Poll: What Do You Think of Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth's Ending?

It wouldn't be a true Final Fantasy ending if there wasn't room for interpretation. One of the aspects I love about the series. I'm excited about all the theory crafting that's bound to happen over the next three years.

I had a glitched PS1 copy back in the day that wouldn't let me continue to disc 2. For me, I was finally getting the continuation of the story.

After 20 years, spoilers of the original were known so I expected what came, but the explanation on exactly what was changed as far as fates go is a bit confusing. I'm hoping for clarification on the finale.... some time in 2027.

To me, it was convoluted and set up an interesting but worrying precedent for the third entry. Not to mention how much emotional impact it sucked away from the big event.

I had no clue what the heck was going on

It was kind of stupid. I really dislike the idea of Cloud still thinking Aerith is alive. It destroys a major part of his character arc where he had to deal with that failure and regret. It also took the air right out of the big finale moment. Just poorly thought out overall, imo.

Nomura can't resist adding additional layers of confusion to every story he directs.

I still enjoyed Rebirth overall but the ending was dumb.

I feel it's a ending that you can only understand if you played the original and know what's comes next for Cloud and the state he's in. All the events do match up with the original though.

I do think it's a shame they treated the death of Aerith this way. It would have made more impact if they showed it completely and started the weird timeline montages after that moment. I understand that they wanted to show the mental state of Cloud during it but it took away the impact the original had.

I'm looking forward what the last game will be and how it all comes together.

I thought the ending was handled as well as it could have been. Had they decided to spare Aerith entirely, more people would have probably been mad, as odd as that seems.

The multiverse style of timelines is not my favorite style of storytelling because it feels like it cheapens the narrative.

I thought it was pretty clear she is still dead, at least in what I'm just going to call the Main Remake Timeline.

That said once you bring in Zack and his strange time-line... then I'm completely lost. 😅

I liked it a lot - without going into spoilers I'll say I like the general idea behind the remakes, even if it's not necessarily the same as the beloved original. Good game.

I'm still upset they gave me hope for a second that Cloud saved Aerith.

How do you make the famous death in video game history impactful a second time around? You give me hope that it can be changed and then take it away. I thought they handled that just fine for the most part.

Interesting concept for the next game but I feel like the impact of Aeriths death is ruined by everything else they tried to cram into that moment leaving me more confused rather than sad in that moment. On top of the fact that Cloud can somehow see her despite the rest of party thinking she is dead is pretty dumb. Either commit to her being dead or keep her alive, don’t do this half killing her thing which is really confusing. Other than the ending the rest of the game was great though.

@Martijn87 @glennthefrog I think I'm in agreement with both of your comments. Part of me quite likes how weird things get, but at the same time, the impact of Aerith's death hits nowhere near as hard when you don't actually see it happen. I think the direction could have been much better.

I like that we get a moment where it looks like Cloud saves her. That was a real "holy sh*t!" moment for me. But then for it to cut between different realities and have her just be dead in Cloud's arms... The fake out could have been really meaningful with, again, clearer direction.

And yeah, it's one of those where it's much more effective if you're already familiar with FF7. Square Enix trying to sell this trilogy like it's great for newcomers still baffles me!

I didn't really know what was happening tbh.

the scene didn't have the impact (or shock) of the original.
the whole story is disappointingly convoluted.

• Aerith's personality is a bit annoying overall.

I enjoyed the ending and think it really did something better with enhancing Cloud's unreliable mind and psychosis. Folks want to make up all these insane timeline issues when I really don't see it as all that complicated, and that it is alluding to variations of worlds can live in the lifestream, but doesn't mean they are actual timelines.

One thing I realized upon second viewing, which was brilliant is the fake-out of Cloud saving Aerith, he didn't actually save her at all and she isn't actually alive in another timeline. It was Cloud's broken mind making the entire thing up. Even Aerith's hands moving up to Cloud's cheek, she didn't do that. Cloud is so far gone mentally he is the one holding Aerith's hand to his face and he's actually talking to a corpse.

Anyway, I cried. I found it to be a fitting ending and not as confusing as many want to make it. End of the day, Cloud is now completely insane and has no idea what's real or not, and Tifa/Barrett realize he is now completely off.

Wow, what a way to spoil that FF7: Rebirth has an ending. Never again Push Square, never again

I think no one is able to fully understand what happened and imo Aerith’s death shouldn’t have been handled as ambiguous as it was.
I didn’t play the OG FF7 so I honestly don’t have that nostalgia goggles but I still knew what was gonna happen, and after actually thinking my answer for a few minutes I can’t say other than disappointingly convoluted.

