The first entry in the ongoing Final Fantasy 7 trilogy, Remake covers the entire Midgar portion of the original game. However, where the original spent about seven or so hours in the neon-lit city, Remake expands the chapter to a full-blown 40-hour adventure. So, what happens across those few dozen hours? Let’s dive in.
Bombing Mission
Final Fantasy 7 Remake opens the same way as its ’97 counterpart: with the bombing of Midgar’s Sector 1 Mako Reactor. The operation is carried out by the eco-terrorist group Avalanche with a little help from our game’s main character, Cloud Strife. Cloud Strife is not a member of the ragtag team, but rather a mercenary brought on for this particular mission due to his knowledge of the reactor’s layout. You see Cloud is a former Soldier, an elite member of Shinra Electric Power Companies standing military.
As for why a power company needs its own military, in the world of Final Fantasy 7, Shinra essentially owns and operates the bulk of the world. The company rose to power after it discovered it could tap into the planet’s life force–or lifestream, as the game calls it–to withdraw mako, an energy source used to power people’s homes and way of life. The only downside to all this is they kind-of, sort-of might be killing the planet while also contributing to poverty, class warfare, and gross inequality–hence why Avalanche is intent on shutting down their operations.
Alongside Avalanche founder Barret Wallace and members Jessie, Biggs, and Wedge, Cloud successfully infiltrates the reactor and places a bomb on its core. After a few battles, a narrow escape, and an explosion much larger (and more lethal) than anyone at Avalanche anticipated, we see via the Shinra security cameras a couple very interesting things: President Shinra was watching the group the entire time, the bomb was a dud, and the explosion set off was actually courtesy of the Shinra company itself.
Meeting Aerith
In order to avoid suspicion, Avalanche separates and joins the panicking crowd. As Cloud navigates through the chaos, rubble and ruin, he begins to hallucinate an encounter with Sephiroth, a formidable figure original Final Fantasy 7 fans (and Smash Bros. players) will be very familiar with. Cloud chases after the caped man until the fiery illusion is broken by a young woman, Aerith Gainsborough, asking him if he’d like to purchase a flower.
The pair’s meet-cute is interrupted, as Aerith is swarmed by ghastly, hooded figures who are invisible to Cloud until the pair make contact. While Aerith is able to flee the scene, the ordeal catches the attention of nearby Shinra officers, who begin to hunt down Cloud. The ever-cool-headed Cloud narrowly escapes by jumping aboard a moving train and reunites with the rest of Avalanche. The team then heads to the Sector 7 slums, where their hideout and Cloud’s childhood friend, Tifa Lockhart, await their return.
The Sector 7 Slums
Tifa greets the team as they arrive at her bar-turned-Avalanche headquarters, Seventh Heaven, and expresses concern over the operation and the amount of damage the team did to Sector 1. While Jessie feels similarly, Barret and the rest of the team are largely content on moving to the next target–albeit without Cloud’s pricey services. Tifa takes Cloud’s lapse in employment as an opportunity to help Cloud establish himself in the neighborhood, rents him an apartment near hers, and offers to help him find clients around town. Cloud accepts Tifa’s help, but alarms her when he almost attacks his frail, murmuring neighbor who wears a cloak and reminds Cloud of Sephiroth.
In the midst of Cloud and Tifa’s quest to find Cloud work, Tifa’s friend Johnny is taken by Shinra’s Public Security team under suspicion of him being a member of Avalanche. Worried he might let her involvement slip, Tifa asks Cloud to join her in rescuing the gullible goofball. After the pair take out the soldiers holding Johnny under arrest, Cloud prepares to kill him to ensure he won’t let the info slip. However, a distraught Tifa quickly stops him, and Johnny leaves, vowing to never return to the slums.
Though Cloud’s time with Avalanche has seemingly come to a close, Jessie approaches the merc with a mission of her own: to help her find a new blasting agent that won’t cause as many civilian casualties, as she still is under the assumption her bomb caused Sector 1’s devastation. Cloud agrees, and follows her, Biggs, and Wedge to the wealthy part of town, which resides atop the plate above the slums. On the way, Cloud is confronted by a Soldier named Roche, who expresses a peculiar interest in Cloud. The group continues to the Shinra employee housing district, where Jessie’s parents live. While Jessie, Biggs, and Wedge distract Jessie’s mother, Cloud sneaks in through the back to steal Jessie’s father’s work ID. Cloud discovers that her father is in a comatose state after suffering from mako poisoning while working for Shinra, a major factor in Jessie leaving her budding theater career to join Avalanche.
