Final Fantasy 7 Remake INTERmission (with some Rebirth talk)

[00:00:00] Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of the Pre-Order Bonus podcast. I'm one of your hosts, Cameron Warren, and I'm joined as always by Jacob Price, Professor of Video Games. Jake, there's a lot of stuff going on. Elden Ring DLC is coming in June.

[00:00:30] Pretty excited for that. I popped back open Elden Ring and started another play through. This is going to be my long three or four month lead-in. I figured if I'm going to play the DLC,

[00:00:43] I might as well roll a new character. That's a pretty good video game. Not going to lie to you. Pretty solid game. I would go so far as to say that it's one of the best games ever made.

[00:01:00] Pretty handily. It is just so good. I did the same thing. Pop back in, started up a new character. Somebody from our Discord, Freddie Go Boom, long-time listener, a good friend also started a new

[00:01:11] character and it isn't quite there but it is bringing back to the days when Elden Ring first came out. There was peace on Twitter. Everybody's just sending messages about the new cool random things that they found and discovered in game. There was just like sustained

[00:01:29] enthusiasm for the game. Because one, it's a massive game and two, people just kept finding more and more things. Check out this weapon. Check out this elevator I found that goes to a whole new

[00:01:42] area. Check out this optional boss. Check out this area. That's one of those peak moments I feel like at least in gaming history where there is actual peace. It's kind of like the other time that this happened was when Pokemon Go first released in 2016. Also another

[00:02:03] moment of gaming peace and world peace. It's bringing me back to that, just getting different messages talking to people about what they're excited for with the new Elden Ring DLC coming out. Yeah, it looks like it's going to be pretty significant. It's a $40 DLC and you can trust

[00:02:22] from Soft if they're going to charge that much for an expansion. You're looking at a pretty hefty meaty experience, which is exciting. Yeah, coming on June. In the meantime, in the meantime, I keep getting vibes from Dragon's Dogma 2 that it's going to have

[00:02:46] kind of similar. It's basically like boss rush in an open world. I played the first one and it is obviously a very different game from Elden Ring in a lot of ways, but there's potential there. I gotta say that when they keep releasing more like,

[00:03:09] oh, this is what this character build looks like. This is what this play style looks like. This is what you'll be doing in the game. Man, they are building the hype incredibly well. Like looking at the game, I'm like, ooh, there's three different character classes that are

[00:03:25] interesting to me and it looks phenomenal. I think Baldur's Gate 3, obviously all these games have been in development simultaneously anyway, but Baldur's Gate 3 kind of, I think, is kicking off like this RPG golden year, golden age maybe, where we're getting just

[00:03:46] incredible RPGs coming out. Obviously, we're going to be talking about Final Fantasy 7 a lot today, remake and we'll be focusing on the intermission DLC, but as of this recording tomorrow, we've got Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. We've got Dragon's Dogma 2. We've got Elden Ring DLC.

[00:04:05] And so this might just be the year the RPG for me. Yeah, 100%. The other thing that we got even more confirmation that looks like that Switch 2 is not coming until 2025, so that's going to make for an interesting fall situation. Is this going to be a quiet year, Jake?

[00:04:24] So, dude, I've been thinking about this and I think your prediction that Xbox is going to do incredibly well at the game awards and other end of the year ceremonies is going to come true.

[00:04:37] Sony has already said that between now and early 2025, there's not going to be a major first party release. That doesn't mean there won't be important releases for PlayStation that are exclusive to that console. But now with Nintendo things seem to be pushing out for this

[00:04:56] Switch 2 rumor launch in March 2025. Yeah, the huge competition seems to be kind of exiting the stage and we know that Xbox has Hellblade 2 avowed, are a history untold, and then possibly and hopefully the Indiana Jones game coming out. So,

[00:05:19] Xbox might really show up in this fall, which I'm sure the folks over at Xbox are crossing their fingers right now. They're like, please just give us this fall. But it's looking up to be an interesting fall schedule. Yeah, absolutely. It should be very interesting. Xbox definitely has

[00:05:40] a chance to get in there and kind of make something happen. So, it will be definitely interesting to see for sure. The other thing is there's more layoffs. Yeah, and I can't say too much about these because they're with my parent company. So,

[00:06:01] I can't really comment on reasons why or whatever. But what I can say something I've been thinking about a lot, and maybe we can just briefly chat about this, is what is the solution to this problem. Because obviously a lot of this is just, hey, look,

[00:06:24] every single company's cutting 8% of their staff. So, we have this opportunity to do it and not look like the only jerks in the room. So, that's obviously part of it. Yeah. Part of it is

[00:06:36] obviously like actually, we do have enough money and it's not that big of a deal, but we can make it look like we grew by cutting operating costs. Obviously, our operating... But that doesn't... That also comes with the fact that the truth is, is that the cost of

[00:06:51] games are going up. We've had a lengthy discussion on this. Yeah. Cost of development are going up. Everything's more expensive. Everything's taking longer. So, the current situation with these companies that are making games is the old model that they used to be doing is not working. Right.

