The Final Fantasy 7 Remake opening cinematic movie will give you chills

Square Enix has finally given us a look at the full Final Fantasy 7 Remake opening cinematic movie and it's pretty damned impressive.

In just a few minutes, you'll get a sense of how much depth and detail Square Enix is pouring into the Final Fantasy 7 Remake. You'll get a broad look at the city of Midgar, the people struggling to make it day-to-day under the ever-present threat of the Shinra Electric Power Company, and, of course, the Avalanche crew – including favourites Cloud Strife, Barret, and Tifa, as they kick off the game with one hell of an entrance by train.

Final Fantasy 7 Remake is set to launch on PS4 on April 10, 2020, and it's certainly been a long time coming. Not only because the Final Fantasy 7 Remake delayed, but because this has been something fans have been pining after for years.

In fact, if you want to see how the famous cinematic has evolved between hardware generations you need only look below. If you've got a minute, let's dive into what the game looked like in 1997, in 2005, and 2020.

Final Fantasy 7 (1997)

First up, you'll find the PS1 Final Fantasy 7 opening cinematic movie from 1996, the game that introduced a generation of western players to the JRPG genre. The fundamentals are certainly the same, but it should be clear for all to see just how far the industry has come in two decades.

Final Fantasy 7: Tech Demo (2005)

Here we've got the Final Fantasy 7 opening cinematic movie from 2005, for PS3! This is when Square Enix poured fuel on the remake fire, sending FF7 fans into a frenzy for the decade to come. Square Enix created this technical demo for Sony so that the company could easily demonstrate the power of the PS3. It was revealed at E3 2005, and it made us believe that the detail seen in Final Fantasy 7: Advent Children could one day be represented in a game... how naive we were back then.

Final Fantasy 7 Remake (2020)

Anyway, because I'm nice, I've also time stamped the Final Fantasy 7 Remake opening cinematic movie for PS4 so you can watch all three, one after the other, from the same starting point. You're welcome.

If you want to ensure that you get a copy of the upcoming PS4 game on day one, be sure to preorder Final Fantasy 7 Remake, and prepare to get excited about next-gen by watching our latest Dialogue Options below:

Josh West is Editor-in-Chief of GamesRadar+. He has over 18 years of experience in both online and print journalism, and was awarded a BA (Hons) in Journalism and Feature Writing. Josh has contributed to world-leading gaming, entertainment, tech, music, and comics brands, including games™, Edge, Retro Gamer, SFX, 3D Artist, Metal Hammer, and Newsarama. In addition, Josh has edited and written books for Hachette and Scholastic, and worked across the Future Games Show as an Assistant Producer. He specializes in video games and entertainment coverage, and has provided expert comment for outlets like the BBC and ITV. In his spare time, Josh likes to play FPS games and RPGs, practice the bass guitar, and reminisce about the film and TV sets he worked on as a child actor.