... "Trends have changed"? What a pointless statement from a development perspective.
I mean, who're you making this game for? RPG fans? Action adventure fans? Fans of the original game? older fans of the franchise? Newer fans of the franchise?
Fact of the matter though is that FFVII is still the best-selling FF game to date, and had its largest influx of sales during a period when gaming wasn't half as socially acceptable as it is now, and the total gaming population of the world was smaller by a significant degree.
What does that tell us? That "evolving" FF to match the "trends" by catering to people who probably don't have much interest in RPGs to begin with is not getting you ahead, because ultimately, FF will always be a game shouldered largely by fans of classical JRPGs, and they're slowly dropping off your consumer list the more you give them the cold shoulder with your new design philosophies.
What this sounds like to me, is another instance of the VG industry's implosion by increased production costs I.E
"Oh we just have to make this game look like a CG movie! Ooops, that's gonna cost so much we now have to sell more copies than what are core fan-base is capable of shouldering, so let's change stuff to make the game more appealing to the rest of the gaming public (the people who generally just play Call of Duty, Assassin's Creed, Uncharted and the annual sports titles like Fifa)."
Screw you SE FF department. Those people didn't buy your games way back when, and the majority of people who did are not interested in playing GTA in a FF skin. (...)
Dissidia: FF global sales - 2.24 million
Dissidia 012 : Duodecim FF global sales - 0.88 million
VS.
FFVII : Over 11 million, and that's still not a perfect estimate.
Adding together every FF game with an action battle system and FFVIIAC sales you still don't top that, meaning that the vast majority of FFVII fans (and indeed FF fans) are not most familiar with Dissidia's action battles.
In fact, the people familiar with action based FF battle systems in general are a minority within the total FF consumer base.
(...) based on this interview and the previous ones, and the game-play video, I'm getting a strong feeling that the battle-system we're looking at is like the RPG-style set-up for the Dissidia games.
(...)
Wrong. What you should have said here is "That isn't to say we're changing all that much".That isn’t to say we’re changing everything!
Now it sounds like you're changing more than you're not changing, which defeats the purpose of a remake to begin with.
I'm happy they're confident, but belief alone seldom leads to good results.
How about you get together a strong test-panel of dedicated fans from across the world to give you feed-back along the way? That way you'd have a much better factual idea of whether or not you're striking that balance, instead of just a belief based on jack all.
No people, that interview really didn't do it for me.
Also, based on some of the awkward English in there I'm kinda doubtful as to the quality of their translation work. I'd really like to see/hear the original Japanese.
I'll still try to remain hopeful. I think I'll have a pretty good idea how this will turn out by the next trailer, and that's when I'll probably put me cards on the table and set my expectations.
This, to a degree, annoys me.The starting point was – and our executive producer [Shinji] Hashimoto-san has mentioned this – it would even be okay if we just upped the graphics to the quality of Advent Children. But, in terms of game styles and battle systems, it’s been 20 years since the original, and a lot has changed. Trends have changed, and I believed that we needed to revisit and rethink that aspect for the remake.
"Trends have changed"? What a pointless statement from a development perspective.
I mean, who're you making this game for? RPG fans? Action adventure fans? Fans of the original game? older fans of the franchise? Newer fans of the franchise?
Fact of the matter though is that FFVII is still the best-selling FF game to date, and had its largest influx of sales during a period when gaming wasn't half as socially acceptable as it is now, and the total gaming population of the world was smaller by a significant degree.
What does that tell us? That "evolving" FF to match the "trends" by catering to people who probably don't have much interest in RPGs to begin with is not getting you ahead, because ultimately, FF will always be a game shouldered largely by fans of classical JRPGs, and they're slowly dropping off your consumer list the more you give them the cold shoulder with your new design philosophies.
What this sounds like to me, is another instance of the VG industry's implosion by increased production costs I.E
"Oh we just have to make this game look like a CG movie! Ooops, that's gonna cost so much we now have to sell more copies than what are core fan-base is capable of shouldering, so let's change stuff to make the game more appealing to the rest of the gaming public (the people who generally just play Call of Duty, Assassin's Creed, Uncharted and the annual sports titles like Fifa)."
Screw you SE FF department. Those people didn't buy your games way back when, and the majority of people who did are not interested in playing GTA in a FF skin.
