Final Fantasy VII Revelation Brings Back Rebirth’s 8 Regions, but the Highwind Changes Everything

Final Fantasy VII Revelation will bring the Final Fantasy VII Remake trilogy to a close in Spring 2027, and Square Enix is preparing a world that looks far more ambitious than a simple return to the locations explored in Rebirth. The final chapter launches for PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and Nintendo Switch 2, with the Highwind giving Cloud and his companions the freedom to travel across a massive connected world from an early stage of the adventure.

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth already introduced 8 major regions filled with towns, combat challenges, Chocobo routes, side quests, minigames, and environmental activities. Bringing those same areas back risked making Revelation feel overly familiar, especially if the final game followed the original Final Fantasy VII story without giving players meaningful reasons to revisit places such as Junon, Gongaga, Cosmo Canyon, or the Grasslands.

Director Naoki Hamaguchi has now explained that Square Enix designed Revelation around a different relationship with the world. Instead of guiding players through regions in a mostly fixed sequence, the Highwind will allow them to approach the planet more freely and choose the order in which they explore many locations.

"Because players will be able to travel via the Highwind from an early stage, we believe a game design where players can choose their own order of approaching the world map, even more so than in Rebirth, would be a better fit. In that sense, rather than repeating the same experience across the trilogy, each title will change the very way of engaging with the world."
— Naoki Hamaguchi.

The Highwind is therefore more than a faster travel system. It changes how the entire world is structured. Players will be able to fly between continents, cross oceans, search for distant islands, and parachute directly into selected locations. Regions that once felt separated by progression barriers will become parts of one connected planet that can be approached from different directions.

We previously covered how Final Fantasy VII Revelation gives players early access to the Highwind and greater freedom across its world, but Hamaguchi’s latest comments make it clear that the airship is also the solution to one of the trilogy’s largest design challenges. Square Enix needed to preserve the world created for Rebirth without asking players to repeat the same exploration structure for another full game.

Returning regions will contain new narrative events, activities, routes, enemies, and environmental changes. The awakening of the Weapons and the approaching threat of Meteor will affect the world, giving familiar locations a different atmosphere and stronger connection to the final conflict. Communities that once felt relatively safe may now face destruction, fear, political tension, or direct attacks from forces connected to the planet.

Hamaguchi confirmed that the development team only brought previous locations back after finding compelling reasons for players to visit them again. The goal was not simply to increase the size of the map, but to create a world that feels changed by everything that happened during Rebirth.

"It wasn’t an easy task for the team, but I feel that, as a result, we’ve created a world map that feels truly substantial."
— Naoki Hamaguchi.

That sense of scale will also come from the addition of locations that did not appear in Rebirth. Rocket Town, Wutai, Mideel, and the northern regions of the planet are all expected to become major parts of Revelation, giving the final game a combination of completely new destinations and significantly updated returning areas.

Rocket Town and Wutai are especially important because both were memorable locations in the original Final Fantasy VII. Their absence from Rebirth led some players to believe Square Enix had simply moved content into the final chapter to make the trilogy larger. Hamaguchi explained that the decision was instead made to protect the pacing and emotional focus of Rebirth.

"Rocket Town and Wutai are certainly memorable in the original game, but when we looked at the plot and overall gameplay experience of Rebirth, we felt that they contained a very high density of information, and that including them at this stage would actually hinder the flow and pacing of the main story. Therefore, we made the decision to exclude them from Rebirth from the outset."
— Naoki Hamaguchi.

Rebirth already had to introduce several regions, expand the relationships between the party members, develop Sephiroth’s growing influence, explore the Temple of the Ancients, and deliver one of the most emotionally complex endings in the trilogy. Adding Rocket Town and Wutai could have distracted from those events while giving Cid and Yuffie less room for meaningful development.

