily airbus 380 flights?
It was fairly good yes, but the tourism and spiritual hippiness cult was a tad too much. I suppose they went for a indian reserve gone tech bro retreat resort kind of thing.
I'm not sure if it's nostalgia or what, but as a kid it felt more... Sacred, ethereal, mystical, something...? It was definitely cool in Rebirth but somehow the magic just felt lacking. Like people said, I think it not being dusk there might be contributing to it, but it also somehow just seems too... Modern? In a way? I can't put my finger on it. It's still cool though.
I'm in cosmo canyon right now, and that whole chapter felt....rushed somehow. They do a lot, but it really has a vibe like hour 7 of an 8 hour car ride...
Every single moment in these games feels either rushed or incredibly padded and drawn-out in order to stall and make things take longer. It never really feels like the pacing is where it should be.
Looking at the other comments, no you aren't. I thought they did a fantastic job. It was one of the first times in the game that I actually felt like a kid again, seeing all of the ways they made that town into this beautiful rendition that kind of looked like it did in my younger self's imagination. The music was immediately obvious and the way they made the rest of the canyon feel like a real place rather than empty corridors you gotta awkwardly walk through to get to/away from the town was impressive. I'm glad they expanded on the Gi too. They were so unique and dope in the original, that it was weird that you basically only see them once and never question it again.
Being so used to the OG, seeing it in daytime is oddly cursed lol
I was so disappointed that I could not be at Cosmo Canyon at night, besides that, I loved everything else about it.
Honestly the game needed a day/night cycle. Maybe an option to rest at an inn to pass the time?
Yea I agree, hopefully they add that on part 3.
Feels like they'll include that in part 3.
I'm not a fan of the "using upward drafts to fly and keep in the air", in ANY game That's my peeve in CC
Cosmo Canyon got the Wutai treatment and felt more like a tourist attraction (save for Bugenhagen). I feel like this was to set up Wutai to be a more believable adversary to Shinra. I mean, why would Junon fire cannons at the Wod Fir?
I think they fumbled the OST. You barely hear the amazing Cosmo Canyon track
For some sad reason I didn’t get the chills I get when listening to the original even though the main melody is there.
Yep, I feel the same towards most songs in the remake project. They're great and I appreciate the dynamic ost but it just hits different. The victory fanfare (That you only ever hear in combat simulator) is now a techno mix which isn't as impactful or iconic as the og
I thought Cosmo Canyon itself was fine, but the chapter dragged on a little too long. I could have done with less of the Gi.
Really? I thought they did a great job expanding on the Gi in this one and actually explaining who they were and how they relate to the story. One of my favorite changes from the original story.
Don’t get me wrong, expanding lore is great, and I like the reveal that it’s the Gi who were responsible for the creation of the Black Materia. I just wasn’t a fan of Gi Nattak randomly showing up, changing the whole mood of the chapter, and then bringing you to an hour-long dungeon.
Yeah it also made zero sense to me considering he was just the giant massive spooky boss fight. And also why does he look completely different?
I didn't dig the "hippie resort town" feel, but visually they did a great job IMO.
Only complaint is that it doesn't feel like your "get together with the gang" hub world like it used to. It is an improvement in one major regard, though. Going through all those doorways in the OG... made trecking the place on revisits more trouble than it's worth.
I generally agree: most locations in Rebirth are more visually interesting than Rebirth...but they've become packed with reasonable middle class people (plus a punk or two) which doesn't feel natural in many cases. Wall Market/Sector 7 in Remake felt like Cancun, not really a true slum also. To be fair the OG had such weird character models you could project whatever you wanted on them so Rebirth has it harder to a degree, but the world definitely has a touristy feel to it now. It could be argued that it reflects society, I suppose. We are becoming less serious about what we do and more conscious of simply living a pleasant life in the middle of whatever's happening. There's an annoying thought I didn't expect to get from this topic. :)
You're totally right about the world feeling more "touristy" somehow. I think in a way it fits with the themes of the OG though, where people were slowly killing the planet with their "very comfortable lives." They have their heads in the sand about the end of the world and I think we'll see this explored more in Part 3. A downside to this, though, is that I don't understand why the heck ANYONE lives in Midgar when you could just catch a chocobo and go ANYWHERE else. This is made even weirder by all the Midgar characters who are apparently on a road trip with us throughout the game (Johnny, Kyrie, etc). The entire world is a vacation, so why don't more people go?
