Remake Interviews: Catch-all Thread

[ForceStealer]

I still maintain they've been pretty consistent with Cloud's personality within the Compilation. (Normal in Case of Tifa, Crisis Core, Dirge) It's only in the cameos that they seem stuck on AC Cloud (Dissidia, KH). He's fine in World of FF, by and large.

But yes, I'm eager to see his whole FF7 arc represented.

 

[Flintlock]

Front page: Remake voice acting almost complete – Kitase. Thanks to Dawn for writing the bulk of it.

Edit: I'm dumb, I missed out the word "almost" from the title. Sorry if it was shared incorrectly on any of our social media.

 

[SirVival]

Hi fellow members. It's been a while since I last logged in, 6 months to be exact. From what I catched from the front page (thanks Flintlock!) the voice acting seems to be done. This raises some questions:

1) Have they offered any estimation when the first part of the game should be actually finished?
2) Any info on how many episodes/installments the final product will be?
3) Anything else that could be of interest or of any great significance that I might've missed?

 

[Flintlock]

As far as I'm aware, the answer to questions 1 and 2 is a simple "no". Question 3 depends on what you consider interesting or significant. I'd say these screenshots are the biggest thing we've been given recently. Relevant forum thread with lots of analysis/speculation here.

 

[Tetsujin]

1) Have they offered any estimation when the first part of the game should be actually finished?

 

[SirVival]

Thanks guys

About the Playstation 4's lifespan... I mean it's common knowledge what SE tried to do by announcing the game so early for PS4 excusively, but I can't shake the feeling that this was a mistake on their part. PS5 could be expected to come out between 2018-2020, after which I'd suspect PS4 will still have some good 2-3 years left in it. So the remake should be finished in the next 4 to 6 years, which I'm not very optimistic about as it's SE we're talking about here. A lot of variables play a role and I don't have too much knowledge about porting older PS games to the newer consoles, but wouldn't it be just easier to schedule the remake for the ps5 instead? What's your take on this? What is the best/worst case scenario actually?

Do you think it's plausible to expect them to stretch the remake on two consoles? That would be... sad.

 

[Tetsujin]

Do you think it's plausible to expect them to stretch the remake on two consoles?

Absolutely gonna happen imo.

Should the production be prolonged due to being in multiple titles, will the rest of the titles maintain the quality from the first?

Kitase: With the quality line set in place, it’s our duty to carry on and protect it until the very end without having any disturbances for the episodes under production. But of course as we advance through the episodes, it’ll only be natural to have quality that is fitting for the next generation [of when the episode releases].

http://www.siliconera.com/2017/01/3...ht-take-final-fantasy-xv/#z33XlHp1sEy9PMMa.99

(He might not be talking about console generations, but let's face it, that's what's gonna happen )

 

[Theozilla]

I think the PS4's lifespan is going to at least as long as the PS3's was. So I think the earliest we might see the PS5 released is late 2020. If the Remake is going to be a three-parter I think they'll be able to get the first two parts out before the PS5 is released. I think the third part (and an eventual complete collection) will likely be a dual release on the PS4/PS5 though.

 

[ChipNoir]

Do you think it's plausible to expect them to stretch the remake on two consoles?

Absolutely gonna happen imo.

Should the production be prolonged due to being in multiple titles, will the rest of the titles maintain the quality from the first?

Kitase: With the quality line set in place, it’s our duty to carry on and protect it until the very end without having any disturbances for the episodes under production. But of course as we advance through the episodes, it’ll only be natural to have quality that is fitting for the next generation [of when the episode releases].

http://www.siliconera.com/2017/01/3...ht-take-final-fantasy-xv/#z33XlHp1sEy9PMMa.99

(He might not be talking about console generations, but let's face it, that's what's gonna happen )

The same article gets a different translation here : http://gematsu.com/2017/02/final-fantasy-vii-remake-producer-yoshin