Whomever feed that impression to Nomura and Kitase needs to be fired.We haven’t completely transitioned into action, but as our director [Tetsuya] Nomura-san says, Final Fantasy (in terms of action games) is best represented by Dissidia in the current landscape. In terms of the Final Fantasy action battles people have experienced themselves, that is most familiar to them these days. In terms of the image of the battle system, that’s where we’re getting the feel from. It won’t be as action-focused as Dissidia, of course, but the the visuals and how the gameplay feels in essence will be drawn from that Dissidia-esque style.
Dissidia: FF global sales - 2.24 million
Dissidia 012 : Duodecim FF global sales - 0.88 million
VS.
FFVII : Over 11 million, and that's still not a perfect estimate.
Adding together every FF game with an action battle system and FFVIIAC sales you still don't top that, meaning that the vast majority of FFVII fans (and indeed FF fans) are not most familiar with Dissidia's action battles.
In fact, the people familiar with action based FF battle systems in general are a minority within the total FF consumer base.
FFXIII sold reasonable well - it was on a recent console, sporting relatively high-fidelity realistic graphics, and it also had a command-based battle system with transitional combat happening on a separate screen. A relatively large numbers of fans were fine with this and bought the game - in fact the battle system was one of the things about that game that received the most praise from fans and critics alike.
That being said, to end on a positive note - based on this interview and the previous ones, and the game-play video, I'm getting a strong feeling that the battle-system we're looking at is like the RPG-style set-up for the Dissidia games.
In the previous interviews they said that they wanted people to be able to think strategically, and play stress-free which implies little if any reliance on twitch/combo/timing mechanics.
That and with the comparison to Dissidia, I think we're looking at a set-up where you select a command off of the battle menu, and then have a large part of the actual attack/defend process be automatic.
That would be pretty clever because that would allow you to calmly scroll through spells/items, select targets etc without having to worry about the melee getting out of hand because the characters would be sitting ducks whilst you scroll menus.
I imagine you'd select attack, and then perhaps only have nominal control over movement by selecting a target, and Cloud slashing away automatically. Whilst if you pick defend, he'd evade and block automatically based on context as well.
This way, you could set a character to attack, switch, set another to defend, switch again, scroll through items/magic whilst your characters fight etc.
Perhaps play around with the camera, and just take things in whilst the fight plays out.
This would retain the visual flair of the compilation they care so much about, and the tactical nature of old-school command based battle systems. It would also be a good way to salvage most of the old Materia system, or even adding a skill system on top of it, where advanced attacks (combos, death blows etc.) evasion maneuvers (wall-running, boosts, double jumps etc.) would get added to combat through progression in those areas.
I'd be quite please if that's the direction they're taking it.
I can only speak for myself personally - but the tendency to drop out half-way through a repeat play-through of an old game isn't because I already know the story - it's because despite wanting to experience the story, I have to jump through all the game-play hoops to get at it.
Unlike a movie or book, where the story is constantly unfolding as you progress with no barriers stopping the progression - gaming as format is founded on the very principle that your progress ties together with performance in game-play.
What gets old playing FFVII for the umpteenth time isn't the story - it's all the stuff in-between keeping me from getting to the interesting points of the story I want to see.
Who am I kidding though? I'm still playing FFVII start to finish to this day, pretty much yearly, and I friggin' love the game-play.
Sure. That's a dumb mind-set to have going into a remake though, since when people are asking you left and right for a remake, that's probably what they want, and if you really have all this pent up creativity you feel like using, how about you make a new game instead?
Wrong. What you should have said here is "That isn't to say we're changing all that much".That isn’t to say we’re changing everything!
Now it sounds like you're changing more than you're not changing, which defeats the purpose of a remake to begin with.
I'm happy they're confident, but belief alone seldom leads to good results.Of course, within Square Enix and across the globe, there are people who think it’s on this holy scale. That there isn’t anything we can touch or play around with. But we believe we know the balance between what can be changed versus what needs to be protected.
How about you get together a strong test-panel of dedicated fans from across the world to give you feed-back along the way? That way you'd have a much better factual idea of whether or not you're striking that balance, instead of just a belief based on jack all.
No people, that interview really didn't do it for me.
