Hopes for Remake & Rebirth (story/content)

[Starling]

I'm fine with change. All this on my part is simply a fantasy of what I would like to see, essentially if I had creative control of the product.
That being said, an HD fully 3D FF7 in cell-shaded graphics would, by most standards, also be a huge change. I simply want the art-style to be consistent, because I consider it by far to be FF7 strongest point separating it from earlier and later titles.
Without that, stylistically speaking, it's just an FF8/FF10/FF15 playing FF7 dress-up.

The art style staying as shown in the trailer would be staying consistent. It's not as big a leap from the artwork as you make it out to be, and the backgrounds were designed in a way that seems to lend itself better to a semi-realistic style than an animesque cel-shaded style.

Are we looking at the same footage? The artwork of the original and the actual graphical presentation of people in the trailer are, I repeat, completely different.

Comparing the two is like comparing the art-direction of Gears of War with Trigun, Dragonball, or Ah My Goddess.

You make it sound like they're completely unrecognizable. Cloud's hair is still recognizably spiky, Tifa, Yuffie etc still look relatively the same. Really, you're making a bigger deal out of it than it needs to be, as the differences in appearance are largely superficial.

I think you'd get more mileage out of your anallogy if you used another case of showing the same character in different styles, such as comparing different LoZ games.

Spoiler: Vincent

Spoiler: Link

As shown with the various depictions of Vincent throughout the years, they all seem to be relatively consistent. While the various examples of Link aren't the same individual, they're all still recognizable as Link regardless of the art style used. I'd also like to take the time to point out that it's perfectly fine for there to be differences between the appearance of characters in the artowrk and what they look like in the game. A minor example would be that SS Link look a lot more fierce in the artwork than he does in-game.

What you're referring to is, I get the impression of, is the presentation - the set-pieces. Yeah, Cloud is wearing his standard outfit, yes Midgard (at least the night-time shots) is true to the original. That's not the substance of the style though - that's the actn paint the exact same landscape and it will look different stylistically speaking even if the set-piece, the image, is the same.

As for the engine and textures - That's just wrong from a development stand-point. Have you played, or seen, any of the lastest Naruto games released the last few years? There is absolutely no reason what so ever why SE couldn't make a extremely high-fidelity, smoothly animated Cell-shaded version of FF7 for PS4. Non what so ever - They didn't opt out of such a style because of tehnical concerns, that I can tell you for certain.
They most likely didn't consider it at all to begin with, because FF7's style evolved with the release of the compilation, and now it is what it is. I'm just saying I don't like it.

I was mostly referring to Cloud's hair, actually. As I've said above, even large stylistic changes should be able to keep the character recognizable, and the style that's been used previously does a good job translating the artwork into the character designs. I'm not really interested in most anime spin-off games so I haven't really paid much attention to the Naruto games. The thing is, you have to account for the locations and the characters. Cel-shading is best suited for stuff that's stylized in the way you'd see in comic books or 2D animation. Last Order gives us an example of FF7 characters in a straight up anime style and quite frankly, that's not the way to go. So far, it's the semi-realistic style FF games have been going towards that seems to work best, when taking both the characters and the locations into consideration.

Yeah, but that's irrelevant because I was not making an argument about what I would do if I wanted to make the game successful - but what they would have to do in order to truly please me as fan.
There is a big difference. I recognize that I won't get my way ever. I wasn't saying I should or that it would be clever of them to do so - simply that it's the way, in my perfect world, that it would end up being.

It's still relevant in pointing out the problems in them attempting to make those changes. Understanding why it can't or is unlikely to happen helps better evaluate what expectations are reasonable and which ones aren't.

You made it sound like cel-shading is objectively superior for the purpose of representing the OG, making the current style out to be a bigger departure than it actually is, treating the current style as if it hardly has any relation to the way the characters are supposed to look.

As for ignoring their old fans - I am not saying they will entirely - however, if this game is going to cost anywhere close to the same as other western AAA titles, they're also going to have to sell as much.
The original crowd alone does not cover that large of a population, meaning that whenever they hit a design snag in the development, where a fan-base preference butts heads with general consumer preferences, the original fan-base will lose out.

Add that to the fact that the "original" fan-base is divided as well, between original purists like myself, and those who came in with the compilation who has much less of a relationship with original material, there really isn't all that much incentive left for the producers to think too much about keeping it true to the original except in the most basic of ways in order to keep it recognizable.

I think you underestimate the importance of pre-existing fans. The fans are the ones who give feedback so of course it's a good idea to pay attention to what the fans think and why, while being mindful of the reasons in order to evaluate whether or not it's a good idea to take things in that direction.

Well it is - because I don't like the compilation.
The thing though, is that I pretty clearly made a point of the fact that most of my preferences are not likely to see the day of light, nor that I expect them to. I reserve the right to dislike the compilation and the direction of the remake, and you're free to disagree.
However, I did not make those statements to have an argument about whether they would work or not, which I think I made pretty clear as I have acknowledged over and over again that I don't think they would - which is why I don't understand why you'd bother to attempt to make it into an argument.

You're the one who responded to my relatively short post with a wall of text, which makes it look like you did want to make a bigger argument out of it.

I am not arguing that SE should make the game closer to the original style because I think that would be better for the franchise or for profits, or necessarily for some objective standard of what makes a game good - I simply said that's what I would want it to look like to really feel at home with it. There literally is nothing to argue about in such a statement.

Just because you're expressing something you want doesn't mean no one can bring up counterpoints about it and discuss the other aspects of it. Too often I see people say things like that because they think the game won't be worth bothering with if it doesn't fit their desires regarding the art style, which I find rather limiting. Why would someone want to give up on a game over just that?

I find the opposite to be true. Be a pessimist about something up front, and you'll never get disappointed, and the thing you engage with will almost certainly exceed expectations and as an extension feel satisfying in direct relation to how much better it is than you expected.

Being pessimistic is like having disappointment as the default. It makes you biased against things without giving them a fair chance. On top of that, negativity feels more exhausting than positivity or even just neutrality on the matter.

Go in with hopes and dreams, tiny or huge notwithstanding, and when the product inevitably doesn't deliver to that standard, you're left with a sense of disappointment that makes some serious damage to your perception of the product for a very long time.

That's what happened with FF8 for me. FF7 and pre-release hype completely skewed my expectations of it. Got it, was disappointed. Hated on it for 2 years, before I replayed it and finally got to like it for what it is.

I'm not going to submit my experience of the remake with that, especially granted SE's history with the franchise the last decade or so. I'll go into this in a state of minus on my expectation meter, and I'll let the game convince me otherwise. Nothing else matters.

I'm not saying you have to hype yourself up to assume it's the best thing ever, which would obviously set the bar too high for most things. You have to reach a balance where you're neither too positive, nor too negative. Take the limitations into consideration, but also keep in mind the possibilities that remain on the table until otherwise shown. Even if it doesn't turn out quite like yo were hoping, appreciate t for what it is rather than what you wanted it to be.

I didn't respond to the rest of your post, because it's pretty much repetition of things I've already disagreed with or covered.

You have to be careful about stuff like that. Considering the length of the post though, I'm not all that surprised you'd want to cut out what you could. Personally, it's easier to keep track of when everything gets quoted.

To make a short reply to the common sentiment - I think the blandness you see in AC is a direct result of the new art-direction. It was a conscious choice to pick a color-palette that fits with the more realistic look of the world and the characters, and it was a conscious choice to center the plot and action around locations from the game that would work with the original style, rather than places like Cosmo Canyon or Gold Saucer that both are pretty whimsical and have physically impossible/super impractical architecture in them.

The blandness I referred to was in CC, not AC. The OG makes use of plenty of generic NPC models so it's not something I consider worth getting too upset about in the compilation. CC's blandness was in the lack of detail in the location and some character renders that failed to breath life into them the way they should have. Considering the other games available on PSP, I'm sure they could've done better with that. I understand why they went with less colon for AC and it fits with the tone, even though they could've put more colour into it. The remake trailer is pretty promising about those not being an issue for it and it's not like Midgar doesn't have some impossible/impractical structure as well.

You say you can envision the quirky scenes of the original in the remake with the style from the teaser and I believe you - I can too - That's not my problem. I am simply saying it's not likely to happen, because it will look jarring and weird with the new style.
This is a game we're talking about here - of course they can realize any scene they want.

Part of what I said in my previous post was about how limiting your thinking as a consumer can limit the thinking of the game makers when they try to figure out what would go well with us. It's hurtful in the long run because it enforces the belief that those things can't happen despite being possible.

The reason I make this argument is because the compilation games and AC has not contained scenes, enemy models, and characters like in the original. NPCs, or in the case of AC, background characters have been toned down to fit the more somber design, gone are any sign of the locations with oddly shaped and disproportionate buildings among other things.

Artists worry about making their work look consistent and thematically wholesome. That's why the compilation in general has less quirks than the original, because while the quirks could be made, they would look out of place to most people given the overall new tone of those products.
Since the remake seems to be going to realistic route, it's not unreasonable to think that they might cut away content that meshes poorly with the new art-style - again, not because it cannot be done - but because they'll probably think of 100s of things that might work better.

I'm pretty sure I covered this earlier in the post.

And while those new things might be good in their own right - I think the removal of the trippy and vibrantly silly things in FF7 is to take away a large part of what made FF7 so special to begin with.
Remove it, and you're left with a pretty standard, and melodramatic piece of art with very little left to single it out from other titles, especially with FF15 on the horizon.

SE still has enough of a sense of humour to keep that kind of thing in there. I mean, Wall Market is fairly important to the plot and can't really be removed without some serious changes and bracing for a riot. I wouldn't be too upset if they changed the CPR thing so you'd either save Pricilla's life without the weird, medically inaccurate depiction of CPR, whether it's by making it more accurate or by skipping the minigame segment. They're probably better off keeping some playable element of it though. If they're as dedicated to remaining faithful to the game as they said, then they would know to keep those parts.

 

[hian]

The art style staying as shown in the trailer would be staying consistent. It's not as big a leap from the artwork as you make it out to be, and the backgrounds were designed in a way that seems to lend itself better to a semi-realistic style than an animesque cel-shaded style..

No it wouldn't. It would be consistent with the style of compilation, not the art style of the original. Again, you're confusing the image/subject with the style. You're not actually addressing what's being said here - as I said, it's quite possible to draw the exact same object in two widely different styles and still be creating an accurate representation of the subject being drawn.
PS4 Dissidia Cloud has all the same features as anime Cloud - that's not what I am arguing here - I am arguing that I like the style of anime Cloud, and I think the semi-realism Cloud looks moronic.
That's just my personal feeling about it.

I disagree with the backgrounds, and if I wasn't lazy I'd provide you several examples of locations in FF7 that clearly don't even make sense in terms of things like perspective, and physics. One of the best examples of the top of my head perhaps, is the church in the slums.

You make it sound like they're completely unrecognizable. Cloud's hair is still recognizably spiky, Tifa, Yuffie etc still look relatively the same. Really, you're making a bigger deal out of it than it needs to be, as the differences in appearance are largely superficial..

You're not reading what I am saying - It's not that they're not recognizable - they're not styled the same.
The only thing here, to say it plainly and clearly -
I do not like the semi-realistic style, in my opinion it looks stupid.
Get it now?

I think you'd get more mileage out of your anallogy if you used another case of showing the same character in different styles, such as comparing different LoZ games.

As shown with the various depictions of Vincent throughout the years, they all seem to be relatively consistent. While the various examples of Link aren't the same individual, they're all still recognizable as Link regardless of the art style used. I'd also like to take the time to point out that it's perfectly fine for there to be differences between the appearance of characters in the artowrk and what they look like in the game. A minor example would be that SS Link look a lot more fierce in the artwork than he does in-game.