Saving Rocket Town for Revelation allows Square Enix to focus more closely on Cid Highwind. Although Cid travelled with the party in Rebirth, he was not a playable character. His hometown, failed space program, history with Shinra, and personal regrets are central to understanding who he is and why he ultimately joins Cloud’s fight.

Rocket Town should also carry more emotional weight now that players already know Cid. Instead of meeting him and immediately moving through his backstory, Revelation can build the location around a character who has already become part of the group. His relationship with the Highwind could also give the airship a stronger narrative role rather than treating it only as a convenient vehicle.

Wutai has received an even larger transformation. In the original game, the region was mostly connected to Yuffie and could be explored through optional content. In the remake trilogy, Wutai has become a major political power involved in a growing conflict with Shinra. Its influence can already be felt across Remake and Rebirth through military tension, propaganda, intelligence operations, and the possibility of another war.

This expanded role should place Yuffie much closer to the center of Revelation’s story. Her loyalty to Wutai, anger toward Shinra, grief, and desire to protect her homeland can now become essential parts of the main narrative. Wutai may also create difficult questions for the party if the region’s goals do not completely align with Cloud’s mission.

"As a result, this created room for Rocket Town and Wutai to be treated as locations of significant importance in the third instalment, both in terms of story and gameplay experience. Looking back now, I believe it was the right decision in that it maintained the experiential depth of each individual title."
— Hamaguchi.

The decision makes sense when looking at the trilogy as 3 separate experiences rather than one original game divided into equal sections. Remake focused on Midgar and transformed a relatively short portion of the original into a complete urban adventure. Rebirth opened the planet and emphasized travel, relationships, exploration, and discovery. Revelation now appears designed around freedom, global consequences, and control of the entire world.

The return of the 8 Rebirth regions could also make the final story more emotionally effective. Players have already spent dozens of hours learning these places, helping their residents, and building connections with local characters. Returning after Meteor appears and the Weapons awaken could make the crisis feel more personal because the threatened locations are no longer anonymous points on a map.

The world should also evolve through new traversal systems. Square Enix has already discussed Pico, a companion Chocobo whose development will influence how players move through environments. Combined with the Highwind, parachuting, and region specific exploration mechanics, Revelation has several opportunities to make familiar areas feel mechanically different.

The Highwind could also transform optional content. Rebirth often required players to complete regional activities before moving forward, while Revelation may allow players to pursue dangerous enemies, hidden islands, Weapon encounters, or character stories in a more flexible order. This could give the final game a stronger feeling of adventure while reducing the checklist structure that divided opinions in Rebirth.

The final chapter must also accommodate an expanded playable party. Cid and Vincent will become fully controllable, creating new combat combinations and opportunities for character focused missions. Rocket Town and Wutai should give Cid and Yuffie major narrative development, while Vincent’s connection to Shinra, Hojo, and the wider history of Sephiroth could become increasingly important as the story approaches its conclusion.

Square Enix is also preparing the FITS customization system, large Weapon battles, returning outfits, and expanded endgame challenges, suggesting that the game will continue offering substantial content after the main story ends. The decision to reuse Rebirth’s regions is not a concern if those places properly show the consequences of the story. The world should not look or feel the same after the arrival of Meteor, the awakening of the Weapons, and Shinra’s escalating attempts to maintain control. Familiarity can become a strength when players return to places they already care about and discover how dramatically they have changed.

The Highwind may ultimately become the feature that defines Revelation. Rebirth was about discovering the world one region at a time. Revelation appears to be about possessing the freedom to cross the entire planet, choose where to intervene, and witness how every location is affected by the approaching end.

Square Enix is not simply making Rebirth’s world larger. It is changing how players move through it, why they return to it, and what those locations mean during the final chapter. If the studio delivers on that promise, Final Fantasy VII Revelation could turn one of the trilogy’s biggest risks into its greatest strength.

Are you excited to revisit Rebirth’s regions with the Highwind, or do you hope Final Fantasy VII Revelation focuses more heavily on Rocket Town, Wutai, and completely new locations?