5. Final Fantasy VII Remake
(Available on PlayStation 4)
Before its release, the level of hype surrounding Square Enix and director Tetsuya Nomrua’s, who is the legendary director behind the Kingdom Hearts series, remake of Final Fantasy VII was so high that it was unclear that it could live up to expectations and deliver an experience that could match the iconic 1997 original. However, they created a remake that vastly exceeded expectations and delivered something truly refreshing.
If Square Enix and Nomura just put the game’s iconic characters and locations in a dazzling new engine and brought players into the same old fantasy scenario of rebellion, battling inner demons, diverting destiny, it would’ve just been your standard remake. However, they go the whole nine yards in bringing the iconic game into the modern era of JRPG’s and create new moments that for fans to love about this game. With his experience with Kingdom Hearts, Nomura takes Final Fantasy out of the turn-based combat era and instead utilizes real-time combat and battle menus to create some fresh, fast-paced, and strategic gameplay that never gets old. Not only can players take on epic boss battles and thrilling fight sequences with new strategies and options they can implement with the touch of a button, but for the first time, they can fully play as multiple characters aside from iconic protagonist Cloud Strife (voiced by Cody Christian).
It’s even more amazing how this remake comes with its own experiences that build on small instances of what the first game brought to create memorable moments of its own. Moments like the incredibly fun motorbike sequences, the surprising and visually stunning dance sequence that Cloud has to do, everything with Roche (voiced by Austin Lee Matthews) and Johnny (voiced by Yuri Lowenthal, and the ways that fate and destiny are played with within the story showcase how this was never designed to be just a fan-pleasing remake and be something so much more. They even offer the chance for more to be done with fan-favorite protagonist Zack Fair (voiced by Caleb Pierce) from Crisis Core and it’s one of the greatest and most emotionally compelling moments in gaming of the year.
Capcom raised the bar for remakes with Resident Evil 2 last year, but Square just soared to the heavens with Final Fantasy VII as its truly THE gold standard for remakes now. It not only delivers a present-day masterpiece of gaming, honestly like all the games on this list do, with how innovative and refreshing the experience is, but it also presents a strong future for the eventual Part 2 we’ll get one day to tread new ground and offer a, hopefully, rich story and experience of its own.
