Hey, I'm the one doing the FF7 Re-Edit on Youtube. I've done a Dark Crystal fan edit before and a Hobbit supercut as well. But now I'm working on Final Fantasy VII. This project is going to last years.
If you follow this account, you're going to see me post when videos launch and otherwise you won't see me much. This is the tumblr equivalent to subscribing to the YouTube channel, and I have other blogs for other projects and my real life.
You can skip this intro - no prior knowledge is required to enjoy FINAL FANTASY VII, but you can read about what you are about to see here (
Along with links to the videos, I'm going to blog about my process making the eps. This will keep the YouTube pages free of my ramblings (or my obsessive AerTi shipping).
Attached is the Glossary and beneath is the Table of Contents.
7R - The series of games being used for the production.
Beacause - 2011 fan translation of the OG.
Bullet Time - a term for a slow-motion
Table of Contents
Links will take you to the videos with the behind the scenes notes!
We open with the first image from Chapter 17 - Cloud in a bed. The POV shot of him looking from the ceiling to the door was done by me, featuring my Remove Cell Mural mod.
Shinra Building Original Colors by FantasyRaiderr once again adds a subtle whitening to the walls that make Shinra HQ feel more sterile. The prison doors three-in-a-row reflect the original layout of Shinra HQ, although the rooms are allayed differently in Remake.
Since this sequence isn't in Remake, I felt like I had to take more care to establish the eerie tone for this sequence. Shots are slow as I introduce the theme Trail of Blood by Nobuo Uematsu (EC version).
The dead MP in the hallway is from Chapter 16, during one of the fights I cut. Staggering that enemy caused him to bend over such that I could freeze him and manipulate him to be slouched against the wall there.
When we return to Tifa in the bed, I play with model swaps again. Cloud and Tifa are switched in this scene, requiring three mods: Model Swaps by juijub to turn Tifa into Cloud, and Tifa Invisible Weapons by Narknon to remove her weapons from "Cloud." Lastly, Tifa Replace Cloud by Natsukashii1111 allowed us to swap Cloud's model for Tifa without crashing the game.
For this shot, I needed Tifa to run out first, pursued by Cloud. The game can't do that with the default models, so I kept Tifa and Cloud swapped. I also used Model Swaps to turn Aerith into Tifa, and then had "Tifa" and "Cloud" run from the room. If Cloud has a slightly girlish gait here, it's because he's using Tifa's running animation, while Tifa is using Aerith's. I considered trying to cut this shot altogether by doing one of my patented "camera pans around the environment" coverups, but without a shot like this the story isn't quite clear, so it has to stay.
The shot of Tifa rescuing Aerith is pretty funny to me, just because of the cocky way Tifa is standing. It's because she's using Cloud's animations, of course, but even with Cloud's animations she doesn't usually look so posed. At least it's literally a pose that Tifa's concept art is doing lol.
For the shot where Cloud opens the door on Red XIII, it's actually a composite shot! To get Red XIII curled up like that, I had to go back to Chapter 16 and grab him from the holding cell, placing him safely on the right half of the frame. Then I had to keep that camera angle on memory (aka I couldn't exit the program) navigate back to Chapter 17 and open the door as Cloud on the left side of the frame. Then I composited the shots together - quite proud of myself :)
The other Barret and Red XIII shots are from that long scene that starts Chapter 17, although at different angles to fit the scene we are creating. Invisible Whispers removes the pesky ghosts.
The take where Barret and Red XIII are running up behind Aerith and Tifa is another one where I shrunk Cloud down and put him just out of frame, causing characters to run to be nearby him (Tifa and Aerith were already close enough as to not need moving). I swapped Tifa and Aerith in order to keep Tifa's arms bare for continuity.
To get this shot of the materia, I had to load Chapter 16 again and head into the vents - that's when this purple materia is loaded into the gamespace. Luckily, that cell room is also loaded at the same time, so it was simply a matter of moving the materia from the vents to the cell.
This line of "Let's check our materia" does a lot of heavy lifting, summarizing about an hour of someone's average playthrough so far fiddling through menus. On to the blood and gore!
Trail of Blood
To get the dead bodies here, I froze the game and descended from this floor down to the lower levels - particularly the staff lounge and the conference room floors. The first shot is a still shot because the blood is actually a static image superimposed onto the frame - the blood splatter is clipart, I colored it to look like it's interacting with the room's light source, but I still wanted it to be starkly red. A shocking image!
More bodies are strewn in this dutch angle shot. Yes, that is Chadley. But don't worry! It's fine if you smash him, he's all right.
Jenova Chamber
Another "go through the floor" sequence makes pretend like the Jenova chamber and Hojo's lab are connected like in the OG.
Jenova is gone, and a trail of blood leads from her tank towards the elevator. The blood is censored in remake to be bubbling purple goo. To restore the red color, I used Blood Trail Classic by FantasyRaiderr. Then I had to turn off particle effects to cease the luminescent bubbling. Unfortunately, the glowing purple lights lining the blood trail cannot be removed. My attempts to recolor the lights in post proved beyond my skill.
Here's a shot I couldn't fit into the episode, but I really appreciate the dead bodies added by FantasyRaiderr throughout the environment. Very creepy.
Hojo's Lab
That's the end of the episode… unless you are watching the Extended version, in which case we have an entire second pass through the soundtrack (EC's Trail of Blood)
Hojo's Lab (called the Drum in Remake) is so big it beggars belief. Where in Shinra HQ is all of this supposed to fit? Well it's both the 67th and 68th Floor, and if you've been watching the other extended sequences, you've also seen a big staff lounge, movie theatre, and a massive library. Shinra HQ is just that big.
