What location are you most looking forward to?

[hian]

I certainly hope so, and I agree that FF XV design philosophy should give us pointers about how the world of FFVII will be designed in the remake.
For one thing I would very much like to see transportation infrastructure (railways and roads) which would make the world more believable, however it will require some serious revisions in terms of "level design" (or so to speak), because the OG railroaded the progression of the players through limitations in the means of transportation (which do not make much sense, from a world-building perspective).
As for urban environments, I'm not sure which design method they'll use. I think that the OG design is obsolete (as they're the stereotypical RPG-towns with the weapon shop, the item shop, the inn + 2 or 3 random houses, an acceptable standard at the time but definitely outdated now), and when you try to save resources by rendering only portions of a town (such as in FF X or FF XIII, and most cities from the Dragon Age franchise), IMO you fail to convey how a town feels like. I personally prefer the way towns are rendered in the Assassin's Creed franchise, which IMO convey a proper sense of scale and population, but it may be too expensive in terms of resources. I could live with the kind of compromise you have in FF XII, though.

Yeah, there are so many things that don't make sense in FFVII world.
The good thing is that you could keep a very similar traveling structure simply through clever use of writing.

You could very well have a road system, and a railroad going through the mountains behind Midgar to directly Junon, but have the mountain foot be a large military check-point, that would be on high-alert and closed off to civilians after the death of President Shinra, thus forcing Cloud and Co to take the longer and more difficult path through the swamps via Kalm and the Chobobo farm.

This could even open up for more some additional side-missions later (who knows, helping people cross the barrier from Junon to Midgar for some reason or another? etc.) , or a short-cut for backtracking from Junon back to the Midgar area later.

I prefer the towns in the Yakuza/Ryu ga Gotoku series over AC.

AC has huge cities, sure - but they're mostly empty space content-wise, and artificially pad game-play time when you have to travel large distances of nothing important to get to the few places that are important.

Yakuza on the other hand has a smaller more limited city map which is cleverly designed to feel like its a part of a larger world - and because of this it's also packed with people and interactive places and things.

I could be happy for FFVII remake to essentially make a more FFXII-ish approach to its design (although I'd like larger areas with more content), and have the world delivered in "pieces", which then get tied together into this large abstract "traditional" world-map that you only traverse when you're in the air-ship, or a boat/submarine etc.

I think that could work really well, and save up resources that really should be used for the stuff that really matter that I don't want them to skimp on, like enemy models, skills/magic, mini-games, story-content, etc.

I would prefer a huge open world though - but I'm not sure how realistic that is for the following reasons :

1. I don't know how well the Unreal 4 engine is equipped to make open world games. As far as I know, not a single one has been made yet, and I can't name a single one announced for it.
2. Nothing from the devs suggest they're thinking of making it an open world game.
3. The original game wasn't open world, and so on the face of it, should not require an open world structure to begin with
4. An open world structure requires a lot of time and resources SE might not be able to spare at the moment for FFVIIR, and it might also cause development problems due to the structure of the original that the devs don't want to get bogged down with.

 

[Mayo Master]

Yeah, there are so many things that don't make sense in FFVII world.
The good thing is that you could keep a very similar traveling structure simply through clever use of writing.

You could very well have a road system, and a railroad going through the mountains behind Midgar to directly Junon, but have the mountain foot be a large military check-point, that would be on high-alert and closed off to civilians after the death of President Shinra, thus forcing Cloud and Co to take the longer and more difficult path through the swamps via Kalm and the Chobobo farm.

This could even open up for more some additional side-missions later (who knows, helping people cross the barrier from Junon to Midgar for some reason or another? etc.) , or a short-cut for backtracking from Junon back to the Midgar area later.

That's pretty much exactly what I had in mind as far as how to arrange the layout of paths between Midgar and Junon, while keeping the same progression as in the OG. However, there are some other areas in the world which are artificially remote, for no good reason so far. I was thinking of how remote the Gold Saucer is, while being the #1 amusement park in the world, or how remote the Icicle village is, while apparently having plenty of tourists showing up for the ski season. I think the Compilation has begun to retcon that to a small degree (CC features a highway between Nibelheim and Gongaga, for instance), but I really hope for a complete overhaul of that in the remake.

