Following a promising yet imperfect demo last month, the final release of Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth on Switch 2 and Xbox Series consoles is here - and we were keen to discover if the issues we raised last time out had been fixed in the retail code.

For Nintendo's handheld, the news is largely positive, as a series of crucial optimisations sees the Switch 2 version perform better than its demo counterpart - though little has changed visually. In contrast, the Xbox Series X and S versions unfortunately show no significant performance uplift from the demo, retaining issues like frame-rate drops and a troublesome camera judder bug. The core questions now revolve around the extent of the Switch 2 improvements, the lingering issues on Xbox, and how both platforms fare beyond the initial demo chapters in areas like the Junon region.

Starting off with the Switch 2, it's clear that Rebirth's release on the system is some feat of engineering, given that the game is running on a platform with an order of magnitude less power available than on PS5. To make things workable, Square Enix made significant visual trade-offs which remain in the final build. This includes dropping texture asset quality to match the Xbox Series S version to fit into the 12GB of available RAM, something that's conspicuous in cutscene close-ups but less obvious during general gameplay and combat.

Further visual compromises on the Switch 2 include pruned-back shadow draw distances, aligning them with the Xbox Series S version, while object detail is also reduced, with some items removed from areas like the city of Kalm and plant density lessened across the Grasslands. Geometry and foliage LODs are reined in while roaming the open world, leading to noticeable pop-in - something that's sadly a feature across all console versions, but more pronounced here and on Series S. Lastly, NPCs still use decimated animations beyond a certain range, causing characters to freeze in place, and water bodies revert to a lower-quality mesh with visibly dithered volumetric fog.

On the upside, the game's core visual integrity is maintained, with all object physics, cutscenes and the world structure fundamentally intact. Character models are preserved and look superb, and the port retains dynamic shadows for moving objects and screen space reflections on water. In terms of resolution, the docked final build targets a 540p to 1080p range, reconstructing to 1080p using DLSS. The portable mode drops to a 380p-756p range, this time reconstructing up to 576p. This DLSS approach avoids the ghosting typical of standard temporal anti-aliasing, leading to a crisper, sharper image than the Series S's native 1080p graphics mode, though it does come with the downside of noisy artefacts in fine details like hair.

The headline change for Switch 2 is performance. Retesting the demo areas reveals significant strides toward holding a stable 30fps lock. The most crucial improvement is in cutscenes, where the initial 66-100ms hitches on camera cut are now greatly reduced. Square Enix has worked to optimise Unreal Engine 4's asset streaming, ensuring frames land much closer to the 33.3ms target for 30fps. While drops still occur, typically in the 50ms range, the less aggressive nature of these hitches is still a notable improvement.

Performance has also improved in key gameplay areas. NPC-dense locations like Kalm town, which previously saw the frame-rate visibly lurch into the mid-20s, now only drop a few frames under 30 in the final release. This improvement comes with a trade-off: NPC density has been reduced in the final build to stabilise the frame-rate. Similarly, open areas like the Grasslands, which suffered semi-consistent drops and hitches during sprinting or combat in the demo, now exhibit a clearly lessened frequency and severity of frame drops, with the more sizeable 66ms+ hitches reined in. As a fun, if minor, footnote, the low-poly vegetables on the cart in the demo have been upgraded to high-quality models in the final release, a benefit Series S players also receive.

Moving past the initial demo content, the Switch 2 maintains its expected performance profile. Tight interior areas like Chapter 3's Mythril Mines largely maintain 30fps, with only small single-frame dips. The most glaring drops occur during boss battles, where bursts of special moves or enemy staggering trigger larger hitches, preventing a totally stable 30fps line during major combat. The second open area, the Junon region, behaves similarly to the Grasslands, with quick sprinting and open views of terrain triggering more dropped frames, though it generally stabilises at the target 30fps.

Turning to the Xbox Series consoles, the 30fps graphics mode is generally stable and commendable on both Series X and S. The Series X achieves a consistent pin-sharp native 4K at 30fps, comparable to the base PS5. The 60fps performance mode is unfortunately not as watertight, with plenty of sustained drops under 60fps that were present in the demo and remain unaddressed in the final build. This performance variable is compounded by the fact that VRR does not appear to engage correctly, meaning drops into the 50s and 40s still manifest as visible judder. Series S's 60fps mode suffers severely in image quality too, frequently dropping to native 540p or 648p, resulting in a blurry, mushy upscale with TAA ghosting.

Furthermore, both Series X and S suffer from the persistent 'camera judder' bug in their performance modes. This issue, which has been seen in other Unreal Engine 4 titles, causes camera movement to update at uneven intervals, creating the perception of frame-rate drops even when the game is holding a stable 60fps. Curiously, the Series S actually runs better than the Series X in key stress tests, as its reduced foliage density results in frame-rates that hit 58fps in areas where the Series X sits at 50fps. While both consoles can unlock their frame-rates by setting the system refresh to 120Hz, this is no real solution, as the 60fps performance mode still settles near the 60fps line and the camera judder persists.

Overall, while the 30fps modes on Xbox are solid, the 60fps alternative has too many unaddressed drops and bugs, making the Switch 2's improved (albeit imperfect) 30fps lock a far more impressive achievement given its constraints.