They gave Barret a shirt!
We’ve looked at a lot of Clouds over the years. There was that first, blocky boy who jumped off a train and into our hearts. Then came the wolfish up-scale in Advent Children. And most recently, a fresh-faced teen in the trailers for the simply named Remake.
All the characters of Final Fantasy 7 have seen multiple updates to their designs across the years. Let’s take a peek at how their newest looks compare to their origins!
Cloud
Ah, nothing like a sleeveless turtleneck for comfort and practicality.
The biggest change here is a wealth of detail brought over from the concept art and more realistic proportions. We can actually see the… bolt threads? Of Cloud’s… armor? It’s a bold fashion statement to be sure, but the practicality of its use in combat is… questionable.
Also, the hair. Thankfully thousands of cosplayers have done the work of translating the original geometric yellows into feasible wigs. All the design team had to do was model it.
It was probably really hard to mess with this design since we’ve seen Cloud rendered in high-def so very often that every element has become iconic. From his boots’ steel-toe to the tip of his unwieldy Buster sword, this is classic Cloud!
Aeris
Aeris has seen a few subtle changes to her design in the Remake, which seem to be focused on fitting her look more concretely to the role of the ingenue.
Her pink denim (?!) button-down body-con dress from the original Nomura concept art has morphed into a more flowy sundress, the shoulders of her jacket are softened, and her wrist bracers are now gravity-defying bracelets.
Her remake design is full of wonderful new detailing as well. The red jacket is full of zippers and pins and buckles (does it have pockets?) and we can see a tiny bit of flower jewelry in her necklace.
Her bangs have been brought back down to earth in the new design as well. Indeed, her whole hairdo has been made into an impossible instagram-able confection which I am not jealous of at all.
Barret
They gave Barret a shirt! And sunglasses!
And a couple of big leg-pouches. Presumably to hold all of the bullets he’s shooting out of that gun arm. Close examination of the most recent trailer also seems to indicate that he still has that weird metal… corset? Belt? Cumberbund? Oh, well. It wouldn’t be Final Fantasy without a few weird belts here and there.
Barret’s face seems like it might be a little bit softer. He’s certainly less blatantly angry than his original concept art. One can only hope that some of the racial stereotyping has also been re-designed.
I understand that there’s a lot of work still to be done before this game hits the shelves and what we’ve seen in the trailers is not the finalized design, but I do hope the team is able to render Barret’s flattop decently by launch day.
Jessie
Oh, Jessie. Her update has given very specific meaning to the term “breastplate”, as what once was a grey-shaded polygon has now become a fully metal-encased torso. I don’t know how she can breathe in that! There is no visible fabric or gap in her armor.
Her ponytail has also gotten much longer. I didn’t actually remember her original model having a ponytail at all but sure enough, there it was. It was certainly hard to miss in the new trailer with those sweet acrobatic flips over turnstiles and the full hair-whip head-turn. Some effort seems to have gone into making Jessie look a bit more conventionally feminine.
Biggs
Whoa, talk about a glow-up! With this new Biggs as a poster boy of AVALANCHE I personally am very ready to join and save the planet.
What once was “hair chunk with a spike” is a beautifully styled mane leading down to a leading-man-styled jawline, which rises above what look to be TWO t-shirts held down by a leather harness Biggs seems to keep TWO spare clips of ammunition in. I don’t remember Biggs using guns, but maybe he’s got two of those as well. A far cry from the sleeveless tough guy of the original game.
Sephiroth
Much like Cloud, there aren’t a lot of changes that could be made to Sephiroth’s design since every single hopeless Final Fantasy nerd has already mapped its entirety inch by obsessive inch.
We can’t see very much of him in this short trailer, but I’m willing to wager that this will be the same Sephiroth we saw in Advent Children, if a little more high-res.
Aps
Look at this guy! We’re really anticipating seeing more of these iconic enemies from the original Final Fantasy 7 rendered in full gruesome detail.
There have been many instances through the years of updated visions of player characters, but seeing the sheen of sewer water over the mottled blue skin of a beast like Aps is a relatively novel phenomenon. And it looks like it got a bit of an update power-wise as well! Is that electricity coursing through its… horns? We may all have some re-education in front of us on how to fight these bad guys.
Shinra Trooper
You may be wondering why we included these kids, but just look at their new outfits! Gone are the nondescript blue polygons of their previous uniforms and with the new detailing we can get a more complete vision of just how this planet-killing corporation decks out their private military.
Fun! They’ve got scarves now! Is it cold in Midgar? Maybe! They’ve got truncheons now! So they don’t JUST shoot dissenting civilians, they can also bludgeon them! Not that they will. It’s just bullets for the members of AVALANCHE. But isn’t it nice to know that’s a choice they’re making?
What do you think of the new character designs? Let us know in the comments, and for all the soon-to-come news on the Final Fantasy VII remake, stay right here on IGN.
Lucy is an ancient enby who emerged from a secret well deep in the woods to shame mankind, only to find some of them are okay, actually. You can find her cosplay and duck pics on twitter @couldlucy
