Sq. Enix
This newsletter incorporates spoilers for Ultimate Myth VII and Ultimate Myth VII Rebirth.
Halfway via 1997’s Ultimate Myth VII, Cloud Strife walks up a small staircase and reveals his better half, Aerith, kneeling on a small platform. She’s locked in prayer as holy-looking gentle streaks in during the home windows round her. That serene second offers method to a surprising tragedy. Aerith seems to be at Cloud and frivolously smiles ahead of the digital camera pans above her head. A black shadow bursts out of the sunshine above her; it’s the villainous Sephiroth, huge sword in tow. Ahead of Cloud can procedure what’s taking place, Sephiroth plunges his sword via Aerith’s again, killing her.
Her frame is going limp as Sephiroth pulls his blade out. There’s no lengthy good-bye. There’s no closure. Aerith dies.
It’s a second that traumatized a whole technology of players. Regardless of how time and again you play Ultimate Myth VII, the end result by no means adjustments. Each Cloud and the participant controlling him are left feeling like they’ve failed their most useful birthday celebration member, a healer who has spent the journey heroically protective everybody. It’s a merciless accident, person who leaves a grief-stricken Cloud questioning if can have executed the rest to save lots of her. Perhaps if he’d proven up one 2nd faster, she’d nonetheless be alive.
Reasonably than dancing round that second, Ultimate Myth VII Rebirth makes that dramatic irony the point of interest of its tale. The remake sequel makes use of Aerith’s forthcoming destiny as a gas for an emotional, character-driven tale about heroes overcoming self-doubt to struggle for a greater long term. That means comes with a significant — and really polarizing — trade to the unique finishing. Whilst it’s positive to infuriate some purists, the grand finale is the precise payoff that Rebirth’s subversive tale referred to as for.
A long term with out future
Proper from Ultimate Myth VII Rebirth’s first bankruptcy, it’s transparent that the sequel is solely constructed round Aerith’s well known destiny. That’s made abundantly transparent proper from the beginning. Its surprising first bankruptcy sees Zack Truthful, miraculously alive after escaping his Disaster Core dying, looking to rescue Cloud and the crowd from Shinra custody. The operation is going all mistaken when a helicopter crashes. Zack pulls Aerith out of the wreckage and holds her as her frame is going limp, simply because it did within the authentic Ultimate Myth VII. For a second, it seems that that Aerith is, as soon as once more, useless.
After which, whiplash.
All at once, we’re again with Cloud and his buddies, together with an excessively a lot alive Aerith, as they proceed their adventure to prevent Sephiroth. Everyone seems to be wearing on as though not anything’s came about. It’s a maddening second, and person who Rebirth takes its candy time following up on. For an extended bite of the tale, avid gamers are left at the hours of darkness. The place’s Zack? Are we coping with exchange universes? Is Aerith useless? The ones questions dangle over the peppy journey for an excruciatingly very long time, with solutions teased out via a handful of cryptic interstitial scenes.
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That second creates a stress that carries via all of the journey. Proper from the soar, Aerith’s looming dying appears like a tangible risk. Even if the birthday celebration effectively killed the idea that of future in Ultimate Myth VII Remake, that doesn’t imply Aerith is secure. Tragedy can nonetheless strike at any second. However by way of the similar token, it’s now not too overdue to save lots of her both. Regardless of being probably the most recognized spoiler in online game historical past, Rebirth effectively turns Aerith’s destiny into a complete thriller.
That dynamic is vital to accepting how Rebirth ultimately subverts gaming’s maximum memorable collection. Strip apart all of its wacky timeline shenanigans and also you’ll to find that Rebirth tells a grounded, human tale about characters who in point of fact consider their futures are unsalvageable. Regardless of definitively regaining their loose will on the finish of Remake, every member of the team has change into their very own worst enemy. Cloud is satisfied that he’s sure to change into like Sephiroth, with any heat succumbing to callous indifference all through the tale. Barret is petrified that his overprotective cling over his daughter, Marlene, will suffocate her. Everyone seems to be coping with some type of grief or trauma, all of that have planted seeds of self-doubt of their heads.
In Remake, the crew had to triumph over the God-like manifestation of future to regain their loose will. In Rebirth, they’ve to defeat a lot fiercer foes: themselves. It’s now not a low-stakes struggle to tame non-public nervousness; Aerith’s again is at the line.
