Kinda Funny Gamescast: Video Game Podcast - We Played Final Fantasy VII Rebirth! - Kinda Funny Gamescast

Episode Date: February 7, 2024

We were joined by Adam Cole from twitch.tv/thechugs to talk about our short time with Final Fantasy VII Rebirth! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What's up and welcome back to the kind of funny games cast. Of course I am Tim Gettys and I'm joined by the nitro rifle, Andy Cortez. Great afternoon, Tim. Great afternoon to you. And rounding out our crew today, we have Adam Cole, aka Chugs on Twitch. Dot TV. You should follow him at The Chugs. Adam, how are you doing?

I'm doing great. How are you guys doing? Phenomenal, very excited. The three of us just hung out and live reacted to the PlayStation stay to play, showing off Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. It looked fantastic. We're going to talk all about what we thought about that. And in addition to that, we all actually got to

preview the game. We got our hands on to varying degrees of the game, got to play a whole bunch of it, and we want to give you our thoughts. Although, remember, the demo's out now. So you guys are going to be able to go out and play a whole bunch of it yourself if you would like to do that. But just a little reminder for everyone, this is the kind of funny games cast. We each and every week, we get together to talk about video games and

all the things that we love about them. You can join us on YouTube.com slash kind of funny games to watch. You can join us on podcast services to listen. But if you wanted to go above and beyond, you can get the kind of funny membership on Patreon or YouTube to get the shows ad free and watch us live as we record them. And you get a daily exclusive show. It's a great deal.

I love it. Shout out to some of our Patreon producers, Carl Jacobs, Streaking Ain' Easy and Delaney Twining. Thank you all for allowing this to happen. Today we're brought to you by The Kind of Funny Store. We got a whole bunch of new merch up right now. you can go check out at kindofuny.com slash store, but you'll hear more about that later.

I want to get right into it. There's just too much Final Fantasy 7 excitement. Adam, I want to start with you. Because I met you a few weeks ago at, we were in L.A., got to go to this preview event, and I see you at the hotel, and I see your shirt, and I see cloud on it. And I was like, I'm going to go up

and introduce myself to this guy. He looks familiar. I'm not sure where I know him from exactly, but he seems like my type of guy. I walk up to you and immediately egg on my face. I'm like, this is fucking Adam. God damn.

No, I'm so glad you did. I'm so glad we finally got to meet face to face, man. Especially at such a cool event like that. God, I was hyped. It was awesome. It was awesome. And look, now I'm on the show. And now you're amazing.

It was great, man. Yeah, that's the thing. It was awesome. Got to talk to you and be like, oh shit, like you are all about Final Fantasy. This is so rad. And then Andy, you got to play a little bit of it as well.

So, yeah, we played the game. But Adam, so what is your history with Final Fantasy 7 as a series, the original, the remake, all the things in between? So I kind of have a very short but funny backstory is my first experience with Final Fantasy 7, the original on PlayStation 1, was actually a mistake. Is me and my younger brother, we really wanted Resident Evil 2 that year for Christmas. We were so excited. And my mom discovered that that had M for mature on it, and we were not allowed to get Resident Evil 2. So instead, we got Final Fantasy 7. And me and my brother both cried.

We were so upset. We wanted Resident Evil 2 so bad. Then we played Final Fantasy 7, and to this day, it's one of the most influential. Yeah, right, right, exactly. Only happy tears. Well, happy and sad tears, I guess. But yeah, Final Fantasy 7 has impacted me. One of the most influential pieces of entertainment media, period.

Like, again, just the ability to make me care so much about these characters, care so much about video game music, just wanting to constantly escape into this world. Final Fantasy 7 did that better than any other game I'd experienced at that point. I love that. I love it so much. I imagine did you play through a remake. I did. I did multiple times, multiple times. And I think what I love so much about remake, aside from the fact that it's done such an amazing job of replicating that special spark that the original Final Fantasy 7 had is it's created the exact same sense of wonder I had when I was a kid playing Final Fantasy 7 again with the questions of where is the story going to go what exactly is

going to happen but I'm just as thrilled if not more thrilled than I was when I was a kid so I loved Final Fantasy 7 remake loved it hell yeah so Andy let's before we get into our preview thoughts of our hands-on experience we just saw that state of play any takeaways um I I just am confused by so much of what is about to happen in the game because there's so much of that that I don't know. A lot of these references that you and Adam are making and going like, oh my God, this area, oh my God, this, I just have no experience of that.

I never played the original Final Fantasy 7. Was never a huge fan of turn-based games and I saw my cousin had it at one point. I was like, there's 20 discs there, what's going on here? I don't have a PlayStation with a 20 disc changer, you know? But I knew that when remake came out, I wanted to give it a shot and I fell in love with the remake. Towards the end of it, no idea what the hell is going on.