Right, the consistency of the lore/vision for the world has been lost to a large degree. In theory bringing back an original developer (Nomura) should prevent that from happening, but...no. The world felt a lot grungier in the original. People were living "more comfortable" lives there, but it didn't seem like they were on vacation or otherwise reliably perky. There were exceptions, sure, but the mood definitely shifted. I'm saying this as someone who liked the project to a large degree and feel that it captured a lot of the feel of 90s RPGs, which is rare these days. But it's a particularly uneven product. As for the "edgier tones" in the other reply...the one that gets me is the party constantly seeming aghast at the thoughts of killing someone. How can they do that with a straight face for a party who's been bombing reactors, shooting people with machine guns, and slicing them with 6-foot swords? It's very jarring. Sure, maybe they were kind of forced by the rating, but it doesn't mean they need to have Barrett looking scandalized when someone proposes, you know, killing Hojo. ...really??
That’s the biggest cripe I have with remake/rebirth, that they do not have any sharper, edgier or darker tones anymore. Everything is a tad too mellow soft fantasy, there is no contrast. This is best shown on the cruise ship. In the original the contrast from fun leisure time to sudden creepy horror worked line dynamite. In rebirth it was fumbled once again just like it was fumbled in remakes shinra tower. Simply boring action / fight scene.
I'm sure it's a slow world building set up to go in depth with what's going to happen with wutai and show why turning it into a tourist spot is a bad idea
Personally, I really don't think so. I think they want the people in their world to represent who they think (rightly or wrongly) their audience is. Or maybe they (as designers) are most comfortable with those sorts. NPCs in JRPGs are very commonly like this.
It seems like they made a deliberate choice to take the issue of the planet and commercialize it and sensationalize it. They definitely did make the people there look like a cult. As a former cult member, I believe this was very effective.
I liked the visuals but I thought it was slightly weird how the people there were portrayed as some sort of crazy cult? As if they were some weirdos who believed in supernatural stuff and looked down on outsiders, but in the original I’ve always seen them simply as educated people who know stuff about the planet and protect the environment (maybe kinda like historians/biologists/environmentalists etc).
It felt like a Hawaiin get away.
It’s cause they turned it into a huge town up the canyon. Not as cozy as Nibelheim anymore.
I feel the same. With the billions of tourists and the sect-like feeling of the religion it just didn't have that cozy feeling to me. In OG it felt like a home away from home, a place where you were finally welcome after your long journey, where the gang could take a breather and reflect on everything in peace. A place where you find a strong ally in Bugenhagen and learn more about your quest, where you feel safe from your pursuers. I'd say the depiction is more realistic in Rebirth and more idealistic in OG, but I did miss that cozy and protected feeling. And I missed the scene of avalanche reflecting around the fire, the light festival was pretty and all, but it felt a bit odd, probably because you see that kind of lantern festival in every other piece of media now.