I am amazed that you managed to put those pictures of Vincent next to each other and don't think there is a huge stylistic difference between Vincent looking like a real human being, and Vincent being a drawn anime-styled character.

My point is simply - if we presuppose that character art is not an abstraction trying to mimic a conception of a real human being, but rather an artistic creation in its own right, then if you were to create a 3D render of that to make it come alive, what would be more accurate way of doing it - re-imagining the image as a real human being, and then make the 3D model, or simply model it as it as into 3D?

Surely you understand the distinction? It's completely possible to make a realistic render of Son-Goku from Dragonball, and keep him true to the original design, by relatively having the same hair, wearing the same clothes etc. I still wouldn't call that stylistically true to the source material.

There is a reason game adaptations of anime tend to be cell-shaded - because that's the style of the original material is in, and that's the best technology to replicate it in 3D.

I was mostly referring to Cloud's hair, actually. As I've said above, even large stylistic changes should be able to keep the character recognizable, and the style that's been used previously does a good job translating the artwork into the character designs. I'm not really interested in most anime spin-off games so I haven't really paid much attention to the Naruto games. The thing is, you have to account for the locations and the characters. Cel-shading is best suited for stuff that's stylized in the way you'd see in comic books or 2D animation. Last Order gives us an example of FF7 characters in a straight up anime style and quite frankly, that's not the way to go. So far, it's the semi-realistic style FF games have been going towards that seems to work best, when taking both the characters and the locations into consideration.

And here's the crux of the problem - Here you and I simply disagree completely, and it's not something worth arguing about.

Apart from annoying discrepancies in the story, Last Order was IMO artistically speaking the best FF7 spin-off product (or rather the only good) they ever made.

The point here is that Nomura's original character art is the kind of art you'd see in a comic book or a 2D animation, and I think that based on how that design was picked in the first place, and how the art looks in the original game, that it, in its own way, mimics that style - it's obvious that if they could have made the game to look like the art back in the days, they would have.

People need to stop pretending technical limitations is the only reason these characters looked like anime characters and remember that Resident Evil 1 came out one year earlier.

The only reason this style hasn't been picked up again, is because it never really gained traction again, and Nomura's style changed drastically with FF8, and he's never looked back.
Instead of staying true to the artistic vision of the original though, he's retconned the entire thing to fit his new artistic preferences. To be fair, he's perfectly within his right to do so - however, I am perfectly in my right to say that I think his new style is bland and boring.

It's still relevant in pointing out the problems in them attempting to make those changes. Understanding why it can't or is unlikely to happen helps better evaluate what expectations are reasonable and which ones aren't.

The thing you don't seem to get is that this is not an expectation of mine to begin with, making this topic pointless to debate.

Besides, I've already accurately given the explanation why it won't happen -
1. That kind of style does not have mass appeal
2. Nomura no longer uses that style in his FF designs, except for the odd character portraits and Kingdom Hearts

You made it sound like cel-shading is objectively superior for the purpose of representing the OG, making the current style out to be a bigger departure than it actually is, treating the current style as if it hardly has any relation to the way the characters are supposed to look.

No, I made it perfectly clear that I was talking about my own personal preference over and over and over again.
If you can't read my posts without misrepresenting my position despite numerous clarifications and repetitions, and insist on arguing a point I've already told you is pointless to argue, then please stop addressing posts to me. You're no different than a troll at that point.

You're the one who responded to my relatively short post with a wall of text, which makes it look like you did want to make a bigger argument out of it..

Please don't try to shift this. You replied to me first, to a post that didn't make any factually contentious statements of any kind, and made a point out of focusing on the part of my post that was prefaced with a clear qualifier that it wasn't meant to be taken as something I expect to happen. Ever.

As long as you keep making a thing out of this, I'll reply - Because you're the one who started it, and you're the one who's keeping it going.

Just because you're expressing something you want doesn't mean no one can bring up counterpoints about it and discuss the other aspects of it. Too often I see people say things like that because they think the game won't be worth bothering with if it doesn't fit their desires regarding the art style, which I find rather limiting. Why would someone want to give up on a game over just that?

But that's not what you're doing is it now? You're replying to me directly, as if I am making a specific kind of argument, when I am not.
You're fighting windmills and acting as if I am the one who set up the duel.

I don't care what you find limiting. I play games because I enjoy them. One of the things that impacts my enjoyment of a game has to do with art-direction. I don't play games that I don't like the look of, or the sound of, or the game-play of.

FF7, again in my completely and purely subjective opinion, was something I enjoyed primarily for its art-direction. I think it's game-play is pretty mediocre (It rehashes a lot of stuff from FF6, FF10 has a better battle-system, FF8 and 9 have better world maps and exploration, and the story has its share of issues). Yeah, if the remake changes everything and is good in every right except the art-style, I'll probably play it.

Generally, I don't think that's going to be the case though.
I think it's going to be mediocre, as pretty much every other FF game since 10/10-2 has been, and when you slap the new art-direction on top of that, there literally is nothing left there to interest me.

It's just another bland and average SE RPG.
Of course, before you go off on a tangent about my negativity and not being able to give the game a fair shot - this is all conjecture that I might revise at any moment. Unlike certain people, I am not invest enough in my opinions to care about whether I am wrong down the line. I am wrong, I am just wrong. Nobody's lost anything by that. I'll still be one of the first people to get a hand on a demo, or look at play-throughs online to adjust my perceptions of it.

Being pessimistic is like having disappointment as the default. It makes you biased against things without giving them a fair chance. On top of that, negativity feels more exhausting than positivity or even just neutrality on the matter.

For you perhaps. Not for me. Don't assume that you can know how I feel or how my mind works based on your own personal experiences, just as I won't assume I know the same about you.

Part of what I said in my previous post was about how limiting your thinking as a consumer can limit the thinking of the game makers when they try to figure out what would go well with us. It's hurtful in the long run because it enforces the belief that those things can't happen despite being possible.

So, I shouldn't voice my opinion because it could impact the devs to change their design of the game - but I should voice my opinion if it can impact the devs to do something that you think is a positive?
Got it.

There is an endless amount of varied opinions out there - this kind of thinking doesn't get you anywhere. Opinions don't enforce beliefs in vacuums. There is a larger context here - consisting of variables that we can't control or influence for the most part. My opinion is here, is balanced by yours for example.
My opinions are not held hostage to the feelings of others, game-developers or otherwise. I am not going to revise an opinion because some person out there might take it the wrong way. That's inane.

I'm pretty sure I covered this earlier in the post.

I can accept you think you did, but I don't really think you did.

SE still has enough of a sense of humour to keep that kind of thing in there. I mean, Wall Market is fairly important to the plot and can't really be removed without some serious changes and bracing for a riot. I wouldn't be too upset if they changed the CPR thing so you'd either save Pricilla's life without the weird, medically inaccurate depiction of CPR, whether it's by making it more accurate or by skipping the minigame segment. They're probably better off keeping some playable element of it though. If they're as dedicated to remaining faithful to the game as they said, then they would know to keep those parts.

I am not so sure.
I don't see anything to suggest that SE are still doing stuff like that in their games. They're decidedly more tame and PC these days, than back in the 90's.

Also, please, Wall Market is not important to the plot. It's a minor transitional part of the plot that bears no relevance to the larger red threads of the narrative.
It only serves as a place to get the player familiarized with Aerith, and as an obstacle you have to surpass get you back with Tifa and Barret, and as a way of segwaying you into the next part of the plot which is actually important - the kidnapping of Aerith facilitating the infiltration of the Shinra tower, which ultimately introduces you to Jenova and Sephiroth.

Wall Market could easily just be replaced with a background picture and some narration and nobody (except the old fans) would feel as if something was lost from the flow of the narrative or the game.

However, as I said earlier, there are some very good reasons to think this remake isn't really a conventional remake, and isn't going to contain much except the most central scenes from the original game, being transitioned between from a hub area. I am not one to spread rumors so I am not going to go into public and blab about why this is likely to be case, but there is a very big chance that if you're expecting most of the stuff from the original in the remake, you're likely to get disappointed.

Take that as you may.

 

[Tashasaurous]

Again, you're confusing the image/subject with the style. You're not actually addressing what's being said here - as I said, it's quite possible to draw the exact same object in two widely different styles and still be creating an accurate representation of the subject being drawn.
PS4 Dissidia Cloud has all the same features as anime Cloud - that's not what I am arguing here - I am arguing that I like the style of anime Cloud, and I think the semi-realism Cloud looks moronic.
That's just my personal feeling about it.

Okay, so you prefer FFVII characters and ect to be in 2D anime kind of style and not the semi-realism style of FFVII characters. I get that. Me, I prefer the characters in their AC renders since they're more perfect than the anime style in my opinion. I once thought the 2D was okay, but then I realised that I prefer the realism AC rendering of FFVII a lot better.

This is starting to sound like how I prefer Ash's original eye-style pre-Black and White arc, and that I do my best to ignore the new eye-style or do my own fan art of Ash by re-doing his eyes back to "normal".

You're not reading what I am saying - It's not that they're not recognizable - they're not styled the same.
The only thing here, to say it plainly and clearly -
I do not like the semi-realistic style, in my opinion it looks stupid.
Get it now?

Okay, I kinda get it now. It's not much of a problem that you're one of those who don't like the realistic style-version of FFVII that is part of the series now these days. It's okay, though. I'm the opposite-it's the anime-art-style of FFVII that I don't like.

And here's the crux of the problem

- Here you and I simply disagree completely, and it's not something worth arguing about.

Apart from annoying discrepancies in the story, Last Order was IMO artistically speaking the best FF7 spin-off product (or rather the only good) they ever made.

The point here is that Nomura's original character art is the kind of art you'd see in a comic book or a 2D animation, and I think that based on how that design was picked in the first place, and how the art looks in the original game, that it, in its own way, mimics that style - it's obvious that if they could have made the game to look like the art back in the days, they would have.

People need to stop pretending technical limitations is the only reason these characters looked like anime characters and remember that Resident Evil 1 came out one year earlier.

The only reason this style hasn't been picked up again, is because it never really gained traction again, and Nomura's style changed drastically with FF8, and he's never looked back.
Instead of staying true to the artistic vision of the original though, he's retconned the entire thing to fit his new artistic preferences. To be fair, he's perfectly within his right to do so - however, I am perfectly in my right to say that I think his new style is bland and boring.

Yeah, arguing over something like a simple disagreement is pretty much silly. It's kinda like a couple I know that tend to fight over a Spoon. It's like trying to place Shrek in 2D which looked terrible in his three comics and how the Shrek movies look better in 3D.

I think you made your point quite clear. But then again, we can't just ask Square Enix to go back to the art-styles that we like. Everything's bound to change eventually.

The thing you don't seem to get is that this is not an expectation of mine to begin with, making this topic pointless to debate.

Besides, I've already accurately given the explanation why it won't happen -
1. That kind of style does not have mass appeal
2. Nomura no longer uses that style in his FF designs, except for the odd character portraits and Kingdom Hearts

My thoughts almost exactly. Like I said, we all like different things or things that are opposite to each other and that's just perfectly fine with me and other people who would agree.

Plus, I like Nomura's anime-style arts of Kingdom Hearts and the KH manga(though he had nothing to do with the Manga).