No idea why everybody's angry. in some cases, or why some people are pumped about what the future changes may be. I'm just kind of, I'm blown away by the amount of variety. I did not expect this to kind of have that. It feels like whenever I see random screenshots from people playing like a dragon, and there's a million different mini games, and here we're seeing so many different things that the developers are bringing to the table, that I just, I'm kind of stunned that there's that much variety of,

Because remake had a couple of, you know, different mini games here and there, but nothing to the degree of this. I would say even in addition to the mini games, just even the locales that we're being, you know, like Final Fantasy 7 remake, very focused on that midgar part, which has a lot of very similar looking exteriors and interiors, right? You're either in the dark slums or you're kind of in the winding hallways with a lot of green glow of being in Shinra and all that. So yeah, here it's a lot more. So Adam, seeing this trailer, was there any areas that really stood out to you that you're like, oh, my God, multiple. But one that really, really stuck out was a gold saucer. I've been so curious to see how that was going to look. And it looked just as majestic and magical as I hoped it would.

I can't wait to explore more of gold saucer. Cosmo Canyon is another favorite area of mine. Really, there are so many different areas. I'm curious to see what they do. Like, again, how they extended so much. on what the original Midgar was in remake, to think they're gonna do that with all these new areas in rebirth, it has me so stoked, so excited.

Yeah, and so it's really cool now kind of blend in what we saw here with a little bit of what we actually got to play. So for people to play the original, they'll know the Midgar section is kind of the, the just opening of the game, and then once you get to the end of it, it turns into much more of an open world style adventure, where there's a big world map with a ton of different towns and just a lot more variation in where you're,

you're going and we see the moment in the in some of the state of play we just saw them like going through a corridor and then you they open up to the big beautiful green field and that's kind of this big introduction to the open world moment and that was something that we got to see in the hands-on demo that we played and it was very emotional for me like like coming out this moment we're seeing you're like walking out it was just like it's definitely overwhelming uh for a lot of reasons like in terms of like the gameplay and in terms of like oh it's an open world game there's a lot of checklist-y stuff. There's a lot going on. Seeing this map we have here, it's like, oh, baby, this is, this is a lot.

But it also is like, wow, they're kind of already delivering on a dream here of like seeing these old moments that we had when we were little kids of the wonder of this moment of like, wow, this is the biggest thing I've ever seen. And to see it now and still feel that way is like pretty special. I think it's pretty shocking how like throughout every generation of video games, you always say like games will never look. better than this. And replaying and re-experiencing Final Fantasy remake right now with Snowbike Mike and it being his first time, you still get those close-ups on the character's faces.

He's just like, how can the game possibly look better, right? And then you see a trailer like this and are kind of immediately reminded, oh, they are improving it somehow in some way. And all of these, like, the lighting and all these different environments, everything just looks so handcrafted and like special. I'm just really stunned by the level of care and quality. into all these different things we're seeing right now on screen. So Adam, talk a little bit about your experience playing the game.

Yeah, and going off of what Andy had just mentioned is even the little bit that I did get to play this game. I spent so much time walking around and just looking at all the detail in everything, whether it's like a picture frame or flowers or like a signpost outside. It's insane how much attention to detail they've had. But very similar to your experience. in the sense of getting out into the open world and seeing it for the first time. Again, just blown away. Two things is one, I remember thinking, oh, my God, this is huge. And you open up the map, and I thought that was it.

And then you pull back and you realize, oh, my God, I'm not even close to seeing the entire open world. The Eldon Ring moment. Exactly, exactly. Very, very similar. And then also, two, I really enjoyed how much stuff was filled in throughout the open world. It's not a ton of empty space with nothing to do, whether it's enemies or buildings to explore or just a bunch of different stuff. It seems like there's going to be a ton to do in the open world, which to me is a big key as far as making your open world really, really

exciting. So my God, through the roof, like just goosebumps all up and down my body going through that experience. Yeah. Yeah. So this is now the second time I got to get my hands on the game. And I did my first preview back in, I want to say September, that would make sense. Yeah, it was the TGS demo. And I remember, like, talking about it and being like, I'm so stoked for this, but there's just something about the preview that just didn't, like, nail it for me.

