Volume 686 of Dengeki Playstation features an interview regarding Final Fantasy VII Remake with producer Kitase Yoshinori regarding development of the game.
Also see:
- FFVII Remake: Interview with Nomura Tetsuya and Kitase Yoshinori
- Safer Sephiroth, W-Materia and More: 7 Mistranslations and Other Oddities in Final Fantasy VII
- Final Fantasy VII Remake: Illusion or Not? The Antagonist Explained by Ultimania
The interview begins with Kitase being asked how he feels now that Final Fantasy VII Remake is being released, and he says that he is excited at how they can finally bring the game to the fans.
When asked what lead to the development of an FFVII remake, Kitase says that up till now, if young gamers wanted to experience the origin story of Cloud and other FFVII characters, they would have to play the original FFVII with its Playstation age graphics. He says that by remaking the origin story with the latest modern technology, young gamers and old ones can enjoy FFVII with the greatest gaming experience.
Kitase is next asked how the staff on the original FFVII were involved with Remake. He says that Nomura and him decided on the overall direction the game would go in, such as with the game design and scenario. With the scenario, the two of them and Nojima (Kazushige) constantly made adjustments from the conception of the project up to the present. He says that this is similar to how they worked on FFVII 23 years ago.
Additionally, Uematsu (Nobuo) worked on VII Remake’s theme song, and because having this song with lyrics was an element not in the original, Kitase requested that Uematsu focus on it, and he did.
When asked what parts of the story he would call highlights, Kitase says that for new players, all of the game is highlights. For older fans, he says to look out for differences with the original, especially the episode with the Avalanche members.
The interviewer points out that there are parts of the original game that would be hard to replicate entirely in the present day, such as the Honeybee Inn, and asks what such difficulties they had with VII Remake. Kitase says that the Honeybee Inn gave them trouble, and they had to redo it several times in development. In the end they kept the “adult” feel from the original while turning it into a more refined form of entertainment.
Next, the interviewer says that many Japanese fans have an aversion to action games, and asks if they have any plans for people who feel uneasy about the game’s battle system. Kitase says that he believes that the players will grow as they play the game, and that as such they should enjoy the game fully on the default settings. For people who are still uncomfortable, however, he recommends classic mode, which allows players to enjoy ATB-centric battles like the original’s.
Kitase is asked if there were any specific system or balance-related elements where he gave direct orders, and he says that he did not, having left everything to the development team, who are of a generation closer to contemporary gamers.
The interviewer mentions the lack of save points and asks for confirmation that the player can save anywhere, and Kitase says that they can, and expresses how he is slightly disappointed that the original game’s “mysterious object” save point is not in VII Remake.
Finally, Kitase is asked if experiencing working on the original and the remake have led to him feeling anything in particular, and to this, Kitase says that while being the producer on VII Remake meant that he did not touch the content creation directly, he did participate as temporary help as a game designer, directly planning some parts such as Mako Reactor no. 5 and the higher floors of the Shinra building.
Kitase says that while progress in graphics and game design has resulted in development environments and workflows getting more complicated and having to think about more things, he felt that his core as a game designer, such as his power to come up with presentation and ideas has not changed.
Also see:
Final Fantasy VII Remake was released on the Playstation 4 worldwide on 10th April 2020
What did you think of FF7R? Let us know in the comments below!
>Kitase is next asked how the staff on the original FFVII were involved with Remake. He says that Nomura and him decided on the overall direction the game would go in, such as with the game design and scenario. With the scenario, the two of them and Nojima (Kazushige) constantly made adjustments from the conception of the project up to the present. He says that this is similar to how they worked on FFVII 23 years ago.
lol, as I said this things aren’t done alone by one person with others not knowing but planned, discussed, etc but shitposters kept saying it was nomura, eat shit dumbasses I was right and your wrong
Story and scenario are completely different things. Story is the plot, scenario is the script, how hard is that to understand?
>Kitase, who was director of the original FFVII, is asked how much input he had on the remake. He says that the overall direction and concept, story and worldbuilding was left to Nomura
>He says that Nomura and him decided on the overall direction the game would go in, such as with the game design and scenario.
“Direction of the scenario” = story. These are literally referring to the same thing.
>With the scenario, the two of them and Nojima (Kazushige) constantly made adjustments from the conception of the project up to the present.
“Scenario” means the script, concrete details on who does what and who says what, not the story, not the plot.
Illiterate idiot.
zoomers think one guy creates a game and not a whole team of them and can’t comprehend memorizing more than one.
I beat the game last night and loved it. The pacing was pretty bad and the last chapter wasn’t my FAVORITE but I really don’t get the mouth-frothing hate some so-called fans have for it. The new stuff was cool, memorable, and interesting, and it has me excited about what comes next.
People keep comparing this to TLJ but these are totally different. 7R isn’t just making up stuff to subvert for subversion’s sake, it’s clearly doing this because it wants to send the story to a new direction. TLJ was just changing pre-existing characters and killing them off for no reason just to “subvert” and that’s what made it terrible. TLJ was like having Cloud have a completely different personality and then die, and be replaced with Leslie. CLEARLY 7R didn’t do anything of that sort.
The characters in 7R are still the same as in 7. In fact most of them are even better! They get more fleshing out, more character moments, more backstory, more personality! And now they’re sending these characters we love on new adventures, what is there NOT to like?
The people griping about the changes were never fans of FF7 or FF or JRPGs in the first place, they’re just bitter haters whining about nostalgia for something they barely remember.