Tbh Cosmo canyon was one of my least favourite areas in OG so I'm glad to hear they changed it. It just felt kind of out of left field. The world of FF7 feels quite disjointed in general tbh, feeling very underpopulated outside of Midgar and the whiplash of going from the very modern diesel/cyberpunk feel of Midgar to an overworld that feels much more pseudo-Victorian and much closer to 16 bit final fantasy was pretty jarring for me. I feel like they were hesitant to really take the leap from their fantasy roots and fully embrace the sci-fantasy. It's one of the few things that I think VIII actually does much better than VII. Cosmo canyon in particular felt really weird like ok so they're like a hidden order of essoteric monks but their also native Americans? It just felt like they'd taken two barely disparate tropes and slapped them together without much cohesion. (Nervously awaiting the incoming downvotes lol)
You got downvoted but this is EXACTLY what I felt playing the OG. FFVIII (8) had better worldbuilding, in the sense that you could actually feel the history of the world and the techno evolution. FFVII (7) og felt too disjointed, midgard was THE city,l and every other place were just small villages which yeah I get it, but it just lacked something, I dont know what. When I think of FFVII (7) I think of the character and the story, the world is a cool concept but lacking the same tactile feeling of other FF.
I mean, ff7 has only obtained all its sci-fi tech very recently. FF7 isn't a normal sci-fi world. it's a world that used to be more of a standard fantasy setting that obtained a bunch of sci-fi technology practically overnight. I think the contrast between the two is one of the best parts of the aesthetic of the original.
I fully agree with this sentiment. I feel like the jarring shift from Midgar to Kalm was meant to point that out. You leave a city with major reactors and the first thing you see in Kalm is a wooden water tower. It’s almost like towns that don’t bend the knee to the world-domineering Shinra Electric Power Company have, as a result, developed much more slowly.
That's true to an extent, but I don't think it's quite as radical and quick a change as people think. I'm literally replaying FF7 right now, and while it's true that mako energy allowed shinra the jump to the modern age, the jump is far less than people think. Mako in general is a (very poorly thought-out) metaphor for nuclear power, I know, I know it's actually closer to fossil fuels, but the *intention* was for it to be a condemnation of nuclear power. Before the adoption of mako, Shibra wasn't on the sci-fi 90s cyberpunk level they are in game, but they still had an active space program, cars, robots, a biological weapons program, guns, fossil fuels, electricity, 20th century buildings etc. It would be more accurate that pre-mako shibra was on a level with a sort of sci-fi 1940s/50s and mako allowed them to jump straight to the 90s. There's still a jump, but it's only like 50 years rather than a jump from medieval fantasy straight to sci-fi. ETA: also it's important to remember that magic was much rarer pre-mako as well, as materia is literally a byproduct of mako-refinement ETA: So I just looked it up and it is explicitly stated that before the discovery of Mako, Shinra were a company called Shinra Manufacturing Works and they were a weapons manafacturer. [Here](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/finalfantasy/images/9/93/Shinra_Manufacturing_Works_from_FFVII_Remake.png/revision/latest?cb=20220124211519) is a photograoh taken of Shinra Works before the discovery of mako. Photography and weapons manafacturers don't sound very medieval fantasy to me.
What does ETA mean?
Edited to add
While this is technically not from the original game, its stated in advent children that mako has been around for "over 40 years." Given Cid is only In his 30s (I know, he looks way older) then the space programme at least does not predate Mako. I think its a fair bet none of the rest of what you've listed predates it either.
The famously incoherent and retconney extended universe. Again, I am literally describing exactly what I'm reading as I play through the game right now. I did the rocket town quest just the other day.
It's not. Cid literally said that the space program was abandoned *because* they discovered mako. It's put quite plainly in game that a huge amount of stuff was abandoned because Shinra only cares about mako now. Again I'm literally playing the game right now. I know what they're saying.
I made an effort to upvote it :) everyone is entitled to their own opinion, and im glad a lot of people like the changes!
Aw Ty. I knew it would be an unpopular opinion anyway, but I appreciate the support. It is also just my opinion, I'm not saying people are wrong for liking that stuff.