And I think I did the Spider-Man 2 preview the day before. And it was just such a great demo that we got to do for Spider-Man that the next day playing Final Fantasy, I was like, I get it. I'm so stoked for this. But there's just something about where they're placing me in the actiony pieces and then in the open world, it just felt a little more jarring. This demo, the way that it starts off is essentially with like a, a brief recap of the very end of Final Fantasy 7 remake,

super hype, super exciting, the motorcycle chase out. And then you just get into this retelling of a flashback to the Nebelheim incident. And then you're in it and you're playing as Cloud and Seth Roth. And this is the demo that a lot of people are going to be playing. And you just go right back into it. And I loved the framing of, it being kind of the crew of characters in present time talking to cloud about what happens. Like,

tell us, now that all that crazy stuff just happened, tell us about who is this, Seth Roth guy? And they start using that. And I think that framing for both people that haven't played a Final Fantasy before, gives them at least some understanding of what's going on. And for people that,

like, played remake a couple years ago, I think it's a really good refresher on like, hey, here's the main cast, here's why they matter, and here's the stakes of the story going forward. and then the first hour or two is just pure Final Fantasy 7 goodness man you and Cloud and

Seth Roth going through wrecking shop there's nothing cooler than you playing as a main character and then either playing as or seeing an NPC come in and just their damage numbers are a thousand times higher than yours and they're just a boss that's taking you like minutes to defeat they come in in and two swipes and they're dead you're like this is awesome you know yeah I was it was perfect for me somebody who has only ever seen Seph Roth as like the dude that is always being thirsted for on Twitter

right as he's just always like the super hot dude with the long hair and like I never really knew much about the relationship outside of that between him and Cloud and I think it's kind of perfectly framed for someone like me who would only ever play the remake to see oh let's get a glimpse

at what this relationship was at one point where Cloud is kind of a rookie right he's kind of this rookie soldier first class and separate all right you take this you take this little uh encounter right here i want to see what you can do in this moment i thought it was just super cool getting these conversational back and force between all these different characters and the team up combo attacks all that stuff was just really cool and made me excited for what the rest of the game would be combat wise and uh it's important to note and you just said all that stuff but without saying anything specific here it's very much

if you know you know type situation the whole opening of this game has so much stuff that if you're for it, even if you're not looking for in some ways, you're going to be like, oh my God, this is how they're doing this, and that is really damn cool. But it doesn't really get in the way of the storytelling for somebody that might not necessarily be looking out for all those things. Adam, what do you think about the combat of specifically even that section of the Cloud and Sephiroth stuff? Yeah, again, it was so fun and so well done.

First and foremost, aside from, again, seeing the relationship side of things with Sephiroth and Cloud, again, they do a wonderful job of making Sephiroth feel incredibly powerful. So it is so, so much fun in the opening moments of that game. But I also, I really do enjoy the synergy attacks. I think that's a really cool new addition that is both very cinematic

and just exciting to perform and exciting to do. But the combat feels as smooth as ever. It seems like they've taken what worked in remake and just added so many more details and little things that you can do to make the combat even more intricate, but also just as easy to pick up and play as well. It's not like it's super difficult,

but I feel like the people who really do pay attention to detail and figuring out what type of attacks they want to do, what the enemies are weak to. There is so much to play with in Rebirth. And even in the little bit that we did get to play, it's like this started off with the Concephoroth bit, but then eventually we get into the more the open world sections and we got to play through some of the town

and do some of the odd jobs that they talked about. And then we got to go a little bit more. to more of an open situation where it is kind of the actual open world part with a lot more combat scenarios and being able to see how versatile the party is of like how many different characters they are, how different each one of them plays. Because in remake, you're able, for the most part, you had the three characters and there was like, sorry, the team of like what was like four for the majority of the game, but you could play with three on your party at any time, switch between them.

Here already, it's like there's so many more characters to play as. Like we saw in here, there's, you know, Red 13. fee and that being added to the full party. That's in addition to Aerith, Barrett, Cloud, Tifa. So you have a lot more flexibility in who you want your team of three to be and the dynamics between them all. Adam was just talking about the synergy attacks, the team attacks that they have. It's an interesting new feature on top of everything from the remake system where it doesn't

expand any of your magic. It is more based on doing the odd jobs on the sides to. build the personal relationships between the different characters. And the higher those levels are, you can, when they're in certain scenarios in combat, you're able to go to a new menu to do these, like, combo team attacks that are very cinematic.