 

[hian]

Okay, so you prefer FFVII characters and ect to be in 2D anime kind of style and not the semi-realism style of FFVII characters. I get that. Me, I prefer the characters in their AC renders since they're more perfect than the anime style in my opinion. I once thought the 2D was okay, but then I realised that I prefer the realism AC rendering of FFVII a lot better.

This is starting to sound like how I prefer Ash's original eye-style pre-Black and White arc, and that I do my best to ignore the new eye-style or do my own fan art of Ash by re-doing his eyes back to "normal".

Okay, I kinda get it now. It's not much of a problem that you're one of those who don't like the realistic style-version of FFVII that is part of the series now these days. It's okay, though. I'm the opposite-it's the anime-art-style of FFVII that I don't like.

Yes, there you go! That's it. Nothing more nothing less. And, as a caveat per personal preference, I generally don't like art that tries to mimic reality.
I already have reality for that, and because reality is what it is, the more art tries to mimic it, the more obvious the discrepancies become.

When a piece of art just goes : "Poi! Out the window with you realism", I have much easier time suspending disbelief, and simply enjoying it for what it is.

(there are exceptions though - my favorite FPS of all time is Rainbow Six - Rogue Spear for PC)

I think you made your point quite clear. But then again, we can't just ask Square Enix to go back to the art-styles that we like. Everything's bound to change eventually.

It's good I didn't ask for it then, nor expect it. As I said, it's a fantasy - one that I would make happen if I had the power to make happen, but one that isn't going to happen.

Still though, thinking about it now, there is nothing wrong about asking SE to change their art-styles. I mean, as I've already said, there is nothing saying that there is this linear progression between anime styled art and realistic art. They're just two different artistic choices.

And, as I've already pointed out - they've already changed the art-style once, so why is it suddenly off limits principally speaking to change it again?

It's kinda strange - because when compilation fans get up in arms when purists say "drop the compilation stuff" they're literally ignoring that the thing they're feeling there is exactly what the purists felt when SE introduced the compilation to begin with.

If anything, the compilation, and titles like 10-2, or the 13 spin-offs just demonstrate that nothing is holy, and nothing is set in stone in relation to their products as far as SE is concerned. They don't need justifications to change their products, nor do they see it as imperative to keep their new line of products consistent with the old.
They primarily seem to be concerned with mainstream appeal and sales.

I think everyone should recognize this and be consistent.

Plus, I like Nomura's anime-style arts of Kingdom Hearts and the KH manga(though he had nothing to do with the Manga).

I do too. My first time seriously wishing for a remake was back when I played the original Kingdom Hearts on PS2.
Personally, that's the time, the place, and the style I'd wish for a remake to begin with, and that really hasn't change.
I'd rather see a PS2 remake than a PS4 remake any day of the week, technical limitations included.

It's good that we can agree to disagree though. Sorry for a long and tiring exchange with a rather flat ending, but hey, it happens.

 

[Tashasaurous]

Yes, there you go! That's it. Nothing more nothing less. And, as a caveat per personal preference, I generally don't like art that tries to mimic reality.
I already have reality for that, and because reality is what it is, the more art tries to mimic it, the more obvious the discrepancies become.

When a piece of art just goes : "Poi! Out the window with you realism", I have much easier time suspending disbelief, and simply enjoying it for what it is.

At least they don't have plans to do a live-action FFVII title with visiual(again, sorry for the spelling mistake) effects. THAT would've suck big time.

It's good I didn't ask for it then, nor expect it. As I said, it's a fantasy - one that I would make happen if I had the power to make happen, but one that isn't going to happen.

Still though, thinking about it now, there is nothing wrong about asking SE to change their art-styles. I mean, as I've already said, there is nothing saying that there is this linear progression between anime styled art and realistic art. They're just two different artistic choices.

And, as I've already pointed out - they've already changed the art-style once, so why is it suddenly off limits principally speaking to change it again?

It's kinda strange - because when compilation fans get up in arms when purists say "drop the compilation stuff" they're literally ignoring that the thing they're feeling there is exactly what the purists felt when SE introduced the compilation to begin with.

If anything, the compilation, and titles like 10-2, or the 13 spin-offs just demonstrate that nothing is holy, and nothing is set in stone in relation to their products as far as SE is concerned. They don't need justifications to change their products, nor do they see it as imperative to keep their new line of products consistent with the old.
They primarily seem to be concerned with mainstream appeal and sales.

I think everyone should recognize this and be consistent.

I don't think the Company would reply anyway. I've tried sending messages to them by doing it the old fashioned way-letters-two times, but they still haven't gotten back to me. I don't even know if I send it to the right place. I asked about the new sequel to the Compilation and a remake of Before Crisis but obviously they either ignored me or my letters were thrown away since they were wrongly adressed.

I'm just happy that the Compilation was created to answer the question of what happened to humanity, because I'm terrible in coming up with my own idea of what happened between an ending and an epilogue.

FFXIII was just crap in characters and storyline. FFX-2 was okay, though they could've done a bit more, and they screwed up in making that audio drama stuff. Besides, everyone likes the quality of games now these days and not really focusing on the gameplay or characters or even the storyline.

I do too. My first time seriously wishing for a remake was back when I played the original Kingdom Hearts on PS2.
Personally, that's the time, the place, and the style I'd wish for a remake to begin with, and that really hasn't change.
I'd rather see a PS2 remake than a PS4 remake any day of the week, technical limitations included.

It's good that we can agree to disagree though. Sorry for a long and tiring exchange with a rather flat ending, but hey, it happens.

I thought the first Kingdom Hearts was okay and didn't neccessary needed a remake. They remade Coded twice in a row and like Before Crisis, it was originaly on mobile. Why they remade Coded twice and not even remake Before Crisis even once is beyond me.

 

[hian]

At least they don't have plans to do a live-action FFVII title with visiual(again, sorry for the spelling mistake) effects. THAT would've suck big time.

Haha, well who knows? Could be good in its own right? Wouldn't count on it though.

I don't think the Company would reply anyway. I've tried sending messages to them by doing it the old fashioned way-letters-two times, but they still haven't gotten back to me. I don't even know if I send it to the right place. I asked about the new sequel to the Compilation and a remake of Before Crisis but obviously they either ignored me or my letters were thrown away since they were wrongly adressed.

A couple of problems with contacting the company - If you really want to address those working on FF, you're going to have to address them in Japanese and either contact the Tokyo HQ, or send something to their members twitter etc. in Japanese.

It just isn't reasonable to expect that the people at the English-speaking offices will have the time and energy to bother translating fan-letters into Japanese, and then relay them to the people in Japan working on these titles.

Then there's the issue of what a fan is asking or saying - since pretty much every video game company has non-disclosure contracts with their employees, they really can say much about any projects, except old ones, due to the potential impacts the answer might have.

An employee confirming or denying a question about the future of a certain franchise can create ripple effects that actually impact the stock market value of the company in question.

This is why most information is distributed through official channels, either through controlled interviews with major news outlets, or through press-conferences.

I'm just happy that the Compilation was created to answer the question of what happened to humanity, because I'm terrible in coming up with my own idea of what happened between an ending and an epilogue.

My problem with the AC continuation though, is that I felt that it contradicted the logical conclusion of the originals ending.
The last scene of Nanaki and Midgard suggests that humanity completely abandoned the city after it was hit by meteor, and that would fit with the theme of the game, and it would be the most logical move.

After all, Midgard was a huge metropolis powered almost exclusively by Mako, and the population and building density was absurdly high. Add that to the fact that almost nothing grew in the city, and probably wouldn't grow for at least some time even with the reactors knocked out, Migard simply isn't livable anymore.

How would you get running water, electricity and food through Midgard to support life? I would literally be impossible, at least within the lives of the cast of the original.

That is why AC literally makes no sense what so ever - unless you start rationalizing stuff with a little bit of magic etc. but generally, that just starts begging lots of questions for other parts of the plot. Why are these people living in/close to Midgard?

Generally, I just figured humanity abandoned Midgard, moved back to towns like Calm, or built new ones far away from the decay of Midgard, where they could actually grow stuff right away, and have quick access to clean water. The heroes just retired to their home-towns etc. and lived out their days in peace and quiet.

AC literally throws that all under the buss simply for the sake of giving us a few scenes of the characters we all love (with very little actually time spent on fleshing out what these people's lives are like now) and bunch of really contrived plot-mechanics to facilitate a bunch of epic battle scenes that hit a high note by "recreating" the final showdown of the original, between Cloud and Sephiroth.

I thought that was cheap of SE - Very cheap. Especially since it didn't really need to be there to begin. I can't for the life of me think of a single person prior to the release of AC who thought FF7 needed spin-offs. Literally no-one. People were already thinking about a remake though, which means that when the first screens of AC were released that's literally what most people I know started thinking of - a remake.
I remember just as many disappointed faces and angry fans once it was discovered to be a movie, as when they released the tech demo for the PS3.

But all that being said - I still loved the movie the first time I saw it. I still think its really entertaining as its own thing. I just can't for the life of me consider it canonical (though it is) or even fitting in with the original.

FFXIII was just crap in characters and storyline. FFX-2 was okay, though they could've done a bit more, and they screwed up in making that audio drama stuff. Besides, everyone likes the quality of games now these days and not really focusing on the gameplay or characters or even the storyline.

Though I wasn't a fan of the plot and the setting of FFX-2, and the fact that it as a spin-off, I still thought it was a good game. It had great combat, a decent score, good pacing, and was generally a feel-good adventure.

FF13 just kinda killed it for me though. I can't exactly put my finger on it - but it's like they just took FF10 and it's concept and stripped it down to the bare bones, swapped out the setting and plot, and stirred it all around in a big pot, pulled it out and went "Voila!" to the stunned silence of the original FF fan-base. The they said, "hey, let's make two more games because these resources cost a lot to make, so we'll reuse most of the technology and save up some more money for our next title!"

I thought the first Kingdom Hearts was okay and didn't neccessary needed a remake. They remade Coded twice in a row and like Before Crisis, it was originaly on mobile. Why they remade Coded twice and not even remake Before Crisis even once is beyond me.

Kingdom Hearts has become a giant mess. Kingdom Hearts didn't even really need a sequel. It would have been as a stand-alone game.

 

[Tashasaurous]

Haha, well who knows? Could be good in its own right? Wouldn't count on it though.

...Ever seen the Sleeping Beauty remake titled Maleficent and how they messed up her evil character into a protagonist and Stefan into a villian? I thought that killed Sleeping Beauty all together, and Maleficent is the mistress of all evil, not like her live-action counterpart.

A live-action film of FFVII is a kiss of death.

A couple of problems with contacting the company - If you really want to address those working on FF, you're going to have to address them in Japanese and either contact the Tokyo HQ, or send something to their members twitter etc. in Japanese.

It just isn't reasonable to expect that the people at the English-speaking offices will have the time and energy to bother translating fan-letters into Japanese, and then relay them to the people in Japan working on these titles.

Then there's the issue of what a fan is asking or saying - since pretty much every video game company has non-disclosure contracts with their employees, they really can say much about any projects, except old ones, due to the potential impacts the answer might have.

An employee confirming or denying a question about the future of a certain franchise can create ripple effects that actually impact the stock market value of the company in question.

This is why most information is distributed through official channels, either through controlled interviews with major news outlets, or through press-conferences.

I see what you mean. Bugger.

My problem with the AC continuation though, is that I felt that it contradicted the logical conclusion of the originals ending.
The last scene of Nanaki and Midgard suggests that humanity completely abandoned the city after it was hit by meteor, and that would fit with the theme of the game, and it would be the most logical move.