Fight Against MOTH Unit
There's a lot of Red XIII, Barret, and Cloud, and not so much of the girls. That's because Tifa and Aerith aren't here in Remake, they've been temporarily separated from the main group. I grabbed them and placed them in the background of the shot where Cloud brings his sword to bear, but they don't do anything in combat except stand around, and they can't be added to the party even with a cheat engine.
The reason this extended edition exists is because in the OG FF7, this creepy music played uninterrupted during battles and exploration - something that hadn't been seen in the game yet. The emotional impact was great. For this sequence I tried to recreate that feeling by adding in sound effects here and there where often I do not, just to emphasize how hushed the musical score is.
The sequence where Tifa and Aeris are sneaking around and encountering all sorts of escaped monsters called for more grabbing and moving - this time Cloud, Barret, and Red XIII. At this time, I can cheat and add the boys to the party, allowing us to face these Zenene monsters together.
Without much time left in the music to portray this battle, I opted for a breakneak pace. I included some of the old sound effects from the OG FF7 as a nostalgic easter egg.
Final Thoughts
I am torn as to which version I like better. The short version maintains this eerie tone and leaves on an uncertain, dread-filled cliffhanger. The extended version has some great visuals, it showcases the team working together, and provides what is considered iconic FF7 goodness… but it risks diffusing the tension and dragging out the pacing. I suppose that's why I made two versions. On to the next challenge - a whopper of an episode!
In the OG Shinra Building, there are two sets of three identical cells, and our heroes are split between them and placed in prison. In Remake, there is only one cell and the crew is neither split nor imprisoned. Had to pull out quite a few tricks to make these scenes possible!
The first way to make sure that these seemed like distinct cells was to erase the distinctive mural from the non-Aeris cells. I had to make a mod myself to do this: Remove Cell Mural by Ite. I also had to use Invisible Whispers as usual to erase the ghosts that appear in this scene in Remake.
Our first scene has Cloud and Tifa investigating their cell. In order to get the shots I wanted, I glamored Cloud over Aeris using the Model Swaps mods by juijub, as well as Invisible Buster Sword also by juijub - if Cloud himself weren't supposed to be disarmed, then the constant glamoring over other characters would have required the sword be hidden, for continuity's sake as well as not having Tifa wearing it lol.
To get Tifa to replace Cloud (something not covered by the juijub mods) I used Tifa Replace Cloud by Natsukashii1111.
Our second scene has Barret and Red XIII together. Luckily, Barret has a monologue in the scene from Remake as well, although in 7R he is surrounded by the rest of the party rather than alone. This required some careful maneuvering of the camera - especially since I can't change the DOF of the camera and so have to keep it moving so that the image doesn't become blurry. The result is actually quite a natural-looking scene, when preparing these notes I forgot that these shots weren't from the original game.
A small continuity error here - in one shot the chest hasn't been opened. I had intended to open it before each shoot day, but I must have forgotten. Whoops!
For our third scene, Aeris talks to Tifa and Cloud through the wall. I did like that Aerith has a childhood mural and kept that addition from Remake. This also more smoothly allows Cloud to 'hear' her remarking to herself about her 'old room.'
More shots here by glamoring Cloud over Aeris and Tifa over Cloud, as well as re-angling. Better to show you.
For the brief Aeris/Tifa fight, I actually used the same shot twice, once with a simple re-angling and once glamoring Tifa over Aeris this time.
All this reshooting and glamoring had me coming up with insane situations like this:
I do.
Our final scene has Red XIII talking in his sleep. While most of this episode uses the three opening scenes from Chapter 17, the shot of Red XIII curled in a ball is from Chapter 16, where he has been taken from the specimen elevator and placed in the cell (which is luckily being rendered!) to give him a good night's sleep. The scene of him turning around is another group shot - There was basically no way to get this motion without this crazy angle lol.
The shot of him talking is a simple re-angling. To make sure Aeris' dress wasn't going to blow into frame, I glamored Tifa over her.
All of the clips of Barret in this scene are taken from the same shot I used before - it supplied no fewer than 5 shots in this episode!
Final Thoughts
I'm thrilled that this episode turned out as well as it did. It was one of the more daunting episodes and I initially thought I would be doing much more of my "filming idle animations" technique. juijub really came in clutch here, I'm really grateful.
We're not out of these cells (yet) so next episode will start us off with more of the same… but with some fun new challenges!
This episode puts our DOUBLE EXTENDED edition at exactly the 4-hour mark. Wow! The non-extended (numbered) episodes have a combined run-time of just under 3 hours and the Extended Edition (my preferred watch) is coming in at over 3 and a half hours. We're nearing the finish line!
There are three distinct sequences in this episode: a chat with Red XIII, the elevator trap, and a confrontation with the President. None of these sequences are in Remake, although there are other scenes that take place at these locations.
A Chat With Red XIII
This scene (or its illusion) was constructed using the Party Manager mod to make Red XIII the leader (so that everyone looks at him), and of course UUU to arrange everyone in a group and to hide the glass door of Aerith's cell. Otherwise, some simple shots as the crew "chats" about their next steps. Aerith is not in the party so that she can continue looking around furtively.
