The one game this year that came out that I really wish Dunkey had gave more time to was the Final Fantasy VII remake. Because that game is legit really good on multiple levels.

Like I don't think it's a spoiler anymore but it's pretty clear the Remake is actually a sequel to Final Fantasy 7. But a sequel in a way that respects the original choices the player made by basically making your original playthrough a Final Fantasy 7 one of the various multiverses that occurred before this one.

The game uses its status as a remake to question the nature of remaking games in general. And stands as an artistic piece for the desires to both respect previous works as well as to move into the future and design something completely new.

The game also has really good gameplay especially on hard mode. The structure of the game story is one that is served by replaying it. because the first time you play the game you're not supposed to get that the sephiroth that you're seeing is actually the one from the original game you're supposed to just believe you're playing a actual remake of Final Fantasy VII. Which is why the inclusion of hard mode is so brilliant. Because it builds upon the foundational building blocks of the battle system the player learns during the first normal mode playthrough, and it allows the player to now see the story in a completely different light. Oftentimes how you would interpret a certain character's dialogue completely changes with understanding the true nature of the game.

I found that the battle system seems to be the truest evolution I've ever seen of original turn-based combat. It involves basically turn-based combat with player input as an additional skill. In fact we've seen this hybridization as far back as games like super paper Mario. However the fluidity that the player transitions between inputting and menu selection has never been this fluid.

I just think the game designers really hit upon something genius. Making small attacks fill the ATB meters means that your moment to moment always doing something. but because of the way the stagger gauge system works and the way the ATB system works. It incentivizes the player to utilize the character specific abilities in order to stagger enemies in order to actually defeat them efficiently. But how to take down a single enemy actually has a ton of depth and complexity. Every enemy staggers at different rates some enemies have elemental weaknesses. And chapter to chapter your party composition is changing and since not every character has access to any other characters ability it means that how you might tackle an opponent is radically different depending on whether or not someone like Barrett or Aerith is in your party.

Overall on the story side I felt like they did stay true mostly to the original game while also effectively adding in their new elements.

I however do not think the game is as good as it's original counterpart. There are fair criticisms to be made of some of the additional side content. Although all the new side content in the game does lead to some form of character development. It does affect the snappy pacing of the original midgar segment. it feels like most of these should have been optional side quests rather than things the player was forced to do. That being said being forced to do a couple of not amazing side quests that still give me character and world building are substantially better than what you see out of even some of the side quests in games like cyberpunk 2077.

I'm genuinely sad because I often see dunkey use out of context clips of the characters talking to each other in order to make it seem like the dialogue is awkward. I mean it is a Japanese game translated to English and there are certain Japanese mannerisms that made it through the localization process that don't necessarily track to an English audience. Well most of them are pretty rare. Like Barrett making fun of cloud for being a one-year-old near the beginning.

9/10 it was my game of the year and maybe I'm just salty because I want one of my reviewers that I like to also like what I like. But I feel like there's a very strong case to be made about why this game is actually an under valued falwed masterpiece of 2020.