After all, Midgard was a huge metropolis powered almost exclusively by Mako, and the population and building density was absurdly high. Add that to the fact that almost nothing grew in the city, and probably wouldn't grow for at least some time even with the reactors knocked out, Migard simply isn't livable anymore.

How would you get running water, electricity and food through Midgard to support life? I would literally be impossible, at least within the lives of the cast of the original.

That is why AC literally makes no sense what so ever - unless you start rationalizing stuff with a little bit of magic etc. but generally, that just starts begging lots of questions for other parts of the plot. Why are these people living in/close to Midgard?

Generally, I just figured humanity abandoned Midgard, moved back to towns like Calm, or built new ones far away from the decay of Midgard, where they could actually grow stuff right away, and have quick access to clean water. The heroes just retired to their home-towns etc. and lived out their days in peace and quiet.

I didn't think of that about that. I heard from alotta people that humanity was wiped out and you're the first person to haVe come up with that theory...a little late since it was almost 20 years ago since the original game first came out, though.

Though if you read the On The Way to A Smile novellas, which are set between the ending of the original game and the film, then it'll make more sense. I've pretty much seen all of the FFVII titles so far, except for Last Order since that didn't appeal to me at all.

Though in the end of Dirge of Cerberus, grass and ect began to grow again, giving out a hint that Midgar will eventually become a lush-green forest or something.

I thought that was cheap of SE - Very cheap. Especially since it didn't really need to be there to begin. I can't for the life of me think of a single person prior to the release of AC who thought FF7 needed spin-offs. Literally no-one. People were already thinking about a remake though, which means that when the first screens of AC were released that's literally what most people I know started thinking of - a remake.
I remember just as many disappointed faces and angry fans once it was discovered to be a movie, as when they released the tech demo for the PS3.

But all that being said - I still loved the movie the first time I saw it. I still think its really entertaining as its own thing. I just can't for the life of me consider it canonical (though it is) or even fitting in with the original.

Well, obviously, they didn't come up with the same theory as you just did and so they decided that it was an open oppontunity to expand the FFVII universe. Though it was a dumb move not to make another title sequel of the Compilation after Dirge of Cerberus, leaving us edging on what Genesis's idea on how to protect the world with the supposed to be dead Weiss, and instead opted to do a remake of the original game, and not even remake Before Crisis either.

I have the AC movie and I'm torn in liking that version or it's updated Complete version.

Though I wasn't a fan of the plot and the setting of FFX-2, and the fact that it as a spin-off, I still thought it was a good game. It had great combat, a decent score, good pacing, and was generally a feel-good adventure.

FF13 just kinda killed it for me though. I can't exactly put my finger on it - but it's like they just took FF10 and it's concept and stripped it down to the bare bones, swapped out the setting and plot, and stirred it all around in a big pot, pulled it out and went "Voila!" to the stunned silence of the original FF fan-base. The they said, "hey, let's make two more games because these resources cost a lot to make, so we'll reuse most of the technology and save up some more money for our next title!"

Yeah, they could've done a bit more on the plot on FFX-2, but the setting was pretty much from the original FFX game with new areas. Plus, believe or not, that game was made and released exactly two years since the original game came out, matching the two year of calm in the game itself, ironically.

The only thing I liked about FFXIII at all was Serah. Other than that, the game itself was just bull-crap plus. And Snow, god, he irritates me to no end. Makes FFXII the second worst Final Fantasy game ever made in history. Sadly, Lightning, according to a lot of people, is a female version of Cloud, which is sad. Out of the two, Cloud is the best.

Kingdom Hearts has become a giant mess. Kingdom Hearts didn't even really need a sequel. It would have been as a stand-alone game.

My sister thought of the same thing, until Kingdom Hearts 2 came out, and, I like KH2 best than the first game due to it's story. At least the upcoming KH3 is the last we'll ever see of Xehanort forever.

Plus, the true second KH game was the Gameboy version of Chain of Memories since younger kids wanted to play Kingdom Hearts on the Gameboy advanced or something.

 

[Theozilla]

I don't really like it. Personally I think Cloud's haircut looks completely silly in realistic graphics. I also think the character art is blander in that style.

Agreed, I should have separated the two. My main point is that neither of those are really difficult to adapt into realistic styles compared to the scenarios of the narrative. I tried, but apparently failed, to make a distinction between what parts I don't want to change simply because I don't like where it's going (the realistic style), and what I think will change because it simply won't look good for people in general.

As you've pointed out, all the characters and most of the organic monsters etc. are completely adaptable. My point about the character though, was simply that I didn't like the style.

The larger point of my perspective on what is likely to get cut due to incongruence, has to do largely with the narrative, not with characters.

Well, I personally think Cloud looks fine in the current standard SE style, and still manages to "feel" like the original FFVII is terms of visual style. Similar to how I think Link looks fine in Twilight Princess/Hyrule Warriors/etc. despite the art style looking pretty different from the original TLOZ/ALttP art/character portraits.

That's not really all that silly though. If I remember correctly Cait Sith has not been featured atop the iconic mog of the original character in any of the compilation titles, and while I am sure this has been rationalized post-hoc by the writers, I am pretty sure this is entirely due to the fact that it would look ridiculous with the new style.

Technically the Mog was added in and rendered in the opening of ACC.
Anyways, I think Cait Sith is still pretty silly/ridiculous looking visually and as character concept, with or without the Mog. So I don't think it's absence is that significant.

You also have to remember that there are many ways to put comedic elements in a game. Nomura wanting lighthearted moments in the remake does not mean that he sees the weirder scenes from the original as being necessary to achieve whatever he means by that statement.

AC had plenty of jokes and banter in it, despite being a generally drab and melodramatic piece of cinema.

As for the Tekken 5 thing (or I'd say Tekken in general) - that's a relevant and rather good point. The Metal Gear Solid series would be another.
As I said, it's all conjecture at this point.

However, granted the overall tone and style of the compilation, it's disconnect with the original, and the tone and style of the trailer I simply think it's more reasonable to assume (not that it's reasonable to assume much to begin with) that this won't be like the original in that corny, LSD trip kinda way - and that makes me really sad, because, as I said, that's what I enjoyed about the game the most.

FF7 to me was sensory overload modern-punk 80's/90's anime on steroids delivered in the abstract RPG format. That's what made it a great game - It's the same thing that makes Battle Arena Toshinden my all-time favorite fighting game, and why David Hasselhoff's True Survivor is one of the most brilliant songs of this decade (of course, IMO).
It's difficult to capture with words, but those who understand this feeling, do.

This is what I see being robbed from the remake. That won't be there, unless the teaser is a lie, and a complete distraction.

I am not opposed to changes - additional story elements, materia, quests, even new characters, or radically revamped battle-system. I can handle all that - I can learn to love that for what it is.
I am just sick and tired of the style of most contemporary games, and indeed media in general.
I long for the completely unashamed, tacky and trippy style of games like FF7 and BAT, but nobody really makes that stuff anymore.
To my mind - removing that from the remake, is removing the one thing that made FF7 distinguish itself as a game to begin with.
Without it isn't really all that different from earlier iterations and other RPGs - especially, as I said, with a game like FF15 on the horizon.

I think you're taking the stylistic/tonal differences of the Compilation content as too much of an indicator of what to expect from the remake. Sure, the Compilation titles have differed from the OG, but they were spin-off titles (part of the point of doing a spin-off is to have the capacity to experiment and change things up) and recreating the original tone and style of the OG wasn't necessarily the goals for them (and even within the Compilation the entries do differ even each other significantly).
Unlike the remake where the creators so far have stated that even with the expected changes staying faithful to the OG is still a big deal for them.

And as demonstrated with Tekken (and you mentioned MGS as another example) having a semi-realistic graphical style doesn't mean a game is incapable of having a weird/quirkly/silly content and tone.

 

[hian]

...Ever seen the Sleeping Beauty remake titled Maleficent and how they messed up her evil character into a protagonist and Stefan into a villian? I thought that killed Sleeping Beauty all together, and Maleficent is the mistress of all evil, not like her live-action counterpart.

A live-action film of FFVII is a kiss of death.

Didn't see it. Have you seen Street Fighter Assassin's Fist? That was a really cool film that really managed to capture the essence of the game.
But, I agree - I don't think I'd want a FF7 live-action movie.

I see what you mean. Bugger.

That being said though - I've offered this before to other fans, but if someone really wants to contact the Japanese SE, that's something I can actually help with. I can't guarantee replies, but I can translate into Japanese and make sure it reaches the right people.

I didn't think of that about that. I heard from alotta people that humanity was wiped out and you're the first person to haVe come up with that theory...a little late since it was almost 20 years ago since the original game first came out, though.

You're the second person to tell me this, and it makes me equally nonplussed this time. The first time I saw the ending of the game it never occurred to me that mankind got wiped out.


I mean, meteor got stopped. The FFVII world is pretty big, and is populated across several continents. If the meteor made enough damage to cover the sky in ash and smoke, or something to that effect, which might have killed off humanity, it should also have leveled Midgard with the ground.
The fact that a lot of Midgard is still standing in the last cut-scene pretty much means that the meteor didn't actually have that much of an impact destruction-wise, and the damage should not have reach particularly far - certainly not all the way to places like Nibelheim etc.

Similarly, if the meteor had an impact large enough to wipe out humanity, then it would be completely unreasonable to expect plants and stuff to grow as well such a short time after the events.

So as a kid, I just though :
"Oh, people just moved off to the country-side then? That's nice."
followed by
"I wonder if Nanaki had those cubs with another weird Nanaki-like thing, or if he impregnated a human being"

I never really thought to much about what what happened to the cast, because for some strange reason I felt like I already knew - a false memory or something that I had already seen what happened.

Cloud would work as a mechanic, Tifa would open a flower-shop, Yuffie would go back to Wutai to run her fathers Dojo-thingy, Reeves would get back into politics, Barret would live quietly somewhere with Marlene, Cid would go back to Rocket Town and design new air-crafts and rockets, Nanaki would obviously go back Cosmo Canyon, become village elder and start a family, and Vincent would retire to Shinra mansion in Nibelheim and become a scholar/researcher.

That's it. I don't know why I felt I knew this at the time - I just did. I can literally see the scenes in my head rolling after the credits, although I know they didn't, and that they don't exist.
- Cloud in a garage, under a bike, covered in oil
- Tifa in a wood and glass building attending flowers
- Yuffie doing that weird brush-off animation in the Dojo in front of a bunch of people
- Cid sitting in front a table drawing, while shouting at Shera
- Nanaki running up the stairs to Cosmo Canyon, being greeted by all the people of the village
- Vincent strolling back and forth in the hidden cellar, reading books, like Sephiroth did before
- Reeves on a podium addressing the public in the streets of Junon.

This image is was (still is I guess) so strong that to me AC just didn't make sense at all when I first saw it.

Well, obviously, they didn't come up with the same theory as you just did and so they decided that it was an open oppontunity to expand the FFVII universe. Though it was a dumb move not to make another title sequel of the Compilation after Dirge of Cerberus, leaving us edging on what Genesis's idea on how to protect the world with the supposed to be dead Weiss, and instead opted to do a remake of the original game, and not even remake Before Crisis either.

I have the AC movie and I'm torn in liking that version or it's updated Complete version.

A small rant, but again, these are just my personal opinions on the compilation -

If they hadn't introduced characters like Genesis and Angeal, which again, don't really add anything to the original narrative except more questions, then they wouldn't have to face issues like that to begin with.

I generally liked CC, mostly for its game-play, the fact that you got to re-experience the FF7 universe (it's also a game that I think, graphically speaking, comes close to capturing the original style - at least in-game, though not in the FMVs) and because I just thought it was an interesting concept.
But, the addition of other super-soldiers besides Sephiroth, simply felt incongruent with the original plot (not to mention to retcon of how Zack's death played out, and Cloud's relationship with Zack).