[00:07:09] No, and just to kind of continue that briefly, I do recommend that you go back and listen to a recent episode we did on layoffs and then we talked about the finals as well. Yeah.

[00:07:20] I think the solutions that seem to be making the most sense are ones that we have... We're starting to see them being implemented and that would be Sony and Xbox kind of reevaluating what exclusivity means for them. I mean, Sony is...

[00:07:36] It seems like they're hinting at more day one PC launches, simultaneous with their console launches. Xbox obviously is taking the notion of exclusivity and kind of shoving it in the trash can and kind of bringing some of these titles like Sea of Thieves and Grounded to me make

[00:07:55] total sense. And I actually think that the Xbox business update really hammered this point home. Those games have pretty much hit their max potential with the way that they're situated now. So, why not push beyond that and get more people in and more people in cross play? This

[00:08:15] is the thing I'm most excited about too. It's just like all these new Sea of Thieves and Grounded players are going to be able to jump in with cross play. And that's how those communities and those games can continue to grow. I think that's awesome.

[00:08:31] But yeah, in terms of solutions to this problem, we got a sense of what PlayStation and Xbox are doing. Nintendo's the anomaly here. They're really slow to embrace new ways of doing business. I think Nintendo Switch Online is probably the closest and only thing that we're

[00:08:52] going to see for quite a while and then changing their business strategy. But I think if you're a third-party studio and a third-party publisher, you can't fall back on Daddy's Money, Daddy's Wallet. Would that be Microsoft or Sony? You've got to be really savvy in what you're doing.

[00:09:10] And some news that came out today was 505 Publishing sold the rights to Control to Remedy. And a part of me is kind of like, ooh, if these like AAA, AAA studios, however you want to call them

[00:09:21] like Remedy are in a position to buy their IP from software just bought their IP from Bandai Namco for Elden Ring. I don't know man. It's kind of looking bleak for that space. I don't know

[00:09:33] what to do. I don't know what to say other than people have got to be really careful with their wallets. Yeah, absolutely. I think a couple of thoughts come to mind just super quick.

[00:09:47] I don't... It's going to be sort of an all of this situation but Final Fantasy VII, this is going to kind of take us into our conversation today. Final Fantasy VII Remake slash Rebirth slash Integrate are kind of pretty good examples of where I think this industry

[00:10:05] could potentially go. Okay. I do think there's probably... Games probably need to cost double what they cost today if we want to continue to have the experiences that we've had and for

[00:10:17] corporations to be happy. Right. And to make the kind of like margins that they expect to make on these type of experiences. And if you look at Final Fantasy VII Remake, Rebirth, Integrate and you combine all the costs of those together 70 plus 70 plus 25 or whatever it is,

[00:10:36] you have a game that essentially is costing close to $200. Right? Right. That obviously they developed Rebirth after Remake but it was originally kind of set out as like, hey we're going to make Final Fantasy... We're going to make a remake of Final Fantasy VII. Right. Which evolved into

[00:10:53] this massive experience. I kind of look as that is maybe the example going forward of maybe how you should think about building ginormous games in the future. If you're going to charge that kind

[00:11:06] of money, do you break down the experience into, hey let's take something like... I'm thinking of like Uncharted 4 is a great example. Okay. Massive game that took many, many years, came out at 60 bucks. Could you have split that into two games? Right? Charge 60 for both of them or

[00:11:28] even 40, then you're at least making like 80 or 90 bucks or however you cost it. Right? Right. You easily could have split that into two 60-70 dollar premium experiences because there's just that much content in those. Right. Right. So anyway, that also comes with the fact that

[00:11:47] like, you know, these are just the realities and our players are going to be upset that they're not getting as much value for their dollar anymore. Maybe, maybe not but like companies are already

[00:11:58] trying to take as much of your money as possible for the least amount of... Right. Yeah. So I see that as a much better way. Right? Like the other example I think about Spider-Man, right? And

[00:12:13] how much effort they put into that sequel that didn't really show up on the screen or show up in the gameplay. Could you have just gone straight off Spider-Man 2018? You didn't make a whole bunch of

[00:12:26] crazy upgrades in terms of graphics, in terms of fidelity, in terms of cinematics. You make a parody of experience. Right. Right. And then you save a whole bunch of money and then you sell...

[00:12:39] So those are the starts types of things that I know these companies are talking about and thinking about like, they're in meetings right now as we speak trying to figure this stuff out. And I

[00:12:48] think that that's probably the direction that these things are going to go over the next four or five years. Yeah. I think ideally all of these studios would be able to optimize the resources that

[00:12:57] they have while simultaneously retaining all of their employees. Right? Like that I think is the ideal scenario. Right? Where instead of trying to go bigger and better all the time,

[00:13:08] you think, okay, what are we able to accomplish with what we have here and now? And the example that I want to bring up is Sucker Punch's Ghost of Tsushima. Right? And ever since the Spider-Man 2 Insomniac

[00:13:21] hack came out, I've been extremely worried about what's happening at Sucker Punch because I imagine what was the budget I think supposedly Ghost of Tsushima one cost how much? Uh-huh. It was like if it's right, it was like 80 million which is crazy for what they put out.

