The State of Play presentation ended on a high note with the official reveal for the PS5 version of Final Fantasy 7 Remake called Intergrade. The next-gen update for one of 2020’s biggest releases features a slew of expected upgrades like higher fidelity, graphical and performance modes, and a new photo mode. But, a big surprise for fans of Final Fantasy 7 Remake was the surprise reveal of a new episode coming exclusively to the PS5 version of the game featuring Yuffie, the materia-hunting ninja who was an optional character in the original game.
Expanding her story beyond that of a secret character is a good move for Square Enix and helps to set expectations for the future of the remake project. Ultimately, fans weren’t sure what to expect from the State of Play presentation, but it certainly delivered on this front.
In the original Final Fantasy 7, Yuffie was an optional character that players could obtain via random encounters with her. Her presence in the game’s story, and that of her home country of Wutai, was completely possible to avoid. Now that FF7 Remake Intergrade will introduce Yuffie formally to the game, it brings her into the story’s forefront and has implications about the story’s focuses going forward. Her presence also heavily implies some changes to the core story even from before the now-infamous defeat of the Whispers in FF7 Remake.
One thing that FF7 Remake did well was to flesh out not just the city of Midgar, but also the relationships between Shinra and the people throughout the world of FF7. The game explores the tensions among the citizens of Midgar as they worry both with the oppression of Shinra’s corporate army but also with the external threat of attack from the country of Wutai. In the original game, Wutai is a purely optional locale and its history with Midgar (and Shinra) is mostly hinted at more than directly addressed, but the free PS5 update for FF7 Remake will thrust Yuffie into the spotlight and with it the story of Wutai’s conflicts with Shinra.
The original game doesn’t do much to explore it, but FF7 Remake did a lot more to expand on the conflict between Wutai and Shinra. Wutai had been a country rich with materia, the magical substance that facilitates the use of magic in FF7’s world. Naturally, the evil corporation of Shinra saw suit to invade Wutai in order to obtain access to its powerful resources. This change in FF7 Remake was a welcome one for many fans, and helped to round out players views of both why Shinra was so worthy of ire and the game’s world at large.
From the trailer shown at the State of Play, it seems Yuffie is operating as an actual operative of Wutai in FF7 Remake, which helps to make her character seem more engaged with the world. In contrast is her character in the original, as even if players explore her backstory through the optional Wutai scenarios, she isn’t portrayed as much beyond a thief. These “secret” events were done well enough at the time, but FF7 Remake needed to treat Yuffie well if it had planned to incorporate her as a main element of the game. It seems that Square Enix has made some bigger plans for the young ninja going forward.
Interesting also is the seeming incorporation of Yuffie’s presence into events that were happening concurrently as the main events of FF7 Remake. There had been fan theories about her being present at certain moments throughout the game and this new episode will likely confirm or deny those theories. Many fans of the series weren’t expecting to see Yuffie until FF7 Remake Part 2, so her presence was a welcome sight during the presentation.
The trailer also sees Yuffie traveling with several cohorts that seem to be all-new characters. Of the newly featured characters only one was given a name, Sonon, and he appears to be another ninja from Wutai. The two are introduced for the first time at one point in the trailer and, at a later point, are seen having somewhat of a disagreement. Seeing how this relationship affects Yuffie and how it might flesh out more elements about Wutai’s culture is an interesting thread for fans to follow. Attempting to speculate about what else will be changing in the world of FF7 Remake has been a fan-favorite activity since even before its release, and the changes made to Yuffie’s introduction also bear some interesting implications.
As most fans are of aware at this point, FF7 Remake changed many elements of the game and its protagonists in often slight ways. But an overarching theme of the game was fate, and in that, there were strange enemies called Whispers that existed in order to maintain the “original timeline” of FF7. The game ends with Cloud and the rest of Avalanche defeating the Whispers and in essence defying fate, opening the doors to big changes to the story later on. However, Yuffie’s episode is clearly happening at the same time as the events of FF7 Remake, meaning that these different events are happening before the defying of fate. It will be interesting to see if Square Enix treats this as one of the small changes or if Yuffie will herself have to deal with the Whispers.
Regardless of speculation, it seems pretty clear that Square Enix has some big plans for how it will be changing the main storyline of FF7 Remake. How it has chosen to introduce Yuffie bodes well, and was one of the features FF7 Remake needed to execute with care. It has interesting implications for the development of the Wutai and Shinra relationship, and is likely a good idea of how it will handle FF7’s other famous secret character Vincent Valentine.
Final Fantasy 7 Remake Intergrade will be available for PS5 on June 10, 2021.
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