The problem with a lot of the compilation is that it doesn't really expand the universe. That's why a lot of people say that the compilation feels like fan-fiction rather than actual tie-ins to the original.

Take AC - AC tells us something that IMO, was already pretty obvious, that the world of FF7 went on, and then it just essentially added a lot of plot contrivances to re-create the final encounter of FF7 for fan-squeals.
It doesn't actually take a step forward in the plot, it pretty much ends right back where it started, where I though the original ended, and it does very little to actually flesh out the characters beyond what we already knew about them from the original.

CC does a much better job because it adds a lot of new content. The problem is that, in the case of CC, IMO, the content doesn't feel congruent with the original, and adds a lot of questions in stead of answering them.
I already knew the general gist of what happened, and who Zack was from the various flashbacks in the original, so while CC fleshed out Zack as a character, that's not really pertinent to the plot of the original, and for the sake of doing that they also added a lot of other things that further complicated matters, rather than resolve them.

Because Genesis and Angeal were not in the original, adding them feels weird, because by any account, they are the kind of characters that should have left their marks to the point that they would be mentioned, referenced, or even appear in the original.
That's the difficulty with prequels made post-hoc to the source-material - how much can you add before the lack of the things you added start conflicting with the original material?

Sephiroth was special - one of a kind. That's a central point of the original, and characters like Angeal and Genesis detract from that.
Combine that with the fact that the only other named. 1st class SOLDIER you encounter in the original is Zack, which if the original flashback(s) is anything to go by, was really, really weak compared to Sephiroth (weaker by far than post Jenova-cell treatment Cloud), then I think it goes to show that they weren't thinking at all, that there would be other 1st Class soldiers even remotely similar to Sephiroth.

If you're like me and you played the original first, and several times over before you got into the compilation, this is rarely an issue. You can just jot it down to discontinuity caused by team and time issues on part of SE, and just play the original as if it's in a vacuum, wholly apart from the rest of the compilation.
If you're one of those who jumped on board with the compilation, or decided to experience all of FF7 in chronological order, then the disconnect becomes really apparent, and perhaps even immersion-breaking.

I even see people on this forum struggling with this disconnect trying their best to create theories or rationalizations to explain why certain things don't seem to add up - but at the end of the day, it's pointless. They don't add up because FF7 (even internally by itself) and its compilation is disconnected. They're not perfectly written.

That's why I personally hope they either go the route of remaking the original "as the original" - meaning since the compilation didn't exist when the original was made, then the remake should be made to reflect that, not attempt to make sense of all the stuff that doesn't make sense now because the compilation was made post-hoc and didn't address the issues from the original whilst adding new ones -
Or, they should pretty much re-think and re-write everything.
Want to put Genesis and Angeal in? Rewrite their parts and characters to be better integrated with the plot etc.

The only thing I liked about FFXIII at all was Serah. Other than that, the game itself was just bull-crap plus. And Snow, god, he irritates me to no end. Makes FFXII the second worst Final Fantasy game ever made in history. Sadly, Lightning, according to a lot of people, is a female version of Cloud, which is sad. Out of the two, Cloud is the best.

I never knew why people made that comparison. Everybody seems to remember Cloud as this bleak "hard-ass", and that's just messed up.
People forgot Cloud constantly making jokes at Barret's expense, and the quips that he could deliver?

Cloud was a pretty balanced character, and the player had a lot of room to interpret his character for themselves based on what dialogue options they chose for him, and what characters they brought with them to event scenes.

My Cloud was never dark or broody - He was a professional, and a realist, but also a caring guy with a sense of humor.

Lightning is not like Cloud - she's a parody of the first couple of lines Cloud ever uttered in the reactor break-in from the first 20 minutes of the game, extended into an entire character.

My sister thought of the same thing, until Kingdom Hearts 2 came out, and, I like KH2 best than the first game due to it's story. At least the upcoming KH3 is the last we'll ever see of Xehanort forever.

Plus, the true second KH game was the Gameboy version of Chain of Memories since younger kids wanted to play Kingdom Hearts on the Gameboy advanced or something.

I also think Kingdom Hearts 2 is a great game. I just don't think it did the story of Kingdom Hearts any favors. They could just as easily gone the Final Fantasy route and made it a game with completely new characters, kept some of the story-outline, and the game-play, and the game would be just as good, without adding to the absurd direction of the story-line of Kingdom Hearts as established in the original.

That's why I never liked FF spin-offs either, and why I really think Squaresoft made a fantastic tradition by making each game a stand-alone title.
As much as I love FF games - they're nonsensical a lot of the time. They're silly, and logically inconsistent - probably because they're made pretty organically with scores of people who have to co-ordinate their efforts meticulously in order for the final product to be consistent.
There's bound to be problems with the story-telling.

Just look to train-wrecks like Metal Gear Solid. That's what happens when you try to make a video-game with a deep and complex story covering hour upon hour, and then make sequel upon sequel.

Writing prequels and sequels to FF7 that make perfect sense with FF7 probably isn't possible - because FF7 didn't make perfect sense to begin with. But that's why each new installment in the franchise will keep making things worse.

In that sense, the remake is an excellent chance to put everything in order - to re-write the entire story if you will. They can adjust the original story to fit better in with compilation, or they can remove and re-write the parts of the compilation that make little sense with the original.

Whatever they end up doing though - it's probably going to end up pissing off a lot of people.

Technically the Mog was added in and rendered in the opening of ACC.
Anyways, I think Cait Sith is still pretty silly/ridiculous looking visually and as character concept, with or without the Mog. So I don't think it's absence is that significant.

I think it's considerably less silly than when it's atop the mog. After all, it's essentially just a cat.
And, as should be apparent by my argument containing several examples of different instances of stylistic change - it's not that this is significant in and of itself, it's that when you put it all together it becomes significant.

One ant in the kitchen is not a problem. When they're building a nest there, it is.

I think you're taking the stylistic/tonal differences of the Compilation content as too much of an indicator of what to expect from the remake.

How so? The trailer is a pretty clear indicator to my mind - as is Nomura's constant blabbering about realism, and many years now of designing characters that pretty much all look the same.

I'll say it again - this is all conjecture, but if I had to pick a position about the direction of the remake granted what evidence we have, I'd say the unreasonable position to hold is one where you hope that the style of this game will be very different from the style that has been established in all the high-end scenes of the compilation (AC, and the CC cut-scenes in particular)

Sure, the Compilation titles have differed from the OG, but they were spin-off titles (part of the point of doing a spin-off is to have the capacity to experiment and change things up) and recreating the original tone and style of the OG wasn't necessarily the goals for them (and even within the Compilation the entries do differ even each other significantly). .

It doesn't necessarily have to be the goal for the remake either. I would say that when they ditched the anime design of the characters, they've already demonstrated that, but I know most people here won't accept that.

And as I said, any compilation titles that is delivered in a format capable of providing the audience with high-fidelity graphical representations of the plot, such as AC or the FMVs in CC, the style is consistent.

I'd say that style is again consistent by what we see in the trailer - although, of course, it's been greatly improved in terms of sheer quality.

Unlike the remake where the creators so far have stated that even with the expected changes staying faithful to the OG is still a big deal for them. .

Nomura has however also stated that you can't really peg down what made FF7 what it was to begin with, and that he doesn't want to get trapped by limiting ideas of what it means to be true to the original - so when they say they want to be true to the original, it's very ambiguous, because we don't know what their conception of the original is, and neither it seems, do they.

And as I said, which I say as a developer, combining all these factors with the economic, resources- and time-related issues surrounding this game, it's pretty easy to see where this is going.

But, if you're happy with that, then that's great. I'm repeating myself awfully here - but I don't suffer from sour grapes, nor am I opposed to changes.
If people get what they want, that's great for them. I am simply making an argument for what I don't think we're going to get, and the person who's going to be the most disappointed by that is not the people who love the compilation, the style found in AC, and the people who long for a more stream-lined, action-oriented re-imaging of FF7, it's going to be me.
Those people on the other hand, will probably be really happy with what's coming with the next announce in October.

 

[ForceStealer]

I mean, meteor got stopped. The FFVII world is pretty big, and is populated across several continents. If the meteor made enough damage to cover the sky in ash and smoke, or something to that effect, which might have killed off humanity, it should also have leveled Midgard with the ground.
The fact that a lot of Midgard is still standing in the last cut-scene pretty much means that the meteor didn't actually have that much of an impact destruction-wise, and the damage should not have reach particularly far - certainly not all the way to places like Nibelheim etc.

Similarly, if the meteor had an impact large enough to wipe out humanity, then it would be completely unreasonable to expect plants and stuff to grow as well such a short time after the events.

It wasn't that Meteor might have killed humanity. It's that Holy might have. Magically. No huge amount of destruction required. Bugenhagen says that Holy eliminates all things harmful to the Planet, and then wonders which side of Holy's judgement humans would fall.

 

[Tetsujin]

Midgard

Midgar*

(Sorry, I had to )

 

[hian]

Midgar*

(Sorry, I had to )

Oops. I'm Norwegian, so it happens.

It wasn't that Meteor might have killed humanity. It's that Holy might have. Magically. No huge amount of destruction required. Bugenhagen says that Holy eliminates all things harmful to the Planet, and then wonders which side of Holy's judgement humans would fall.

Given the theme of the game, the fact that Cloud and Co (who're humans) are fighting to save the planet, the fact that Holy was summoned by Aerith (and with the allusions to her conscious presence within life-stream), and the fact that there is no reason why humans should be killed but Nanaki and his kind be spared (both races are obviously sentient, and smart enough to pose the exact same threat to the planet down the line), I don't think that would be a reasonable assumption to make.

Include that with the fact that if Holy can discriminate between targets apparently - why would one assume that holy would kill all of humanity, and not just the humans who are actually a threat to the planet at that time? I mean, the hippie humans in Cosmo Canyon obviously pose no threat to the world.

Finally, if Holy was killing off humans, you'd think humans would start dying the moment holy started to manifest itself, yet holy is completely centered on meteor, and people are seemingly unaffected.

Nah, I don't think it would make sense to think humanity got wiped out playing FF7 before the release of the compilation, based on one throwaway comment by Bugenhagen.

The most incriminating evidence of all though, is that if the authors intended for us to interpret it as humans going extinct, and that was the intended direction of the story, then they wouldn't have made AC to begin with.

 

[CryptCreeperX]

Considering that Crisis Core is canon now (and AC), I really hope the remake addresses the issues I found in both. It being my second day here, I don't want to ripple the waters by writing what those issues were. Kudos to the brave souls that do. But from past experience, people have come at me with pitch forks and torches. So I ain't gonna open that can of worms. And I want to make friends here! So I'll just say that I hope the remake keeps true to the characters and doesn't sacrifice smart, visceral narrative for fan service.

 

[Theozilla]

I think it's considerably less silly than when it's atop the mog. After all, it's essentially just a cat.
And, as should be apparent by my argument containing several examples of different instances of stylistic change - it's not that this is significant in and of itself, it's that when you put it all together it becomes significant.

One ant in the kitchen is not a problem. When they're building a nest there, it is.

A cat that stands on two legs with mickey mouse-esque gloves and boots a red scarf tiny crown on it heads that speaks with a Scottish accent is pretty darn silly IMO and is hardly "just a cat".

How so? The trailer is a pretty clear indicator to my mind - as is Nomura's constant blabbering about realism, and many years now of designing characters that pretty much all look the same.