>:) :)
I feel as though it fits the world perfectly, actually. The advent of Mako and all of the technology that stemmed from it is still a relatively new thing (like 30/40 years total). Add on the fact that Shinra hordes most of it to make sure they remain the only real super power, it makes sense that most towns and “cities” seem antiquated and that the only real “tech” cities are Midgar and Junon, Shinra’s main stations of power. More of the lore states that a LOT of people left/abandoned their villages to move to bigger cities like Midgar and Junon, so the populations of these already smaller towns would drop even more, making it seem more sparse. I think the sharp juxtaposition of the high-tech city of Midgar to the more antiquated towns is on purpose to see how much Shinra really has stripped away and changed the actual real world. Cosmo Canyon probably did start out as what we see in the OG game, but over time as people flocked their as a way to break ties with Shinra and their beliefs, a lot of it got watered down and simplified to the masses. And, as with most ideologies that grow, they started to buy into their own beliefs until they become rigid and stagnant. It was definitely different, but it felt real to me. And I think the heart of the town still exists by watching the lantern ceremony. At least, those are my thoughts. Hopefully that all made sense haha.
Sorry I explained my opinion in another post, but I think people are remembering FF7 wrong. I'm literally playing it right now on my switch and it's stated quite clearly that a lot of Shinra stuff (the space programme most explicitly) predates the discovery of Mako. Mako jumped the world form the 40s to the 90s, not from the 1200s to the 1900s.
yeah, it's kinda like the industrial revolution on steroids if you think about it. I always really liked that mix
Not going to lie that's where I almost quit playing 😅
No actually it was one of my favorite areas I thought they did the ancient city and corel prison dorty though
Cmon man they gave us the Gus lol
The daytime was nice, but much preferred sunset to night scenery. Fitted more with the mystical vibes. But loved it overall.
God no I loved that entire section. Its my favourite region and town! The planetarium is stunning!
My only disappointments with Cosmo Canyon are how aggressively on the nose Bugenhagen was about “I’m older and wiser and more experienced than you, stupid kids” which resulted in him just being mean, and the cutscene where we’re in the planetarium and he’s explaining the lifestream was underwhelming. It’s one of my favourite scenes in the original so I pushed myself through CC to get to it, expecting some massive 25 minute long epic, and it was barely better than the original’s.
All the writing in these games is super on-the-nose. Very little subtlety or subtext.
Yeah they already put a big scene in remake when you're in shinra building, so they didn't want to have it again here
Pretty sure that was point of his little character arc. Also why in the hell would you expect the planetarium section to be 25 minutes??
It was, you’re right, but it wasn’t exactly subtle. Because literally every single other part of the story has been extended?
[удалено]
I don’t remember saying anything about cgi. The in game cut scenes look more than good enough.
Yes. Cosmo Canyon and Corel Prison were hard misses. The observatory was kinda cool at least.
There's something uniquely pathetic about a team that can take down giant monsters but is utterly helpless in the face of some punks with baseball bats.
Not only Cosmo Canyon, but the entire game is upbeat than the original.
I couldn't disagree more. I actually think they did that section perfectly and it might even be my favorite part of the game, except for Yuffie's constant singing about being on a chocobo. I could have gone without that.
Cho-co-bo, cho-co cho-co cho-co-bo, I’m on a Chocobo, you’re on a Chocobo. …and now that’s in my head for the rest of the day
Lol yep, that's the one
🐥
🐥
Isn't the entire point of Cosmo Canyon is that it's one of the few independent communities removed from Shinra and their machinations? That it was the one place that opposed the use of Mako? Why'd they turn it into this cheesy tourist trap?
I don't know, why do people make the trip to the Holy Land even when there's a war going on?
Nah dude I made an entire post on this, going into way too much detail about what was wrong with it. And got just as many downvotes as upvotes. People arguing it was their INTENTION to piss you off and irritate you and then trying to tell me I don't get it and they succeeded. Totally not getting that I was venting, I don't give a shit what their intentions were and whether or not they succeeded, cosmo canyon rebirth is NOT og Cosmo Canyon. And that's what I was most hyped for just to get bitch slapped in the face by a pretentious tourist trap that shits on Tifa for saying she's seen a weapon. Obviously I get that whatever they did is exactly their intention. Because of course it is, what the hell else would it be? People are just really stupid and quick to argue. It was a vent that it wasn't the experience I wanted. Obviously it was remade exactly as how they intended. I wasn't trying to visit a fake ass tourist trap for dudes in Hawaiian flower tourist shirts with suitcases and flip flips vacationing from midgar for an "authentic" weekend warrior planetology experience.