[00:13:39] Yeah. Absolutely insane for what they put out and you know long time listeners I apologize we always use this example because we're huge fanboys but also because it's a great example of this.

[00:13:48] We're like if that was your budget right and you were able to produce what is Ghost of Tsushima, a total masterpiece, what in I imagine their budget has at least doubled or tripled since then?

[00:14:01] What is happening in Ghost of Tsushima 2 is Sucker Punch kind of going down the exact same path Spider-Man 2 with these same problems that you brought up. The budget's ballooned, there's a whole lot of extra work occurring but to what degree are players actually going to

[00:14:16] be able to notice that and register that those changes have taken place. Yeah, I just wish that there's this better sense of optimization of resources without cutting all the people who

[00:14:30] made it right and how does that happen folks? I wish I had a clear-cut answer right but I think you are onto something with the pricing model right where like if you were building a sequel right

[00:14:42] and then maybe the Elden Ring DLC is a good example of this where you are building upon assets and ideas and things that already exist right? How possible is it for you, aren't you in

[00:14:55] a better position to optimize maybe those things that you're making? That's kind of the hope that I have. Yeah, Elden Ring is a great example because think about Elden Ring 23 million copies sold and basically for a game of that caliber you're essentially going to have a 90 plus percent

[00:15:13] attachment rate to the DLC. Yeah, so you're thinking hey we just got yeah we worked for an extra couple years on this game but so what? We're going to get an attachment a crazy

[00:15:24] attachment rate on this DLC. We only spent two and two years and a you know 2.3 years or whatever it is right? We spent 2.3 years and now we get to put out a $40 expansion that's going to

[00:15:37] have this massive attachment rate to this game that's already out in the wild and has done phenomenally successful. Right and not every game is going to be that case but you bring up Ghost of

[00:15:47] Tsushima, is it a situation of like you know does the next Ghost of Tsushima come out in two parts and the first part is 60 bucks or 50 bucks or 40 bucks or even $70 and it's a 20

[00:16:00] to 25 hour game and they do it that way and I don't know I think that's personally probably fine and like reflects the reality of the industry or Insomniac do they put out the Venom game that's

[00:16:12] $40 and that's an 8 to 12 hour experience. I think that those are perfectly fine like for the gamer and the player and allows that business model to be healthy because I'm guessing what's happening now

[00:16:25] as Sony is going to these studios and be like look 200 million like you spend over 200 million like we're slashing your budget or you know next time around like you spent anything you spent over

[00:16:38] 200 million that comes out of your next game that's going to be like the type of conversation. The worst type of conversation I'm sure but it's interesting though because that's part of the

[00:16:48] rumors with these upcoming Xbox games right is that the idea is that okay it's time to make a experience and I like I think this this sort of pricing and release model makes it's much more

[00:17:01] palatable for the consumer because if somebody is like hey we have this massive triple A gate coming out it's not so many bucks it's a hundred dollars how many people are going to be turned off from

[00:17:12] spending a hundred dollars on something right but if you do chunk that down to imagine like 50 and 30 right where since 60 has been the benchmark and you're like oh 50 bucks and then I can spend an

[00:17:25] extra 30 and that makes sense and that total like you are getting at that total is at 80 bucks and that's over 70 dollars assuming that all that stuff is kind of planned all at once in one

[00:17:37] production cycle. I think some things that are sort of fickle this is something I've learned about indie games is that if you have an indie game and it's successful with a publisher

[00:17:47] and you want to keep adding to it a great example this would be in you know Dear Friend of the Show, Sandy, his game with his team Moonstone Island they are continually actually putting out tiny

[00:18:00] DLC packs that are really cool right and they're like two to four bucks or something but what I've learned in conversations with other indie devs is typically with your publisher you have to hit like a benchmark you have to hit a goal and then they're like okay we'll

[00:18:16] give you funding to keep adding little bits to this game right which is more and more common in the indie space and the biggest example this is somebody who has no publisher but concerned

[00:18:24] ape with Stardew Valley right but I feel like that is actually happening and that is one way for indie games and publishers to try to keep generating revenue as hey we're just going

[00:18:35] to ride the wave of this entire game right and we're going to hope that this increases our long tail of sales because you can buy the base game at discount like let's say 25%

[00:18:45] discount and it's like oh if I buy these extra two like DLC packs I'm spending you know the consumer is like okay I'm spending what I would have for the base game at normal price but I'm

[00:18:56] getting extra on top of it and then that extra money being spent is only beneficial right for those indie studios and for those those smaller publishers so I do think that this model is

[00:19:07] happening and it is working in some regards but yeah we are currently experiencing the big financial shakedown and in that shakedown a lot of people in their jobs are falling out yeah I mean consumers should be expected for a change like this there's no long this is no