Kitase: “I think it’s my responsibility to decide the level of quality and maintain that quality to the very end during production of the episodes. Of course, as the episodes progress, it’s only natural that the quality match.”
Read more at http://gematsu.com/2017/02/final-fa...s-progress-weekly-famitsu#HgRs7DwmPXPKDApa.99

So basically the writer of the Siliconera flubbed, and I'm 90% sure the ("") was added in after it was pointed out. Unfortunately the damage had already been done, and people are still latching onto that line in the wrong way. Its pretty clear that generation means each part, not that they anticipate the games being on the PS5. Of course it will be, after the fact, since Square almost never lets games languish on an outmoded s7stem if they can help it. I mean, how many versions of IV are there now?

They will probably stay true to their words: Part one will likely be out late 2017 or mid 2018, and part two I will bet money will be out within a year of part one. They'll finish by 2020 on the PS4, then turn right around and port it all in a Complete edition with extra bells and whistles on the PS5, to distract gamers from the inevitably wait for a Final Fantasy XVI on the PS5.

Second hand news can be tricky, and once its out there, it can really send readers in the wrong direction.

 

[Tetsujin]

I'd expect part one to be out 2019 at the earliest to be honest. With two years at least in between following installments. Shit's gonna take forever.

 

[ChipNoir]

I'd expect part one to be out 2019 at the earliest to be honest. With two years at least in between following installments. Shit's gonna take forever.

Here's some food for thoughts: This all still technically "One" game. It's not a series of sequels, one intending to best the last and so forth. Once a master model is done, its done. The Midgar and Junon we visit in part One (Assuming we get that far) is going to be the exact same Midgar and Junon we visit later on in part two or three. That means that they only need to complete the material along a certain point and then boom: Release. Everything that backtracks is just a matter of scripting the game to go back to those assets again, likely installed to the HD from the disc.

I fully expect that the disks will mostly just be plugging in the new assets and scripts into the same engine completed in part one. No major new changes between parts in terms of the core engine should be a issue. All the major gruntwork is going to go into part one, and the other parts are going to be a hell of a lot easier to complete by comparison. I'd give it a year at most per part.

 

[Theozilla]

I'm more in the middle of ChipNoir and Tetsujin's ETA's. I think November/December of 2018 is the most likely date for the first part's release and a wait of about 1 and a half years for each subsequent part (so mid 2020 for part 2 and November/December of 2021 for the third/final (presuming three total) part).

 

[Tetsujin]

FFX-2 took more than a year to make and that was almost nothing but recycled assets. It's hard to say of course without knowing where they'll do the split but I don't see them being able to recycle such an amount for individual parts that it would speed up development by that much.
The other parts are never gonna happen within a year of each other.

 

[ChipNoir]

FFX-2 took more than a year to make and that was almost nothing but recycled assets. It's hard to say of course without knowing where they'll do the split but I don't see them being able to recycle such an amount for individual parts that it would speed up development by that much.
The other parts are never gonna happen within a year of each other.

On the otherhand, X-2 deals with ton of new game mechanics, which is probably where a lot of the development time was sunk. Outside of adding new new abilities and mini games (Which may still just be all completed in part one) I don't expect a ton of changes to mechanics as a whole.

 

[Ite]

Junon in Part 1? Hah.

 

[ChipNoir]

Junon in Part 1? Hah.

Oh go polish your geometric surface. v_v;

I'm firmly in the camp that thinks part one should and likely will end after the Junon Ship scenario. Its a perfect narrative ending for part one in every way.

 

[Theozilla]

Junon in Part 1? Hah.

Oh go polish your geometric surface. v_v;

I'm firmly in the camp that thinks part one should and likely will end after the Junon Ship scenario. Its a perfect narrative ending for part one in every way.

Same, especially if the total number of installments are three (which seems likely since each part is supposed to be equivalent to an FFXIII game in size/content). Like from both a narrative and marketing perspective I pretty sure SE would want the first FFVII Remake entry to show Sephiroth appearing in it (outside of the Nibelheim flashback), and the first Jenova boss battle would make for an appropriate first installment final boss.

