Whoopsie artwork isn’t the only thing hiding in Crisis Core’s ShinRa Mansion, though, because down in the basement is a rather cute nod a Final Fantasy VII fav. Spoilers within, obvs.
The ears of many a FF7 veteran will have no doubt instantly pricked up at the mention of the ShinRa Mansion, it being the home of a certain optional party member in the main game. And yep, when you’re exploring the basement of the mansion to find where Sephiroth’s been holding himself up for the entirety of your Nibelheim holiday, you’ll notice that some enemies start dropping ‘Coffin Keys’.
At first, it’s not entirely clear what these Coffin Keys are for, but look around and you’ll see two adjoining doors in the room leading to, you guessed it, a couple of crypts. Each room contains half a dozen coffins, but four of them can be opened with these special keys. Open all of them, and the following little cutscene ensues. As the coffin lid slides back, Zack lets out a yelp, surprised to see someone’s sleeping in there. The other coffins all contained monsters to fight, but Zack’s so wigged out by this sudden turn of events (and given they’re sleeping so peacefully) that he decides to leave them well enough alone.
See you again in seven years, pal.
I should note, this coffin scene isn’t a new addition to Crisis Core: Reunion. The 2007 PSP original also had this little Easter egg in it, and from the looks of things plays out exactly the same way, with exactly the same dialogue. Can’t say the same for the Getty Images art, though. That’s almost certainly a blunder unique to this 2022 remaster.
Speaking of Reunion-specific oddities, can someone please tell me what’s going on in this photograph scene with Zack, Tifa and Sephiroth outside the ShinRa Mansion? Tifa is absolutely tiny, and somehow seems to have shrunk quite considerably from both the original FF7 version of this photo, and its 2007 Crisis Core equivalent. Sure, she’s only meant to be 15 years old in this photo, but seriously, something’s not right here, and I don’t think we can blame it on timey-wimey Remake nonsense (mostly because there is none).
As discussed in my Crisis Core Reunion review yesterday, this 2022 glow-up is a very straightforward, beat-for-beat remaster of the original PSP version, albeit with fancier, upgraded graphics, re-recorded voice lines and a newly arranged soundtrack. As such, if you were expecting this remaster to pull a FF7 Remake and change things up in the story a bit to account for ahem its rather canon-breaking ending reveal, you’ll be disappointed. It’s still a halfway decent Final Fantasy game, for sure, but when it doesn’t do much to add to Square Enix’s new Remake-verse, it’s certainly not essential viewing before Final Fantasy VII Rebirth comes out.
Still, Tifa’s mysterious shrinking and Getty goof aside, it’s good to know our red-robed, sorta vampire pal continues to be alive and well. Kinda. Maybe we should have left that coffin open a crack, let a bit of fresh air in. Sorry Vincent. Please don’t hold it against us.