And don’t get me wrong, all up until Chapter 14 it was a 10/10 game for me but the ending just didn’t cut it, it’s unclear and convoluted and it heavily takes away any emotional impact of THAT moment.

I remember throughout the end of Chapter 13 and beginning of 14 I was nervous af anticipating THAT moment, when it finally happens you parry Sephiroth and you seemingly save Aerith, then multiversal ***** happens and turns out she’s dead, but wait not really, but wait again she actually is (?), like I just don’t understand what happened and I couldn’t experience any emotion, it left me incredibly confused when I should’ve been devastated.

I think it works. The execution was a little too busy, but the end result hits just as hard. Maybe even more so because I've never had to let that moment sit with me like I do now.

I really liked the ending, rather than just show Aerith dying it also shows how completely screwed Cloud's mind has become where he thinks he still saved her. Even Tifa and Barret are noticing that Cloud isn't the same person as before. Really made me invested to play the final game.

@glennthefrog Once again like so many other people have said, Nomura did not direct this game. Nomura was the one who wanted the game to stay faithful.

Aerith seems be a Schrödingers cat, both alive and dead. Sepharoth didnt and doesnt need to turn into a giant monster again. I face palmed at that moment, he is more intimidating as he is. Zak not staying in the same timeline by the end and biggs not playing a bigger role did suck. Cloud having the black materia and absorbing it into the buster sword without saying a word seemed off but that can go places storywise in the third so il allow it lol in all i didnt mind the ending, it raised the stakes for the final part but they need to handle the multiverse stuff properly or the story will become incomprehensible

I didn't find it all that confusing, but I do think that the way it was presented really killed the impact of Aerith's death. Replaying the original FF7 earlier this year, and I still get emotional at that scene when it comes up, despite playing through the game many times over the years. But I was just completely untouched by it in Rebirth because of how poorly it was presented. It should have been more impactful with today's technology, but they found a way to make it less impactful in the end, which is...pretty astonishing.

Absolute trash, so much so that I'm going to skip the third part of the game. Nothing like being told "let's change fate and destiny" over and over again only to have the ***** end plot giving you the exact same childhood trauma but this time in 4K and a bloody PhD to understand it.

This is why Nomura should've stayed in designs where he belongs instead of attempting to write a story. Such an insult the OG plot.

Not everything needs to be a ***** Kingdom Hearts

@Paper_Yoshi I couldn't agree more. One thing that ran through my mind not only through the ending, but through many other parts of the game was "they have no sense of subtlety in storytelling". The building Aerith was in was swarming with whispers, Sephiroth showed up (yet again) as they approached the building, they even had to add multiple phases to Jenova afterwards which reverts from Aerith's theme to Jenova's theme (while Jenova is my favorite FFVII track, it did NOT belong in that boss fight).

I haven't played remake/rebirth yet, waiting for the whole thing to release in 100 years, but couldn't resist the spoilers because...it's not like I don't know the OG story and am curious how they're handling this. Just hearing what they did without seeing it myself, I'm not convinced they've "fully killed off Aeris" despite what they did or didn't show. They wouldn't have gone gone out of their way to not show it, leave it as the "cliffhanger" ending, etc if they weren't planning to do something with it. IDK if they'll kill her off or not by the end of the third game, but I imagine they intend to do more with her ,whether it's that she's in-party, or that her spirit can't connect with Cloud with the "power of the Ancestors" or whatnot. Guaranteed, she'll reprise in part 3 one way or another.

But if they start part 3 in the cave with no freaking healer like the OG, I'm out lol!

@QiaraIris "Not everything needs to be a ***** Kingdom Hearts" Not even Kingdom Hearts should be Kingdom Hearts. Sometimes what seemed "creative" 20+ years ago just turns out to be bad writing.

Thought it was quite clear that through Cloud's perspective, Aerith is alive, due to his warped and damaged mind mixed with mako poisoning that the game showed so many times. But in reality, she is truly gone and among the lifestream.

It was more depressing seeing the others (especially Tifa) grieve out in the grass field while Aerith's spirit could only stand idly and watch her friends. It also tied in with Advent Children where Cloud could still talk to Aerith's spirit.

The confusing thing though was with Zack's timeline. I was expecting by the end there'd be some definitive conclusion with him when he and Cloud merged for the fight. Such as him and Aerith reuniting in the afterlife or something. Have to wait until part 3, I guess.

