The Game Awards last night had many different appearances, but one that only had a smaller showing was Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. Many people expected a full-on trailer to be shown because the game was only a few months away, but we only got a partial trailer in conjunction with the orchestra playing the game’s official theme song in “No Promises To Keep.” But, thankfully, Square Enix was willing to pick up the slack for that and released a more complete trailer showing off not only the footage from The Game Awards but also more in-depth cutscenes with new characters and teases of the future.
For example, we not only see all the characters we know, but several we haven’t seen in full yet. Vincent makes his full-on appearance after the team “awakens him” from his coffin. We also see the arrival of Cid, who asks Aerith if he can help her in any way. We also get teases of the gameplay, including many of the summons that you can do within the second title of the remake saga.
Another tease we get is with the changed storyline. We see multiple scenes with characters who have never interacted before, and it’ll be interesting to see how it all plays out. For example, we see Zack Fair finding Biggs, who is wondering why he’s alive. Zack even finds Marlene, and she has a dire message for him.
But when you get to the back half with the “No Promises to Keep” song on full blast, we glimpse the crux of the potential changes. Specifically, we see more of Aerith and Cloud and how their bond is growing quickly, and it all leads to a shot of Aerith in a familiar pose with black feathers descending all around her.
The team behind Final Fantasy VII Rebirth has acknowledged that the second game will end in the location where Aerith dies in the original game. But they’ve been hinting heavily that things won’t go the way they did before, and this seems to tease that even more. Zack isn’t supposed to be alive, and destiny has already proven to be changed, so will Cloud, Zack, and the others be able to save her again? Or will this be one crossroads that the team can’t go in a different direction within?
You can watch the full trailer below and get the game when it arrives on February 29th.