BTW, AngriestPat who constantly whines about anime bullshit in games loved it, MaximillianDood who’s THE pillar of the FF7 community loved it, and even Jim Sterling who hates Kingdom Hearts and Nomura loved it. The game has an 88/100 critic score on Metacritic. How much more proof do you need that it’s good? The people griping are probably trolls who didn’t play the game.
The classic people who disagree with me are trolls. Max is a massive hypocrite and says it’s different from Kingdom Hearts because he can understand it, then says new players won’t be able to understand it. So forgive me if I I don’t care about him trying to keep his relationship with square enix intact over being objective.
Jeremy Jahns didn’t like it, neither did Eurogamer, but congrats to naming two people who randomly agree with you, one of which who has blatant ins with the company in question with all the early access he got.
It was awful to anyone who cares about competent storytelling and people like yourself are likely objective morons who only want to see cool fights and have nothing make sense. See? Real easy to flip back on you.
>Jeremy Jahns
literally who
>neither did Eurogamer
Oh boy EUROGAMER didn’t like it, next you’re going to tell me IGN or Kotaku didn’t either!
Try again with someone who actually matters, chucklefuck.
this jogo is very bueno
but you muchacho are very , how do you say
you are extremo retardarado
My first experience with Final Fantasy was 8 in 1999 when I was 14. It has been my all time favourite game all these years and I’ve played greats like The Last of Us, Horizon: Zero Dawn, etc. I’ve been an artist since well before I even knew what a video game was, but FF8 influenced me in such a way that Tetsuya Nomura has pretty much been my sole inspiration/art idol since I discovered his work in 1999. It influences my own style today.
I played FF7 a few years ago because the hype drew me to it (and I wanted classic FF after FFXIII was disappointing). I can’t remember why I didn’t finish FF7, but I do remember enjoying what I got to see.
Ff7Remake, which I’ve not yet finished though I fear it is close, is fantastic from corner to corner. The voice acting is superb, the graphics are exquisite, the characters are humanly fleshed out and beautifully designed. The soundtrack is hands down second to none and grips your imagination. Every composition perfectly fits the atmosphere of every scene and place.
My only gripe is that we have to wait for the next part in the story, but given the amount of work that has clearly gone into this first game of Remake, I understand why. I just wish I could experience the whole story in one big go because I’m damn addicted to it, but given that I haven’t done much of anything else since I got the game, it’s perhaps a good thing that I’ll have to wait for the next installment. Chances are decent that I’ll have to get it on cross-console (from PS4 to PS5) too which sucks moneywise.
I have zero complaints about the game itself. FFVIIR had fully engulfed my creative brain, and my gamer soul. It is an exquisite work of art with a classic FF feel brought forward into modern visualization and it should be given its due reverence.
Well freaking done, SE. Well done.
The game is made for Japanese gamers first and foremost, and Japanese gamers already know Sephiroth and Cloud from spinoffs like Dissidia and RB and CC and shit. They don’t want the original game’s buildup, they just want Sephiroth.
FF7R doesn’t exist with no context. There is context, that context is Crisis Core and Dyssidia and Advent Children and other spinoffs. 7R doesn’t exist in a fucking vacuum, most of the players already know who Cloud and Sephiroth and Zack and Aerith and Tifa are as characters, but they don’t know the full original story of FF7 despite having snippets like “Sephiroth killed Aerith” “Zack died protecting cloud” “Sephiroth is gay for Cloud” from all this side stuff.
What they did actually makes sense in a way when you consider who they’re making the game for.
They’re making it for “newer fans” which means people who like the characters from stuff like KH and the mobile games and Dyssidia, but never actually played FF7. So technically it does mean new players as in they never played FF7, but FF7 is big enough that there’s no way that there can be a new player going in without already who Cloud and Sephiroth and Aerith are.
Seriously, let’s say that 7R actually started off presenting Sephiroth as this regular guy and war hero who disappeared a couple of years ago. How many new players would have bought that? In Japan at least Sephiroth is on the cover of spinoffs, on billboards, on gigantic advertising prints covering the sides of entire buildings, he’s in magazines and arcade games and spinoffs and Kingdom Hearts presented as a big villain and Cloud’s eternal rival, how could anyone possibly go in to FF7R without knowing that he’s the villain?
It’s stupid to think that 7R could have been remade 1:1 with no changes and still been the way it was in 97. What they did was brilliant, it doesn’t remake the story 1:1, it remakes how it makes the player feels 1:1. Now we actually don’t know what Sephiroth is up to, we don’t know what will become of Aerith, we don’t know where the story is headed. And that’s exactly how we felt at the end of Midgar in FF7 in 97.
I feel like Nomura doing the plot with Nojima doing the actual writing is a perfect storm that might have things actually turn out good
Nomura tends to make his stories too abstract and throw in all sorts of stupid bullshit, but he also has this fixation on how everything has to be a perfect good ending in the end no matter how ridiculous it gets.
Nojima is known for wanting to make things TOO down to ground and not in a good way, he doesn’t care about realism as much as making character personalities and relationships “realistic” which means grimderp edgy shit like killing Tidus and bringing him back just to make Yuna suffer over how he’s fake, or all the bullshit with Rinoa and Seifer and Squall.
They’re two completely different brands of crazy and from what we’ve seen in 7R I get the feeling like they cancel each other’s worst parts out in some ways to make it so that the final product is actually decent.
I liked it, screw the haters