Board 8 > Rumorzone: FF7 Rebirth selling half as well as Remake

(+) Yeah! (+)

Rebirth is missing a very important qol from Remake regarding sidequests. In Remake when you complete objectives, you get a prompt to immediately warp to the quest giver and complete. I have no idea why this is gone in Rebirth.

Remake also I feel did a good job of setting up the lulls in the main story so that doing sidequests makes sense at that point in time. Like this is the chapter where the story is Tifa has to do errands or you're hanging out with Aerith for a day. In Rebirth, Barret is like "let's go south, far away from Corel"... But a green marker just popped in North Corel... And it heavily involves Barret. So it feels weird to interrupt the msq to go do that side quest.

Basically there is almost never a point in the story where it makes sense that the gang is taking the time to help people out.

That's the benefit of telling a small story in a controlled location in a big game. Rebirth is telling a big story in an open location in a big game. You don't have as much down time, and it's not as easy to justify going all over the place to do something. I don't really need a story justification for side content, but it would've been nice to keep the option to go straight to the quest giver.

Fast-travel usually covers that pretty well. The main QOL issue for returning after sidequests is having to walk. And Remake gave you a single chance right as soon as it was time, sometimes conflicting with other things you'd like to do in the proximity.

BK_Sheikah00 posted...

Remake also I feel did a good job of setting up the lulls in the main story so that doing sidequests makes sense at that point in time. Like this is the chapter where the story is Tifa has to do errands or you're hanging out with Aerith for a day. In Rebirth, Barret is like "let's go south, far away from Corel"... But a green marker just popped in North Corel... And it heavily involves Barret. So it feels weird to interrupt the msq to go do that side quest.

Basically there is almost never a point in the story where it makes sense that the gang is taking the time to help people out.

This has never mattered to me in any game. I don't care if the planet's going to be destroyed in 5 minutes. Let me spend 10 hours racing chocobos.

Leonhart4 posted...

Rebirth is telling a big story in an open location in a big game.

No it's not. It's a very tiny story (chase Sephiroth, then way later, get black materia) in a huge open game. Remake had a much more detailed story which is why it was able to spend so much time on its story. There's no juice to squeeze from Rebirth's story so all the time had to be minigames instead.

Also R3 is gonna all be AI generated quests with AI Sephiroth voice acting and shit so all this discussion is moot anyway

Reunion is going to Sephiroth extolling Square Enix's blockchain efforts

buy $LFSTRM

foolm0r0n posted...

Also R3 is gonna all be AI generated quests with AI Sephiroth voice acting and shit so all this discussion is moot anyway

That will probably be better VA work than Sephiroth has right now NGL.

foolm0r0n posted...

It's a very tiny story (chase Sephiroth, then way later, get black materia) in a huge open game. Remake had a much more detailed story which is why it was able to spend so much time on its story.

I mean big story in terms of scale. The scope, maybe not so much. You cover a lot of ground, even if the overarching story doesn't necessarily progress that much.

Remake took 5 hours of content and stretched them into 40, all while basically staying in the same place the entire time. Remake had a lot of time to fill, and it did a good job of it.

All other issues aside, I think the way Remake and Rebirth have handled Sephiroth is extremely disappointing. I haven't seen a single new player have any investment in him as a villain whatsoever.

When I came out of Rebirth, I honestly felt Sephiroth night be the worst villain in FF at this point.

I think I'll stick by that, too.

KamikazePotato posted...

All other issues aside, I think the way Remake and Rebirth have handled Sephiroth is extremely disappointing. I haven't seen a single new player have any investment in him as a villain whatsoever.

They're using him way too much. FFVII took a "less is more" approach with Sephiroth. He's not actually in the original game that much, but they made almost every scene with him count. There's very little fluff any time he appears. As such, he's super memorable, and it feels like he's in the game a ton because you remember every time he shows up.

Heck, even some of the times you don't actually see him leave a big impression, like him killing the Midgar Zolom.

KamikazePotato posted...

All other issues aside, I think the way Remake and Rebirth have handled Sephiroth is extremely disappointing. I haven't seen a single new player have any investment in him as a villain whatsoever.

This does not sound promising for his results in the next Character Battle.

I'm torn because Sephiroth's boss music at the end of Remake is the best version of One-Winged Angel ever made, but that fight should never have existed in the first place.

TeamRocketElite posted...

This does not sound promising for his results in the next Character Battle.

he definitely ain't winning a rematch with Tifa, I'll tell you that

LeonhartFour posted...

he definitely ain't winning a rematch with Tifa, I'll tell you that

100%

Ill have to see how the end of Rebirth treats him, because so far between Remake and where I am in Rebirth Sephiroth has been used well

Tifa's debated 2018 run would be a complete stomp these days. MMX, Luigi, and Sephiroth would all get crushed by the might of the Italian Senate.

KamikazePotato posted...

All other issues aside, I think the way Remake and Rebirth have handled Sephiroth is extremely disappointing. I haven't seen a single new player have any investment in him as a villain whatsoever.

