The only place the Remote Drone should not work once Trace has obtained it is the short section of the game in Ukkin-Na between Trace's first hallucination and Trace meeting Ophelia after the Vision boss fight. Â Trace should not be able to leave Ukkin-Na during this part due to him not having the Trenchcoat.
That may be a bug.
I do not understand what yoiu mean by "Climbers".
Level 7? Â You mean Edin?
Have you used any of the Parametric Passcodes that play back ingame dialog?
Have you tried reconfiguring the game's controls to rule that out?
With a bit more information I may be able to help out more. Â Good luck.