The music here is Red XIII's Theme - the Ever Crisis version. It's a near perfect replica of Uematsu's original but with some extra chugging strings following the baseline for a bit of oomph. This is the only place this track ever plays in the entirety of FFVII, so I am happy to showcase this lovely track (the leitmotifs introduced here come back in spectacular fashion much later, but this specific track only appears once).
The Elevator Trap
This sequence was done by loading an earlier save (before the Shinra board meeting) and adding Aerith and Red XIII to the party. This allowed me to freely run around Floors 59 to 64 with them. Unfortunately, we're supposed to be on the 66th Floor hyuk hyuk. Had to make sure I didn't point the camera at any floor numbers except the '6'.
I had to install some new mods to get Rude and Tseng into this scene. Replace Cloud with Rude bu Shimesaba and Playable Tseng over Cloud by AitherBunny accomplish the same feat of glamouring the characters in, although they have the same mannerisms as Cloud so I couldn't linger on them for very long. Tseng's approach is at 60% speed to give him a more dignified gait.
Musically, to create a smooth transition between Red XIII's Theme and Enter Turks I created two extra sets of 4-bar-snaps, one sped up +14 bpm to match Red XIII's Theme and one sped up +7 bpm to allow a gentle decelerando that can be felt when Barret turns to face Cloud!Rude.
Confrontation with the President
The opening and closing shots of this scene were taken using the worldspace at the beginning of Chapter 16, the only time Shinra HQ's exterior is fully rendered. The long pan-around in the middle was taken in Chapter 17, along with most of the shots of President Shinra talking and walking (although here are some comparisons to show that it was not easy to do! Some of Shinra's coverage is from Chapter 10, mostly when he is sitting.
For the gang, I got lots of coverage to mask the lack of dialogue. I had to do some more playing with Cloud!Rude and Cloud!Tseng.
The shot of Red XIII flapping his gums is from a scene late in Chapter 17, to get the shot how I wanted, I had to defeat a boss fight several times. That boss fight is not in the OG, so it's not here.
Getting a shot without Tifa or Aeris was really difficult, because they are both so close to him! And I can't change the focus on the camera, so I had to really finaggle to get the shot looking just right.
Final Thoughts
Much like Episode 33, I had intended this episode to include more scenes than it does! Another split keeps this video under 5 minutes. The next episode is much like this one - scenes that didn't happen in Remake, cobbled together by sheer will!
Don't forget to turn on CC for dialogue subtitles!
Oh this was a fun one!
[Chapter 16] Scenes 58-60
The first shot here is lifted directly from Scene 58, the second shot had its angle moved. The top couple of shots at the top of the elevator are unchanged, but Remake places guards in front of Aerith's tank, so there are some cuts and re-anglings in subsequent shots.
Remake gives us two scenes of back and forth between Hojo and the trio, separated by fights (snip snip). The shots I used here are completely out of order, and in no way do the lips line up with the dialogue. To indicate that Barret is ready to kill, I grabbed Barret and Tifa from one of the fights, yeeted everyone else to the lower floor, and had Barret reload his Overcharge at the angle I wanted them to be at.
Scenes 61-65
Hojo brings up the specimen (Red XIII). I used the lift sound from all the way back in Chapter 1 to create the machinery noises. The shots are all originals - I'm quite happy with the shot that pans up to the tank's machinery. Thie helps sell the idea that something is happening (nothing is actually happening).
To get the trio to turn around for the ensuing shot, I employed a trick I learned for Episode 27 - shrinking the party leader down to 0 and placing them behind the other party members, causing them to turn around (party members will always want to be nearby the leader and facing them). Unfortunately, until this point Cloud was the only person the game designated as party leader (outside of combat) and I needed him to turn around as well. In previous episodes (such as Eps 8 and 29) to get a shot of Cloud turning around, I manually did so while controlling him (actually very difficult to do without moving him too much!) but I figured that since I had to finally figure out how to use the Party Manager (see below) I instead added Aeris into the party, shrunk her down to 0, and placed her right behind the trio so that they turned around naturally - only needed one take.
The top-down shot of Red XIII "rising" on his platform is a simple dolly zoom – classic movie magic!
In Remake, Red XIII isn't lifted into the tank at all. To restore the OG's scene, I had to do more than just move actors around using Unreal Engine Unlocker. I had to finally use a Cheat Table to hack the game and take manual control of Red XIII.
Enter Party Manager Cheat Engine Table by Qwazerty. This allowed me to put any of our five main characters (and even DLC characters Yuffie and Sonon) into or out of the party. In order to create this sequence, I put Red XIII in the party but that wasn't enough - until Chapter 17 he is instructed to lie in his cage. You can get him up and walk him around, but as soon as you relinquish control he curls back up. The exception to this is in battle - just so happens that a battle takes place with Red XIII nearby (explained later) so putting him in the party, triggering the battle, then moving him up to Aeris's tank was the way to go. I tried it once while putting Aeris in the party too, but in battle she holds a staff, which she should not have in her tank. The bonus to this is, when Aeris is not in battle, her idle animations are to look around anxiously. She'll be doing this for most of the original shots into the next episode.
It took about 6 hours to get the shots of the tank with Red XIII and Aeris both within. For the shot where Tifa is running towards them (I had to change Tifa's position or else she would have teleported from one side of Cloud to the other mid-scene), I made Red XIII the party leader (this also kept him from curling into a ball, but it creates a subtle continuity error in his posture that I'm not crazy about). For the ensuing shot where Tifa turns to face Hojo, I kept Red as the party leader but shrunk him down to 0 and moved him to the other side so that both her and Cloud faced where I wanted them to.