[00:19:25] longer going to be the 60 70 dollar premium game go buy it situation it's going to be one of these three different options of smaller game slightly lower price bigger game chunked into multiple games that somebody works on for six seven eight years

[00:19:40] right hopefully not that long four five six years uh wait they continue to update it and then they have a quote on quote live plan of releasing five of these sevens an interesting case because they actually made a 30 to 40 hour game

[00:19:58] that turned into a you know 300 hour game and then they ended up releasing it and two and now three games right but there's investment that they made upfront that now they're going to

[00:20:09] get back over the long tail because they kept working on the same game but they turned it into three different games and so that's going to be a situation the other one that we just I'll

[00:20:18] just briefly mention is no man sky situation where you make a game with the plan like hey we're going to release a game and the plan is we're going to continue to work on this for a

[00:20:31] long time until it's successful we're going to like force this the game to be successful the case of no man sky is it's a miracle that actually occurred for that game because of its launch

[00:20:43] I do think that for most games that sort of fall into that category it's an enormous risk and you got to have some sort of backing or some sort of security to do that or you got to know

[00:20:54] that your game is really going to pay out in some ways but yeah that could work just keep updating the game until it becomes successful um I think follow-ups so cyberpunk's another example of where it came out absolute mess if leadership goes oh guys like

[00:21:12] this is a bomb drop it go to the next project that whole story of um of the dlc like of and you know it becoming the super polished great experience yeah ever happens

[00:21:26] and they never make you know that 30 attachment of the new dlc right so but they did and now that game's going to continue to sell it's going to be like witcher three and i'm just crazy long

[00:21:36] tail another another recent game that comes to mind we're coming back to remedy entertainment on wake two has got two dlc planned right the game that does phenomenally well it's remedies they're on the record of saying it's their fastest selling game um yeah and that's just

[00:21:50] going to increase that tail there as well all right and get this I know folks we need to talk about this dlc but this just in as of this recording um EA is laying off 5% or 670 employees

[00:22:06] oh great that's an episode min recording um some more info well I don't know dude well that's a great song dude that's stupid stop laying people off yeah I mean this is just man what a I mean what does

[00:22:24] what is left to say at this point like figure it out game companies you're better than this yeah I yeah man it just sucks to see something that you love so much as a medium

[00:22:38] and it's an artistic medium but you know it's it's a medium that also exists because there's an opportunity to make money and companies have to continue to grow endlessly and oh man

[00:22:52] this just it's sad it sucks and guess what the stock prices are all going to go up when you find people because that's what happens part of it all right well let's move into conversation about um fighting against and blowing up corporations and talk about final fantasy seven

[00:23:08] and integrate uh or intermission intermission is is the name of the dlc integrate and we're kind of doing this to be honest with everybody listening we're kind of doing this just because we cannot freaking wait to play rebirth and jake and I've been sitting on our hands

[00:23:28] literally with anxiety to play the with desires to play this game so Jake how are we going to break this one now we will be talking about the intermission the final fantasy seven remake intermission dlc that is a mouthful so we'll just be saying intermission

[00:23:43] from here on out we'll be talking about it in our characteristic four categories the first one being the narrative so we'll be discussing the story elements obviously this this is dlc

[00:23:53] based on you fee you're playing as her um so we'll be talking about her and and sort of what her story is in the city of midgar next we'll be talking about mechanics uh here we discussed

[00:24:04] really just how you're interacting with the game mostly in this case it will be talking a lot about combat and then third gameplay loop so essentially what is keeping you engaged in what are sort

[00:24:17] of cycles of play in each play session in throughout intermission and then finally impact on the industry we kind of started this episode you know little flipped we've talked a little

[00:24:28] bit about final if you say final final fantasy seven remake trilogy as an example of just the way that remakes you know broadly but also how big budget games are are being treated in the

[00:24:42] industry but we'll wrap up the conversation going full circle there but yeah just just also to echo what Cameron said um we have been I think Cameron I have texted each other

[00:24:54] like every day for the past feels like week or week and a half being like uh you know when is final fantasy seven rebirth out so we have been super excited for this seeing the glowing reviews

[00:25:06] the super high scores uh isn't helping either but uh yeah and I gotta say even in in all my hype and excitement I went and I saw the special theatrical run of final fantasy seven advent children

[00:25:23] and then I went and I found there's an anime short it's final fantasy seven last order which was really good I actually really enjoyed that the advent children movie is uh did I say

[00:25:35] advent calendar oh my gosh folks I'm so sorry if I did anyway the advent calendar haven't dude I'm done the advent movie I'll be honest it was mid but it was exciting to see all the

[00:25:48] characters there so I'm trying to get my ducks in a row for the narrative that's upcoming in rebirth but Cameron talking about intermission what did you think of this ufie dlc what did

[00:26:02] you think when they first announced that this dlc was coming um honestly like I didn't really think much at the time and to be honest with you when it came out I downloaded it and played

[00:26:17] several hours and then I just stopped and I was like I'm good and so uh and then what I started to listen to like a few podcasts of some kind of crazy ff7 fans

