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When I discovered the magnitude of the character I’d be portraying, that’s when the real homework began.ĭid you look through Cloud's other appearances in things like Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children to prepare for the role? When I first auditioned for the character, everything was pretty anonymous. However, my older brother is a longtime fan. I had not played the original Final Fantasy VII prior to taking on this role as I was all of two years old when the original was released. What's your history with the original Final Fantasy VII? Here’s what Cody Christian has to say about bringing one of gaming’s most iconic characters to life.Ĭloud plays darts in Final Fantasy VII Remake. The end result is a fresh take on Cloud that still feels entirely in line with over 20 years of history. for weeks to hear the variety of fight noises and understand a bit of the character’s movements and special abilities.” “I even played as Cloud in the most recent Super Smash Bros. “I was all of two years old when the original was released,” he tells Inverse. The funniest thing about Christian’s pitch-perfect performance is that the actor never actually played the original game. While Christian hasn’t gotten the call to reprise his role for the sequel or Intergrade yet, he says he’s ready for round two. The unabashedly delightful performance netted him a nomination for Best Performer in a Lead Role at this year’s BAFTAs. The voice actor portrays Cloud in Final Fantasy VII Remake, perfectly straddling the line between badass and lovable doofus. That means we’ll be seeing much more Cloud over the next few years. There’s a sequel, an expanded re-release, a battle royale game, and a definitive compilation in the works. One year after its successful remake released, Square Enix is doubling down on the game. This makes the second part of a remake of a nearly 25-year-old game extraordinarily appealing to play, an impressive feat in itself.Final Fantasy VII isn’t going anywhere. His metaphorical rise from the dead opens so many doors for the second part of the remake that it is hard to predict where Zack's story will go, but his survival is undoubtedly going to have some absolutely huge ramifications in the next game. Only now it is not only the memory of him that lives in Cloud that is important, but the actual character himself. Zack's original importance and his revival in the remake elucidate how deep and twisting the lore of these games are. Zack still evokes mystery though, as he did in the original game. Since Aerith, Cloud, and Sephiroth all have close ties to Zack, his survival will likely heavily influence the direction of these characters' stories. Other huge questions about Part 2 of the remake concern the fates of Aerith and Sephiroth in particular, as well as the rest of the cast of characters. Final Fantasy 7 Remake Part 2 is going to deliver a brand-new story in terms of where Zack goes next, which adds even more to the already soaring anticipation around this game. However, everything released up until the remake had a definitive death date for Zack, so his story ultimately ended at the same point. Additional ending scenes added to Final Fantasy 7 Remake Intergrade seem to imply that Zack is alive in the same universe as Cloud, possibly disproving the fan theory that the Zack seen at the end of the remake is in an alternate universe. Numerous points in the remake emphasize that this is not the same game players remember from 1997, and Zack's survival is a big one. These changes truly solidified the remake as something much more than merely a remaster of the same game with new technology. This has huge ramifications for where the plot could go in the second part of the remake, as originally Zack was merely a ghost in the narrative without an active role.
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Arguably one of the biggest of these surprises is a clip at the end of the game showing that Zack is alive, having survived the encounter with Shinra infantry that originally killed him en route to Midgard. The Final Fantasy 7 Remake threw a couple of curveballs players' way, including the mysterious Whisper creatures and a rewritten canon.
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