In the shot where Barret shoots the door, Red XIII is very conspicuously missing from within the tank - this is because during the actual cutscene (Scene 63) the game de-renders him and I can only use what they render in.
Once the door opens, I used two shots in quick succession to try and sell that idea that Red XIII is pouncing out of the tank. The first is a super close up of his snarl, which is from a later scene in Remake (Scene 65). The blurry shot of him leaping over the camera is the same leap that we use in a moment to have him crash through the window "at Hojo."
The shots of Hojo flying back as the shattered glass flies everywhere are shot and sold via a mod: Invisible Whispers. He's actually floating gently through the air in these shots and the glass shards are actually ghostly dust clouds. Invisible Whispers removes the offending ghosts, leaving their dust to act as bright specks on the screen, hopefully to sell that he is knocked back as the window shatters and Red XIII pounces. In reality, these are two different scenes. The shot from behind Barret where Red XIII seems to collide with something in the room helps to sell this, a happy accident (it's actually Red XIII's model ceasing its animation because it is supposed to be out of frame haha).
There is one continuity error here that I could not fix. In the split second that Red XIII crashes through the window, there is one frame where you can see Aerith standing with Cloud and the gang, whereas in this scene she is supposed to still be in the tank. I tried refilming this from other angles to cut her out but it really just didn't work. Did you notice her?
The ensuing shots are from Scene 61 (Aerith being released from the tank) 63 (Tifa and Aerith reuniting) and 65 (Red XIII chasing Hojo into the elevator). Then, the shots take a sudden turn to the DIY. The tilting shot of the "auxiliary lift" is an original, and that lift is not actually upstairs.
Cloud "throws Aerith a new staff" (uses a potion animation) and Aerith "catches the staff" (enters combat animation). This is the first weapon change in the series - the only planned one, in fact! I'm sure if I continue after this arc concludes, there will be more.
Red XIII running down the stairs to greet the party is me controlling the boi. The party manager mod allows me to run around as my boi! MY BOI! Ahem.
Since this scene doesn't exist in Remake, all of these shots use my classic "only shoot people's 'reactions' to dialogue cause no one is actually speaking" method. Also, as the boss fight is actually occurring on the level below, I have to sell you on the idea that everything happening down there is actually happening up here, and that means trying to mask the geography of both rooms.
The music here is Hurry! from EC.
Scenes 53-56
The fight against H0512. In the OG, you send Aerith off with either Barret or Tifa, and your party against the monster is Cloud, Red XIII, and either Barret or Tifa.
In Remake, your party is Cloud, Barret, AND Tifa, and Red XIII is in a cage next to you asleep during the fight.
Well, that won't do.
I swung the pendulum far in the opposite direction. Not only did I hack it so that Red XIII is in the party helping to fight, I didn't send Aerith away and instead added HER to the party as well. Five party members all fighting together.
I filmed this fight for about 30 hours, getting over 300 shots. It was only late in the process that I realized that I could move characters around and adjust them mid-combat, helping me to create really good looking shots like this:
Also it helped me turn the little OPT monsters around so that we are seeing their eyeballs instead of their disgusting buttholes, which ruined so many shots for me before I started turning them away.
Honestly if I had realized I could have done this from the getgo the fight scenes in all previous episodes would have all been so much more deliberately constructed. I can actually storyboard and create shots the way I want now! Perfect timing, of course, there are only a few fights left in the series lmao.
The music here is the EC version of Those Who Fight Further but the final guitar hit is from, wait for it: Won't Get Fooled Again by the Who. That's right, the CSI: Miami song that starts with "YEAHHHH!!!" It is in the key of A and therefore matches Those Who Fight Further.
Final Thoughts
A lot of compromises in this episode but in some ways, I pulled this off better than I thought I would when I started this project. I was really sad that this sequence was so different in Remake and so I am happy to share the original scene with Remake's spectacular visuals.
Next episode will be more of the same! Lots to film. Hope you enjoy the ep.
Don't forget to turn on CC for dialogue subtitles!
These next few episodes are this series' crucible - by hook or by crook I am assembling these shots and constructing these scenes from pieces scattered around two chapters. It definitely won't be perfect but if I can pull off at least relaying the story, I'll be very happy.
[Chapter 16] Scenes 48-52
The various shots of Hojo walking around were done by literally grabbing him and yeeting him to various places - the game instructs him to walk to a specific location, so as long as he can find a path he is a very obedient walker. The two shots of him standing still (in front of the "precious specimen") are from an earlier instance where he is only instructed to stand and perform idle animations. And voilà - an entire scene with Hojo!
The one shot of the lab assistants was filmed using the "Scene 52" cutscene - a sequence that introduces the boss fight… which we will see next episode. The shot of Hojo getting in the elevator is lifted directly from that scene.
I'm quite fond of the transitional shot I made to show Tifa running up to the "precious specimen." It starts with the elevator and pivots, giving some time to allow for it to seem like Cloud, Tifa, and Barret are truly alone (I had to hide the assistants, let's just assume they also left the room). In order to get Tifa to run to that location, I placed Cloud (the party leader) around where I wanted Tifa to end up (party members always want to stand near the leader) and shrunk him down to 0. Then I threw Tifa far enough away as to time her run with the shot. It turned out pretty good although it took me about 10 tries.
The shot of Barret and Cloud walking is from scene 52 - in that sequence, Cloud comes to a stop because they are taking Hojo hostage. In this scene, that is not happening, so Cloud is instead stopped in his tracks as he notices the misty red tubes that are where Jenova was in the OG.