A choice to motion
En path to the Town of the Ancients, Rebirth waits to play its complete thematic hand till a key collection with Zack. Halfway during the tale, we in spite of everything get a less assailable thought of what’s happening in his asides. Zack reveals himself in some kind of exchange timeline except the sector we all know. There, the citizens of Midgar face an forthcoming apocalypse — one whose arrival is signaled by way of a fractured sky. If it takes some time to totally piece that in combination, it’s as a result of that’s exhausting to glean from the folk round Zack. Everybody in Midgar slightly recognizes the location or turns out specifically fascinated by saving themselves. They’re resigned to their destiny.
Zack isn’t having any of that. In a brief speech, he expresses his frustrations with the truth that everybody has given up so simply. That second finds his position as a super foil to Cloud. The place our blonde hero is brooding and hopeless, Zack is bright-eyed and made up our minds. He has just right explanation why to be too; he defied his personal dying in opposition to all odds. Perhaps his model of Gaia is past saving. Perhaps Midgar’s citizens are proper to suppose they’re too small to stop an apocalypse. However that doesn’t imply that everybody will have to simply roll over and let it occur.
Even if confronted with the unattainable, it’s all the time value combating for a greater long term.
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Zack’s name to motion lays the groundwork for Rebirth’s finale. In its penultimate bankruptcy, Aerith’s destiny starts to really feel extra inevitable as the sector rather actually narrows. The place many of the recreation takes position in wide-open biomes the place avid gamers can stretch their legs and discover freely, Bankruptcy 13 takes the crowd to the Temple of the Ancients. It’s an extended and linear dungeon that calls again to the restrictive degree design of Remake, again when characters have been fated to transport in a single predetermined course. Rebirth subtly inspires that claustrophobic feeling once more as Aerith’s dance with future approaches. The stress reaches its boiling level.
The hard bankruptcy can pay off — now not with a flashy boss struggle, however with key moments of expansion for our heroes. On the middle of the temple, every birthday celebration member undergoes a tribulation the place they’re compelled to stand their insecurities. They see their pasts: the folk they’ve misplaced, their screw ups, all the emotional luggage. It’s a healing second, one the place everyone seems to be compelled to drag up the anchors retaining them again. By way of the top of it, there’s a way that the team has have shyed away from changing into just like the hopeless citizens of Zack’s timeline.
With self-defeat forged apart, they’re in spite of everything in a position for his or her largest problem … despite the fact that it approach going through some other tragedy.
Schrodinger’s Aerith
Regardless of how in detail you realize the unique Ultimate Myth VII, not anything can get ready you for Rebirth’s ultimate bankruptcy. Reasonably than just heading to the Town of the Ancients and staring at Aerith die, Cloud reveals himself in a surreal collection that virtually performs like an RPG model of An American in Paris. It’s a surreal, balletic collection whose arrival is telegraphed two chapters previous by way of a efficiency of Loveless, an epic play throughout the Ultimate Myth VII universe. It’s now not only a fan provider for individuals who’ve all the time sought after to peer an absolutely discovered model of the play; it’s making ready avid gamers for the theatrical finale.
A lot of the grander plot is published within the finale stretch, too. We be informed that after one thing deviates from destiny, like Zack surviving a firing squad, it creates a brand new timeline. Sephiroth’s final plan is to reunite the ones fractured timelines, reducing out any variables in his final quest. The more difficult you learn into it on a natural plot degree, the extra holes you’ll to find.
However Rebirth’s finishing isn’t intended to be taken so actually; it offers in some just right out of date symbolism. Ahead of the massive finishing, Cloud and Aerith to find themselves wandering via Zack’s international on one thing of a date. One collection sees Cloud going to other boulevard distributors and given a collection of presents to shop for for Aerith. It doesn’t matter what he chooses, the service provider as an alternative gives him one thing solely other. It’s a last manifestation of his final nervousness: that he gained’t have a call in Aerith’s destiny.
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It’s the closing second of self-reflection Cloud will get ahead of he’s compelled to in spite of everything face his largest worry. In a demanding collection following the dreamlike collection, he enters the Town of the Ancients and reveals Aerith in a well-known pose. She’s as soon as once more praying, surrounded by way of holy gentle. The whole thing starts to play out proper on cue. Black feathers fall from the sky because the digital camera whips up. A black blur at the ceiling temporarily beneficial properties its shape. Sephiroth dives down, sword in hand. Historical past is ready to copy itself … after which, a conflict of metal.
Sephiroth’s sword doesn’t pierce Aerith; it’s intercepted by way of Cloud’s Buster Sword. A long time of catharsis burst out. Aerith is stored.
