Final Fantasy 7 Remake HANDS ON: 8 Ups & 3 Downs

5. The Characterisation

Again, away from the decision to make Tifa look like something you could rent out for 30 mins provided you rinsed it out after, the work done on realising these characters on a modern console is stunning. Cloud is about as perfectly pitched as he could have been; brushing everyone away with cold indifference but still showing faint signs of concern underneath it all.

Biggs, Wedge, and Jessie have been made more three-dimensional than they were in the original, with the impending inevitability of their fates considerably harder to stomach after only a few minutes with them. And Barret, while occasionally slipping into 'bad stereotype' territory, at least feels true enough to the original character that an OTT Macho Man Randy Savage vibe just about works.

Our antagonists here, most notably President Shinra and Heidegger, are straight out of the 90s Hollywood Baddie playbook, but given the way, we know the narrative unfolds it's forgivable.

Finally, the time I had with the game sadly meant no encounters with other party members like Red XIII, Cid, Cait Sith, Yuffie or Vincent, and the sections of the game I saw tragically didn't include low-key MVPs The Turks, but the early signs are definitely promising.