FF7 Revelation Sets Up a Rude Awakening for Cloud
Sephiroth’s got his number
By breaking the original story of Final Fantasy 7 into three parts, the team behind Square Enix’s ambitious remake trilogy created a challenge for themselves. Remake has the iconic reactor bombing mission to kick things off, but how do you recreate that magic three times over? Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth opens with a dread-inducing sequence detailing the Nibelheim incident five years earlier. Now, Final Fantasy 7 Revelation takes a similar, though more rapid-fire approach, steering headlong into Cloud’s fractured mental state at the end of Rebirth.
During a roughly 40-minute hands-on demo of the game’s first chapter on a PlayStation 5 Pro, I ventured into the Northern Crater, took the newly playable Cid and Vincent for a spin, and watched Cloud tiptoe right up to the brink of collapse. The time flew by, and I came away ravenous for more — even if I remain mostly unconvinced that Revelation’s newest tweaks to the remake’s combat system are entirely necessary.
From what I can tell, Revelation picks up very soon after Rebirth leaves off, with Cloud and company departing the City of the Ancients to pursue Sephiroth at the Northern Crater. As the party ventures deeper, they begin to feel the intoxicating effects of all the Mako energy in the area (it’s like the Force, but also magic soul petroleum). Barret and Cid comment that they’re feeling tipsy. Yuffie wants to go home to Wutai, fearing an imminent Shinra invasion. All the while, Tifa continues to unconvincingly ignore Cloud’s rapid deterioration, for her own sake as much as his.
Most of the preview took place in the Northern Crater, which gets a splashy glow-up in true FF7 Remake fashion. Whereas the PS1 originally depicted this area as an endless, green-black pit in the ground, it’s got more of a trippy, cosmic feeling here, with massive crystalline formations and shimmering aurora borealis ribbons weaving through the sky. In the original game, it’s a drab place where you spend a whole lotta time, so I’m pleased that there’s nicer scenery to enjoy this time around.
As Cloud and friends journey to the center of the Planet, they get into a few fights along the way, allowing me to get acquainted with Revelation’s two new playable characters, Vincent Valentine and Cid Highwind. Vincent functions like a hybrid of Barret and Red XIII, with long-range standard attacks that make him a nice option when the fighting gets hectic or Cloud is getting pummelled. Hold R1 for about two seconds and Vincent will transform into the werewolf-like Galian Beast, which is tanky and ferocious, if a bit slower than Red’s spinning sidewinder attacks. I found Cid a little harder to appreciate at first — until I realized if you simply hold down the basic attack button (Square on PS5), he’ll unleash a nonstop barrage of quick little stabs with his polearm. Among his arsenal of skills are a couple of dragoon abilities, which see him leap high into the sky and do a plunging attack. Both newbies feel comparable in power to Cloud, and once I get my hands on the full game, I’d be curious to see how the power creep with Cid and Vinny feels compared to earlier characters like Yuffie and Cait Sith. They’re good! Maybe too good!
Though the system won’t be available at this early stage of the final game, my Revelation demo did allow me to test out the new FITS (or “Function-Integrated Tactical Suitwear”) system, essentially a swappable job mechanic that allows your party members to customize their skill loadout. Cloud was using the Summoner FIT, which allowed him to channel either Ifrit, Shiva, or Titan to add elemental effects to his attacks. If your ATB gauge fills in time, you can also do an elemental tag-team Synergy attack with your chosen summon. It’s fun, and I can see it being very useful in more challenging or optional boss fights. That said, I found the addition of Synergy tag-team skills in Rebirth pretty superfluous, and this left me with a similar impression. I’m curious to see some of the other FITS roles, but at first blush it’s yet another submenu dragging down Remake’s otherwise snappy and thrilling action-driven combat.
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From a storytelling perspective, this early stretch of Revelation manages to accomplish a great deal in a relatively short period of time. As the squad complains about the Mako in the air, we’re rapidly reacquainted with their personalities, their banter, inside jokes, and pressing concerns. Everyone is largely as we left them, with the exception of Red XIII, who is now addressed as Nanaki in all in-game menus and speaks with his chipper kiddo voice instead of his gravelly old man voice after Rebirth’s events in Cosmo Canyon. This is a departure from the original game, where he was always Red, and a very welcome one. That’s his real name, and his friends should call him that!
The momentum picks up after the party mulches through another incarnation of Jenova, and Sephiroth appears — but only to Cloud. Sephiroth has a new voice actor for Revelation, with Critical Role’s Travis Willingham replacing Remake and Rebirth actor Tyler Hoechlin, who was unable to return for the third game. Honestly, I found the change more jarring than expected, but I hope to be persuaded as the game goes on.
After taunting Cloud very bisexually and pointing out that he doesn’t have a number on his arm like the other Shinra test subjects, Sephiroth shows Cloud, Tifa, and Barret a black-and-white version of the Nibelheim incident. It’s then that Cloud finally remembers Zack Fair, though he hasn’t quite pieced together the whole story. Undaunted — and wholly unprepared for what he’s about to find out next — Cloud plunges further into this phantasmic recreation of his hometown, daring Sephiroth to show him more. Yes, Square Enix has found another banger way to open one of these games. And, much to my chagrin, that’s where the demo ended.
There’s much more of this story to tell, but one thing is clear: the end is nigh. Everything about Final Fantasy 7 Revelation has a flourish of triumphal, well, finality about it, from the splashy new FITS worn by Cloud and his companions, to the new flashes of color adorning the in-game menus. The fate of humanity may hang in the balance, and the Planet’s dyin’ as we speak, but even the dreary old Northern Crater has never looked more colorful and alive. The spring can’t get here fast enough.
Final Fantasy 7 Revelation will be released for Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 5, Windows PC, and Xbox Series X on April 8, 2027.