That reduction is short-lived. In a chaotic collection harking back to Michael Haneke’s devious Humorous Video games, we unexpectedly flash right into a extra acquainted timeline. Aerith lies bloodied, the ill results of Sephiroth’s timeline reunion. An international-bending conflict ensues, the place Cloud fights the One Winged Angel along each Aerith and, ultimately, Zack They triumph over Sephiroth, but it surely’s some other timeline pretend out. Sephiroth in the long run leaves Rebirth victorious. Zack is shipped again to his international, Aerith lies useless, and a grief-stricken Cloud is apparently left torn between worlds, in a position to peer the death sky of Zack’s timeline and Aerith’s ghost.
It’s so much to unpack.
What does all of it imply?
LikeRemake’s polarizing finishing, the collection is bound to antagonize Ultimate Myth VII purists. A justifiably crucial learn may just go away one miffed with a “multiverse” curveball that softens gaming’s largest tragedy. Sq. Enix doesn’t wimp out on killing Aerith, but it surely does give avid gamers the lacking closure of her 1997 dying. Rebirth has its cake and eats it too by way of making a Schrodinger’s Aerith: She’s each stored and killed, alive and useless. There’s even a glimmer of hope that she may well be completely rescued partially 3 by way of undoing Sephiroth’s reunion.
Even though it can be an emotionally difficult finishing for fanatics, Rebirth couldn’t have ended every other manner.
Aerith’s pseudo-death creates a multilayered conclusion for the birthday celebration’s collective arc, person who’s wealthy with nuance. Sure, Rebirth is a story of heroes overcoming self-doubt and finding out that they’re masters of their very own destiny, but it surely’s practical in its optimism too. Even though you’ve gotten the facility to switch one thing, that doesn’t imply you all the time can. Aerith’s deadly go back and forth to the Town of the Ancients is one thing of a suicide project. It’s a long-standing fan principle that’s made extra specific in Rebirth when the Aerith in Zack’s timeline tells Cloud that she’s going to die. Like Zack’s Disaster Core dying, she is aware of she is also sacrificing herself to prevent Sephiroth in the longer term. That’s her option to make, now not Cloud’s.
Sq. Enix
We don’t all the time get the danger to save lots of the folk we like. We will be able to take a look at our highest to be careful for them, simply as Barret worries that he’s obsessively doing so for Marlene, however there’s no method to totally give protection to anyone on this unknown adventure of lifestyles. That may be irritating. After I suppose again to buddies I’ve misplaced, I nonetheless have moments the place I beat myself up. Since dropping one good friend to a freak automobile twist of fate a couple of years in the past, I’ve continuously questioned if I can have avoided it by way of inviting them to hang around that day. Perhaps that might have pulled them clear of the intersection the place he used to be struck by way of a automobile. It’s a complete myth, but it surely nonetheless haunts me once in a while. I’ve needed to paintings via that grief over the last few years, and now not let the at-times random inevitability of dying prevent me from combating for my family members.
Cloud undergoes a an identical arc in Rebirth’s finale, regardless that it’s person who performs out on a extra supernatural scale. The instant the place he quickly saves Aerith isn’t a bodily victory, however a psychological one. In that second, Cloud has totally triumph over his self-defeating view of destiny. For a temporary second, he sees that he’s now not incapable of being a hero. He has the facility and resolution inside of himself to save lots of Aerith. That’s now not in the long run what occurs, but it surely’s now not his fault, neither is it future. Existence shakes out otherwise.
The empathetic great thing about Ultimate Myth VII Rebirth‘s subversive finishing is available in the way it permits Cloud to just accept that Aerith’s dying isn’t a private failure. He did the whole thing he may just to save lots of her, overcoming his personal nihilism to give protection to anyone he loves. That’s a heroic act that merits to be celebrated, despite the fact that it doesn’t save you her homicide. Existence is going on within the wake of tragedy; you’ll be able to’t simply prevent combating.
On the finish of the journey, there’s a rekindled resolution within the grief-stricken Cloud. He’s reborn. He’s extra motivated than ever to defeat Sephiroth, despite the fact that he’s left haunted by way of Aerith. He gained’t change into like the unhappy saps of Midgar, looking ahead to the inevitable apocalypse to wipe all of them away. Cloud goes to struggle for a greater long term and the folk he loves proper all the way down to his closing breath, despite the fact that the chances appear unattainable. He is aware of he’s able to it; he’s observed his blade trade historical past simply lengthy sufficient to just accept he has the facility.
Existence isn’t outlined by way of our previous struggles. It’s the way you upward push to fulfill the following problem that issues.
Ultimate Myth VII Rebirth is out now on PlayStation 5.
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