It's funny (or rather, sad) how my expectations have declined over the years, not just regarding the FF7 remake, but Square Enix in general. There was a time when I actually wished for a remake of FF7 with modern graphics and voice-acting, but that was in the early 2000s (looong ago, I know). Back when Sakaguchi was still in charge, I never had any doubt that a new Final Fantasy game would fulfill all the prerequisites that I expect from a good rpg.
Part 10 and 12 deviated from this traditional approach, which was disliked by some players, but they were still good rpgs overall, so my expectations hadn't dropped that much by then, even though I found it a bit sad that Final Fantasy had strayed from its roots. Up until this point, I had always tried to avoid spoilers for any new FF game as much as possible, never reading any news or watching any videos about it, since I wanted to discover everything (including who the cast of the player party was) on my own. For the previous games, all I ever knew about them before buying them was maybe the name of the main character, but beyond that... nothing. And I liked it that way, because the games could surprise me so much more than if any content had been spoilered to me.
But then came the big bummer... FF13. As usual, I avoided any and all news, and thus bought it without thinking twice, and started my playthrough completely unbiased, and... The first 2-3 hours of combat were still somewhat enjoyable, as I was convinced that I would reach the first town any time now. Further hours of non-stop battling followed... my mood got a bit worse, but I kept going, still hoping that the seemingly endless chain of battles would eventually end and I would get to the first town to do something other than battling for once (Go shopping, talk to the people, maybe play a minigame or discover a sidequest or some such. After all, an rpg lives on variety, right?)... but the further I progressed, the more it dawned on me that the variety I was seeking would not be forthcoming anymore...that the entire game was indeed just one long battle marathon from beginning to end, with nothing else in-between... my initial excitement over a new FF game had gradually diminshed, and during the final third or so of the game it became a chore rather than a fun freetime investment. I merely wanted to get it over with. This had never happened to me before: at first I was looking forward to getting to play a new FF game, but towards the end I was actually looking forward to not having to play it anymore!
FF13 was the game that lead me to change my approach towards new rpgs. From now on, I would carefully inform myself before I would even consider spending money on any new FF game, despite being spoilered that way. That was the last time that I blindly bought an FF game, as my faith in Square Enix had been deeply shaken. In fact, I haven't bought anything from them ever since except for the steam versions of the PS1 games. I didn't buy the two sequels to 13, and also not FF15, even though I got my hopes up again when they initially announced a world map for it. But following news dampened my expectations for FF15 again, such as scraping the world map idea again, a retarded action combat system, and worst: spreading the story over several media (the game, a movie, an anime series, DLCs), so that those who only played the game itself wouldn't even be able to grasp it. Thus I also ended up skipping FF15, once again being dissappointed in a main FF game, but at least not wasting money on it this time.
When the FF7 remake was finally announced, it was at a time when my trust in Square Enix had already hit rock bottom, so my expectations for the remake were never high to begin with, but Square Enix still managed to lower them even more with stuff like:
splitting it into multiple episodes
Certain gameplay contents only available if you pre-order the game (and pre-order a specific version on top of that! WTF?)
adding totally out-of-place story content (those Whispers that control Fate? WTF?)
Probably some more story nonsense from the compilation
Most likely, no world map
I cannot comment on the combat system since I haven't played a demo yet. Some say it's definitely better than that of FF15, and that there is at least some depth to it, so we'll see.
I for one don't plan on getting it anytime soon, or likely not at all. MAYBE if they ever release all episodes including all content on pc, and even then it'll probably be used copies from the secondary market at a cheap price. And that's a HUGE maybe...