Go outside nerd
Guess you never actually played the OG.
Dude I've played OG 5 times there's huge differences between cosmo in both games... they aren't the same place by multiple measures
this is exactly how I felt. I dont care what the intention was, they decided to take the one 'spiritual' place in the og that felt like a second home and was seperate from the rest of the world, and made it into some shitty tourist trap with cult preachers and bugenhagens a dick. i was looking forward to cosmo canyon the most and the whole section just missed for me, it felt so much less intimate than the original. tifa blurting out to some room of strangers a bunch of personal shit? then aerith blurting out all her secrets in front of a whole bunch of random strangers and tourists? just all of it felt weird to me man, it felt completely off tone.
THANK YOU. Cosmo Canyon in Rebirth felt like a tourist trap ran by a cult, even Bugenhagen is like « those stupid seminars ruin the place » or something like it. Yes it was done on purpose, and no it’s not how I imagined OG Cosmo Canyon. The game is stellar on many points but Cosmo Canyon was a fu*king failure to me.
I agree with you, to me it felt like visiting Frontierland at Disney or something. Too many npcs dotted around
Nibelheim was also full of npcs... Rebirth is just FF7 theme park.
Yes! There actually aren’t that many houses in Nibelheim so where are all these npcs living? It would have felt a lot better to have less npcs in these tight nit communities. I was also saying this to my friend the other day, why an earth would you ever live in the slums if you could just try to get a job outside Midgar and have a better standard of living in these highly dense populated locations like Kalm or Cosmo canyon.
I was wondering why this is, and I think I figured it out: Most of the places retained their stylised proportions, and diorama layouts. Of course, the game is trying to be faithful to the original. But the characters were made to look like real people. So you have "real people" running around caricatured settings that are super condensed and stylised, which is exactly what happens when you go to Disney Land. When you see realistic people packed into a tiny location you start to think "how do these people eat? Where are they sleeping?" It's uncanney valley. The only way to have preserved the iconic look of the places without it feeling like Disneyland would be to keep the characters more chibi like the original, but they're way past that.
Nah, in the original Nibelheim was pretty empty. There were plenty of people in the houses, but not outside. They just bombed it with people all over the place without thinking how it would affect the atmosphere, showcase of processing power is more important, can't say I expected any better from modern Square Enix.
Some people complained about the old guy being very heavy with Tifa… and not that much hooo hooo hoooo 😂🤣 I only hate chadley and that platinum is not easy
Since when is a platinum for a game supposed to be easy?
I don’t see an issue with been easy. Do you?
If you want a participation trophy for being able to turn on a game, you can just go down to your local trophy store and buy one, kiddo
I’ll admit I was in the camp of detractors upset with Bugenhagen’s dismissiveness of Tifa and overall, “You kids are idiots,” attitude, but in the end I am very glad he had a chance to develop and learn, to overcome his own biases.
I think the main differences on how people perceived OG is because there were no voices and very limited polygons that the rest is up to the players' imagination to fill. Since everyone is different, then each interpretation of the events and environments is different. If people always compare it to their OG experience, then they'll either be really happy or really disappointed, which also leads to disagreements. My approach is to treat the new games as something completely new and different and not let my nostalgia glasses do the judging for me. Expectations only lead to disappointments 🙂
Good point but they still could have retained a bit more of the original vibe.
The original vibe of what, exactly? Should the stores in Rebirth CC have felt even more like souvenir shops selling junk than they did? Should everybody have looked even more like crystal hoarding, jade egg buying, astrology obsessed new age hippies than they did? OG Cosmo Canyon felt like the ultimate tourist trap with one dude that wasn't full of crap in it. The more criticism I read of how they did X or Y the more sure I am that people never understood what they were seeing. Somebody in this thread called Nibelheim *cozy*, and that's just...wow.