Mostly makes me appreciate how much 7 was a prototype for X's story

KamikazePotato posted...

Tifa's debated 2018 run would be a complete stomp these days. MMX, Luigi, and Sephiroth would all get crushed by the might of the Italian Senate.

Luigi's Mansion 3 sold better than Remake and Rebirth combined!

KamikazePotato posted...

Tifa's debated 2018 run would be a complete stomp these days. MMX, Luigi, and Sephiroth would all get crushed by the might of the Italian Senate.

I think Luigi would still have a chance, although he probably loses. Between Luigi's Mansion 3, Mario Wonder, and the Mario movie, he's probably held up pretty well over the last 6 years.

LeonhartFour posted...

Remake took 5 hours of content and stretched them into 40

Rebirth took 15 hours and stretched it into 120. Same ratio.

The difference is that the original obviously rushed through Midgar and it was straight up bad. Remake gave it the proper room to breathe and be enjoyable, plus an extra 30% ish of filler.

But it seems like Rebirth didn't actually have to fix anything. The original midgame was fine with good writing and had enough core and side content. So what is the 800% stretching for really?

foolm0r0n posted...

The difference is that the original obviously rushed through Midgar and it was straight up bad.

yikes

Honestly, it makes sense that FF sales aren't that great anymore since the only (supposed) great game that's been released since FFX is XIV, and that's an MMO with high barriers to entry. I guess not every series can be like Sonic and Pokemon and sell with mediocrity off of name recognition alone.

It has ober 250 hours of 100% free main story content, the barrier could not be lower!

UshiromiyaEva posted...

It has ober 250 hours of 100% free main story content, the barrier could not be lower!

the barrier could be much lower than 250 hours, that'd be nice

Nothing is forcing anyone to have to play through that 250 hours if they don't feel like it's worth it, it's not like you're handcuffed to game.

I'm not saying it's nature as an MMO isn't going to understandably stop people, but if we're talking amount of game to accessibility of said game ratio, there may not be any game on the market with less of a barrier than XIV.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

Nothing is forcing anyone to have to play through that 250 hours if they don't feel like it's worth it

correct

The barrier there is more how everyone says "Well, it finally gets good after you slog through the first hundred hours."

Mewtwo59 posted...

The barrier there is more how everyone says "Well, it finally gets good after you slog through the first hundred hours."

This is a common misunderstanding.

The game is already good for the first 100 hours. It just gets great after that.

The unfortunate part is that it's not until you get to the point where you have to actually buy the game and start paying monthly that it becomes the best Final Fantasy game.

Mewtwo59 posted...

Honestly, it makes sense that FF sales aren't that great anymore since the only (supposed) great game that's been released since FFX is XIV, and that's an MMO with high barriers to entry. I guess not every series can be like Sonic and Pokemon and sell with mediocrity off of name recognition alone.

Rebirth is the best reviewed game released so far this year!

Yeah, you're right, I overlooked both FF7 remakes. But I think FF7 Remake and Rebirth being remakes means they don't help the perception of "Final Fantasy is back" like a mainline title being great would. They're more like a blip like Sonic Mania was for Sonic.

XVI reviewed as well as Remake!

The games are good again and have been for a while. Its just too late.

I will say theres a lot of discussion about the content of the games in threads about this, but it truly does not matter to their sales. You could predict this all from the moment Remake launched below XV. How good tye games are is unimportant. Which is a shame because Rebirth is one of the best RPGs ever made.

Also the main story of Rebirth is like 45 hours, I did nearly everything significant at just under 100. Its much less stretched out than Remake.

LeonhartFour posted...

the barrier could be much lower than 250 hours, that'd be nice

Those hours are pure content, though. It's not 'spend 250 hours fetching bear asses', it's 'spend 250 hours playing through three Final Fantasies in a row, which range from very good to comparable to any of classic era FFs'. People sell the game like ass, frankly, and make it sound like the stuff before the paywall is a chore. It's not. It's where 'the final fantasy energy' went while XIII and XV were busy shitting the bed.

---

Unrelatedly, the remarks of 'Sephiroth wasn't that present in ff7' are flabbergasting to me. The dude was fucking everywhere. He's with you from literally the bombing mission to the city of the ancients very obviously! Sometimes he's onscreen, other times he's giving running commentary on everything you're seeing. It's subtle, but he rarely is ever far away. The remakes don't change this beyond making it a bit more explicit, tbqh.

Yeah I think whats actually happening is people realising that Sephiroth was always one of FFVIIs weaker parts!

And yeah even just ARR is a good time. Its not like, an all time classic or anything but its a good Final Fantasy game. Especially since they have condensed it recently.

The point is that I don't want to spend 250 hours on one game, no matter how good it is. With the amount of time I have to play games these days, beating all of FFXIV would take me literal years if I only played that and nothing else. Not interested.

LightningStrikes posted...

Yeah I think whats actually happening is people realising that Sephiroth was always one of FFVIIs weaker parts!

