!Major, Mega, Platinum-Level Spoilers for Final Fantasy VII Remake Follow!

The first thing I wanted to do upon finishing my first playthrough of Final Fantasy VII Remake was to talk with other people who had finished it, as well. The problem is, the game just came out today for most people, so the next best thing to that conversation is the following spoiler guide in which I tell you every character who showed up, how the game's plot compared to the original and where it diverged, and the big surprises awaiting everyone. Major spoilers follow from here on out.

Now, to be clear, I've only banked about 30 hours into Final Fantasy VII Remake on Classic Mode, meaning I haven't explored every nook and cranny, have only achieved about half of the trophies, and have yet to see how it compares on Normal and Hard modes. Some spoilers will undoubtedly be left out; if you know some, feel free to clue us in! But if you're just looking for a casual read-through to see how Remake honors the original and changes it for the better, or to find out what you might have missed, read on:

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Image via Square Enix

It should come as no surprise that the regular playable characters Cloud, Barret, Tifa, and Aerith are front and center in Final Fantasy VII Remake. They're on all the marketing material, feature in the trailers, and will be your main company throughout the game. The same goes for eco-terrorist group Avalanche members Jessie, Biggs, and Wedge, all of whom get much more characterization and personality in the remake than they do in the original game. And here's your first spoiler: Jessie actually gets quite a bit more backstory as we learn about her dream to star at the Gold Saucer (one of many locations that doesn't appear in this title) and her father's comatose status from exposure to mako in a Shinra storage unit. (You find all this out when you sneak into Jessie's house to steal her father's Shinra keycard.) Problem is, Jessie is one of the very few characters who actually dies in this game, which is an all-time bummer after getting to know her in the Remake; she really was a contender for Best Waifu.

Other tried-and-true allies that pop up along the way are Aerith's birth mother Ifalna (in a flashback) and her adoptive mother Elmyra Gainsborough, Barret's daughter Marlene, and surprise allies Mayor Domino and Deputy Mayor Hart. Other than a group of well-meaning kids in the slums, the Sector 7 inn caretaker Marle, and the occasional store-owner or citizen, allies are in short supply for the Avalanche crew. (We do, however, get a Cait Sith cameo and a surprisingly extensive amount of time battling alongside Red XIII--my favorite--though not as a playable character. But nope, no Yuffie, Vincent, or Cid Highwind just yet. Fingers crossed.)

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Image via Square Enix

A little further down the spectrum towards villainy are some more gray-area characters who act in their own self-interest, sometimes hindering Cloud & Co., sometimes helping them. The most harmless of these is Johnny, the goofball from the Sector 7 slums who returns for the remake, along with his crush on Tifa. (And who can blame him?) But here's where Remake expands the characters a bit: We get a new trio in Wall Market that aim to help themselves by helping Cloud and Aerith. Those newcomers are coin-flipping trickster and stable-owner Chocobo Sam, the fashionable hand-massage parlor owner Madame M, and the fabulous proprietor of the Honeybee Inn, Andrea Rhodea. Each of these three have their moments, but it's sleazy mob boss Don Corneo's lead henchman Leslie Kyle who really comes through. (Leslie is much more helpful than returning fellow henchmen Scotch and Kotch, who also appear in boisterous fashion.) Leslie wants revenge against Don Corneo for taking his fiancée, Merle. (Marline, Merle, Marle... surprised Martha didn't show up.) Leslie has appeared in Final Fantasy lore before, as has Shinra executive Reeve Tuesti, whose change of heart against the evil corporation aids Cloud & Co. in both the original and, indirectly, the remake. And let us not forget the Whispers, the Dementor-like spirits of all who have lived that make it their afterlife's duty to make sure no one interferes with fate and destiny... and sometimes they're more effective than others.

Before we get into Shinra and the many evil-doers that fill the company's ranks, I want to spare a moment for a few SOLDIERs out there. First is Roche, a newcomer to the series who shows up during a motorbike chase scene on his own suped-up ride. Roche is a blast, I only wish we saw more of the character during Remake. Final Fantasy VII fans will likely be more interested in Marco, the mysterious, injured, and robed man with the number 49 tattoo who haunts Cloud's steps throughout Midgar; more on him later cuz it's SUPER spoilery. However, the biggest surprise by far came in the final moments of this game as none other than SOLDIER Zack Fair was shown battling Shinra forces with the very familiar Buster Sword outside of Midgar before helping an injured Cloud get to safety, all in either a flashback or mingled timeline of sorts. This was a stand-up-and-shout moment for yours truly and, I'm sure, millions of fans out there. Stay tuned to see if more comes of this cameo.