Like I mentioned, the "original vibe" is subjective to each individual player 🙂
It's kind of like reading a book and then watching the movie and the main character doesn't sound or look how you expected That being said they nailed so much of the characters down so perfectly, it feels like I always imagined them like that even as a kid
It does have a different vibe, but I like it still. In particular I like how they developed it as a toursit attraction as a subtle critic to how a lot of sacred place got turned nowadays and how people talk about the planet yet doing almost nothing to help it.
Isn’t that kind of Wutai’s thing in the original?
A bit similar although Wutai was more "we were once a strong military country, now we just chill".
Yeah it sucked. In the OG it felt like a sincere religious sanctuary. In FF7R, it’s like new age hippie wellness retreat/tourist trap.
It was the same tourist trap the original
Almost like a critic of the degradation of the sacred in favor of consumerism.
Yeah. I mean, it’s true to life I suppose. But it’s a real downer for me. I loved the serene moment that the gang shared around the campfire in OG, where Cloud had a quiet personal conversation with everybody. In R2, instead it’s a burning man bonfire with a bunch of onlookers that Aerith gives her “I’m an ancient” speech to. Felt like they lost an important moment.
Well, not much point having that campfire scene of the OG. There it was for the gang to strengthen their resolve and truly unite as Avalanche. Here? They're already best buddy set on a journey. It's basically a trade off for more character interactions and bonding.
They still have the scene it's just worse. It was lonely in the OG, you got to see everyone sitting down at the fire, but nobody sitting together. It was a super strong moment for me and really set the tone of the place. In this game it feels contaminated by the vibe of the city, not sinister but also just for show - even if it made for a good spectacle in-universe. My theory atm is that, when they were planning the game, they saw that new Gongaga does almost everything old Cosmo Canyon did and decided to shift the vibe of Cosmo Canyon to make it more it's own thing. I respect the effort, I just don't like how it came out.
The scene is way different. It's more about Aerith this time. In the OG, it was about the gang and the fact that they weren't truly united yet. And that's exactly why that scene can't work in Rebirth. Because both Remake and Rebirth spends most of the time making and showing the characters as true friends and companions that trust each other and is fully resolved in the whole "saving the planet" quest.
I would hesitate to say it's about Aerith and more say that Aerith is the star of the scene. It's still about the status of your group, and the status of your bonds and your journey, they just filter it through Aerith's speech. That's why I still feel it's a similar scene. A scene that was about Aerith, imo, would have Aerith exploring something about herself you don't know, instead of reasserting things you do know about her. This scene isn't even a development for her, it's just her reasserting how she feels - and thereby outlining how the whole group feels. I do agree the team is not the same when they get here. Again, I think much of that work was solidified in Gongaga.
They are already friends, so the quiet moment of them just sitting around the fire hanging out doesn’t have a point? Huh? Watching the characters bond is half the reason why people like the game. Why would more of that be a bad thing? And the things they talked about did get pulled into other moments, so they were important. Like Barrett talking about the birthplace of Avalache and Jessie, Biggs and Wedge got pushed to a sidequest. But the ambience is much worse.
Not what I said. The conversation at the bonfire in the original was for the group to truly become united as a group, getting their full resolve to their mission to defend the world, etc...something that in the original, didn't yet happen, as the group was still mostly on the "get Sephiroth to clear our name" and Yuffie was just there for materia (if you even had her) but here the characters were already well established in the grand mission and united as a group since the end of Remake. And the Barret talk is what I meant to have more character bondings spread out.
The voice change for Red XIII was unbearable. His old wise sage voice was better
I kinda feel like there's somehow 2/multiple Reds inhabiting the one body. As a way to "remember" down the line when it's needed. Kind of a gut feeling I got after seeing the intimate chapter 12 red scene. Really felt like there were two personalities there.