[00:26:30] and I was like and then you know with rebirth obviously looming on horizon I finally uh about two months ago now I went back because I want to go finish this because I'm

[00:26:39] so excited for rebirth and I can't I can't wait um and so I did that and it was definitely worth it and just reminded me it was a reminder of just how freaking good yeah that game is

[00:26:52] and how just good it is to play um but yeah no this just to kind of set the stage for intermission the the point of this dlc is is essentially to introduce you to

[00:27:07] ufi um who plays a much as as I understand it plays a much greater role in ff7 rebirth and is actually one of the main like playable characters which is a little bit different

[00:27:19] from the original ff7 where ufi is actually a lot of people may not know this ufi is actually optional like secret side character with a massive side quest attached to her that is completely

[00:27:33] optional dude yeah um that to me was wild so I first played the og final fantasy 7 when it came to consoles and that sort of it wasn't like quite a remaster right but I don't know anyway when they

[00:27:48] when they relaunched it and I remember I found her I finally tracked her down I beat her and then she joined the squad right and she felt super optional to be totally honest like she was present

[00:28:02] and this is somebody you could cycle in I didn't really like her um and by the way I guess it just bears is saying that this this will be full of of spoilers and intermission is short enough that

[00:28:15] kind of the whole narrative is fair game here so just you have been warned but yeah I remember picking her up and I just kind of thinking like who is this kid that's

[00:28:24] tagging along because she's she's like younger than the rest of the party and I found her to be kind of annoying and then she goes and she steals all of our materia and she takes it to her homeland of

[00:28:34] wu tai and I was pissed dude I was like ufi sucks and so when this dlc came out I thought I don't really care this is a character I didn't care about in the og um I didn't find to be

[00:28:47] particularly useful who dragged me along this whole other side quest that I wasn't sure what I was getting myself into um but there was an option to purchase the final fantasy seven

[00:28:59] integrate um is addition on on playstation I was like sure fine I'll get it and then I started playing it because I was like oh man I know she's gonna be a big part of rebirth and honestly

[00:29:12] I think intermission if you were like me and you're a little jaded by ufi the intermission dlc does a really fantastic job of contextualizing and giving a lot of nuance to who she is why she

[00:29:25] is the way that she is and gosh dang it like I ended up liking her quite a lot by the end of the the intermission dlc yeah I mean she was still a little bit anime for me elaborate on that what

[00:29:40] does that mean uh I hope that doesn't come off as a fence I don't mean to be but it was like like you know how okay so like a lot of japanese game characters have this like over the top

[00:29:58] robunk uh like over the top personality traits right um which I think actually in ff7 they do a pretty good job of like tempering that back a little to be honest which is kind of interesting

[00:30:14] um obviously cloud super broody and and you know like broody teenager type situation but that I think actually works ufi just it's just a little bit too she's like this ninja who's

[00:30:30] crazy powerful but acts like like a you know like a 13 year old yeah I don't know it's part of the vibes it's fine that being said her combat's super dope and she has this ginormous boomerang that and

[00:30:43] she's super overpowered as well just like rex dudes um so and then the other thing dude like this is maybe we talk about this like during the narrative dude the music in these games is just

[00:31:00] yeah balkers like the best soundtrack in any video game for me like hands down and I'm thinking specifically of like the moment I fell in love with intermission integrate whatever it's called

[00:31:12] you know when you're in like the factory and it does like the whole jazz sequence yeah oh my goodness that was the moment when I was like you know what there's these little things here that like

[00:31:26] kind of bug me like a just a teeny bit but this music for whatever reason this is just turning this into an experiment like a totally different experience like taking it takes it to the final

[00:31:36] fantasy seven remake music is a total ill worm and I'm gonna go on record saying I think it's better than the original music like I actually enjoy it way more than I do the original um

[00:31:49] but yeah let's let's actually get to a narrative here so uh you obviously play as ufi we've mentioned it she shows up in midgar this is happening during the events of final fantasy seven remake

[00:32:02] and she is on a mission she's like this super stealth ninja from the country of wu tai and wu tai and and shinra specifically but midgar have been at odds with each other right they they

[00:32:16] don't get along there's a lot of politics that are sort of hinted at between these two different nations and so she is there because there has been a devastating attack on wu tai and it's kind of to

[00:32:27] get revenge so her mission is to infiltrate the midgar headquarters and steal the ultimate materia like this thing that supposedly they're working on and so she meets up with members of avalanche and this is this is actually some of the narrative detail that was added that I really

[00:32:43] like this is a different branch of avalanche than the one that barrett wallace runs which is sort of considered to be the most extremist of all the different branches of avalanche and so she's

[00:32:58] with a different branch she speaks with a few people she uh is teamed up with sonan kusakabe who is a very cool character and they kind of start doing some of these missions to infiltrate

[00:33:11] midgar together they have to go get you know fake ids so that they can get into the building so the game is really divided narratively only into two chapters one is like pre-planning and