Jenova is not here in Remake. She is somewhere else. I had to somehow create the illusion that these two chambers are connected, which I did using an earlier moment of Cloud walking down a staircase stairs (also shot using 52).
Musically, we have the same sequence from Ep 32 (the two Rebirth tracks) but this time we let it continue as a synthetic percussion brings in the iconic J-E-N-O-V-A arpeggio in an eerie fashion…
[Chapter 17] Scene 12
These next sequence was shot using Chapter 17 - I liked keeping things in slow motion at first, it adds a creepy element and a hypnotic feeling as the music transitions through two Remake music tracks: Noises in the Night (a variation on Trail of Blood) and Cultivating Madness (the J-E-N-O-V-A arpeggio plus some dramatic bass, cymbals, and string section chugging a la OWA).
The shot of Tifa coming down the stairs is from 52 (see above) - most of the other shots are from a scene in Chapter 17 that… goes a bit differently in Remake. Notably, there are two additional party members here in Remake and they had to be filmed around.
A few of the shots of the Jenova specimen are from the last scene of Chapter 16 - particularly the headplate which is higher resolution in that sequence than it is in Chapter 17.
Final Thoughts
This and the next episode were made concurrently, planned as one episode actually. The way the Jenova sequence developed, however, I decided to split them. I've already uploaded the next episode so I will write up the behind the scenes soon. Enjoy!
It's funny, the more original shots and re-arranging I have to do, the less I feel it's necessary to talk about the process. About half of the shots here in the boardroom scene are originals - none of the OG's dialogue survived, but the scene was longer and therefore had more opportunities for me to match the mouthing with the OG's script. In the scene, there's only one shot of Cloud and Tifa in the vent - every time you see them, it's the same shot from a different angle.
In the OG, Barret does come with them up into the vents. After a few attempts at bringing him along, it ended up being best to capitulate to what 7R does here and have him miss the scene. It also means that he isn't chirping a running commentary that would surely get them caught.
The music here (after a repeat of Infiltrating Shinra HQ from the last episode) is a blend of two Rebirth tracks, actually. These appear only in-game, not the official soundtrack. The first is a Shinra Inc. variation played during a boardroom scene in that game, and the second one has an oboe and clarinet duo toying around with the bass line of the J-E-N-O-V-A leitmotif – her first musical foreshadowing in this series.
Lastly, in 7R, Hojo gets the titular line "something stinks" but it has been given back to Scarlet. Scarlet's great line from Remake ("I personally have no problem with torture!") is one of those things that 7R players can enjoy on their playthroughs.
I hope you enjoy! The next episode is one of the tougher ones, I'm going to have to install a whole bunch of new mods to make it work. Wish me luck.
For a while, I was treating this like a full episode, because it covers mandatory beats of the story. I found it increasingly difficult to translate the various puzzles and sequences of Shinra HQ into watchable
scenes… In my opinion, FF7's Shinra HQ is the gold standard for tower dungeons. Every floor is a different kind of challenge. Remake does away with it all but introduces an interesting twist - Mayor Domino has been a secret rebel this entire time. Since that is a 7R invention, and since the rest of the episode creates pacing problems for the series, it has been relegated to only the extended playlists. But here are the bts notes anyway!
[Chapter 16] Scenes 22-42
There are no guards to fight on the 59th floor, although until the last moment I had a placeholder there in case I could mod the floor numbers and include a fight.
Unlike my work on the pillar sequence in episode 26, I wasn't able to change the floor numbers. This may have been due to a conflict with Shinra Building Original Colors by FantasyRaiderr - an absolutely essential mod.
Getting a bit ahead of ourselves here. The round elevators are an iconic feature of Shinra HQ, and I didn't even know that you could ride them in Remake until I started filming for this episode. In 7R, the stairwell is quicker, more convenient, and literally in front of the elevators. I can see why the developers wanted to discourage the use of the lifts, however - they are glitchy as hell. They do not slow when the engine is slowed - meaning that my usual method of filming wasn't possible. While ascending/descending in the lift, light actors pop in and out (you may notice it happening) and lastly, the camera is fixed to point away from the building while the lift is in motion because the building is loading and wiping assets behind you. This makes it VERY hard to film, but I was determined!
The short sequence with the distracted guard is a hacked up and refilmed moment from a cutaway scene with Scarlet - this blocking was happening mostly in the background. It begins with a quick shot of Hojo's panoptical console from Chapter 17, then suggests that these two guards work in a security control room. I overlaid the security cam border over some new footage of me exiting the lift. Doing so finally taught me how to create transparency in the editing software I use.
Floor 60 was pretty straightforward. I kept some reaction shots to the golden statue, but not the dialogue. I wish there were a sneaking and hiding minigame here, but the mystery of what is going on with the security cams replaces that in terms of drama.
Floor 61 in the OG is this staff lounge complete with a central tree. In Remake, this lounge is found on Floor 63. This has been remedied. The combat simulator and the Cosmos Theatre have been combined into a kind of backdoor out of this area. The liberties I take with both games here are why this episode is cut from the main series. The scene meeting Hart and heading into the library is mostly intact, with a few lines cut here and there for punchiness. The same is true of the scene with Domino - rather than invoke a larger AVALANCHE organization, I changed Domino's line to "Biggs didn't tell you?"
The music in the library is an unreleased track related to Domino. When entering his office, the music switches to 7R's The Shinra Building clipped and ramped by yours truly. The transition between the two tracks was a bit of a doozy, but the clarinet does some heavy lifting in terms of bridging the two keys.