They're stunning. And so cool. And there's so many of them. And like they, it's so many of them feel, it's remake was fun because it was constantly like switch, switch, switch,

go, go, go. Like it was turn-based combat, but it's also very actiony. It's really pushed up to like, you're moving a lot. more in this, I would say, in terms of like, like telling somebody to cast a spell while you're setting something up, getting in position to do one of the team attacks and just like boom, boom, boom,

moving. Like, it's a lot of fun. For Adam and Tim, for, because I didn't get to play all of the sort of where the actual preview opens up. I kind of ended a little bit before that. Does any of it get a bit daunting? Did you ever have a moment where there's too much stuff being thrown at you with these odd jobs and, you know, I can imagine that if there's, this is their chance to kind of introduce a lot of the, what the rest of the game would be. Do you ever feel like overwhelmed at any of those moments? I did not. I did not. And actually, too, the little bit that I did get to experience, the cool thing was, too, is every piece of side content that I did, like, felt worthwhile. Like, I didn't feel like I was wasting my time or even every dialogue option that I had. It

didn't feel like, okay, let's get through this. But I was not at any point feeling overwhelmed or, oh my God, this is going to take forever. Again, this was very, very early within the game. But no, no, I thought it was very easy to follow along with and also really, really fun to do. Yeah, it's weird for me because, you know, I'm traditionally not an open world guy and I'm definitely not a, I like my games to be a game. I don't need my game to have a game in it and have that game have a game in it. You know what I mean? So it's like a lot of this, it's like, oh, There's mini games galore and side quests all the stuff. And look how open it is.

A lot of that seemingly like, I don't know, man. Like, I really like how linear remake was. I like just, we're having the story. We're in this location. So jumping into this, I'm like, I love Final Fantasy 7 so much. So I'm willing to kind of like give it a shot more than I would some other things. And so far, I'm like, oh, man, they're winning me over. And I think so much of it is that like Adam was saying,

the side stuff feels worthwhile and buried enough that we're not doing the same type of like fetch questy things over and over. And if we are, it's all has unique, um, like dialogue happening on your way. Like let's say you're, you have to pick up thing A, take it to place B, then take it to place C. While that's happening, if that's not the interesting part, the conversations between Eryth and Tifa that are going on that only happen on that quest line, they're so good. And there's some, I love the writing in Final Fantasy 7 remake.

I feel like just having more characters be able to interact so far has been so impressive to me of they feel so real and not just real to like the world we're in. It feels real and authentic to the world they're in, which is so hard to pull off because we've played the original. We have these voices and these characters in our heads. To see Red 13 talking and moving around and like being a real thing and it feeling right, that's so hard to get. Yeah. But I think that so far from what I've played, they have. and it's made all of the open world stuff while daunting, and I will say it is kind of daunting.

Like when you get into some of these open world situations, I want to do it all and I'm like, I can't. But like they were just saying in the state of play, the way that the game has been working is that you can always go back to the side stuff. So there's not this feeling of like, oh man, if I don't do it now, I'm not going to be able to. It's like they understand that there is a story to tell being thrust forward,

but then there's also just limitless things to do. Right. Yeah. Very cool. I just a little nip-pick out there, right? Because, you know, let's give some not so good with the good that I experienced. Me being a visual snob, when you're running around those early moments of the Niebuheim incident, I'm looking at the game and I'm like, ooh, man, right now in performance mode,

this is not even 1440p. This has got to be like maybe around 1080-ish. It looked really, really low-res and kind of fuzzy in a lot of spots. And then during that whole sort of open area for me, I just wasn't really digging the look of everything. It looked a little bit fuzzy. It looked low-res. A lot of pop in here and there.

And then you kind of experienced that first demo boss fight. And it's like they added two more PS-5s to like your machine. And the production quality just ramps up. And it reminded me a lot of my experience with Final Fantasy 16, where there's a lot of moments where the character NPCs and when they're talking to each other. It looks very, very basic and procedural. And then the big boss fight hits. And it's like they pumped $3 billion into the budget of what that boss fight was going to be.

I noticed a lot of that, especially because that first boss fight looks so damn good. And it's in a very kind of controlled cave area. The lighting is fantastic. Everything just looked so top notch. And then you pair that with kind of where they introduced to you the synergy moves. And that just adds so much more to the production value. and you're just kind of blown away that like if you understand

like they're putting a lot of their time into those moments as opposed to kind of running around or you know maybe some patches help out some of the performance here and there but I was really blown away by the contrast in how sharp and amazing things looked in the boss fight compared to just kind of walking around of those early moments where Sephora

as being like you take this one cloud you got this or whatever still gameplay was very very fun though and I enjoyed getting back into that rhythm of combat after, you know, Mike sometimes forces the controller on me when we're doing the Final Fantasy 7 remake play through and getting the hang of that again and just kind of finding the fun

in it again, you know, mixing up the different elements. So much fun. I think from a presentation standpoint, I'm just, it's a little bit of a cheat code because we're talking about some of the most iconic game music of all time. But, like, legitimately though, Final Fantasy 7 music is

it's so much. Like, it's just like, It transports you to a place, to a time, to a feeling, everything. And I remake really pushed it forward of, like, making these beautiful themes even more special. That rendition that you first get is like, oh, my God. And the thing is, so far in rebirth, everything I've seen, they're just having so much more fun with it. And in the state of play, they just said 400 recorded tracks. And I'm not surprised because even in what we played, the first like three, four hours of this thing,

I heard maybe 10 variations of the Fawn Ves 7 main theme, maybe four variations of Ares theme, like five variations of Tifa's theme, and they all feel so perfect and authentic to the moment. There's so much love and care put into, you know, we see Tifa when she has a little, like the cowgirl outfit, and she gets this like Western version of her theme.

