Final Fantasy 7 Remakefinally arrived to thunderous applause early last year, and fans are already looking to the future for more. This ambitious remake project intends to remake and reinterpret all ofFinal Fantasy 7, one chunk at a time. In addition, it appears to be intent to tie up loose plot strings from the oldCompilation of Final Fantasy 7. Now that Square Enix has trademarked the familiar sounding term “Ever Crisis” around the world, fans are trying to piece together what, exactly, this all could mean.
The nameEver Crisisimmediately brings to mindFinal Fantasy 7: Crisis Core. That game, released for the PlayStation Portable in 2007, tells the story of Zack Fair, Soldier First Class and Cloud’s friend while they were serving in Shinra’s military together. Thanks to revelations inFinal Fantasy 7 Remake, Zack’s tale is suddenly of great importance once again, and there may bevital links betweenCrisis Coreand whatEver Crisisis. Finding them now could prepare fans for whatever Square Enix plans next for theRemakeanthology, as with the ending ofFinal Fantasy 7 Remake, it has become abundantly clear that anything could happen. Because of that, this article containsSPOILERS FORFINAL FANTASY 7 REMAKE.
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The Compilation Is At Hand
Something fans immediately noticed whenEver Crisiswas first trademarked was the similarity to the oldCompilationnaming scheme. While not every entry inFinal Fantasy 7’s expanded universeshared this, the majority of the “important” entries did. Entries in theCompilationhad subtitles that began with a word that had one one of the first letters of the English alphabet, and ended with a word starting with the letter “C” (likely in reference to theCompilationitself).
Products named this way includeFinal Fantasy 7: Advent Children,Before Crisis: Final Fantasy 7,Final Fantasy 7: Dirge of Cerberus, andFinal Fantasy 7: Crisis Core. That’s an entry for A, B, C, and D, andEver Crisisfits in cleanly as the E. There is a decent chance that there will be one more product with the subtitle initials “F C”, in reference to “Final Fantasy” and the “finalCompilationentry” by the time the lastRemakegame comes out.
So, knowing that, how does theRemakerelate toEver Crisisif it is aCompilationentry?Final Fantasy 7 Remaketies directly into Zack’s death scene as it was presented inCrisis Core, and there is a passing reference toCrisis Core’s villain GenesisinRemake’s back half. However, there are also many large hints surrounding Sephiroth and theRemake’s final battles that seem to hint atFinal Fantasy 7 Remakebeing a direct sequel toFinal Fantasy 7: Advent Children.
The biggest piece of evidence for this are the three Whispers fought before Sephiroth. Rubrum, Viridi, and Croceo use the same weapons and fighting styles as movie villains Kadaj, Loz, and Yazoo fromAdvent Children.Sephiroth’s early appearances also suggestthat he’s familiar with the plot ofFF7already, and he seems to be pushing for things to go differently much like the protagonists. While this is all circumstantial evidence at the moment, the fact thatFinal Fantasy 7 Remakeis a sequel toFinal Fantasy 7opens the door for all kinds of story tie-ins.
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The Promised Zack
Even ifEver Crisisis not its own game, the presence of the word “Crisis” in its title andCrisis Coresuggests some strong link between the two. AsFinal Fantasy 7 Remakewill be ending its one-year period of exclusivity on the PlayStation 4 soon, a potential rerelease onPC, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/Scould have additional content relevant to the end of theRemake. Now that the Whispers have been defeated and the timeline can deviate from the original game and existingCompilationtitles, Zack Fair, and potentially the entire Avalanche crew, can survive past their previous deaths and reappear later in theRemaketitles. IfEver Crisisis the “definitive edition” ofFinal Fantasy 7 Remake, fans may not even need to wait that long to see them again.
There is a small chance that parts of theRemakecould be remade with Zack present instead of Cloud. In the backstory ofFinal Fantasy 7, Zack was killed in the wasteland surrounding Midgar in an attempt to reach it with a barely-functioning Cloud. Now that he’s survived in theRemaketimeline, not only would he have made it to the city alive and with Cloud in tow, if they were to have spent any amount of time together afterwards, there’s a good chance the Cloud Strife of before would stop existing due to hismemories being unscrambled early. That would pave the way for Zack to join Avalanche, reconnect with his ex-girlfriend Aerith, and play out the entire Midgar portion ofFinal Fantasy 7in Cloud’s place.
That is the most extreme example for what could happen, but that’s not to say it won’t be referenced inEver Crisis. A bonus chapter could be unlocked in the ending that allows players to control Zack in the initial bombing run instead of Cloud, with new dialogue and even new posters in the subway to reflect the altered timeline. The player could follow Zack all the way up to the point in Chapter 2 where Cloud and Aerith are supposed to meet, see the beginnings of that reunion, and cut to a teaser forthe nextRemakeentry. It’s not much, but it’s definitely a scenario that’s been playing out in fans' minds for over two decades, so it would be nice to see it animated with theRemake’s cinematic quality.
Final Fantasy 7is currently standing at a precipice. It feels like anything could happen now, and the promise ofEver Crisisseems to indicate that theCompilation of Final Fantasy 7is coming back in a big way. Even so, there is a chance theCompilationtheming could start and end withEver Crisis’ name, so all of this theorizing could be for naught. All that can be done right now is wait on potential news updates that could come as early as this year, judging byall the Ever Crisis trademarks coming out, or as late as years from now. Hopefully the reunion at the end of this is satisfying, and theCompilationcan be put to rest.