Atop the plate, we get a bit more of Cloud and Tifa’s backstory, as the stars remind Cloud of the promise he made to Tifa back when they were teens. On a starry night in Nibelheim–the pair’s hometown–Cloud told Tifa he was leaving with some of the other village boys to become a Soldier. Tifa then asks him to promise that if she is ever in trouble, he will be the one to come save her; Cloud agrees.
Back in the present, Jessie breaks into a Shinra building using her father’s ID, but the team is quickly overrun by Shinra troops until another Avalanche cell shows up to help them escape. As a thanks for helping her, Jessie promises Cloud the pair will soon go on a date. The next day in the slums, however, Jessie is attacked by the same hooded figures Cloud and Aerith encountered. Her injuries force her to sit out Avalanche’s next mission, and Barrett begrudgingly rehires Cloud. Barrett, Cloud, and Tifa head to the next reactor via train, but their IDs are flagged as suspicious, causing them to abandon the train and head to the reactor via a series of tunnels.
After reaching the reactor and arming the bomb, a hologram of President Shinra reveals to the trio that he has been watching their work and broadcasting it to the public, as presenting Avalanche as a threat increases public support for the Shinra company. He then deploys a high-end weapon to eliminate the group. While Barrett, Tifa, and Cloud survive the scrap, the resulting damage causes part of the walkway they were standing on to collapse, sending Cloud plummeting down to the Sector 5 slums.
Flowers Blooming In The Church
Cloud collapses through a church roof and wakes up in a bed of flowers, after which he is reunited with Aerith. Aerith explains to Cloud that she is being hunted by Shinra’s elite black ops division, known as The Turks, and asks him to be her bodyguard. Cloud agrees and enters a battle with an agent named Reno, almost murdering the man before the hooded figures intervene.
Aerith convinces Cloud to stay the night at her and her mother’s home in Sector 5 and return to Sector 7 the next day. Cloud agrees and the pair get to know each other a bit better, as well as take on Reno’s partner, Rude. Later that night, Aerith brings Cloud back to her house where the pair are chastised by her mother, Elmyra. Elmyra resents Cloud for being a Soldier and thus inviting more danger into Aerith’s life; Cloud understands her concerns and agrees to leave in the middle of the night.
However, Aerith hears Cloud sneak out and takes him to a nearby park, where she reveals that her first love was also a Soldier First-Class. Aerith reveals the name of her former flame to Cloud, but we are unable to hear it, as Cloud’s ears begin to ring at the mention. The pair then notice a carriage passing through the park, and Cloud realizes Tifa is in the back. Aerith informs Cloud that the carriage is headed to a powerful slumlord named Don Corneo’s manor, and Tifa is in danger.
The pair head to Wall Market, the slums’ shady entertainment district, and discover Tifa has been “recruited” as a potential bride for Corneo. Cloud and Aerith decide to get elaborate makeovers themselves in order to present themselves as potential brides as well and sneak into the manor. After a rather risque massage and a fantastic dance performance by Cloud, the pair wind up in the manor and Cloud is reunited with Tifa. The trio confronts Corneo, who lets it slip that Shinra will soon be dropping the Sector 7 plate down on Sector 7’s slums, killing all those who live beneath it. He then opens a trap door, sending them down into the sewers.
The destruction of Sector 7 Slums
Cloud, Tifa, and Aerith race through the sewers and a train graveyard to get back to the Sector 7 slums, which is under attack by the time they arrive. The trio overhears a Shinra broadcast purporting that Avalanche is currently attacking a pillar vital to keeping the Sector 7 plate standing, all while Barrett, Jessie, Wedge, and Biggs are fighting their hardest to defend the pillar against Shinra’s planned detonation. Cloud and Tifa set off ahead to join the rest of Avalanche in fighting Shinra, while Aerith rushes to Tifa’s bar to ensure Barrett’s young daughter Marlene makes it out of Sector 7 safely. Aerith rescues Marlene while 7th Heaven burns to the ground, but the pair are confronted by a Turk named Tseng, who agrees he will get Marlene to safety if Aerith comes with him; Aerith agrees.
