Final Fantasy 7 Ever Crisis update adds to backstory of Sephiroth
What could this mean for Rebirth?
Mobile game Final Fantasy 7 Ever Crisis updated on Friday, adding a much-anticipated new chapter detailing the story of a young Sephiroth.
The new chapter is added to The First Soldier set of missions and reveals new layers to the villain's backstory.
Fans have been busy discussing the story on social media since the update's release - could there be implications for the forthcoming Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth?
Major story spoilers follow.
The key moment fans have shared from The First Soldier is Sephiroth holding up a photo of a woman he calls Jenova, who he believes is his mother.
Except it's not Jenova. It's Lucrecia.
You see, Sephiroth was the son of Shinra scientists Hojo and Lucrecia. Jenova was an alien entity mistaken for one of the ancients. Hojo injected Lucrecia with Jenova cells while she was pregnant, which is why Sephiroth has such exceptional power.
Hojo told Sephiroth his mother was Jenova, but not the alien truth. This new story wrinkle from Ever Crisis, however, adds further tragedy to his backstory: the photo of Lucrecia proves Sephiroth knew who his birth mother was, he just knew her by a different name.
And really, the true villain of the game is Hojo, who lies to his son about who his mother is by showing him his birth mother and making him believe she's somebody else.
While the added backstory for Sephiroth does give some intriguing new details, I'm honestly not a huge fan. As a hero-turned-villain in the original game, Sephiroth is an enigmatic figure but all this explanation saps the mystery and ambiguity out of the story.
What's more, while I'm excited for Rebirth and its story changes, I'm concerned about how much extra backstory will be added and how complex its web of realities will become. Will Young Sephiroth feature in the game, as well as playable Sephiroth? Will we see Lucrecia? Will Hojo explain himself?
In fact, is this Ever Crisis story proper canon? Or an alternate timeline? It's all getting a bit Kingdom Hearts, which is before you compare young Sephiroth's character design with Nomura's other work.
If you're keen to play through the young Sephiroth chapter yourself, it's available now in Final Fantasy 7 Ever Crisis - but it only unlocks once other story missions have been completed, if you can stomach a bombardment of microtransactions.
It also looks like more story content will be continuously added to Ever Crisis based on other Final Fantasy games. That's according to a livestream for the game, translated by Final Fantasy streamer Aitai Kimochi.
The game has also been announced for Steam.