[00:33:22] preparing for the mission and then chapter two is the mission itself and um yeah yufi she's a teenager I think she's supposed to be like 17 or something um and she very much feels more like a teenager rather than an over exaggerated trope of personality so I agree with

[00:33:42] you a lot Cameron we're like to me she felt so much more like a teenager that just happens to be like a super gifted ninja you know which you know whatever this is a video game um but yeah it

[00:33:55] made her so much more I think palatable and likable just to be like oh you know what that's yufi that's actually just how yufi is you know this isn't somebody who's sort of uh purposely

[00:34:06] overwritten and over exaggerated to fulfill a specific role but yufi felt more like uh like a person I feel like in intermission yeah um I think it's a pretty straightforward and like simple story

[00:34:29] there's a teeny bit of crossover with the activities of that's happening like with the main crew from ff7 remake which is kind of fun to see you do go to the same uh like village

[00:34:39] like the starting village from from final sd7 and kind of boop around there and and do some stuff I mean beyond that I don't think there's anything narratively here that I was like

[00:34:51] blown away by but it did a nice job at introducing introducing yufi introducing you to her mechanics you get some really fun battles in there and when you have essentially the best combat

[00:35:02] system ever created for video games you I mean it's it's always just fun to just go fight stuff yeah I mean I don't think is there anything else I'm missing narratively here Jay I didn't

[00:35:13] feel like I mean it doesn't really go super deep or super far especially in the context of remake um all I would add I avoided most spoilers I would say just in my kind of brief synopsis

[00:35:28] but yeah chapter two you can imagine yufi and sonan that go on this mission and guess what they they don't stop shinra because if you've played final fantasy 7 remake you know that cloud

[00:35:39] and barrett and t fun team don't do it either right so things go wrong um I think actually one of my favorite parts about intermission is just the way that they provided exposition

[00:35:52] about wu tai like as a country and the people from wu tai because in my experience with the original final fantasy 7 there is some explanation of wu tai and it is tied to yufi

[00:36:07] but here oh my gosh scarlet you know that that villain and she shows up quite a lot in intermission she is crazy racist I texted Cameron while I was playing I was like dude they just

[00:36:23] turned scarlet into a full blown like super condescending racist villain and I thought it was um important to add that detail because it really shows you what kind of prejudice that like sonan and yufi and wu tai as a nation are facing in this part of the planet

[00:36:44] and I was like wow you rounded out the global politics of final fantasy 7 a little more and a little better right folks obviously don't think racism is a good thing but I think it was an

[00:36:56] a better way of sort of describing the different tensions that were present in the game and in the games universe and so I was actually a really big fan of that it made scarlet a much better villain

[00:37:08] to hate much easier to hate but it also made you sympathize a lot more with yufi being like oh my gosh actually you know not only does final fantasy 7 have to do with corporations and environmentalism but it's also tackling things like immigration and cultural differences and prejudice

[00:37:27] and so I thought it was a really good way to sort of round out what the world of midgar is and what it's like not just for people from midgar but from people who are outside of midgar specifically

[00:37:38] wutaians who come to midgar yeah there's also like a backs like yufi has got like sort of a deep interesting backstory that they allude to uh with some flashbacks that are seem to happen like

[00:37:56] super out of context and it kind of makes it hard to like okay wait a second like what's happening here I'm not sure so I'm guessing rebirth is gonna like dive deeper into that stuff maybe or maybe

[00:38:08] that's going to be in the third game I can't remember exactly where they cut off right the areas and if you would even make it like back to yufi's hometown in the second game I'm not

[00:38:17] sure to be honest yeah I'm assuming that going back to our hometown is part of the game because yufi is no longer optional so I'm assuming they're retaining that storyline but yeah just just super

[00:38:31] interesting the last thing I want to say here and we need to move on from narrative is that I had played final fantasy 7 crisis core reunion another really long title

[00:38:43] um and I what I didn't realize is that yufi is in that as well actually she kind of has I don't know a pretty secondary maybe tertiary like importance in that but being able to play

[00:38:57] that and you actually see yufi as like an 11 or 12 year old and from what I recall four or five years past between when Zach first goes to nibbleheim and the events of final fantasy 7 as they

[00:39:07] start anyway I'm getting way too deep the idea just being that though like yufi is a extremely like hyper kid and a very you know and that's true of her as a teenager but I thought intermission did

[00:39:22] a great job of showing her as a teenager but also showing her as somebody who develops true convictions like political convictions about what she believes she needs to do and what she is capable of doing

[00:39:36] to stop companies like shinrock well jake with that let's talk about the mechanics obviously you've got the same mechanics here as you do in remake aside from the fact that your companion in this

[00:39:52] game is actually not controlled by the player which I think there's some reasons for that my guess is that a it was probably a lot easier to implement a new character and not have to

[00:40:07] make them fully playable be it's probably something to do with like the story of like hey like this person is not part of the main cruise so he's just like a sidekick right yeah which it adds some I think

[00:40:24] it was fine it was like it did throw me off a little bit when I realized like I couldn't control the second person like you can obviously command them to do attacks it's much more like RPG ish