 

[SirVival]

Do you think it's plausible to expect them to stretch the remake on two consoles?

Absolutely gonna happen imo.

Should the production be prolonged due to being in multiple titles, will the rest of the titles maintain the quality from the first?

Kitase: With the quality line set in place, it’s our duty to carry on and protect it until the very end without having any disturbances for the episodes under production. But of course as we advance through the episodes, it’ll only be natural to have quality that is fitting for the next generation [of when the episode releases].

http://www.siliconera.com/2017/01/3...ht-take-final-fantasy-xv/#z33XlHp1sEy9PMMa.99

(He might not be talking about console generations, but let's face it, that's what's gonna happen )

They will probably stay true to their words: Part one will likely be out late 2017 or mid 2018, and part two I will bet money will be out within a year of part one. They'll finish by 2020 on the PS4, then turn right around and port it all in a Complete edition with extra bells and whistles on the PS5, to distract gamers from the inevitably wait for a Final Fantasy XVI on the PS5.

I'd expect part one to be out 2019 at the earliest to be honest. With two years at least in between following installments. Shit's gonna take forever.

I'm very much there with Tetsujin. I do admit though that ChipNoir's arguments are on a solid basis. Would you care to give your take on why FFXV took almost 10 years to finish and why the new KH game is coming out so slowly ? SE really seems to have a problem with trying to give a cutting edge graphic experience, which is extremely time consuming and imo, will eventually get their original timetables shot behind the barn. This part in particular really strikes to my eyes and gives me a reason to believe we could be in for another 10 year wait, until the remake is finished:

Famitsu: What’s the progress condition for Final Fantasy VII Remake looking like?

Yoshinori Kitase, Producer: We’re currently brushing up the scene from the announcement trailer. We can now see the line of quality that we’re aiming for more clearly, but there’s still a ways to go.

 

[ChipNoir]

Absolutely gonna happen imo.

http://www.siliconera.com/2017/01/3...ht-take-final-fantasy-xv/#z33XlHp1sEy9PMMa.99

(He might not be talking about console generations, but let's face it, that's what's gonna happen )

They will probably stay true to their words: Part one will likely be out late 2017 or mid 2018, and part two I will bet money will be out within a year of part one. They'll finish by 2020 on the PS4, then turn right around and port it all in a Complete edition with extra bells and whistles on the PS5, to distract gamers from the inevitably wait for a Final Fantasy XVI on the PS5.

I'd expect part one to be out 2019 at the earliest to be honest. With two years at least in between following installments. Shit's gonna take forever.

I'm very much there with Tetsujin. I do admit though that ChipNoir's arguments are on a solid basis. Would you care to give your take on why FFXV took almost 10 years to finish and why the new KH game is coming out so slowly ? SE really seems to have a problem with trying to give a cutting edge graphic experience, which is extremely time consuming and imo, will eventually get their original timetables shot behind the barn. This part in particular really strikes to my eyes and gives me a reason to believe we could be in for another 10 year wait, until the remake is finished:

Famitsu: What’s the progress condition for Final Fantasy VII Remake looking like?

Yoshinori Kitase, Producer: We’re currently brushing up the scene from the announcement trailer. We can now see the line of quality that we’re aiming for more clearly, but there’s still a ways to go.