They tried to remove the original brutality from the scene overall, and gave us some wonky " clouds having a mental breakdown" is Aerith Alive?
No she isn't the story remained the same, just made annoyingly difficult to understand for some reason, rather than just been direct

I assumed the Aerith death scene would be different so I was already prepped for that. I honestly don't even super hate what happened as she did still die (which I'm SO grateful for from a narrative standpoint). My issue is the WAY it was executed. I get the logic behind showing it from Cloud's deranged perspective and seeing his broken brain invent a reality that she's still alive even though she clearly isn't. That whole leaning into his psychosis is cool...but it just robs the most famous scene in RPG history of any emotional impact. It would have been better I think to have had it play out just like the OG, then backtrack after the final battle to see how Cloud perceived it as the twist into the ending.
Ultimately though, I'm convinced in game 3 when Cloud gets his head set straight we will see the death and water burial scene as it actually happened.

I think it completely diluted down the impact of Aerith's death, a process which begun when Cloud initially saved her (but didn't really, as it was all in his head). In the original, the point was she was there, and then suddenly she was gone, and he could never see her again. In Rebirth he can't seem to get rid of her.

@Paper_Yoshi totally with you on this - it just doesn't work. Such a shame.

Spoiler for pt.3: aerith spirit travels to the secondary world body and wakes up, while cloud still on the wheelchair will wake up later once he falls in the lifestream (only for a short period then he will return to its original dimension)

@mariomaster96 Kept thinking this is all Cloud's fever dream. Whether or not, the events are real in that universe was certainly room for debate.

They air balled a layup

The missing pool scene and the scenes that were missing from the credits that are clearly big spoilers for part three, and the way they're revealed will have the ultimate say on how impactful this is. We've not seen the full story yet. Loved the way it was done so far.

In a vacuum the best thing they could've done is stay completely true to the original. The original scene in the forgotten capitol is still beautiful, but having it remade in the FF7 Remake style would have been even more breathtaking.

If they had done that in FF7 Rebirth though, it would've made the whispers, the theme of defying destiny, and the meta teasing about this being an unknown journey feel pointless.
I'll admit, when I saw a certain sequence, I was initially floored (in a good way). Then the confusion set in.

Overall, I currently think the endings is "fine". I feel that I mostly understand what their vision is for this FF7 remake series. Seeing as how the other parts of the story that have thus far been changed have all added significant improvement and context, I'm willing to put my faith in Square that the concluding part of this series will have the payoff we expect for everything.

Basically, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt here. It will be tough waiting a few years for these questions to be answered though.

Im not gonna go for Part 3. At least not until its eventually on PC and on sale. The direction with the story and the pacing of the game itself with all the minigames and padding just was off to me.

I have not finished the game. Last played it back in early march. Just got out of the Golden Saucer.

You know I loved it! The criticism for the lack of impact on the most pivotal scene is completely earned. But I hadn't played the original. At least, not very far. I also didn't like the scene at the end with Cloud, Aerith and Sephiroth. I know this was the graphical pinnacle, but I feel like this was why I didn't like it (maybe performance mode has something to do with it).
Anyway, I loved it (the ending). I had thought that Cloud did save Aerith, but that the convergence and the reality that his friends see solidify that Sephiroth indeed did kill Aerith. I was upset by the lack of impact, so I was placated by the difficulty spike. I died so many times that I got to re-experience this scene at least ten times. A multiverse inside the lifestream.
I'm having a hard time going off to play other games, Because I feel like I'm still not done with this one yet, and I've been playing for over 150 hours.

Btw, I think they did good by Zack. Will he save Cloud? All the Clouds? At the expense of Zacks'? I'm glad that he was so optimistic and level-headed.

Take the wheel, Square Enix. I trust you to finish this.
But, P.S., Cait Sith's death was more devastating than Aerith's.

I don't understand why some realities merged but others didn't. Aeris had to die but Zach is still running around??? Overall it still broke my heart wide open, more so the grieving of the team in the final scenes over Aeris actually dying.

@ShogunRok I'm a week late but I'll say it anyway. I don't think or believe that it was switching between realities and it's more to do with Cloud denying what's happening in front of him in real time. There was what was really happening and what was happening in Clouds head and it was flicking between the two. That's my belief anyway, it's obviously confusing on purpose though.

@QiaraIris This is a lot of misdirected hate. Nomura didn't write it and is actually always the one pushing for it to be more faithful and I think it's Nojima who is the one who wants to change things the most.

Kingdom Hearts ***** is just Final Fantasy ***** let's be real.

I honestly have no idea what happened in the end. Prior to be completing the game, I saw posts saying saying the ending was amazing... and I felt it was just meh