Cloud scales the tower, and is devastated by the loss of both Biggs and Jessie, the latter of whom dies in his arms. Cloud, Tifa, and Barrett reach the top of the tower and face off against Reno and Rude, and while both are severely injured by the ensuing battle, the trio ultimately fails to stop the Turks from both taking Aerith and destroying the pillar, thus dropping the plate down on Sector 7. Barrett, Tifa, and Cloud manage to use a cable to escape Sector 7, but are devastated by the loss of their loved ones and homes.
Barrett, consumed by grief over his daughter’s presumed death, becomes enraged. However, Cloud tells him he believes Marlene is safe at Aerith’s house. The trio heads straight there and discovers Marlene is alive and safe under Elmyra’s care. Elmyra then opens up to the group about why the Turks are so interested in Aerith, revealing that she is actually her adopted mother and that Aerith’s biological mother died outside a train station after she and her daughter escaped a Shinra research lab. Elmyra decided to take in Aerith, but quickly noticed the young girl has strange powers–including the ability to communicate with the dead.
Aerith and the Ancients
The Turks soon track Aerith down, and tell Elmyra that Aerith is an Ancient, a near-extinct race with mystical powers tied to the lifestream. Naturally, Shinra is interested in exploiting Aerith’s abilities for personal gain, but Elmyra tells Cloud that she doesn’t believe the Turks would ever hurt Aerith, as they’ve never used force against her.
The trio goes back to the Sector 7 slums and find an injured Wedge as well as an underground Shinra research facility. As they explore the facility, the team discovers that Shinra has been conducting experiments on living beings to create monsters. However, the hooded specters prevent the group from exploring too deeply, and they return to Aerith and Elmyra’s house, Cloud now insistent that they should rescue Aerith.
Cloud floats the idea to Elmyra, who says she needs a night to think about it. Cloud agrees, and he, Barrett, and Tifa settle in for the night. At this point, Cloud has a special conversation with whichever teammate he has formed the closest bond with. With Barrett, the pair discuss the other sects of Avalanche and Cloud promises to meet them once this is all over. If he meets up with Tifa, he consoles and embraces her as she breaks down over everything Shinra has taken from them. Cloud also has the chance to meet up with a dream-like version of Aerith, who tells Cloud to not grow too attached to her, as she suspects her time with him won’t be long.
Infiltrating Shinra HQ
Elmyra ultimately agrees with the team that Aerith needs to be rescued, and they set off to Shinra HQ to rescue her. After another trip to Don Corneo’s and the sewers where he now hides out, the team eventually finds a means to infiltrate the Shinra building. Cloud then deduces that Aerith is probably trapped in Hojo’s office on the 65th floor, as he is the head of Shinra’s research and science division and would most likely be observing her. However, a detour to the 64th floor allows the team to overhear a Shinra C-suite meeting in which President Shinra denies Midgar head of urban development Reeve Tuesti the necessary funds to rebuild Sector 7. President Shinra states that now that they have Aerith, they will use her Ancient ancestry to find the Mako-rich “Promised Land” to build Neo Midgar. Hojo adds that he also plans to breed Aerith with Soldiers to produce more Ancients.
The trio shadow Hojo to his lab where they bear witness and battle some of his grotesque test subjects and eventually rescue both Aerith and a feline-esque character referred to as Red XIII. Hojo remarks that Cloud bears resemblance to a Soldier, but is fairly certain he was not a part of the program, which causes Cloud’s head to pulse once again. However, Hojo is ushered away by the cloaked figures before he can further interrogate Cloud.
A short while later, Cloud collapses after sensing a creature called Jenova is near. He eventually comes to in Aerith’s old room at Hojo’s lab, where she explains to the party her Ancient–or Cetra–heritage, and states that she hasn’t the faintest idea on how to lead Shinra to the Promised Land. The team leaves the room and finds a tank labeled Jenova, which holds the body of the humanoid creature. Red XIII explains she is Hojo’s most precious test subject. The party explores a bit more–warding off more of Hojo’s experiments as they do so–before coming back to the tank and realizing Jenova is no longer there.