We're never really going to know, but on the surface

1. Final Fantasy Versus was announced just too damned soon. Like, nothing was actually in production. It was basically a concept. FFXIII was doing well enough financially, but it was a huge struggle and Square was well aware they were releasing a flawed concept. So they wanted a new game out to save the Fabula ship from sinking like the titanic. The company just wasn't ready yet to undertake another huge game especially one as ambitious as Versus.
2. XIV DID sink like the titanic, and it's on open record that they cannibalized everything else to make sure that game didn't damage their reputation and take a huge chunk of money with it as an abandoned failure. I recall an open statement on their end-year summary that all HD projects had definitely been delayed because people were being moved to the XIV-Reborn teams. That was three years or so of hard work
3. Crystal Tools and Luminous Engine are not easy things to work with. The PS3 is not an easy thing to work with. There's a reason why the "Top PS3" gaming list is so much smaller than Microsoft or Nintendo's lists, the system is just a nightmare to work with. So much so that they moved Nomura off the XV project to supervise his co-directed Yasue as they moved KH3 over to the Unreal engine.
4. They ran out of time. After a point there's just no hope of selling a game like XV on the PS3. They saw in at least some advance that the whole thing needed to be moved onto the PS4. KH3 was being rebuilt on Unreal, so they had absolutely nothing flag-ship to kick off the new gen. Either they redid it for the PS4 or it would crash and burn. So of course that means everything had to be reshuffled to get into the new console. Thankfully unlike point 3, the PS4 has been commented as a hell of a lot easier to develop for.
5. Wada is an idiot. Ever since he moved into place as company president, he's been very wrong minded, from his insistence on trying to make XIII a marketable brand, to his whole "FFXV must be better than VII" paranoia (Which is a whole other essay i could write). Its no surprise he was strong armed into resigning, and since that point, the company has improved.

On the flip side, none of these situations can possibly happen again. They're working with Unreal, have no lack of support from CC2, have a much clearer release table, and are working with a really good system. All and all a four year cycle seems to be pretty much the norm we can return to. It's not as amazing as PS1 days, but I'll take it.

That aside again, who knows what was happening behind closed doors. I know historically that Square has never gotten their games out ontime. FFIV was meant to be on the NES, V ran out of time to translate, VII has barely half the intended content, IX was on a dying system, XII took three times longer than any previous FF, and XIII was supposed to be a PS2 game, costing them over a year's of progress.

The big difference is that we do have these glaringly early reveals, and we're constantly tapped in. Until the end of the PS2 era, the internet wasn't this huge bastion of insider interviews and stuff. We got an article in EGM/PSM/Whatever, and a review, and that was kinda it. We're a little too informed, but we assume because of that we know everything, and Square still keeps a lot of it's secrets close to it's vest. An unfortunate Japanese industry style, but eh, what can you do?

 

[Theozilla]

Famitsu: What’s the progress condition for Final Fantasy VII Remake looking like?

Yoshinori Kitase, Producer: We’re currently brushing up the scene from the announcement trailer. We can now see the line of quality that we’re aiming for more clearly, but there’s still a ways to go.

I don't really get why so many people found/find this comment concerning, "brushing up on the announcement trailer" doesn't necessarily mean that the team has only worked on/gotten up to content from the opening Bombing Mission and nothing else. Like multiple parts of a game are often worked on the same time at varying qualities/level of polish at once.

 

[ChipNoir]

Famitsu: What’s the progress condition for Final Fantasy VII Remake looking like?

Yoshinori Kitase, Producer: We’re currently brushing up the scene from the announcement trailer. We can now see the line of quality that we’re aiming for more clearly, but there’s still a ways to go.

I don't really get why so many people found/find this comment concerning, "brushing up on the announcement trailer" doesn't necessarily mean that the team has only worked on/gotten up to content from the opening Bombing Mission and nothing else. Like multiple parts of a game are often worked on the same time at varying qualities/level of polish at once.

Its a coping mechanism. People jump on the worst possible outcome so they feel they can avoid worse disappointment if their fears prove true.

 

[Ite]

That, and that the industry is more focused on marketing than product. That, and Square's history of being more focused on marketing than product. That, and Square's inability to deliver product.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Famitsu: What’s the progress condition for Final Fantasy VII Remake looking like?

Yoshinori Kitase, Producer: We’re currently brushing up the scene from the announcement trailer. We can now see the line of quality that we’re aiming for more clearly, but there’s still a ways to go.

I don't really get why so many people found/find this comment concerning, "brushing up on the announcement trailer" doesn't necessarily mean that the team has only worked on/gotten up to content from the opening Bombing Mission and nothing else. Like multiple parts of a game are often worked on the same time at varying qualities/level of polish at once.