I'll say it again - this is all conjecture, but if I had to pick a position about the direction of the remake granted what evidence we have, I'd say the unreasonable position to hold is one where you hope that the style of this game will be very different from the style that has been established in all the high-end scenes of the compilation (AC, and the CC cut-scenes in particular)

Actually, I don't expect the remake to very different at least in terms of visual style from the standard FF graphic style (and as I said I'm personally fine with the current graphical style SE uses). And Nomura's mentions of realism has been mostly just in terms of graphical capacity, not content and tone.
and the remake trailer really doesn't say much beyond establishing that the current FF style is still being used. There is not much to extrapolate in terms of how much silly/lighthearted stuff will be in the game. Even the OG FFVII trailers focused mostly on the Midgar and more serious-oriented content.

It doesn't necessarily have to be the goal for the remake either. I would say that when they ditched the anime design of the characters, they've already demonstrated that, but I know most people here won't accept that.

And as I said, any compilation titles that is delivered in a format capable of providing the audience with high-fidelity graphical representations of the plot, such as AC or the FMVs in CC, the style is consistent.

I'd say that style is again consistent by what we see in the trailer - although, of course, it's been greatly improved in terms of sheer quality.

I think it is more likely to be the goal for a remake than a spin-off title, since a remake implies a certain minimum standard of replicating the source material properly.

And they've never really ditched the anime design of the characters, at least when talking about Nomura's 2d character art, it is still plenty anime-esque.
As for the OG graphics you can't honestly call those anime-esque, they were super blocky popeye-esqu models. And the pre-rendered backgrounds weren't cartoony either, they were very realistic looking and pretty to look at (which part of why the OG is still very fun to play even today). Like if FFVII had come out a few years later the in-game character models would have likely resembled those from FFVIII which the current graphical style is just a natural evolution off with the increase in technology.

Nomura has however also stated that you can't really peg down what made FF7 what it was to begin with, and that he doesn't want to get trapped by limiting ideas of what it means to be true to the original - so when they say they want to be true to the original, it's very ambiguous, because we don't know what their conception of the original is, and neither it seems, do they.

And as I said, which I say as a developer, combining all these factors with the economic, resources- and time-related issues surrounding this game, it's pretty easy to see where this is going.

But, if you're happy with that, then that's great. I'm repeating myself awfully here - but I don't suffer from sour grapes, nor am I opposed to changes.
If people get what they want, that's great for them. I am simply making an argument for what I don't think we're going to get, and the person who's going to be the most disappointed by that is not the people who love the compilation, the style found in AC, and the people who long for a more stream-lined, action-oriented re-imaging of FF7, it's going to be me.
Those people on the other hand, will probably be really happy with what's coming with the next announce in October.

I don't expect there to be zero changes, but I think the extent you're expecting certain content to be removed is, to where the remake would be unrecognizable from the OG in terms of content and tone, is rather unrealistically pessimistic.

 

[hian]

A cat that stands on two legs with mickey mouse-esque gloves and boots a red scarf tiny crown on it heads that speaks with a Scottish accent is pretty darn silly IMO and is hardly "just a cat".

It's still less silly than when it's atop a giant fluffy animal that doesn't resemble any kind of living organism on planet earth.
How many scenes did Cait Sith have again? Never mind.
Stop moving the goal-post.

Actually, I don't expect the remake to very different at least in terms of visual style from the standard FF graphic style (and as I said I'm personally fine with the current graphical style SE uses).

Can you clarify? What graphic style, and what games? The in-game graphics of titles like CC and Dissidia, or the cut-scene graphics of CC and Advent Children?

I don't expect the remake to deviate from the graphics of CC cut-scenes and AC either. That style, and the in-game style of CC and Dissidia is obviously completely different though, and if you can't see that, or admit to that, this seriously isn't worth talking about anymore.
You're either legally blind, or incapable of seeing the difference between subject and style.

And Nomura's mentions of realism has been mostly just in terms of graphical capacity, not content and tone.

I disagree. The majority of AC and CC, versus the majority of the OG begs to differ with that assertion.

and the remake trailer really doesn't say much beyond establishing that the current FF style is still being used.

And that's enough when the current style used in FF and the content that comes with it, is very different from the OG.

There is not much to extrapolate in terms of how much silly/lighthearted stuff will be in the game. Even the OG FFVII trailers focused mostly on the Midgar and more serious-oriented content.

IMO There is enough. But, I don't think it's purposeful to continue this conversation. We'll see soon enough. My opinion though - unlike yours, which seems to be primary based on what you want and a really selective reading of data -
is based on industry knowledge, a comparative judgement of the style as a person who works with content production/art in digital medium, and a few conversations with people who work in the company who is making the title.

I think it is more likely to be the goal for a remake than a spin-off title, since a remake implies a certain minimum standard of replicating the source material properly.

Not really. At least in so far that this "minimum standard" is really ambiguous and subject-dependent.
There really is no objective standard for this stuff. It all falls down to creative vision, and other selection pressures, such as the nature of the market, costs, feed-back etc.


When you have Kitase saying that they're considering dropping entirely a command-based combat system, and when you consider how many fans are actually okay with that, then its patently obvious how selective one has to be to pretend that they somehow can't change tone, style, or events that by all accounts, don't really matter for the narrative.

And they've never really ditched the anime design of the characters, at least when talking about Nomura's 2d character art, it is still plenty anime-esque. .

Stop being obtuse. What Nomura's 2D character art look like is irrelevant when the actual products don't look like his 2D character art.

The only places the anime style of FF7 characters has been kept is in the game-play of games on low-end platforms, the PSP and the PS2.

Nomura himself has said they're going for a photo-realistic style, and that we should expect in-game graphics consistent with, or even better, than that of Advent Children. Every product that features FF7 characters in high-end graphics, have been without the anime style.

You really can't see this, or are you just being obtuse on purpose because you don't like where that train of thought takes you?

As for the OG graphics you can't honestly call those anime-esque, they were super blocky popeye-esqu models. And the pre-rendered backgrounds weren't cartoony either, they were very realistic looking and pretty to look at (which part of why the OG is still very fun to play even today). Like if FFVII had come out a few years later the in-game character models would have likely resembled those from FFVIII which the current graphical style is just a natural evolution off with the increase in technology.

Original Cloud battle-model, and FF7 architecture says hi - Now go troll somewhere else.

The backgrounds don't look realistic. They're highly stylized, and the reason they're rendered like that is because it wouldn't make sense with the 3D models otherwise, and it's not like they had the technology to actually make 3D games that properly conveyed 2D art at that time.

I am pretty sure that if FF7 was released a few years later it would look like this

Not, like FF8.

I don't expect there to be zero changes, but I think the extent you're expecting certain content to be removed is, to where the remake would be unrecognizable from the OG in terms of content and tone, is rather unrealistically pessimistic.

Then I think you're failing to understand my position. Even if they removed every single trippy moment in FF7 and changes the art-style of the characters to look more like characters from Mass Effect or The Witcher, the game would still be recognizable.
You're being hyperbolic.

FF7 consists of large amounts of content, all of it identifying factors making up what FF7 and what that means.

I am simply saying, they're likely to take away the stuff that I feel makes FF7, well, FF7, and focus more on the stuff that the people who enjoyed AC feel makes FF7, well, FF7.

Also - it isn't pessimistic. It's only pessimistic for people like me. It's highly positive for the people who want the game to essentially be a playable AC, and that seems to be a very large part of the FF7 fan-base these days.

 

[Tashasaurous]

Didn't see it. Have you seen Street Fighter Assassin's Fist? That was a really cool film that really managed to capture the essence of the game.
But, I agree - I don't think I'd want a FF7 live-action movie.

Haven't seen Street Fighter Assassin's Fist, but I have seen the Live-Action film of Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, and how they ruined the storyline and ect from the game itself, and we SERIOUSLY do not want a FFVII live-action film.

That being said though - I've offered this before to other fans, but if someone really wants to contact the Japanese SE, that's something I can actually help with. I can't guarantee replies, but I can translate into Japanese and make sure it reaches the right people.

Thanks, but I think I'll pass. Thanks for the offer, though. I can bearly speak French and still have trouble with my English even if English is my first language.

You're the second person to tell me this, and it makes me equally nonplussed this time. The first time I saw the ending of the game it never occurred to me that mankind got wiped out.

I mean, meteor got stopped. The FFVII world is pretty big, and is populated across several continents. If the meteor made enough damage to cover the sky in ash and smoke, or something to that effect, which might have killed off humanity, it should also have

leveled Midgard with the ground.
The fact that a lot of Midgard is still standing in the last cut-scene pretty much means that the meteor didn't actually have that much of an impact destruction-wise, and the damage should not have reach particularly far - certainly not all the way to places like Nibelheim etc.

Similarly, if the meteor had an impact large enough to wipe out humanity, then it would be completely unreasonable to expect plants and stuff to grow as well such a short time after the events.

So as a kid, I just though :
"Oh, people just moved off to the country-side then? That's nice."
followed by
"I wonder if Nanaki had those cubs with another weird Nanaki-like thing, or if he impregnated a human being"

I never really thought to much about what what happened to the cast, because for some strange reason I felt like I already knew - a false memory or something that I had already seen what happened.

Cloud would work as a mechanic, Tifa would open a flower-shop, Yuffie would go back to Wutai to run her fathers Dojo-thingy, Reeves would get back into politics, Barret would live quietly somewhere with Marlene, Cid would go back to Rocket Town and design new air-crafts and rockets, Nanaki would obviously go back Cosmo Canyon, become village elder and start a family, and Vincent would retire to Shinra mansion in Nibelheim and become a scholar/researcher.

That's it. I don't know why I felt I knew this at the time - I just did. I can literally see the scenes in my head rolling after the credits, although I know they didn't, and that they don't exist.
- Cloud in a garage, under a bike, covered in oil
- Tifa in a wood and glass building attending flowers
- Yuffie doing that weird brush-off animation in the Dojo in front of a bunch of people
- Cid sitting in front a table drawing, while shouting at Shera
- Nanaki running up the stairs to Cosmo Canyon, being greeted by all the people of the village
- Vincent strolling back and forth in the hidden cellar, reading books, like Sephiroth did before
- Reeves on a podium addressing the public in the streets of Junon.

This image is was (still is I guess) so strong that to me AC just didn't make sense at all when I first saw it.

Well, I didn't have that imagination, which is why I was happy when they made the Compilation and add on to more of the story, and explored more of the characters's past and present. But that's just me. I'm the type who can feel that some games or movies need sequels and some that don't. Some people talk about wanting sequels to either FFVIII or FFIX which neither need any since they both got happy endings and their stories concluded.

A small rant, but again, these are just my personal opinions on the compilation -

If they hadn't introduced characters like Genesis and Angeal, which again, don't really add anything to the original narrative except more questions, then they wouldn't have to face issues like that to begin with.

I generally liked CC, mostly for its game-play, the fact that you got to re-experience the FF7 universe (it's also a game that I think, graphically speaking, comes close to capturing the original style - at least in-game, though not in the FMVs) and because I just thought it was an interesting concept.
But, the addition of other super-soldiers besides Sephiroth, simply felt incongruent with the original plot (not to mention to retcon of how Zack's death played out, and Cloud's relationship with Zack).

The problem with a lot of the compilation is that it doesn't really expand the universe. That's why a lot of people say that the compilation feels like fan-fiction rather than actual tie-ins to the original.