Another "yikes" take, huh. It's fine if you don't like Sephiroth, but he's a huge reason FFVII became as popular as it is. I'm no fanboy of the guy, but he's used very effectively in the original game and it's something I've only grown to appreciate over time.

And I'll reiterate that Sephiroth isn't around as often as you think, but the way the game uses him makes it feel like he is. The voice in Cloud's head isn't always him either. Sometimes it's actually the young Cloud from the Lifestream dive.

Like Sephiroth being seen at all in Remake is more than you see him the entirety of Midgar in the original. In the Shinra Building, he's there but you never see him. The first time you actually see him is the Kalm flashback, and then you don't see him in the present day until the cargo ship.

I dont see whats yikes about an opinion on a villain in a video game! Or what other yikes takes there might be!

Yeah theres no denying the importance and influence of Sephiroth at the time, Ive heard from casuals who only know FFVII as the one with Sephiroth in it. Yet he was very much a product of what was cool in the 90s and was built around a particular moment in time. And now there are a lot of people looking at him and not appreciating him the same way. This is absolutely possible to synthesise with his popularity at the time. I played FFVII in 2006 and Sephiroth came off as very of his time back then, let alone now.

As for XIV its more akin to playing a series of games with their own beginning, middles, and ends. If you played ARR, you would hit credits in about 40 hours. Thats a Final Fantasy game! You would just then do it eight more times to catch up lol. But youre getting a full game each time.

I do agree with you in general though, it is a lot to get current, and something XIV will have to deal with if it wants to stay relevant. This is actually something that I think WoW has had huge success with lately, actually getting people into the new content more easily (you can apparently get to new content from scratch in 10 hours), and as a result theyve seen their best subscriber numbers in nearly a decade and people are actually happy about WoW again. Not a sentence I ever thought Id write!

MacArrowny posted...

Rebirth is the best reviewed game released so far this year!

Nearly as well reviewed as FF12! We will certainly talk about Rebirth in the same breath as 12 in the future

LeonhartFour posted...

yikes

I know, it was a huge barrier. But Remake did fix it fortunately.

foolm0r0n posted...

Nearly as well reviewed as FF12! We will certainly talk about Rebirth in the same breath as 12 in the future

Theyre tied but Rebirth has more than twice as many reviews so its fair to say did a little better. And they are both also tied with original FFVII lol. I mean, XII did get a pretty rapturous response for like a month after it came out then people turned on it. Now people love it again?

Maybe people just dont know what they like!

Sephiroth is partially a product of his time, sure, but I wouldn't say "people realized he was never that good" is the explanation for why people aren't getting invested in him now. I think that's a bit too reductive.

And there are a lot of very good video games out there that I will never play. FFXIV might be one of them. I'm okay with that.

LightningStrikes posted...

Maybe people just dont know what they like!

No way, especially not with final fantasy

These sales figures are hardly surprising. FF's a series for Millennials which is hardly a growth market and even within this group, FF's been more or less dead in Japan.

Maybe they should have catered to newbies and just played the story straight hmm?

Like instead of worrying that all of gamefaqs knows the twist

I mean the fact nobody ever talks about is that in Japan in particular, FF has been on a linear trend down since X and really since VII, the only exception being X outselling IX. Worldwide its been more uneven though the general direction of travel is obvious. When it has gone up outside of Japan (ie XV) its down to expanding onto new platforms. Now, even limiting it to Playstation Remake was still down on XV so its not everything. But it helps. When VII came out Playstation was two thirds of the market. Now its what, a fifth or a sixth? And thats not even counting mobile.

pjbasis posted...

Maybe they should have catered to newbies and just played the story straight hmm?

Like instead of worrying that all of gamefaqs knows the twist

I mean lets be real here, if they had played it totally the same over three games interest absolutely would have been lost. With the way it currently is they had coverage in places like the New York Times and the BBC about the game wondering if the big moment would change. You cant ask for better exposure than that.

I dont think the content of the games really matters at all to this, the trend has been far too linear and predictable. It really is just a matter of Final Fantasy only appealing to a shrinking demographic on a shrinking portion of the gaming audience.

I do wonder what % of players knew the twist going in. The current ending barely makes sense for those who know what's happening, with the way they cut around so frequently. If you didn't know the original story, it would make 0 sense.

They should've tried for a story that worked for noobs and extended a carrot for veterans. But they just shut out the noobs completely.

And yeah the story doesn't actually matter at all. Most players probably won't get past Junon here anyway.

I mean before it was put on Playstation Plus Remake was the second most finished Playstation exclusive behind The Last of Us Part 2 at just 54% of players finishing it. A lot of people just dont finish games!

squexa posted...

These sales figures are hardly surprising. FF's a series for Millennials

Why is FF more for millennials than any other series its age?

MacArrowny posted...

Why is FF more for millennials than any other series its age?

IMO:

-Not expanding onto other platforms besides Playstation enough, especially PC and Nintendo. Playstation is probably the platform with the oldest core audience.

-Having a decade of bad games when Gen Z were young and at the age to get into Final Fantasy.

-Doing generally a poor job of rereleasing games through the 2010s.