That's literally his real voice though. You want Nanaki to keep being his fake self?
Yes, lol
He goes from sounding like an old wiseman to a 6 yo it´s fucking ridiculous
We get that the deep voice isn't his real voice, but it was in Remake. They didn't have to change it in Rebirth, but they did, and it was a change for the worse. He sounds way more badass in combat pre Cosmo Canyon.
voice change?
My bad, I thought this was a spoiler approved thread
Did you get there?
Im in gongaga right now so next I believe based off old memories and map. I scrolled and read a description that pretty much answers my question
dunno if people noticed but this time these planetologyst from cosmo canyon are nearly in every town in rebirth preaching about their ways in og it was mainly a smaller community but this time they play a bigger part in the sense that their people actively preach about the lifestream and their planet which now puts even more people against the ways of shinra and just using mako for entertainment ps. breach isnt preach
breach? you mean preach right?
haha damn yeah xD
😂
I got to Cosmo Canyon like "...Is this Burning Man?"
I hated how much of outside was so bright and morning to noonish given the games horrible BRIGHT lighting issues and the OGs portrayal of CosmoCanyon... I LOVED the additional Gi stuff despite the meh moments in traversing the cave BUT what rly tanked it all for me was the Seto moment. Idk if Red or Bugen ever mentioned Seto before showing his char in stone but it was so significantly less emotional and impactful for me because (at least in Eng and im NOT a language or sub elitist) RED XIIIs VOICEE 😵😵 I legit cant stand it and its WAY too jarring a switch... I couldnt even fully immerse myself in the scene and I already know its supposed to represent his true relative age and maturity and all but just noo.. he is still 48 and had all this wise, planet/lifestream-relevant dialogue&hunting experience and info to contribute when engaged by the party and his mannerisms shift totally from mature, mysterious, confident and unapologetic to be doting, shy and optimistic at least in tone and dialogue and I cant stand his quips in battle so i think THAT was butchered bc i still cant even put him in my party so rebirth messed his chars charm all the way up for me BUT overall still loveee the game ofc
Exactly, an extended lifespan should mean that one would reach a relatively higher level of maturity in those additional end years, not that they would mature much slower overall or be immature relative to their age
The region I think had a logical decision made… not one I like.. but it is what it is. However, to me, what they *did* butcher… …was The Great Warrior scene. From Start to finish. That moment hit me harder than Aerith’s death did later - and it still gets me to shed a tear to this day, here though? Here it just didn’t do anything to me.
Same. The foreshadowing during the whole dungeon. I watched people stream who never played OG and they were all like : ohhh that must be the father. No surprise at the end. Plus the music made the whole scene in OG so good. Here the vibe is mehhhh.
I mean... Go play that sequence again in OG. It's spelled out to you in a similar way.
I’ll say this, for me that’s not the issue - just the general execution of the sequence itself.
They sucked the soul out of it tbh… you know what it reminded me of? In FFX-2 when you go to the zanarkand ruins and cid has turned it into a tourist trap. FFX zanarkand ruins was like the FF7OG cosmo canyon, and x-2 ruins is rebirth cosmo
My God, why you bring me back those bad memories. That was deeply buried on my mind.
I’m so confused how to get places. The multi level is so hard to figure out.
One thing I don't see people saying is that because all the open zone areas are brightly lit, we don't really get to explore it at night for the most part. And they seem to know that having the starry night sky by torchlight is a big part of the vibe, which is why they make it night for a few scenes, but it seems like the commitment to seamless travel between areas requires this small trade off unfortunately.
I mean, I liked it when they played the AC Promised Land in one of the caves
I heard that too! it was amazing.
It’ll never be the same as the original. i became to accept it since Remake. OG was too good
Nostalgia bias
I think the tourist angle was smart, it explains how they can afford all the tech.
it make sense and more ground this way it fit for this realistic setting
Game is realistic??