In recent weeks, the Final Fantasy 7 Remake has been mostly quiet, which should be no surprise give that its release date is some time off. One of the biggest, more recent reveals though was that of Ifrit and Shiva, the long-running Fire and Ice summons related to the franchise. Graphically, each are beautiful creations with also a little revealed about how they will work.
In the Final Fantasy 7 Remake, summons depart from the way they worked in the original to provide more of a flourish in combat. Essentially, each character can equip one Summon Materia that can be leveled up and also charged by common attacks, with players able to summon the associated creature once the gauge is full. These summons, like Ifrit and Shiva, will operate independently, though they can be told what to do with ATB charges. They will also remain on the field until their Gauge hits 0, unleashing their ultimate attack (Ifrit's Hellfire, Shiva's Diamond Dust) as they leave.
Over their past animations, both are solid improvements. The original FF7's Ifrit simply looked like a satyr with an disproportionate horn size, which was more comical than intimidating. This is no longer the case, as Ifrit looks more like a terrifying demon from Hell than a satyr, and it boasts the physicality to match. Shiva, on the other hand, looks more enchanting that hwe original counterpart. Her traits are more Fey-like and mystical than the original, though she retains much of her original as opposed to Ifrit.
But here in lies the problem: Ifrit and Shiva are understandably those shown first, but where are the other Summons? How can we say that the new summon system looks good without a look at others? The original Final Fantasy 7 had a ton of summons: beyond Ifrit and Shiva, there was Choco/Mog, Kujata, Typhon, Titan, Ramuh, Bahamut, Odin, Neo Bahamut, Alexander, Phoenix, Bahamut ZERO, Hades, and the Knights of the Round. Understandably, the FF7 Remake wouldn't want to show all of these, saving some surprises for the game, and it certainly wouldn't want to show too much beyond the very first part.
That said, it has been confirmed that summons will appear earlier in the story, meaning there should be more to show. The summons that are iconic to their element - like Ifrit to Fire and Shiva to Ice - would be good to show beforehand such as Titan and Ramuh. Others like Choco/Mob are also good contenders to be showcased, with the Final Fantasy 7 Remake saving the bigger summons for players to experience after launch. Before casting judgment of the quality of summons in FF7, it just seems like Square Enix should show a couple more.
Of course, the Final Fantasy 7 Remake is still some time from release, so there's plenty of time to do this. Yet given the nature of summons in the upcoming game, it seems understandable to reserve judgment until more is shown about this particular subset of characters.
Final Fantasy 7 Remake releases March 3, 2020 on PS4.