Final Fantasy 7 Remake's controversial Whispers "cannot act" in Part 2

Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, the second part of the FF7 Remake trilogy, might be diverging even further from the original story, according to a new quote from one of the game's developers.

"As it says at the end of the game 'The Unknown Journey Will Continue', and Cloud and his friends will be on that journey for a while yet," co-director Motomu Toriyama says in the final installment of Square Enix's FF7 Remake blog series. "From here on in the Whispers cannot act to maintain the destined timeline, so fans can look forward to seeing what kind of future awaits the team."

The Whispers are those wraith-like creatures that appear in the first part of the remake every time the crew is about to substantially deviate from the plot of the original game. Their nature and exact motives are unclear, but they play heavily into the end of Remake, and as they seemingly lose power, the game's final moments diverge even more heavily from the original than anything that had come before. (Check out our guide to the Final Fantasy 7 Remake ending if you need a refresher.)

The Remake series is often referred to as a sequel to the original FF7 as much as it is a reimagining, and the implications of the Whispers are a big part of the reason why. What reason do these creatures have for trying to maintain the events that took place in the original telling of FF7? Why is the timeline diverging at all?

Fans are divided on both the remake's divergences and the Whispers themselves as emblems of those changes, but it seems we'll have to wait and see what their reduced role in Rebirth is actually going to mean for the story.

We've dug into what it means for Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth to balance lip service and modern expectations.