Final Fantasy VII Rebirth – 17 June 2022 – the second game in the trilogy announced for Winter 2023 (potentially December 2023) along with Crisis Core Reunion

To celebrate the 25th anniversary of Final Fantasy VII, Square Enix hosted a virtual event that lasted around 10 minutes on its channel on Friday, 17 June 2022 starting from 8:00 am. Unfortunately the live stream was unreliable and had some issues early on but it then managed to get underway and had a smooth sailing from the reveal of Final Fantasy VII Ever Crisis.

The event starting with a reel showing the Compilation of Final Fantasy VII along with its new logo to celebrate the game’s 25th anniversary. The game’s executive producer Kitase Yoshinori hosted the event. It showcased many new merchandise including figurines of Roche with his motorbike and a Shinra soldier with their motorbike along with a Buster Sword digital clock and celebration vinyl with select songs. Plus it was announced that Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade would be released on Steam on 17 June 2022.

As the reel continued, I was a little anxious that we wouldn’t get anything interesting because all that was being shown was more merchandise and plugs for the mobile game First Soldier (which I don’t play) and the announcement that Ever Crisis would be out for closed beta in 2022. The trailer for Ever Crisis showed some faithful recreations of both Crisis Core and Final Fantasy VII with chibi characters on the overworld, while full character sizes in battle, and cool cinematics. The trailer ended with the famous Nibelheim moment with what looks to be a potential tease that history may be rewritten.

Then there was footage of a cinematic of what looked to be the big thing that Square Enix was hyping but not yet announced and I immediately sat up thinking this is it…

It ended up being a trailer for the remake of Crisis Core titled Crisis Core – Final Fantasy VII – Reunion. The trailer showed that the game would be using the same engine as Final Fantasy VII Remake and it looks to be a slick and faithful remake of the PlayStation Portable game with the new voice actors. The game looks heavily improved, but it is obvious that some of the models are less refined and crisp. The cinematics for certain sections look like they have been redone from the ground up like the summoning attack animation for Bahamut. Overall, I was pretty stoked by this reveal. I was pleased to see that the game will be released on several consoles, including the Nintendo Switch, this Winter 2022 (or Summer 2022 for Australians).

I thought the event was over after seeing Crisis Core titled Crisis Core – Final Fantasy VII – Reunion and then the trailer for Final Fantasy VII Rebirth (or Final Fantasy VII Remake Part 2) was revealed. Check it out:

It’s not a long trailer but it focuses on Cloud, Sephiroth, Tifa and Zach. Even though it was short, my excitement levels were definitely up, because it means we may have two big Final Fantasy games being released in 2023 (both Final Fantasy VII Rebirth and Final Fantasy XVI). (Seeing this, all I wanted to know was when is Final Fantasy VII Rebirth being released?) Luckily the reveal shows that it’s coming out next Winter 2023 (Summer 2023 for Australians) for the PlayStation 5 and I can’t wait.

We were also told how many games would be in this Final Fantasy VII Remake series. Final Fantasy VII Rebirth will be the second game in what will be a trilogy of games.

So how long will Final Fantasy VII Rebirth be and how much of the original story will be covered? My guess is that it is likely that the events of Nibelheim will be in this game, but if I had to guess we could see it go as far as the Forgotten Capital or when Cloud hands over the black materia to Sephiroth in the Northern Crater. Perhaps we may have an alternative ending to one that fans expect. In any event, I am excited and wish the team well.