Heading up to 'Floor 65' (Remake's Floor 61) we indulge in the Midgar diorama scene pretty much verbatim. After watching the recently released "How Big is Midgar?" video from BestBudGaming, I did change the scale from 1/10,000 to 1/1,000.
Final Thoughts
Lots of compromises and capitulations in this episode. I love some of the images - I think they are vital, in fact - but overall, this does not accomplish the goal of "reacreating the original Final Fantasy VII in a watchable webisode format." Skipping this vid and going straight from the stairwell that ends the last episode to the conference rooms that will open next episode will be nearly seamless, and keycards, mayors, and elevators can be enjoyed here in the extended edition.
Infiltrating Shinra HQ | Final Fantasy VII (Ep. 31)
[Chapter 16] Scene 01
This scene was restructured and reshot, as per usual. In the OG, you have the option to choose Barret's method and bust in through the front door, but I can't recreate that sequence, so we're going into the garage!
Scene 2
The big scenery pan shot doesn't use cross-fading like previous areas, instead I composited the few frames where the party was both on the stairs and sliding down the ladders. I think the result is very cool! I'm quite struck by the visual majesty of those big lights combined with the climactic notes of the Shinra Inc. theme, which comes to us courtesy of the Ever Crisis soundtrack.
Scene 3-7
There is no truck and sneaking through the garage in OG, the stairs are simply accessed through a side door. Purists hate me for this one simple trick: I kept something I liked. To reconcile it with the OG's sneaky sequence, I cleared the garage of enemies and then set up the shots of their infiltration - mostly by running into corners or to out of the way areas and then dashing through frame while the camera is on a set path. I think the overall effect sells that maybe they were able to sneak in unnoticed.
The music is actually the original 1997 version of Infiltrating Shinra HQ. When the drums come in during the next scene, I blend in the Ever Crisis version.
Scene 15
To film this sequence, I had to run up the staircase sequence about 10 times. It was hard to keep my sanity, and I hope the result is a scene that feels long (like it should) but is not a total pain to watch.
I did cut a few of the dialogue moments from the OG, notably an "are we there yet? are we there yet?" gag and Barret being doom-and-gloomy, prompting a response from Tifa along the lines of "Don't say that, you'll jinx us!" and translated for the Playstation with a bonus slur! Snip snip.
Final Thoughts
The most daunting part of this adaptation is next. I think I may simply cut the Shinra Building puzzle floors and skip straight to the board room meeting. What do you think? I can't imagine I could make those moments watchable - although losing Domino would be a shame. I will hum and haw about it, it may be a while before the next episode comes out for that reason. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this episode! See you next time.
You can skip this intro - no prior knowledge is required to enjoy FINAL FANTASY VII, but you can read about what you are about to see here (
Hey everyone! I decided to make a series intro video that starts the series, not only to showcase the Prelude but also to explain to newcomers and FF fans what exactly they are getting with this video series. We're 30 episodes in and I can see the finish line!
Now, hopefully, you won't need to do any explaining to your friends when sharing this series, this video will onboard them completely.
Cloud, Barret, and Tifa prepare to take on Shinra at the very heart of Midgar.The Tactical Mode project celebrates the story and beauty of F
[Chapter 14] Scene 9
Firstly, the music. The first few notes here are the intro to Remake's Flowers Blooming in the Church, but sped up and raised in pitch to match the Tifa's Theme cue that begins when she says "I know." This Tifa cue is from the end of a boss fight in Chapter 17.
The exchange between Cloud and Tifa here is actually from Chapter 13 - I color corrected it to appear like daytime, all the shots are original (I had to hide Barret in a few of the shots). Barret coming down the stairs is also from Ch. 13. The music cue that arrives here is from Rebirth: Fortified Metropolis (a variation on The Shinra Army Wages a Full-Scale Attack, which is the music cue for the climb in OG).
Every shot after that is Ch 14, although re-arranged and with one take cheated so that Elmyra delivers her line to Barret instead of Cloud.
Scene 50
A single shot of Wall Market does away with quite a bit of OG - the climb will be using grappling guns instead of batteries, and the owner doesn't have a tank in the shop, they have a helicopter. Still, I wanted to evoke OG's flow of revisiting shops and preparing for the adventure, so I've added a single line that tries to both mask the changes and propel us forward.
Scene 90
The trio grapples into the wreckage. Unfortunately, there is no golden shiny wire of hope line - I'm very sad to lose it, but this is one of those moments where 7R backs me fully into a corner: animate the scene from scratch, or use what they give me.
Double-unfortunately, this is the ending cutscene of Chapter 14, and I only have one take of it -- it skips frames here and there, how unsightly. Most sadly of all, I don't have a save for this scene, so in order to retake the shot, I would have to play through the entirety of Chapter 14 again. I'm sorry I simply won't be doing that (it's an enormous slog, see how 88 of the scenes aren't being used?) so our episode limps to the middle line. I color corrected these shots to match the sunset of the next chapter as well.
[Chapter 15] Scene 1
I time ramped Cloud's landing and added an extra sound effect for some oomph (in Remake, his landing is hidden by a fade-in. This launches us into another one of those composite shots I love so much. For this shot, I kept the camera high so that it would conceal the NPCs walking around, and timed it just so that the triggered collapse of the building occurs while we float by. A simple cross-fade as we approach the tower proved not-so-simple - eagle-eyed viewers might spot the monsters fading in at the top left corner.
