Final Fantasy games tend to like to rewrite their own rules with each iteration. While the first ten or so games were built around turn-based combat and random encounters, the way that characters, for instance, learned spells and other abilities changed each time from Espers teaching spells in VI, Materia slots in the original VII, or X's sphere grid.
So let's break down how battle and other systems work in VII Remake.
Attacks and ATB:
No longer a turn-based game like its antecedent, FVIIR has action gameplay that plays into a more quasi-turn-based system called ATB (Active Time Battle - though don't confuse it with the original ATB from the original VII, which was just based on time.) Each character can attack with the Square button, and different rhythms will sometimes yield different types of attacks. You can dodge with Circle and use your character's special ability with Triangle.
Attacking, dodging, blocking, and just waiting will build your ATB meter. A filled meter will allow you to take a special action - either an ability, a spell, or use an item. Typically, there are two bars that can be filled sequentially, so you can bank a second meter to do two special actions in quick succession. With a full bar, hit the X button and you can open a menu while the game slows down to ludicrously low speeds (though not fully paused) so you can navigate the menu and pick what you want to do. Taking any of these actions will use up one of your filled ATB meters, so you'll want to continue with basic attacks to it up again.
At any given time, you're directly controlling one character in combat, and typically, you'll build ATB up faster with your active character. You can thus focus on the character who is most useful in the fight or swap between them (which you can do instantly by hitting left or right on the D pad, or up or down, or I think R1 and L1) to spread the wealth.
Even if you're not directly controlling a character, you can hit R2 or L2 (including while in your X menu) to scroll into the other characters' menus and have them use abilities, spells, or items. Part of the tactical challenge of the game is making sure that everyone is doing something useful when they can be.
Materia:
As you gain new gear and upgrade the weapons you find, you'll gain more and more Materia slots. Materia grants various bonuses, dictated by color. Green Materia gives access to spells - a character with, say, a Lightning Materia equipped in one of their slots will gain Lightning-based spells like Thunder. As you use those abilities, the specific Materia ball will gradually upgrade, giving access to new features, such as more powerful spells (Like Thudera and Thundaga). Yellow Materia grants Abilities, which are like spells, but don't cost any MP (there are other ways to get Abilities, which I'll cover later.) Blue Materia tends to have passive bonuses that can improve magic, while Pink/Purple Materia has general bonuses like raising the character's MP or HP max.
The more slots you have, the more Materia you can use. There is a last kind of Materia, which is Red Materia. This allows you to summon powerful allies like Ifrit, the fire elemental, or Shiva, the ice elemental, to help you in boss battles. Thankfully, each weapon has a special dedicated slot for this type, so you won't have to remember to swap these in before a boss battle.
Proficiencies:
While you'll get new weapons over the course of the game, the old ones aren't necessarily useless. Each weapon for each character comes with a signature ability you can use while wielding it. Using that ability enough (I want to say about ten times, though it might vary from ability to ability) will make the character proficient in that ability, and thus allow them to use the ability regardless of which weapon they're using. Even if you have a weapon that isn't as good as the one you've got, it's worth using it for a bit so you'll have the associated ability.
Pressure and Stagger:
While beating monsters is always going to involve whacking them until their HP goes to 0, you can have an easier time with them by staggering them. Certain abilities, and, depending on the monster, certain types of magic damage, will allow you to pressure an enemy, which will make them less effective in combat. If you fill their Stagger meter, they'll become Staggered, and that will leave them stunned and taking significantly more damage. Abilities like "Focused Thrust" or "Focus Fire" will usually fill the Stagger Meter faster.
Weapon Upgrades:
Each weapon can be upgraded using Skill Points, which you gain each time you level up. Each weapon has its own set of skill points, which can be spent on different bonuses while upgrading a weapon. You can thus choose to focus certain weapons on particular strengths if you want - maybe you want one sword to be Cloud's spell-casting weapon, while another is focused much more on physical damage. This also helps keep older weapons relevant.
There are, of course, a lot of things to keep track of here. But I've found that they come together to make for an enjoyable game that blends the tactical decisions of older FF games with fast-paced action gameplay.
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