And it's like every moment feels bombastic and cinematic because every single moment is backed up by a memorable score. And the amount of times they have funnostic, with the like the one wing one wing and angel sephraoth theme like motifs just throughout little battle stings or throughout moments that are happening it's like man there was like some some storytelling going on just via the audio of this thing that I'm just so impressed by and the moment that I think you're talking about is kind of like it's not the title screen moment of the game but uh the credits moment you're you're like you're walk go for it adam oh no go ahead I was just going to say but

that that was my favorite moment from everything that I got to play seriously just because again video game music is so important to so many of us and it really sets the mood and sets the tone and sets the scene and that credits moment again i was just my face hurt from smiling so much and i goosebumps all up and down my body yeah the the final fantasy seven remake soundtrack is my favorite video game soundtrack of all time i think um but with them taking like some of the classics and making them even better better than adding new tracks that I loved as well, whether it's battle themes or area themes.

So thinking what they're gonna do with FF7 rebirth, even from the little bit that we got to hear, it might top remake for me. I mean, it sounds so good. Yeah, yeah, I'm right there with you. And so speaking of music and transitioning a little bit more to mini games and like things that Final Fantasy 7 are kind of known for, one thing I loved is so early

when you're in Niebelheim just walking around, you go into a house and there's a piano. And then they're just like, just play the piano. And there's just a full on playable piano. Was that the type of thing that you're just like, I'm going to get lost in this? Yeah, I mean, it kind of reminded me of The Last of Us part too, getting on that guitar, like, what stupid songs am I about to cover here with Ellie? Yeah, it's awesome.

Like that level of interactivity and care, having these moments that kind of really help you remember, not just, you know, you're going through this plot, you're going through this story, but these little side things can really like, help cement these memories for you. And I just think all this stuff is so special. Yeah, it really is. We are going to keep talking about our experience with Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth after a really quick word from our sponsors.

This episode is brought to you by kindofunny.com slash store. We've got two brand new drops for you this week. First check out the Kind of Funny broadcast line. Old school telethons inspired this distress design and collection for our annual Kind of Funny Day campaign, which includes a T-shirt, coat bag, and coffee cup. Our cozy collection designed by Nick at Campfire Designs is also available. Get nice and snugly in your choice of a crewneck sweatshirt in joggers and a women's cropped hoodie.

These have been big hits with the team and we think you'll love them too. Both collections are available for the next two weeks on kindofunny.com slash store. Grab them while you can. So jumping back into this, we were just talking about some added mini games. We saw on the state of play a ton of the classic mini games from the first game are coming back. But there's one that is new that we did get to play a pretty good amount. of that is pretty core to the experience of Final Fantasy 7 rebirth. It's a card game called Queen's Blood.

And I'm telling all y'all right now, this is going to be a problem. This is going to be a major problem because it is a card game that is simple to learn, very hard to master, very well presented in the game as like a thing that you're like, oh, this is worth doing, even in the first kind of open area in calm that we got to play in the demo or the preview. there's a wealth of opponents to be able to go and face off in this game and you get worthwhile things and it builds the story and it feels like integrated into it all and the game's really good y'all it's really really good that's a great theme song to itself and it's just super fun it's

snappy like the whole match is done in like three minutes it reminds me a marvel snap so it's going to be a problem i'm telling you right now did you get sucked into this at all adam um So I did, but truth be told, I am horrible at card games within video games. I was terrible at Gwent in The Witcher 3, and I'm terrible at this one as well. But I am determined, determined to teach myself how to play it, because it is very fun. It is very, very fun. So that card game is not the same little tactics game that they had in intermission. No.