Jenova unleashed
The team follows a trail of blood to President Shinra’s office, where they find a cowering President Shinra asking them to save him. After Barrett rejects his offer, Sephiroth appears and fatally stabs the President. After killing Shinra and stabbing Barrett, “Sephiroth” reveals himself to be a cloaked man similar to the one who lived by Cloud in Sector 7. He then transforms into a form of Jenova, Jenova Dreamweaver, and attacks the group.
Following the battle, one of the specters appears and heals Barrett, confusing the party, who is unsure of whose side the spirit-like beings are on. The team then notices another “Sephiroth” carrying away Jenova’s body, just before President Shinra’s son, Rufus Shinra, lands his helicopter on the building and has an intense one-on-one showdown with Cloud.
After Cloud defeats Rufus, he races to join the rest of the party in their attempts to escape Shinra HQ. The team steal a truck and a motorcycle from one of the building’s exhibits and race away, fighting off Shinra mobile units as they do so. While the team manages to escape Shinra, the road out of Midgar leads them to Sephiroth. Sephiroth tears a passage into the air, then asks Cloud to follow him. However, before the team enters, Red XIII explains that the specter-like beings that have been intervening through their journey are called Whispers, and they are essentially arbiters of fate whose only purpose is to ensure the predetermined path the world is supposed to follow happens.
The fight against fate
Upon this realization, many moments throughout Final Fantasy 7 Remake begin to make more sense. Throughout the game, the Whispers ensured Cloud met Aerith at the right time, Cloud attended Avalanche’s second bombing mission (subsequently sending him tumbling through Aerith’s church), Reno was spared by Cloud, Barrett survived being stabbed by Sephiroth, and more.
The gang then enters the portal and faces off against both Sephiroth and the Whispers. By the game’s end, the team have temporarily defeated Sephiroth and the Whispers, thus freeing themselves from the bindings of fate. The team reaches the outskirts of Midgar and Aerith expresses a fear of the unknown. Later, we see clips of Biggs recovering from his thought-to-be-fatal injury and a dark-haired man–Zack Fair–leading a collapsed Cloud to Midgar. These cutscenes seem to indicate the existence of a Final Fantasy 7 multiverse, where the predetermined path explored in the original Final Fantasy 7 is only one of many scenarios that could have played out.
Episode Intermission
Remake’s one-and-only DLC, Intermission follows Yuffie Kisaragi–a previously optional party member–on her journey to Midgar to retrieve a legendary piece of materia from Shinra. Upon arriving, Yuffie meets up with one of Avalanche’s many cells, but finds herself frustrated by their goal of freeing the city from Shinra, as she believes the city is so connected to the company it is not possible. However, Yuffie approves of the more action-oriented Barrett and Tifa who are lamenting the loss of Cloud following the Sector 5 bombing when she catches a glimpse of them; while a brief moment, this incident gives us a better idea of when exactly this story takes place.
Yuffie then meets up with her partner, Sonon, and the pair obtain false employee IDs in order to infiltrate Shinra HQ. During the mission, Sonon compares Yuffie to his younger sister who was killed during a Shinra raid on Wutai, clearly upsetting the presumably love-struck Yuffie. However, the pair continue on their journey until they are confronted by Scarlet, Midgar’s head of weapon development. Scarlet informs Yuffie that Shinra does not have any legendary materia and sends a number of Shinra weapons at the pair. While these machines are bested by Yuffie and Sonon, the tables turn when Scarlet deploys the top-secret military organization Deepground on them.
Nero the Sable, one of the Tsviets or leaders of Deepground, pursues the pair and is ultimately defeated by them. However, as Yuffie and Sonon prepare to leave the facility, Nero rises once more. Sonon quickly shoves Yuffie into the elevator to help her escape, sacrificing himself to ensure she goes free. Yuffie escapes in time to see the Sector 7 plate dropped, effectively killing an eighth of Midgar’s population, and cries out in grief and anger over everything the company has taken from both her and the world.
What’s next
So there you have it: everything you need to know before playing Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. For the next part of the trilogy, we’ll be following Cloud and the team starting from the quiet city of Kalm, all the way to their fateful showdown at the Temple of the Ancients. Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth will be released exclusively on PlayStation 5 on February 29, 2024.