If that's the case, then it would make for kind of a silly response to a question about the progress, don't you think? If a particular scenario/story beat in the game isn't a valid representation of the progress, why use that?

Especially since he adds that they're just now establishing their accepted level of throughput-to-results level of quality.

Without going out of my way to be pessimistic, I just don't see how else to read it.

I do want to clarify that I hope the best-case-scenario predictions come true. I can't help but think Tetsujin's prediction sounds more likely, though.

 

[Theozilla]

If that's the case, then it would make for kind of a silly response to a question about the progress, don't you think? If a particular scenario/story beat in the game isn't a valid representation of the progress, why use that?

Especially since he adds that they're just now establishing their accepted level of throughput-to-results level of quality.

Without going out of my way to be pessimistic, I just don't see how else to read it.

I do want to clarify that I hope the best-case-scenario predictions come true. I can't help but think Tetsujin's prediction sounds more likely, though.

Because that's typically not how big media productions are produced. Like when making an animated film for instance, it's not like a studio only works on the opening scene until it's at a final render level of completeness before other scenes/part of the film are worked on, multiple parts are worked on simultaneously.

Like the voice acting news is evidence of that, if there weren't other scenes/parts of the game that have been worked on/produced in some degree, it would be very unlikely for the voice acting for the main story scenario to be almost be done (also the voice acting news is an example in of itself how other parts of the game outside of the opening scene are being worked on concurrently).

And the response phrasing is perfectly reasonable, to use an analogous metaphor for comparison, say someone was building a house and the builder said in an update that they were currently brushing up on working on the bathroom and could now see what the desired level of quality the house needs to be, one would and should not assume that only the bathroom has been worked on and nothing else, as the foundations and general structures of a house have to be built before brushing up on specific parts of it can occur.

Now the opening Bombing Mission is/was likely the only scene/part of the Remake that is at the current level of quality that was being described/referred to, but it is very unlikely that there aren't other parts of game that have been developed/are being worked on but are presently at a much lower level of quality/development.

 

[ChipNoir]

If that's the case, then it would make for kind of a silly response to a question about the progress, don't you think? If a particular scenario/story beat in the game isn't a valid representation of the progress, why use that?

Especially since he adds that they're just now establishing their accepted level of throughput-to-results level of quality.

Without going out of my way to be pessimistic, I just don't see how else to read it.

I do want to clarify that I hope the best-case-scenario predictions come true. I can't help but think Tetsujin's prediction sounds more likely, though.

Because that's typically not how big media productions are produced. Like when making an animated film for instance, it's not like a studio only works on the opening scene until it's at a final render level of completeness before other scenes/part of the film are worked on, multiple parts are worked on simultaneously.

Like the voice acting news is evidence of that, if there weren't other scenes/parts of the game that have been worked on/produced in some degree, it would be very unlikely for the voice acting for the main story scenario to be almost be done (also the voice acting news is an example in of itself how other parts of the game outside of the opening scene are being worked on concurrently).

And the response phrasing is perfectly reasonable, to use a analogous metaphor for comparison, say someone was building a house and the builder said in an update that they were currently brushing up on working on the bathroom and could now see what the desired level of quality the house needs to be, one would and should not assume that only the bathroom has been worked on and nothing else, as the foundations and general structures of a house have to be built before brushing up on specific parts of it can occur.

Now the opening Bombing Mission is/was likely the only scene/part of the Remake that is at the current level of quality that was being described/referred to, but it is very unlikely that there aren't other parts of game that have been developed/are being worked on but are presently at a much lower level of quality/development.

Its also the safest thing to talk about since it's 100% spoiler free. Square interviews have always been cagey, and I'm pretty sure they're not going to divulge any details beyond what's already been established at a major conference. So far, we all know what the original bombing scenario is, and we all know what its going to look like based on the teaser. So its the safest thing to talk about till they're ready for their next major reveal.

Which had better be E3 or Square will need to beef up its security.