No, no. Oh, shit. And even earlier when you were seeing it, you're like, oh, is that the same? same thing. Same area, different game. The game that we're seeing, like the mini game we saw today is a remake of a game that was in the original game. Minigame from the original game. Got you. Okay. Yeah. But this is a brand new card game in this. And it's, it's just awesome. And I really like it again, so much to shout out about the presentation

of this game. The presentation of the card game I think is like particularly impressive because it again feels authentically part of this world. When you're walking around seeing people playing the card game, you're like, I buy this. It makes the, the world that they're in feel a lot more lived in and real. And during the card matches, they treat it super anime where, like, you walk up to somebody and then they're like,

do you want to, do you want to duel? It's like, very Yu-Gi-O. It's like, yeah, let's do it. And the camera shifts and you hear the like,

whews, you know what I mean? Like, let's go versus. And then as you're playing it, the characters are kind of talking shit to each other. And so you just hear like the BEO of them just being like, like, oh,

you think that got me? Nah, try this. This is awesome, man. Like, it's just so much fun. How much of the demo does that like, or how much of that preview? Is it in the demo? Yes, it was in the demo.

So it was in the preview where you, once you, it was past where you got to play. But it was, um, it's in calm. It's in the city when you first start, uh, when things open up a little bit, but not quite fully open, um, just to give you an idea of a town, which by the way, the towns in this game are bustling. So much to do and see so many conversations happening. And it, like, it's, it's, it's, It's so funny because like playing through this in a lot of ways.

I'm like, god damn, this is just a dream Pokemon game. Like Pokemon step at the fuck up. Yeah. But on the other hand, I'm just like, it's that, but not every single person's talking about Pokemon. Like they're talking about things that feel relevant to that city, to that moment, not like, oh, I heard Chanties can do whatever. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah.

Okay. So it's like I'm really, really bought into the town element, but in this town, there was like at least four or five potential opponents for the card game. Okay, got that. And like, you can buy new cards and stuff. Like, the card stuff is like a big deal, but also you don't really, you could skip it if you wanted to. Okay.

What, what difficulties did you all play on? I played on normal. Okay. For me. Yeah. Yeah. I also, go for it. Oh, I was just going to say, yeah, it was, it was great.

It was great. Yeah. That was it. I played on normal and it was awesome, having a great time with it. And then when I got to the final boss of the demo, which was this like big snake boss thing that I don't think either of you got to. It kind of kicked my ass.

And I was just like, ah, shit. And really it kicked my ass because I had just not been equipping everybody with the right stuff. I was the problem with a preview event for people that don't know, you're limited with the amount of time

you have with the game. And so they're just like, there's a lot to do. You have this much time. Go. So I kind of had to pick and choose. You take a break. It's like,

I want to go to the table, get some like mangoes and get some melons. I was playing a lot of the card game. Oh, man. You didn't even hit up the spread that they had? there? That's wild, dude. But, but yeah. I, I ended up going down to, so there's, there's normal, there's

easy, and then there's dynamic difficulty in this one. Okay. So dynamic, I'm a little unclear. I need, I need a little more experience to understand exactly how dynamic it is. Like skill based matchmaking? Like you get better, it gets better. Yes. Okay. It's phrased that way, but I just don't understand. So it's phrased in a way that makes me think that if you're doing well, it makes it harder for you. Yeah. I don't know if it makes it easier for you if you're not doing well, though. You know what I mean? I don't know if dynamic is a hard.

You got to assume if maybe you lose a couple times in a row, you know. Yeah, probably, probably. I just don't know. I just don't know. So, but yeah, I ended up, I eventually went down to easy. No shame, man. No shame at all. Who is here?

What characters were your favorite to use, Adam? Like, did you have a side character that you could use that had like the coolest move set or one that you felt yourself gravitating towards? Oh, so obviously, I mean, Cloud is the main character. He's a ton of fun to play as, but I really do enjoy playing as Tifa. Like, I love all the different combinations that she can do. She's just so, so fun and moves around the map, like, so, so quickly. So she was probably my favorite to play as, but again, Barrett is fun.

Like, really, all of them are fun. And actually, I'm excited to try extensively a lot more of the characters out as well. but everyone feels great to play and exactly how you would imagine those characters to feel playing as. And interesting note there, Red 13 is like playable really now for the first time. So his play style is, it's pretty interesting.

It's a defense focused where you kind of are going to want to go in and get a lot of like Perry type thing going and your parries will essentially like build up his meters. So for people who played remake and then this is now even more so true in rebirth, every character essentially has a square, attack and a triangle attack.

Square is kind of just the basic punch, punch, punch, punch, slash whatever. And then triangles unique to that character. So Cloud will have the ability to switch between punishering mode and an overdrive. Operator. Operator mode. Yeah. Where it was a little stronger and allows stronger hits, but less defensive options. Whereas operator mode is a little bit more nimble and more defensive things.