Scene 4
A fight with deenglows (or cerulean drakes as Remake calls them). OG doesn't have a fight here, instead it has a battery puzzle and a pendulum quicktime event. I figured this would be a nice use of the climactic moment in the music, as well as act as penance for the gaffs earlier by having a snappily edited romp.
Scenes 5-26
The rest of the chapter is condensed into a few more travelling shots. The more frantic moment of running and aiming the grappling gun actually comes to us from the middle of this chapter's boss fight against Heligunner (Remake's Valkyrie) which I have cut. Sadly, this means that Heligunner itself is cut entirely, marking another major departure from OG. This episode is a real piece of blasphemy.
Scene 27
The gorgeous shot of Cloud's face turning around is slowed down to 80% to help transition into our last shot. I remember seeing this shot as the final sting of a trailer and it took the wind right out of me. Hopefully I have preserved that moment of impact here.
Final Thoughts
Some compromises that I'm not thrilled with, but at least it's a very watchable episode. And we've condensed two Remake chapters into three and a half minutes. We're making good time, but even if you're only watching the numbered episodes, we're up to 2 and a half hours. We're heading into the belly of the beast now, and some of my biggest challenges yet. Wish me luck!
The first half of this episode was quite easy, actually!
[Chapter 13] Scene 11
The establishing shot is by me and the interrogation of Elmyra before her flashback begins is mostly shot-for-shot, with a few cut-ins such as Barret's line, which is taken from other scenes, and some other shifting to accommodate the OG's script (which is more different than Remake's than you might think!)
Scene 12
The flashbacks were super easy to do! It was mostly narration for dialogue timing (one or two snips here and there) and I even using the backing music from Remake!
The big issue was the Tseng scene, which is drastically different than OG. Tseng does some more pacing and explaining in 7R, which is cut - and his lean-down had to be moved around as well. I matched a few of his turns into action cuts, and while I wish I could time his lip flaps more accurately, the final product is good.
For kicks, I de-aged Tseng here (it was over a decade ago!) by using the Tseng Crisis Core-like Hairstyle mod by Shimesaba.
Scenes 09 and 13
The scene following the flashback is actually an amalgamation of two scenes from Remake, which come before and after the flashback scene. Barret's monologue here is mostly one single shot repeated seven times at different angles, as his monologue is cut in Remake. The shot of Elmyra chastizing the camera is actually her chastizing Cloud. Additionally, some of the shots aren't played back at 100% speed - mostly shots that linger on a character reacting. The cuts would be too close otherwise.
Might be a good time to show you how happy I am with the mod Scruffy Barret by Gojeeb. It's a nearly invisible mod but adds that extra touch of eyebrow and stubble that befit the character.
Scene 10
Barret tucks Marlene in and joins Cloud for good. This scene is mostly made from idle animation shots, although the shots where Barret is crouched over the bed come from a short cutscene.
In OG, Marlene is awake and you can engage in some cute optional dialogue with her. Sadly, I couldn't include it in this series.
I decided to end the episode on another knife twist, as Tifa mourns the sky. Enjoy your pain, beloveds.
Final Thoughts
This is a verrrry long episode and the most lines of dialogue in any one episode. It took a while to put together, mostly because it came so close to being readymade but actually getting what I wanted required precise surgery. I had a lot of fun and can't wait to get to the next episode!
An extra little bit of pacing between episodes 28 and 29. The dialogue is modified from OG. The music begins with the unreleased version of Rotting Pizza that plays at Sector 5 station, and then fades into the official Rotting Pizza remake after the fight with the whole eaters (or gorgers).
The crown jewel of the episode is the 45-second long establishing shot. It's a composite of several takes - a section of tunnel that long actually isn't rendered all at the same time. What I did was I created save files at various places in the tunnel, marked the camera track, and then took the shot several times at each save point, clipping each take when the camera moved past what was rendered (or curved down the tunnel enough to hide the tunnel de-rendering in the distance.
Of course, I film everything slowed down to heck and then sped up, but if you want a very nice slow version of the opening shot, here it is with the full unreleased Rotting Pizza.
It's my birthday! Have an episode. Two versions of it, in fact!
Another short scene. This was actually going to be the first scene of a longer episode, but I split the next section into a new episode for a few reasons. Firstly, because together these scenes would be over 10 minutes long (unusual for this series!), secondly, so I can insert a fight with some gorgers in between the two segments for the extended playlist, and thirdly, because I could make an alternate version of this scene where you don't just see the red words – you see Sephiroth speaking them!
So, it's kind of a choose-your-own aesthetic here, one version shows us Sephiroth a few hours before his canonical introduction (the truck scene), and the other keeps his look a mystery. Like Episode 25, I've called the non-purist version one the "extended" version.
Otherwise, the scene was simple enough to piece together. The establishing shot and the wide shot of the crew walking was done using freecam (w some color correction afterwards), and the clanging bells come to us from Ever Crisis.
This is another episode that is both vary satisfyingly purist and anti-purist lol, but not for lack of trying I can tell you that! Better to go scene-by-scene and describe what I did here:
[Chapter 12] Scene 41
The mod I made for last episode makes another appearance right off the top. In 7R, Tifa is interacting with the console before the plate separation has been confirmed, allowing Rude and the Whispers a moment of skullduggery. In OG (and here) we can cut all that and end up at the same place.
