Final Fantasy 7 Rebirthis a beautiful game. The sweeping vistas of the original’s empty Grasslands we’d stomp across withgiant, polygon Cloudis now a gorgeous rural hillside littered with rustic hamlets on the fringes of society. Every interior is filled to the brim with detail that makes the world feel truly lived in, like when you stumble on soldiers inJunonplaying with mini figurines, sitting on worn-down sofas with a whiteboard shoved to the side by an old TV. But trying to take snapshots of this fantastical world is as tedious as unravelling old headphones stuffed at the back of your bedside cabinet.
You’re always tethered to Cloud, so half the work is just positioning your character. There’s no option to switch from orbiting to free roam as with most other photo modes, so trying to fly around for the best shot is incredibly awkward. Once you’re in position, you can at least hide your party if Cloud still shows up on the screen, but in moments where you want to snap pics of your companions - like Red sitting down to play Queen’s Blood - you have to painstakingly work to hide Cloud.
Some snaps I took with the photo mode despite the limitations
What makes this even more baffling is that photo mode isn’t just an arbitrary add-on included out of obligation. Final Fantasy 7 Rebirthknowshow stunning its world is and bakes photography into the diverse selection of minigames. In each zone, you’ll find fellow shutterbugs who mark scenic spots on your map where you can snap a picture for bonuses that embellish the photo mode. It drives you to take in environments you’d otherwise bumble through.
But those snapshot markers are at odds with the photo mode’s mechanics. You’re asked to get postcard-esque pictures of your surroundings, appreciating the handcrafted nature of Square Enix’s astounding reimagining, but tethering the camera to Cloud means you can’t escape your party.
Limiting things even further is the lack of options. The intensity of the filters cannot be adjusted and the selection is tiny; you can’t take selfies or change Cloud’s facial expressions, which is made worse by the fact that he always looks like a kid being forced to go shopping with his mum, and there are very few borders, none of which are cinematic, so you can’t play with aspect ratios. Photo mode doesn’t give you the tools to truly experiment, and playing around with it is often a battle in its own right.
I keep hammering home the tedium of a tether, but it means that you may’t fly far into the air to take birds-eye-view shots or truly soak in the world. It’s unbelievably limiting, cutting out myriad ways to frame a picture by forcing you to stay in a small, circular radius. For something as stunning as Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, photo mode is more crucial than ever, but by being so restrictive, it just makes it a nuisance to use.
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth
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Final Fantasy Rebirth is the second part of the FF7 Remake project. It continues the story of Cloud Strife, a former SOLDIER turned mercenary who joins Avalanche, a group of eco-terrorists seeking to save the planet from the malevolent Sephiroth. As the party pushes out of Midgar, leaving the Shinra Corporation devastated, where will their paths take them?