So for Red 13, his is. You parry and you defend, and it kind of takes the hits in, and it builds that meter up. And then you can use the meter to kind of, like, fight back. So it's like a very countery type of thing. And he spins around a lot. So it's like you can just like tap square or if you build up meter triangle. And he's very like flippy and he gets in there. And it's kind of like, think of him like using his body as like a saw.

Okay. Essentially. So you can kind of go in there super chip damage style. And it's so fun to get a combo going of like T for going in, getting the punch combos going and then set him up. So they're just like getting, ah, yeah.

So did you all notice, like, a whole bunch of, like, crazy dynamic, the team of synergy moves? Like, were you like, oh, what would Red 13 look like with FIFA or so and so with whoever, you know? I wish I had the chance to do more of them. Because actually, I spent so much time, like, just exploring the open world and looking at random buildings and things like that. So I did get to try a few.

And again, all of them are so different. Like, it's so wild how not a single synergy move feels similar to another one. And everyone that I played or everyone that I used was super, super fun. But I still have so many more synergy moves to try out. But I really, really enjoyed them. And again, the whole setup with the unlock system here of like deciding what you want to level up and the small like passive bonuses you get for. throughout that, I love stuff like that.

It just opens up so much stuff within the game. So what's really cool about that, so it's the folio system, which is essentially, I mean, it's a skill tree, but it functions like the sphere grid from Final Fantasy 10, but just on a much more, like, small scale. The Final Fantasy remake had a similar type thing. I forget what they called it, but like as you go through and get your skill upgrades and there was like a tree going on.

Like a galaxy sort of thing. Yeah, this is a, it's a little simpler to look at and understand. And you can go in, But what's really cool about it is any of the save points you go to, you can change whatever you want. And you can just completely restart and renegotiate where you want all of your skills to go. If you're like realizing, oh, I actually want these characters to be like more defensive or faster or whatever it is, like based on how your play style evolves.

And it's really, really cool to me how quick it all is. And I think that's actually a big thing I want to point out how snappy this game is. Like the loading or lack of it, just the like how impressive it all looks and like the presentation of it all. But it's just like once you get into it, man, it's just the menus just load so nicely. Like it's very, very, very, very impressive. I'll tell you one simple thing I love that it's like just such a tiny little thing. The, just the visuals of the pause menu. I love going to the pause menu, seeing your characters there doing like a little idle animation.

You know, a cloud will put his bust his sword on his shoulder and then he'll and then you go to a different menu and it's a different camera. angle. It's just such a nice change from just that blue screen because I've been seeing that a whole lot with this recent play-through. I love that. It's such a tiny change, but it's cool and it just makes the game look a lot prettier, I think. Also, too, another very small detail, but I love when you're exploring the open world and then you get like an encounter out in the open world, how the music so seamlessly transitions into like a battle theme. And then it goes right back into the calm exploration style open world, world. map theme. I think that was so seamless too. The dynamic music, man. I mean, we've seen it in some games. It always hits. I don't know if it's ever hit this hard for me. Wow. And second time I'm bringing up Spider-Man in this preview. But Spider-Man, so good at evoking that thrill as you start swinging in the music like rises and you hear the choir. Like it's always good. But that's one song that might over the course of the game have like two or three versions. But like it's one little thing. This is every moment. And I am so impressed that every section I get,

to has a new battle theme that is also dynamic to the normal just walking around theme. So it's like it is the calm battle theme. It is the, you know, that's where the 400 tracks are. Adam. Really? Like that starts adding up right? Because I remember even the preview I did last time, the first preview when it was more in the June on area of the open map.

The battle theme was the Junon theme battle version. And it's just satisfying, man. And again, I am, it's cheating. I've been listening to these songs for 20 plus a year. Yeah. You know what I mean? Easy dubs for them. Yeah.

But it's like it's an easy win, but they didn't take the easy way out. Right. Like this dynamic stuff, the amount of love put into it, like they showed up with it, man. And it just makes the entire experience feel like earlier, Adam, you were saying that like, Fun Fantasy 7 is like so, so important. Like this to me, it's Star Wars for a group of people. Like it is so special that like this, this cast of characters and the locations and sounds and all of it come together and mean this much and look this good.

For sure. I remember when Final Fantasy 7 remake came out. I know initially some people were disappointed that it was only like one section of the game. But the love and attention to detail they put in remake made it so worth it. And I know the love and attention they're going to put into rebirth is going to knock it out of the park even more than remake. So I'm so happy that they're making this like a three game series. If they continue to put as much love and attention and detail into remake as well as rebirth and then whatever the next game is,

it could be my favorite trilogy of games of all time. It's so, so special. Yeah, man. It's really impressive. And I will say as the two of us being like super, super hardcore fans of this game series and everything, like I am so impressed. Like the way that remake ended, I was beside myself of like, this is the best thing ever for me. Like I absolutely love this.

