Played the rebirth demo, and I think I'm gonna come out with the same feelings about the first part. The gameplay is good. It's fun to see some of these areas from a different perspective and with better graphics, but ultimately I think these remakes are underserved by their creative teams. The town feels totally lifeless from a combination of the animations, the character models, and the voice acting. Almost no one feels like they could be a real, whole person. For cloud in particular, I'm shocked at how bad the voice acting is. It's all underwritten and under performed. This actor was given the role of one of the most iconic characters in all of gaming and did nothing with it... And the director didn't demand anything more of him. Sephiroth is an exception though! And I was pleasantly surprised to find him a little bit relatable and dimensional.

I just can't help but imagine this franchise in the hands of better writers, at least.