Also, based on some of the awkward English in there I'm kinda doubtful as to the quality of their translation work. I'd really like to see/hear the original Japanese.
I'll still try to remain hopeful. I think I'll have a pretty good idea how this will turn out by the next trailer, and that's when I'll probably put me cards on the table and set my expectations.
...Are you serious? You just spent the better part of a month in the other thread convinced that they're "rebooting" the franchise and wiping away all the Compilation stuff and now they've reiterated that they're explicitly not.
Can't argue much with those thoughts Hian. And I definitely agree that the next trailer will give us enough to form a basis for his this really will turn out.
Final Fantasy VII‘s 20th anniversary is in 2017. Can we expect anything for its original release date on January 31?
Nomura: “Personally, I’m waiting for Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 and World of Final Fantasy in 2016. I think when they’re completed, I’ll be able to release new information.”
"There's more and more titles being introduced for the platform, and we're hoping that announcing the remake of Final Fantasy 7, it'll give a boost to people wanting to buy this current generation of console. If we announced the remake after all those titles have been sold, it wouldn't have created such an impact, so that's why we decided on this timing. We wanted to reassure players that PlayStation 4 is coming out with great titles including Final Fantasy 7. That's why we decided to announce the remake."
To me, that's even more reason for Sony to want at least something for the conference. Or maybe if Nintendo really wanted to push the NX, they could make an FF7 announcement. I dunno. I'm sure it will be present in some capacity.
I don't think we'll be getting a new trailer for VIIR this E3.
Square Enix wants FFXV to remain in the spotlight for now. There's also this Dengeki article quote:
Why announce the remake so early then? Nomura stated that:Final Fantasy VII‘s 20th anniversary is in 2017. Can we expect anything for its original release date on January 31?
Nomura: “Personally, I’m waiting for Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 and World of Final Fantasy in 2016. I think when they’re completed, I’ll be able to release new information.”
So basically it's to boost console sales before XV, KHIII, and World of FF. I'm trying not to get excited anytime soon..."There's more and more titles being introduced for the platform, and we're hoping that announcing the remake of Final Fantasy 7, it'll give a boost to people wanting to buy this current generation of console. If we announced the remake after all those titles have been sold, it wouldn't have created such an impact, so that's why we decided on this timing. We wanted to reassure players that PlayStation 4 is coming out with great titles including Final Fantasy 7. That's why we decided to announce the remake."
Not exactly and interview but has some data about VIIRemake.
FFVIIRemake wont come out before April 2017, according to S.E current fiscal year.
Smeh. I'll take remake before KH3.
And how do you know HE delayed it? He doesn't run the company, you know.
Not surprised. I mean, was anyone banking on a 2016 release for part 1, given the upcoming release of FFXV and the fact that a lot of SE's future RPG line-ups and the progress of current projects bank on the success of that title?
Will be interesting to see if we get some more news over the upcoming E3 though.
They're really holding the cards close to the chest when it comes to the remake, and I can feel that the transparency that they proceeded with in regards to XV has somewhat eroded my patience for that kind of approach. I NEEDZ MAH INFO-FIX NAO.
Even if part 1 of thectemake came out first I doubt they would push KH3 back until all parts are released.
I know that he's not the President of Square Enix,
Well, if Nomura is focusing on the remake it probably is because his boss is telling him to. I mean, he didn't want to ditch XV for the remake, he was forced to.
I know that he's not the President of Square Enix,
Well clearly you don't, or you'd stop talking about him "choosing" to work on one game instead of another.
So you're suggesting that his boss wants the remake more than KH3, thus we have to wait for KH3 for pretty much longer if said boss says so?
Okay, then I've seriously am losing my faith in the Company all together, since KH3 will never be released at this rate.
What do you mean I don't know he's not President of Square Enix? I know that he's not, because I read up his profile(profile on his job at least, not his personal life, since everyone's privite on that at least). Yosuke Matsuda is the current President. Nomura's pretty much still the video game and character artist, designer and director of some games he is chosen to do.
Unless Wikipedia is always wrong.
Besides, the Remake is too massive to have even the first part coming out in 2017. Steven Burton, the voice of Cloud, will probably be lucky to voice Cloud in the english version of World of Final Fantasy and KH3.