[00:40:34] in that sense but you can't actually control them and like move around with them one of my frustrations with with uh with that system is that I felt like because of that he died a lot

[00:40:45] when if I could have controlled him I felt like I could have got him out of some harder situation like some more challenging combat situations but overall I mean like again this is what I've mentioned this before but I created a video about the combat system in

[00:41:00] FF7 remake like three or four years ago calling it maybe the best combat I still stand by that this is one of the best combat systems in any game and I think it just absolutely craps on Final Fantasy 16

[00:41:12] and I apologize to people who love who really like Final Fantasy 16 I have nothing against you I think that's great that you love that game but I hated the combat in FF16 because when you

[00:41:25] compare it to this for me it's a complete like it's a complete like that is hilarious good that we could get a little barb in there for Final Fantasy 16 on this episode um yeah the combat is stellar

[00:41:40] I actually didn't mind having having to solely control Yuffie throughout this experience in part because her combat is way fun and I think what they were able to do really well uh in in this

[00:41:53] intermission like in the remake in this telling of her story is combine melee and magic with her because you have her giant boomerang shuriken thing and you can throw it and it'll spin and do

[00:42:07] like just some continuous damage on the enemy that it's you know targeting and then you can keep attacking with different like materia from the background and so and then you can close the gap between wherever you were like launching materia magic and where the shuriken is and so

[00:42:28] I found that like her play style was really engaging because you could be doing so many things simultaneously and it made me really think about like okay well what kind of build do

[00:42:39] I want to make for her what makes sense here so I had a ton of fun um with the combat yeah sonan I kind of treated for the most part as like okay um you get to heal me while I do the attacks

[00:42:52] you know yeah which is a shame but I get it too this intermission's about Yuffie and like you pointed out sonan is not going to be joining you know the party with cloud and crew later

[00:43:03] so I do get it makes sense and it was fun because you can like do combat simultaneously you do like a joint attack on an enemy and that was fun as well too otherwise everything

[00:43:13] else holds like something you get some items items will change how many materia slots you have which can change your play style in different ways um you're leveling up you're getting xp

[00:43:25] all the way up until you get to a final boss which the final phase of that boss was pretty gnarly I gotta say um and but yeah just overall an incredibly fun experience and I also loved

[00:43:36] that you could throw her shuriken to like chop up Shinra boxes to get items from a distance dude what I love that man dude I just can't speak to that that happens a lot in that like factory

[00:43:51] part with the jazz dude dude like I can't you know okay yeah movie hook yeah of course yeah yeah great movie right Robin Williams like weirdest movie ever so weird like if you think

[00:44:08] about that movie for like more than two seconds you realize it is bizarre and it actually has really horrible really around tomatoes yeah but as a kid I was like this thing is amazing I freaking love

[00:44:21] this movie and one of the reasons that movie is so good because the John Williams soundtrack goes so hard in that movie it literally elevates it to a different like it would not be the same movie if that wasn't there and final fantasy seven remake and intermission

[00:44:42] man it just it takes it to a different level it just turns it into it takes it to a different plane of existence because the music is so good if it if that wasn't there like it would be a

[00:44:55] different game that's how powerful and how impactful I think the music is in this game it's just I can't I can't say enough that jazz thing go google that jazz ff7 inter

[00:45:06] integrate jazz sequence and just see how hard they go on that they go really is wild um let's let's keep moving forward the gameplay loop listen the intermission dlc is short

[00:45:19] either like I said there are only two chapters I think I played this in two maybe three game sessions I think um depending on what your time is like I don't know you spend maybe two hours on

[00:45:29] the first chapter three on the second chapter does that sound about right to what your playtime was yeah it's not it's short sweet it gets the job done um and kind of like the remake and where

[00:45:42] things are headed it's really easy to hop in and out but I found it to be more satisfying to really dedicate time to those chapters um there are some side things you can do I'm

[00:45:54] blanking on the name of the minigame um in there and you can do this yes yes right um so you can go and you can play that and there's some side quests and things that you can do um as much

[00:46:08] fun as I did like a few side quests and a few fort condor games yeah they're a ton of fun but no I'm really there for the main story and to get to know you feel better and to see how she plays

[00:46:22] which moving into the gameplay loop it's funny you mentioned that fort condor is it seems like a really beefy part of this of this uh it's like like if you do the fort condor stuff I think it

[00:46:31] would extend your playtime to like 15 to 20 hours potentially yeah because there's a lot of fort condor like opponents that you can go do and actually that's your experience speaking of which when you look at what's going to happen with rebirth over 30 plus minigames

[00:46:46] there's what I'm hearing yeah if the marching one is in I don't know guys it's impossible for it to be higher than a nine out of 10 that marching minigame we'll just knock it like a full point now um

[00:47:00] no but what I'm hearing is the level of minigame in f of seven rebirth is just off the charts wild bonkers crazy and and apparently there's some mixed quality but from what I'm hearing like

[00:47:13] for the most part like apparently there's a full-on rocket league style thing in this game there is a full blown like witcher style card game that supposedly people are saying is better than