Take AC - AC tells us something that IMO, was already pretty obvious, that the world of FF7 went on, and then it just essentially added a lot of plot contrivances to re-create the final encounter of FF7 for fan-squeals.
It doesn't actually take a step forward in the plot, it pretty much ends right back where it started, where I though the original ended, and it does very little to actually flesh out the characters beyond what we already knew about them from the original.

CC does a much better job because it adds a lot of new content. The problem is that, in the case of CC, IMO, the content doesn't feel congruent with the original, and adds a lot of questions in stead of answering them.
I already knew the general gist of what happened, and who Zack was from the various flashbacks in the original, so while CC fleshed out Zack as a character, that's not really pertinent to the plot of the original, and for the sake of doing that they also added a lot of other things that further complicated matters, rather than resolve them.

Because Genesis and Angeal were not in the original, adding them feels weird, because by any account, they are the kind of characters that should have left their marks to the point that they would be mentioned, referenced, or even appear in the original.
That's the difficulty with prequels made post-hoc to the source-material - how much can you add before the lack of the things you added start conflicting with the original material?

Sephiroth was special - one of a kind. That's a central point of the original, and characters like Angeal and Genesis detract from that.
Combine that with the fact that the only other named. 1st class SOLDIER you encounter in the original is Zack, which if the original flashback(s) is anything to go by, was really, really weak compared to Sephiroth (weaker by far than post Jenova-cell treatment Cloud), then I think it goes to show that they weren't thinking at all, that there would be other 1st Class soldiers even remotely similar to Sephiroth.

If you're like me and you played the original first, and several times over before you got into the compilation, this is rarely an issue. You can just jot it down to discontinuity caused by team and time issues on part of SE, and just play the original as if it's in a vacuum, wholly apart from the rest of the compilation.
If you're one of those who jumped on board with the compilation, or decided to experience all of FF7 in chronological order, then the disconnect becomes really apparent, and perhaps even immersion-breaking.

I even see people on this forum struggling with this disconnect trying their best to create theories or rationalizations to explain why certain things don't seem to add up - but at the end of the day, it's pointless. They don't add up because FF7 (even internally by itself) and its compilation is disconnected. They're not perfectly written.

That's why I personally hope they either go the route of remaking the original "as the original" - meaning since the compilation didn't exist when the original was made, then the remake should be made to reflect that, not attempt to make sense of all the stuff that doesn't make sense now because the compilation was made post-hoc and didn't address the issues from the original whilst adding new ones -
Or, they should pretty much re-think and re-write everything.
Want to put Genesis and Angeal in? Rewrite their parts and characters to be better integrated with the plot etc.

I'm hoping that the remake's storyline will fit into the Compilation better than the original game's. Plus, Crisis Core was mainly focusing on Zack's life before his death, and well, there had to be someone to mentor him, and someone to be the main reason of a villian's(Aka: Sephiroth) desire to go crazy other than Hojo.

Look at KH Birth By Sleep and how Xehanort messed up with Terra, Ventus and Aqua which caused the lives of Sora, Riku and Kairi to change forever.

Besides, I'm kinda a special sequel person in a way, and I like happy endings, which is stupid, I know, but that's just me.

I never knew why people made that comparison. Everybody seems to remember Cloud as this bleak "hard-ass", and that's just messed up.
People forgot Cloud constantly making jokes at Barret's expense, and the quips that he could deliver?

Cloud was a pretty balanced character, and the player had a lot of room to interpret his character for themselves based on what dialogue options they chose for him, and what characters they brought with them to event scenes.

My Cloud was never dark or broody - He was a professional, and a realist, but also a caring guy with a sense of humor.

Lightning is not like Cloud - she's a parody of the first couple of lines Cloud ever uttered in the reactor break-in from the first 20 minutes of the game, extended into an entire character.

Cloud's sense of humor was mixed up with Zack's memories due to being experimented on by Hojo-Sicko, but Cloud's a cool character.

I'm not too keen on Lightning. I just don't like FFXIII in general.

I also think Kingdom Hearts 2 is a great game. I just don't think it did the story of Kingdom Hearts any favors. They could just as easily gone the Final Fantasy route and made it a game with completely new characters, kept some of the story-outline, and the game-play, and the game would be just as good, without adding to the absurd direction of the story-line of Kingdom Hearts as established in the original.

That's why I never liked FF spin-offs either, and why I really think Squaresoft made a fantastic tradition by making each game a stand-alone title.
As much as I love FF games - they're nonsensical a lot of the time. They're silly, and logically inconsistent - probably because they're made pretty organically with scores of people who have to co-ordinate their efforts meticulously in order for the final product to be consistent.
There's bound to be problems with the story-telling.

Writing prequels and sequels to FF7 that make perfect sense with FF7 probably isn't possible - because FF7 didn't make perfect sense to begin with. But that's why each new installment in the franchise will keep making things worse.

In that sense, the remake is an excellent chance to put everything in order - to re-write the entire story if you will. They can adjust the original story to fit better in with compilation, or they can remove and re-write the parts of the compilation that make little sense with the original.

Whatever they end up doing though - it's probably going to end up pissing off a lot of people.

From what I'm understanding, you don't like sequels all together...No offence. I think Square was trying to reach up to the point of the Epilogue of the original game. Hopefully the remake will have two endings-one that leads up to AC with some scenes from On The Way To a Smaile Novellas, another which is the original epilogue, and finally, a secret ending set after the Dirge of Cerberus secret ending. But again, knowing my luck, that'll never happen.

 

[hian]

Cloud's sense of humor was mixed up with Zack's memories due to being experimented on by Hojo-Sicko, but Cloud's a cool character.

I don't think that makes sense.

If we go by the original game alone, there is nothing to suggest that Cloud ever adopted Zack's personality - only replaced himself with Zack in his memories of the Nibelheim incident, and ran with the idea planted in him directly by Zack, that they should become mercenaries.

What little we do see of Zack, if we presume Cloud is actually Zack in the Nibelheim flashback, and the scene of Zack on the truck is very different from what we see of Cloud when he thinks he was in SOLDIER.

Cloud isn't pretending to be Zack in the OG, he is pretending to be what he though Zack would be - but there is nothing to suggest he knew anywhere near enough about Zack for his impersonation to be accurate, and in context of CC it clearly isn't.

If we go by CC, the differences are big. Zack to my mind, is kinda like a male version of the Yuffie/Selphie trope (wait, would that make him a Zell or a Wakka? Well, you get my point. He's not the brooding hero that's for sure.). He's a happy-go-lucky kinda guy. Cloud's humor has a mean edge that Zack's definitely doesn't have.

In many ways, I'd say that the first you see of Cloud and his demeanor in many ways is more similar to pre-madness Sephiroth, than Zack I.E your average, professional, aloof soldier kind of person.
(do you really think Zack would say he didn't care about the planet?)

And once Cloud fixes his memories, his personality is even further away from that of Lightening. It's much more positive and caring.
The lightening analogy only really works if ones perception of based only one what one remembers of Cloud after he gave Sephiroth the black materia for the second time, AC Cloud, or Cloud from the first 20 minutes of the game.

From what I'm understanding, you don't like sequels all together...No offence. I think Square was trying to reach up to the point of the Epilogue of the original game. Hopefully the remake will have two endings-one that leads up to AC with some scenes from On The Way To a Smaile Novellas, another which is the original epilogue, and finally, a secret ending set after the Dirge of Cerberus secret ending. But again, knowing my luck, that'll never happen.

Not true =P
One of my all time favorite games - although I don't like it as much as FF7 I consider it artistically superior in every way - is Suikoden 2.

It's the perfect example of how a sequel should be done IMO. It literally improves on everything from the original, tells a better story, pays tribute to the original, and does new things all at the same time.

It's pretty much, I'd say, the best example in gaming (maybe in story-telling in general) of how a sequel should be done.

 

[Tashasaurous]

I don't think that makes sense.

If we go by the original game alone, there is nothing to suggest that Cloud ever adopted Zack's personality - only replaced himself with Zack in his memories of the Nibelheim incident, and ran with the idea planted in him directly by Zack, that they should become mercenaries.

What little we do see of Zack, if we presume Cloud is actually Zack in the Nibelheim flashback, and the scene of Zack on the truck is very different from what we see of Cloud when he thinks he was in SOLDIER.

Cloud isn't pretending to be Zack in the OG, he is pretending to be what he though Zack would be - but there is nothing to suggest he knew anywhere near enough about Zack for his impersonation to be accurate, and in context of CC it clearly isn't.

If we go by CC, the differences are big. Zack to my mind, is kinda like a male version of the Yuffie/Selphie trope (wait, would that make him a Zell or a Wakka? Well, you get my point. He's not the brooding hero that's for sure.). He's a happy-go-lucky kinda guy. Cloud's humor has a mean edge that Zack's definitely doesn't have.

In many ways, I'd say that the first you see of Cloud and his demeanor in many ways is more similar to pre-madness Sephiroth, than Zack I.E your average, professional, aloof soldier kind of person.
(do you really think Zack would say he didn't care about the planet?)

And once Cloud fixes his memories, his personality is even further away from that of Lightening. It's much more positive and caring.
The lightening analogy only really works if ones perception of based only one what one remembers of Cloud after he gave Sephiroth the black materia for the second time, AC Cloud, or Cloud from the first 20 minutes of the game.

I guess you have a point. But still, I think we both have different views on FFVII and the Compilation, so, there's not point in arguing over it. Besides, if there was a decision of picking out if the Compilation is better or the FFXIII trilogy is better, I'd pick the Compilation hands down and dead on. XIII shouldn't even be considered a Final Fantasy game at all.

And Zack's my hero since he actually knows what he's doing. Snow's just an irritating show off who doesn't get anything much right until Lightning Returns and even that's not much. With Zack, at least he saves as many people as he can despites working for ShinRa.

But then again, like I said, we all view the FFVII universe differently.

Not true =P
One of my all time favorite games - although I don't like it as much as FF7 I consider it artistically superior in every way - is Suikoden 2.

It's the perfect example of how a sequel should be done IMO. It literally improves on everything from the original, tells a better story, pays tribute to the original, and does new things all at the same time.

It's pretty much, I'd say, the best example in gaming (maybe in story-telling in general) of how a sequel should be done.

Right, sorry about that.

I guess we have our different views on sequels on the things that we love. Not sure if we want to go there with Dino Crisis series.

That reminds me, why are the games called Final Fantasy anyway? It's the first series I've ever heard in anything that has a title that doesn't make any sense, like that documentary film, "Exit Through the Gift Shop" which, again, had nothing to do with a gift or any shops or exiting through anything.

The only Square Enix titles I know that make sense so far are Kingdom Hearts, Bravely Default and Murdered Soul Suspect, since they have the meanings of the storylines, gameplays and titles, like all of the other games and shows and movies that I've seen in my life.

 

[Theozilla]

It's still less silly than when it's atop a giant fluffy animal that doesn't resemble any kind of living organism on planet earth.
How many scenes did Cait Sith have again? Never mind.
Stop moving the goal-post.

Well I disagree that the Mog makes it significantly more silly, IMO it is already pretty silly as can be. And I’m not denying that his character had few scenes. My original point was even a silly character like him was still used a playable character (however briefly) in a more serious title like Dirge of Cerebus which to me is indicative of SE willingness to still use silly elements even in more realistic visual styles.

Can you clarify? What graphic style, and what games? The in-game graphics of titles like CC and Dissidia, or the cut-scene graphics of CC and Advent Children?

I don't expect the remake to deviate from the graphics of CC cut-scenes and AC either. That style, and the in-game style of CC and Dissidia is obviously completely different though, and if you can't see that, or admit to that, this seriously isn't worth talking about anymore.
You're either legally blind, or incapable of seeing the difference between subject and style.

