I'm not a violent man, but I want to beat Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth's Chadley with a sack of rocks

I’m not what you’d call a violent man. Ask anyone that knows me and they’d probably tell you I wouldn’t hurt a fly. Not because I’m physically incapable, to be clear. If I was locked in a room with a fly and told only one of us could walk out again, I’d be sending flowers to the fly’s family. But I wouldn’t want to hurt a fly.

What was my point again?

Oh yeah, I’m not violent. I don’t have a bloodthirsty bone in my body. I genuinely hate having to hunt animals in video games, I really don’t do well with gore in movies, and even the notion of telling a waiter they got my order wrong brings me to the verge of tears.

And yet, there is Chadley.

Playing Final Fantasy VII Remake back in 2020, I began to boil over with rage any time I had to interact with Chadley, the NPC who helps Cloud and co by presenting battle simulations and crafting powerful materia. The endless, inane chatter. The condescending tone he seems to reserve specifically for Cloud. The name Chadley. Maybe my hatred for this bizarre robo-child is irrational. Maybe not. Either way, I never suspected I had so much capacity for it.

You can imagine my delight then, when, after going into Final Fantasy VII Rebirth relatively blind, I discovered Square Enix decided to make Chadley an even bigger part of the adventure than he was last time around.

At least in Remake Chadley stayed in the slums. You didn’t really have to deal with him at all if you didn’t want to. In Rebirth Chadley is foisted upon you, his grating presence an integral piece of the futuristic handheld device you’re forced to carry around. It’s a little like when Apple users got that U2 album, but not quite as bad.

Instead of being able to, you know, just explore and enjoy Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, I’m subjected to involuntary face-time sessions with Chadley every time I find something interesting. Found a cool point of interest? Chadley will screech at you from the DualSense speakers about why what you’ve just found is interesting before you’ve had a chance to take it in. Fighting a tough enemy? Chadley will offer words of support that amount to him droning on over the game’s excellent soundtrack and banter between the characters I actually care about.

I hate him. I hate him so much. At night I dream. And when I dream, I dream of hurting Chadley.

I want to beat him with a sack of old rocks. I want to drown him in boiling water. I want to force his face through a drainpipe. I want to make him sit through Advent Children. I want to cover his hands in tiny paper cuts then force him to peel lemons.

The late, great movie critic Roger Ebert once famously said film was an "empathy machine”, a way to view perspectives and points of view the world could never allow. I believe video games are, at their very best, capable of the same thing. I only wish Final Fantasy VII Rebirth hadn’t put me in the shoes of someone who wants to run over a synthetic child in a truck.