Tseng's appearance on the TV here is much like Shinra's appearance as a hologram: it "makes sense" and "doesn't really change anything" and I'm "being crazy" but, even so, this is going to bug me forever lol.
For the subtitles, I honestly just went with Remake's dialogue most of the time, already having thrown up my hands at not getting him there in person. Another reason for that is that whatever is playing on the screen in this scene is pre-rendered movie. It doesn't even pause when I freeze the engine! I basically had to use the scene as is.
It must be mentioned: Tseng slaps Aerith in the OG. While this displays the cruelty of both him and Shinra, the threat of a slap communicates the same violence without actually having to watch her get slapped. I'm personally fine with the change.
The music here is from Chapter 12 Hi Stakes Rescore by Neo.
Scene 42
A few shots between transitions here -- every shot required me to replay the boss battle, so this took a while.
Scene 43
The FMV here is an edited version of the mod Plate Fall Closer to OG by FantasyRaiderr (a name you may recognize from earlier episodes, we haven't seen the last of them). Even still, that mod includes an expanded moment here, which I have cut. I also reshot the last shot here - FantasyRaiderr repurposed an in-game shot of the Shinra Building, but since I have access to freecam, I booted up Chapter 16 (where Shinra HQ is fully rendered) and recreated the final shot of the original Plate Fall FMV from 1997:
[Chapter 13] Scene 01
I cut the small bits of dialogue that Remake added here, but I kept Cloud helping Tifa to her feet. While I kind of like the intro cue from 7R here, the rest of the track is not as evocative as what we are hearing, which is the EC version of On That Day, Five Years Ago…
Scene 03
Like most scenes in 7R, the pieces are mostly here for reconstructing the scene, but no one in Remake is actually using the original script. I much prefer the original lines of dialogue, but some of the blocking from the Remake scene is a nice touch (I really like the hug that Barret gives Tifa). To get coverage, I tried to mask their mouths as much as possible by getting super wide overhead shots - this was difficult becuase there are only a few instances where all three characters are rendered at once. In a few instances, I returned to this spot to film coverage using idle animations, the way I did heavily in Episode 13 and 14. It is difficult to direct the characters when it is not a simple matter of them facing one another from 5 feet apart. When three characters are in the party, they are constantly shuffling to give one another room - and they hate being forced to face away from Cloud.
The dialogue here returns to purism, with almost no adjustments to the dialogue from what you would have read on your TV back in the 90s. I think the scene holds up very well.
Final Thoughts
I was both dreading and salivating over making this episode. The original moment is so powerful, and Remake's changes are lamentable to me, even though its a beautiful game and the pieces are all largely there. Hopefully I've been able to bring the best of both worlds to you!
Cloud and Tifa climb to the top of the pillar, where Barret faces off against the Turks.The Tactical Mode project celebrates the story and b
Turn on CC for language and caption options!
Thanks for waiting while I got this episode ready!
[Chapter 12] Scene 36
Invisible Whispers by Neo is used here - you can see their dust trails in the air when Tifa is collapsing next to Jessie. I slowed down the engine and used the slow mo shots with the heartbeat sound to give the episode a sense of intensity right off the bat. The reverberating synth comes from the Hi Stakes Rescore mod, again by Neo.
A couple of lines here (such as "Jeez... Tifa, you should see the look on your face" and Cloud's "We're almost there") come from Remake.
Scene 37
Moving from something so grim and somber to a fist-pumping action scene took a lot of humming and hawing. I went with a very slow dolly up to the platform, using Hi Stakes Rescore again, then the EC version of Enter Turks, transitioning into the distorted guitar variation on Those Who Fight Further from Sector 7-6 Annex.
Eagle-eyed viewers might notice that when Reno hits the button, he's wearing full-fingered gloves instead of his fingerless gloves. That's because in 7R, he's not actually the one to hit the button - it's Rude, whom I left in the helicopter. Invisible Whispers makes another appearance here (or should I say it doesn't) as I struggled to recreate the original sequence of events.
This eventually involved me MAKING MY FIRST MOD for the game: Reno Did It. In order to convince the viewer that Reno actually initiated the collapse, I altered the screen to display the all-red warning that you see here.
Scene 38
After learning from Episode 12, I'm now able to make the white swirly a little smoother: I create 25 individual frames in Paint.net where I progressively rotate, zoom, and blur the image. Then I line them up in my video editor and add white and black fade filters. This time, I did the image creation using a bigger canvas and then cropped down, unlike with Airbuster where I just rotated as I went (which is why the corners in Ep 12 become awkwardly rounded black voids) - both effects are cool, but this one is just a bit smoother. Not perfect, but still hype.
The opening shot is a recreation of the intro cam from the PS1 boss fight against Reno. Then the fireworks begin! With my computer in the state that it is in, this fight took a long time to film and edit - my poor baby is limping to its iminent demise.
The music is the actual 7R version of Those Who Fight Further, which was used for the Airbuster fight. I edited the outro to make sure that there is no choral section - Uematsu was very intentional with the OG's vocals and I intend to honour that.
Scene 39
In Remake, this scene is actually a transitional scene between phases of a longer boss sequence. To make it seem like Reno is jumping back into the helicopter, I reshot some scenes from Scene 37 to sell it. (I have a lot more shots than the ones I used. I even struggled to reverse Reno opening the chopper door to make it seem like he's closing it - that shot took me literal days and I didn't even use it lol.)
Final Thoughts
Another episode I'm very proud of. Next there are a few episodes where there is no combat to worry about, and the first big "oh shit" moment of the story. I can't believe we're here