So you're suggesting that his boss wants the remake more than KH3, thus we have to wait for KH3 for pretty much longer if said boss says so?
Okay, then I've seriously am losing my faith in the Company all together, since KH3 will never be released at this rate.
That's almost exactly how it works.
Sure, Nomura probably has some power to chose for himself what projects to work on - to the extent that he can say no without getting fired when a project is proposed to him, or to the extent that he can propose projects himself and get them green-lit - and he also (when directing) probably has a lot of control over work-flow and task-management, but ultimately he is not the one who gets the final say on what games to work on and what time those games are to be released.
The way the corporate latter works in game development, is that the higher ups of a dev team, lead by the producer, pitches a project to company management and the majority share-holders, and then they have to bargain for time and resources through extensive sit-downs through-out the concept period.
They go back and forth and establish a development window with mile-stones that needs to be reached within certain dates along the way.
Nomura is not in control of that in any of the projects he works on, because he is not the producer, nor does he have to power overturn the executive decisions of the producer and the company heads/majority share-holders.
Why this should make you lose faith in a company is beyond me though, because this is literally how all large video-game publishing/production companies work.
It also does not mean that KH3 will never be released.
It simply means that when it does get released, is not up to Nomura.
What do you mean I don't know he's not President of Square Enix? I know that he's not, because I read up his profile(profile on his job at least, not his personal life, since everyone's privite on that at least). Yosuke Matsuda is the current President. Nomura's pretty much still the video game and character artist, designer and director of some games he is chosen to do.
Presumably what he meant is that if you really knew that, and by extension what that actually means, you should stop talking as if the release date of KH3 and FFVII:R falls on the shoulders of Nomura, because for the most part, it doesn't.
Nomura is most of the time, only a character designer (and at that he only really does drawings and character story-board work), and some directing.
While being a director means that he will be doing task-management which will affect the efficiency of the work-progress of the rest of the team, the team (Nomura included) will still have to work to meet the mile-stone demands set by the initial negotiations between the producers and company management.
If the team does not meet those mile-stones due to Nomura's mismanagement of his team further down the line, this will likely lead to him being replaced.
Unless Wikipedia is always wrong.
This has nothing to do with Wikipedia being wrong or not, and has everything to do, like I've said before, with you not understanding the corporate structure of video game development companies, and the process surrounding development itself - which leads me to this :
Besides, the Remake is too massive to have even the first part coming out in 2017. Steven Burton, the voice of Cloud, will probably be lucky to voice Cloud in the english version of World of Final Fantasy and KH3.
Stop saying this. You don't know this, and by everything that can reasonably be said about the development of the remake, it simply isn't even remotely likely to be true.
Unless you assume that part 1 alone is going to be significantly bigger than Witcher 3, there is nothing what so ever, except a major fuck-up of team/resource management on part of Kitase and Nomura preventing part 1 of the remake from being released sometime within 2017, given what we know of the time-frame, the current state of the company, and the involvement of other companies in the development.
If you think it will - you're looking at an FFVII remake that is so bloated and padded to the point that the entire thing will have the pacing and coherency of the bible read cover to cover. That's not going to happen. Nobody is that dumb.
Final Fantasy VII Remake
Nomura states that the game is still a while away, but not to worry and that production is going at a steady pace. He also states that concrete information on the game will be released at a later time and that when it is next shown, he will appear publicly to reveal it.
...an FFVII remake that is so bloated and padded to the point that the entire thing will have the pacing and coherency of the bible read cover to cover. That's not going to happen. Nobody is that dumb.
Interesting interview, and confirms all-too-late our suspicions that FF7R won't even be brought up at what's left of E3. It's likely that they'll roll out a new trailer at the next PS Experience, or their own private event. My prediction is that we'll get a "character reveal" trailer showing off Tifa and Aeris this December, and then at next year's E3 we'll get a demo and a release date.
Interesting interview, and confirms all-too-late our suspicions that FF7R won't even be brought up at what's left of E3. It's likely that they'll roll out a new trailer at the next PS Experience, or their own private event. My prediction is that we'll get a "character reveal" trailer showing off Tifa and Aeris this December, and then at next year's E3 we'll get a demo and a release date.
FFVII Remake was still too early in development to even appear in this year's E3, so I'm not surprsied since I knew that it wouldn't appear months ago.