IDK, I suppose one could expect the in-game graphics of the remake to be similar to the in game graphics of the arcade/PS4 Dissidia characters.
However, I disagree that the in game graphics of CC and Dissidia are that significantly different from the graphics of the CC cut-scenes and AC beyond the former simply having less powerful engines (as evidenced by the look of the in-game graphics of the arcade/PS4 Dissidia looking more like the CC-cut-scenes since it being made with better technology now).

I disagree. The majority of AC and CC, versus the majority of the OG begs to differ with that assertion.

But (unless I misinterpreted your previous comment) Nomura’s only reference to AC in recent interviews has been in discussing what type of visuals to expect out of the remake. There hasn’t been any reference to them when discussing tone or content.

And that's enough when the current style used in FF and the content that comes with it, is very different from the OG.

IMO There is enough. But, I don't think it's purposeful to continue this conversation. We'll see soon enough. My opinion though - unlike yours, which seems to be primary based on what you want and a really selective reading of data -
is based on industry knowledge, a comparative judgement of the style as a person who works with content production/art in digital medium, and a few conversations with people who work in the company who is making the title.

Fine, in your opinion there is enough information to make a judgment call. I personally don’t think that the trailer and previous Compilation content is enough information to makes claims that significant scenes like the Wall Market sequence of the OG will be cut in the remake.

Not really. At least in so far that this "minimum standard" is really ambiguous and subject-dependent.
There really is no objective standard for this stuff. It all falls down to creative vision, and other selection pressures, such as the nature of the market, costs, feed-back etc.

When you have Kitase saying that they're considering dropping entirely a command-based combat system, and when you consider how many fans are actually okay with that, then its patently obvious how selective one has to be to pretend that they somehow can't change tone, style, or events that by all accounts, don't really matter for the narrative.

I still don’t see how one can make an argument that a remake of a game (particularly a game this popular/iconic) is has less pressure and responsibilities to stay true to its “feel” than a spin-off does.
And changing gameplay affects the narrative/story of a game far less than changes that would actually cut story content (like cutting the Wall Market or Gold Saucer).

Stop being obtuse. What Nomura's 2D character art look like is irrelevant when the actual products don't look like his 2D character art.

The only places the anime style of FF7 characters has been kept is in the game-play of games on low-end platforms, the PSP and the PS2.

Nomura himself has said they're going for a photo-realistic style, and that we should expect in-game graphics consistent with, or even better, than that of Advent Children. Every product that features FF7 characters in high-end graphics, have been without the anime style.

You really can't see this, or are you just being obtuse on purpose because you don't like where that train of thought takes you?

I’m not trying to be obtuse or anything like that what I am trying to get at (as I mentioned above) I don’t think you can consider the PSP and PS2 in-game graphics as trying to replicate an “anime” style, rather the only reason why their in-game graphics resembled Nomura’s 2D art (in terms of level of detail) is because the graphical technology/engine power at the time did not have the ability to convey the same level of detail as their pre-rendered cutscenes.

Original Cloud battle-model, and FF7 architecture says hi - Now go troll somewhere else.

The backgrounds don't look realistic. They're highly stylized, and the reason they're rendered like that is because it wouldn't make sense with the 3D models otherwise…

Okay, I should have specified that the backgrounds were realistic compared/relative to the in-game (non-battle) models, I didn’t mean to imply there was zero stylization to them at all (I’m not trying to troll FYI).

…and it's not like they had the technology to actually make 3D games that properly conveyed 2D art at that time.

I am pretty sure that if FF7 was released a few years later it would look like this

Not, like FF8.

Okay, here I think is where the core of our disagreement lies. You’re saying (I think) that that you think that if Square had the level of technology back in 1997 that we do today that FFVII would have been made with in-game game graphics that would have deliberately been designed to look anime-esque/cartoony (similar to the way Dragon Quest VIII and up and The Wind Waker have 3D character models designed to look 2Dish).
I on the other hand think that the anime-esqueness/cartoonyness of the in-game battle models was mostly a result of the limited technology at the time. I think that if SE had the technology we do today in 1997 they would have tried to have semi-realistic in-game character models (since they immediately went in that direction with FF VIII X XI and XII). I think trajectory of FFVII graphics were always for the current style today, not a conscious stylistic to more realistic models.

Then I think you're failing to understand my position. Even if they removed every single trippy moment in FF7 and changes the art-style of the characters to look more like characters from Mass Effect or The Witcher, the game would still be recognizable.
You're being hyperbolic.

FF7 consists of large amounts of content, all of it identifying factors making up what FF7 and what that means.

I am simply saying, they're likely to take away the stuff that I feel makes FF7, well, FF7, and focus more on the stuff that the people who enjoyed AC feel makes FF7, well, FF7.

Also - it isn't pessimistic. It's only pessimistic for people like me. It's highly positive for the people who want the game to essentially be a playable AC, and that seems to be a very large part of the FF7 fan-base these days.

I don’t want a playable ACC either (I don’t dislike it FYI but I don’t think it is a great film either, I find it to be an okay/decent work), but I just don’t think the remake having same graphical/visual level of realism as ACC means that it is likely to cut content all the trippy/silly content that you think it is likely to.

 

[ForceStealer]

Given the theme of the game, the fact that Cloud and Co (who're humans) are fighting to save the planet, the fact that Holy was summoned by Aerith (and with the allusions to her conscious presence within life-stream), and the fact that there is no reason why humans should be killed but Nanaki and his kind be spared (both races are obviously sentient, and smart enough to pose the exact same threat to the planet down the line), I don't think that would be a reasonable assumption to make.

We saw zero allusions to Aerith's presence in the Lifestream prior to the very last moment of the game. And the game said nothing about the caster being able to control Holy. And Holy wouldn't be destroying humans because their sentient and might hurt it down the road. It would be doing so because humans had already caused a lot of harm to it. Kinda the theme of the whole game. Mako reactors cover the globe, I'm not sure the Planet would bother determining which ones were guilty.

Finally, if Holy was killing off humans, you'd think humans would start dying the moment holy started to manifest itself, yet holy is completely centered on meteor, and people are seemingly unaffected.

Because it was focused on Meteor first? Meteor was a more immediate threat. So you could say it didn't go after anything else until the Lifestream gave it the boost it needed.

Nah, I don't think it would make sense to think humanity got wiped out playing FF7 before the release of the compilation, based on one throwaway comment by Bugenhagen.

The most incriminating evidence of all though, is that if the authors intended for us to interpret it as humans going extinct, and that was the intended direction of the story, then they wouldn't have made AC to begin with.

They made AC seven years after the fact purely because VII's ending was vague enough that they could do what they wanted.
Look, I never thought Holy wiped out humanity either, but the possibility was absolutely part of the thinking behind VII's open ending. Combined with the shoddily translated Red XIII line "Holy is having the opposite effect," for you to say that such an interpretation was unreasonable is, well, unreasonable.

A cat that stands on two legs with mickey mouse-esque gloves and boots a red scarf tiny crown on it heads that speaks with a Scottish accent is pretty darn silly IMO and is hardly "just a cat".

It's still less silly than when it's atop a giant fluffy animal that doesn't resemble any kind of living organism on planet earth.
How many scenes did Cait Sith have again? Never mind.
Stop moving the goal-post.

Moving the goal posts? You're the one being needlessly difficult. The point is just that Cait Sith is goofy as all get-out and was still featured in Advent Children (with the moogle in ACC) and has entire playable levels in Dirge of Cerberus.

Actually, I don't expect the remake to very different at least in terms of visual style from the standard FF graphic style (and as I said I'm personally fine with the current graphical style SE uses).

Can you clarify? What graphic style, and what games? The in-game graphics of titles like CC and Dissidia, or the cut-scene graphics of CC and Advent Children?

I don't expect the remake to deviate from the graphics of CC cut-scenes and AC either. That style, and the in-game style of CC and Dissidia is obviously completely different though, and if you can't see that, or admit to that, this seriously isn't worth talking about anymore.
You're either legally blind, or incapable of seeing the difference between subject and style.

First, quit being a dick. Secondly, the cutscenes in CC or Dissidia are not of a completely different style than the in-game graphics. What are you talking about?

Spoiler

The graphics are obviously better, but they look a hell of a lot more similar than FF7's in-game and prerendered graphics.

Original Cloud battle-model, and FF7 architecture says hi - Now go troll somewhere else.

He's not trolling, stop it.

I am simply saying, they're likely to take away the stuff that I feel makes FF7, well, FF7, and focus more on the stuff that the people who enjoyed AC feel makes FF7, well, FF7.

Also - it isn't pessimistic. It's only pessimistic for people like me. It's highly positive for the people who want the game to essentially be a playable AC, and that seems to be a very large part of the FF7 fan-base these days.

No, I think you're being pessimistic so you can say told you so if it's nto what you want, but if you're wrong it's a pleasant surprise.

Advent Children was a long-ass time ago. Obviously not quite as long as VII, but the game, FF7 is still way more famous. I don't know why everyone has this idea that Square is going to change the original to conform with the Compilation. If you pay any attention to what Square does, you would know that they aren't very concerned with continuity. After all, if they were, wouldn't the Compilation have matched the original anyway?

They're going to make the game they want to make. Will it involve changes? Absolutely. Will those changes be necessarily related to the Compilation? I doubt it.

Also, FF12 and 13 both had realistic characters and both had turn-based combat. I have no idea what they're going to do with VII, but to assume it's impossible to have an at least partially turn-based system because the graphics are good are silly.
I personally expect some manner of hybrid. They already have Kingdom Hearts and FFXV. It's not like they have a full-action RPG quota to fill.

 

[Ite]

Re: Holy

Please leave the ambiguity in, though, Square. The question is so so so SO MUCH MORE important than the answer.

 

[Arianna]

I don't think Holy would attack anyone or anything that wasn't prayed for. Agreed that it takes assuming that the planet didn't have an ulterior motive, provided that the planet is also in contact with/in control of Holy, and that Aerith prayer was strictly obeyed, I don't think Holy would have been the source of discomfort or strain to humanity.

 

[Flare]

With the thoughts of Holy and the Planet's motive, I came upon VII's universe through AC first, and thus after playing the og I knew that holy obviously didn't destroy the planet and more or less listened to Aerith's wishes.

However, keeping the og as its own and not including any sequels, I feel that holy was shown to be trying, but failing, to deflect/destroy meteor. Nanaki's line of Holy having the opposite effect, I took to mean that Holy was just too late, and because it was so close to the planet, it was causing more harm to the surface than it was actually deflecting meteor. Until the Planet intervened, it didn't have the power to deflect meteor since meteor was so close.

Also, the little view of Aerith's face at the end of the game, before the credits, seems to give a positive connotation to the ending. Like, you don't get to see what happens, except that 500 years into the future snippet with Nanaki. But the fact that her visage was shown, made me believe that it was put there to give you a subtle hint that her prayers were answered, and that humanity most likely survived/was forgiven by the Planet.

 

[Ite]

Yeah sure, fine, and sequels are powerful evidence yes, even spoilers by their very nature. But the original story asks the question. It's a powerful question, one we should ask ourselves as we cover planet earth with reactors and drills. Leaving the space open for debate, even if there is a canonical answer outside of the text, is one of the most important things about this story for me.

 

[Stryfe]

I agree that the ambiguity there was a very interesting way to end the game. And it is 500 years later, so I think it's highly possible that maybe something ELSE happens even after AC that could wipe out humanity. Just leaving that possibility open makes the ending of the OG story much more intriguing to me.