[00:47:25] gwent so no we'll see we'll see that's what I that's all I'm just saying that's what I'm hearing that's what I'm hearing through the great time but anyway that's talking about game play loop it's just interesting to note that that is a huge if you're into the fort

[00:47:40] condor stuff and it actually is oh it's a solid like base yeah it's like a solid uh strategy you know similar to like the mobile base builder attack games whatever what is that genre called

[00:47:54] moba's talking about or like clash of clans situation that kind of game I can't remember doesn't matter that that is a big component of but overall gameplay loop is is it's very linear

[00:48:09] like you have people that give quests and then you go to these semi open areas and like linear fashion and complete the quest and that's it and it's like pretty short so nothing crazy to say

[00:48:21] like on the gameplay loop here very similar to f7 remake but just with less content with the exception of having the big component of the fort condor uh challenges which which are scattered all over the map yeah and you know honestly I I really don't think intermission

[00:48:36] as a dlc needs more than what it offers so I think it's a really tightly constructed package and it delivers incredibly well and what what it's selling so I I think it's done super well

[00:48:50] playing this type of a dlc I'm not expecting something like the elden ring elden ring dlc that's going to give me 40 bucks worth of bosses and in exploration and all that stuff so I think the gameplay loop here like I'm I'm repeating myself but it works really well

[00:49:05] because it's linear because it's compact and because there's a lot of heart that sort of goes into that main quest line that there isn't a whole lot of need to deviate unless you're like us

[00:49:17] in your kill and time before you get to play rebirth I'm killing time to play with it by playing let's talk about impact on the industry I think we can just be brief here

[00:49:28] I don't think there's too much to say about this other than we've basically already talked about this the impact on the industry I think I think ff7 remake rebirth is a model for the

[00:49:39] industry moving forward in terms of how they package games how games get worked on and additionally what games get green lighted I think it is an epitome it epitomizes what I think the industry

[00:49:52] is going to move towards it's going to be trusted franchises you're still going to get premium experiences but it's going to be split up over multiple games where teams can dedicate a lot of

[00:50:02] time but ensure that the payoff is going to be there because of how they are setting the fight they're putting together the financials and then make it also so that your game doesn't have to

[00:50:13] sell 30 million plus copies in order to be considered a success right because if you sell you know seven to 12 million copies which is still amazing but if you do that over three games plus

[00:50:27] maybe five million of an expansion then you're going to pay for all that dev cost and make some money and so I think this is what ff7 remake integrated rebirth does yeah that's my opinion

[00:50:38] the one thing that this remake trilogy has going for it is that it is a remake and honestly I'm seeing a I'm kind of creating I don't know if a lot of people are saying this but in my mind

[00:50:50] they I think of it this way like the Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings film trilogy was an anomaly it was a miracle because all the production for all three films was up front and same circumstances

[00:51:01] right it's a reimagining of a beloved story it already has that built-in fanbase and on top of that it delivered an incredible film trilogy and Final Fantasy 7 it kind of checks all

[00:51:14] the same boxes right beloved franchise you've got a great team working behind it you've got the people who were originally behind Final Fantasy 7 and deeply involved right in leadership positions you're chunking it up you're fleshing it out and you are delivering on your promise of a premium

[00:51:32] experience but I do think that because it's a remake it's able to pull this off and so I think Final Fantasy 7 remake trilogy is a beautiful example of how to utilize and create remakes

[00:51:48] of beloved games and not deal with the same sort of pressures and economic problems that a lot of these studios are the where it doesn't connect for me is with new original games like if you're

[00:52:02] creating a new original IP and video game with a brand new cast of characters in a brand new story and it's a triple A studio Final Fantasy 7 remake trilogy is not going to give you super I

[00:52:17] think viable data to try to replicate its model absolutely well Jake any other thoughts on Final Fantasy 7 or uh intergrade intermission it's good I like you Fino um I've since atoned for the

[00:52:32] grudge that I held against her for stealing all your material yeah dude that was a low blow I was pretty annoyed that is a really frustrating and super annoying section of the game which again is completely

[00:52:48] optional but when you get all your materials stolen you're kind of screwed and like the fights are not that easy and you're doing them like without your materia and I believe do you even have your

[00:52:58] gear I can't remember or do you get like I think she just takes the material anyway it might just be the tear but the material is essential right um yeah that's crazy crazy they

[00:53:09] made you feel a lightable character they did it out they did it good for them well ladies gentlemen this has been another episode of the period about his podcast talking about his Final Fantasy 7 intergrade intermission DLC we are super stoked for ff7 rebirth if you haven't played

[00:53:26] these games please go play them rebirth is just around the corner it comes out tonight as of the time of this recording uh we appreciate you listening to this podcast we love every single one

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[00:54:17] want to hang out and chat with us more you can join our discord a link to our discord channel is in the podcast description you can come and chat with us about all sorts of topics it's a great time

[00:54:29] we love chatting with our community there the discord thank you so much for listening and have a great night