And playing through this. Is that because you're like, I'm going to get something new out of this experience? Yeah, it's because to me it's the perfect balance of it's what I've loved before, just done again, which I want. Right. But it's also new. There's also some new stuff. And like, I like getting weird. Let's get weird a little bit.

The biggest thing for me is Zach being at the end. I'm a Zach boy. So if the idea of getting more Zach, I'm just like, that is incredibly cool to me. So with all that, I'm like, this is very exciting. But playing the bit I did here, the way that they handle the flashback into the open bits of like calm and outside com, I was so impressed at the balance of how faithful they are to the original and how beat for beat line for line of dialogue in some cases. like, um, the, specifically the scene of cloud and Niebelheim crawling towards a burning building without giving away any other things about that. I can't believe how faithful it is for something that was so resonant to us back in the day,

but when you watch now, as goofy as hell looking, because it's just a little shitty polygon guy like crawling, but to play through it now, it feels so impactful. And it feels like it should feel, you know, but. then there'll be one line of dialogue that's different noticeably. And you're like, holy shit, what are they doing? Like, I'm just so in on like what they're going to keep the same and more importantly, what they're going to change. But so far with the four hours I played,

I am thrilled at the changes they're making and more so the teases they're making at where this game is going. And I think that's a very exciting thing. Playing this demo, the way that it ends and like the setup that it has, I'm like, oh, they're going to give us stuff in this game. This is not going to be a part three. Team for part three.

This feels like it's going to be like there's shit going on. Very exciting. Very exciting stuff. Very exciting stuff. Adam, any final things you want to say about your time with this? No, just again, I can't think of a time that I've been more excited for a game to come out. And I'd mean that genuinely. Again, going off of everything that you said,

This feels like a giant love letter to Final Fantasy 7, while at the same time, again, creating like a whole new, exciting experience, whether you've played the original or not, this game is going to be a grand slam. I just know it. I just know it. I can't wait for February 29th. Cannot wait.

Yeah, I mean, honestly, the hype is real right now, but I think it's justified. Like, I will say that this preview event, it was one of the rare times that there was a buzz in the room. Like everybody was like, oh, oh, they got. This is special. But all the people working on it. Oh, by the way, the event was incredible.

The entire voice cast was there. And you could tell everybody was like, we got something. Like we got to. That's awesome. So yeah, pretty damn cool. And the last thing I want to say gameplay wise, this is like a huge improvement for me from remake. I hated in remake how Cloud would walk around.

And it felt like he was bumping into everything in the hit box and collisions of how how he was moving was not fun to navigate the world. And like, like, if there's a chest and the, the triangle icon pops up and like, you have to be just right to open it. Some of that still here with the like chest opening stuff.

But just the way cloud moves around the world and like how it functions a lot more. It functions a lot more like, like, Link in Breath of the Wild or Spider-Man. Spider-Man where you kind of just, you hold R2 and you can move and he just goes over whatever you have to. and it feels good to me. Like moving around,

like actually the locomotion of it feels a lot better to me, which was a much needed improvement. To piggyback on that, I thought of you because as I was playing it, there was a little mountain maybe about three or four feet tall than me, not mountain,

but just like a hill of dirt inside of like this larger sort of canyon. And I was like, oh, I can maneuver myself on top of that because there's a little material there. And I'd get it to the top and then cloud would like fall, back down. I was like, oh, I got to do this like three times. And finally I like, I found the

triangle icon pop up and I was like, oh, Tim must not have liked this moment. Yeah. And I haven't experienced that since then. But that was like, I was like, ooh, I hope this isn't the case for the rest of it because Tim hates that shit. Yeah. Yeah. But anyways, I'm sure we're going to have a lot to talk about this game in the weeks to come. Andy, of course, thank you for joining me. But Adam, thank you for joining me. Where again can people find you? Oh, so I, uh, I stream on Twitch. Uh, my Twitch is Twitch.TV slash the Chugs. We play a wide variety of games on there.

Certainly we'll be playing Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. So if you want to come hang out, please feel free. Oh, there we go. Thank you. I love the Sonic logo. Incredible stuff. Yes. Incredible. Well, thank you for joining us. And thank you all for spending your day hanging out

with us, watching the state of play, and then watching our thoughts on this. It's going to be a very fun time. Remember, this Friday is kind of funny day stream part two. All day will be streaming, doing a bunch of fun, cool stuff. the return of KFAF. It's going to be a blast.

But until next time, love you all. Goodbye. Bye, game.