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Image via Square Enix

And now for the villains. There are a lot. Within Shinra, we have President Shinra himself and his executives: war-mongering head of public safety Heidegger, weapons R&D maven Scarlet, Palmer as head of the semi-defunct space program, and the super creepy and more-evil-than-you-even-realize-yet Professor Hojo who oversees science R&D (among other things...). You don't get to directly battle against any of these villains, but you do get to square off against Shinra's son Rufus, decked out in his white suit, loaded with a ridiculous amount of guns (and coins), and his protective magical hound, Dark Nation. (I love this game.) Rufus will be a main antagonist as leader of Shinra going forward, along with likely returning players from the Turks, like Tseng (whom you also don't get to fight), and underlings Reno and Rude (whom you do, multiple times). But when endless waves of Shinra soldiers, mako-mutated monsters, and genetically engineered creatures from Hojo's lab can't stop our heroes, who can?

Enter: Sephiroth. You knew this was coming. Remake is certainly a standalone story in its own right as it tracks Cloud and Avalanche's battle against Shinra before leaving Midgar, but it's the undercurrent of Cloud's mental struggle against Sephiroth, past and present, that sets up the bigger battles to come. The spoileriest of spoilers if you haven't played the original or the remake (what are you still doing here?), but Marco, the tattooed man dressed in tatters, is a sort of Sephiroth clone that the big bad uses as a living doll to possess and control. Sephiroth uses him to torment Cloud, to kill President Shinra, to battle the team as Jenova Dreamweaver, and to steal Jenova's body from Hojo's lab. Even as the game feels like it's about to end, it's Aerith--not Cloud--who senses Sephiroth's true nature, the extent of his evil, and the devastation of his ultimate plan. She warns the others that he, not Shinra, is the greatest threat to the planet. To that end, they pursue him into the unknown future ... and the unknown future of the Remake franchise.

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Image via Square Enix

Final Fantasy VII Remake was, for the most part, a step-for-step progression that matched the original game, with few exceptions. The biggest departure comes at the game's end, not just with the reveal of Jenova (which happened a little later on in the '97 version) but with Cloud and the others leaving Midgar. The original title had them traveling to Kalm, a quiet village on the outskirts of the metropolis of Midgar; that's where Cloud tells them of his history with Sephiroth. In Remake, the gang has to step through a swirling cloud of Whispers and a combination of Sephiroth's Chaos magic and Aerith's Holy magic (more or less). Essentially, they're defying destiny and forging their own path, which is very clever storytelling for both the characters on their journey and this specific version of Final Fantasy VII. Fans can expect something somewhat different going forward, and that's evident by the final insane battle sequences that play out.

The remake has had a number of crazy fights: Hell House, Eligor, Abzu, super spooky ghost battles in the trainyard, Brain Pods, Swordipedes, and Jenova Dreamweaver (though this latter boss wasn't all that impressive; expect that to change as Jenova battles continue in future games. No Midgar Zolom yet, either.) But fans may be surprised to see the remake's version of Weapons arriving in the final chapter. Yep! This time around, they're referred to as Whispers, but the parallels are hard to miss. Originally Ruby, Sapphire, Jade, Diamond, Ultimate, Emerald, and Omega Weapons, we now get Whisper Rubrum, Whisper Croceo, and Whisper Viridi, all of whom are part of Whisper Harbinger but can also combine to form Whisper Bahamut. That entire battle sequence is deliriously insane to the point that I still feel like I hallucinated it. But it pales in comparison to the final stand against Sephiroth. This task starts with Cloud going solo before he's joined, one by one, by his teammates in a touching display, really. But it's also the closest I came to dying in Classic Mode as Sephiroth's "Heartless Angel" attack landed, which, honestly, I should have seen coming. I can't wait to (see someone else) do this fight on Hard Mode!

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Image via Square Enix

In the end, Final Fantasy VII Remake delivers a fantastic modern version of the original, which comprises 95% of the storytelling. That last 5% is formed by new additions like Jessie's expanded story and the new direction that the Remake universe may be taking. We may get to see more of Zack, perhaps giving us a playable campaign with the former SOLDIER and wielder of the Buster Sword. We got glimpses of Red XIII on the run and the massive meteor smashing into the planet, so the core of the familiar story will likely continue. But the smart play here is that Square Enix has introduced a mechanic in the Whispers that gives them free license to change things up as they see fit. And I can't wait to see what they do next!