I prefer the towns in the Yakuza/Ryu ga Gotoku series over AC.

AC has huge cities, sure - but they're mostly empty space content-wise, and artificially pad game-play time when you have to travel large distances of nothing important to get to the few places that are important.

Yakuza on the other hand has a smaller more limited city map which is cleverly designed to feel like its a part of a larger world - and because of this it's also packed with people and interactive places and things.

I could be happy for FFVII remake to essentially make a more FFXII-ish approach to its design (although I'd like larger areas with more content), and have the world delivered in "pieces", which then get tied together into this large abstract "traditional" world-map that you only traverse when you're in the air-ship, or a boat/submarine etc.

I think that could work really well, and save up resources that really should be used for the stuff that really matter that I don't want them to skimp on, like enemy models, skills/magic, mini-games, story-content, etc.

I never played the Yakuza series so I can't tell, but yeah, I understand your criticism of the "emptiness" or "padding" of Assassin's Creed cities.
IMO they could piece Midgar by Sectors, and the other towns wouldn't have to be really big, even if considerably upscaled from their original sizes.
I'm also wondering how the world is going to be pieced together with respect to having the game released in several installments, and how that is going to allow for backtracking. Say Remake part 1 focuses on Midgar, will we have the possibility to roam around the streets of Midgar in Remake part 2? I guess only time will tell.
I wonder of how many "outraged reactions" we'll get from "fans" if the devs decide to do away with the World Map, even if they present a well-thought and coherent world layout

I would prefer a huge open world though - but I'm not sure how realistic that is for the following reasons :

1. I don't know how well the Unreal 4 engine is equipped to make open world games. As far as I know, not a single one has been made yet, and I can't name a single one announced for it.
2. Nothing from the devs suggest they're thinking of making it an open world game.
3. The original game wasn't open world, and so on the face of it, should not require an open world structure to begin with
4. An open world structure requires a lot of time and resources SE might not be able to spare at the moment for FFVIIR, and it might also cause development problems due to the structure of the original that the devs don't want to get bogged down with.

I completely agree. I would prefer an open world structure, but it doesn't have to be open world to be enjoyable. Apparently the devs aren't set on making an open world structure "just because", and hint that they'll rather lay out the game in a manner that is coherent with the content - which IMO is promising, but it depends on how that's going to be executed.

 

[Velorian]

I am prolly wierd but I am looking forward to seeing fort condor.

There is just something about seeing a huge ass flaming phoenix on top of this place.

I see most people are really much looking forward to most of the possibly expected places.
Personally I always had a weakness for the smaller places. They always stick with me for some reason.

Like gongaga, the chocobo farm, lucracia's cave, crashed gelnika (wouldn't mind seeing how this get's crashed into sea), and defiantly not to forget mideel, before and after weapon attack there.

That said. I wouldn't also have a problem if they added a few more new places in, or expanded them.

The old places were cool, but most of them where not bigger then a few screens. I am really looking forward to a more immersive experience when it comes to visiting the towns. Junon was suppose to be a massive place, so I wouldn't mind seeing a lot more of this. I could even see a much bigger security around here. On how to sneak in. I always found it a bit to simple to just take up an elevator (of dolphin) there could be some cool invasion mission to get even into junon.

Another thing, I think could be really impressive is the distant surroundings. I really hope we can explore in 360 views and not just a single camera angle. I want to see the whole of the cosmo canyon, or I wanna see the kalm from midgar, and the crater in the distance from the icicle inn.

And it's a fantasy place, so like someone earlier stated I hope they leave it that, with the chocobo races, it really wouldn't make sense to have a very realistic track. Though I do hope they will bring back chocobo breeding. Perhaps a few new breeds?

 

[Tashasaurous]

I am probably weird but I am looking forward to seeing fort condor.

There is just something about seeing a huge ass flaming phoenix on top of this place.

Nothing weird about you wanting to see the fort condor. I'm looking forward in seeing that too.

Actually, it's actually a giant condor, not a phoenix, though when it dies, a phoenix down feather appears.

 

[Unit-01]

Also it'd be nice to see it alive and moving compared to the JPEG image it is on the background.

I think we can look forward to every location remade in this game. E3 is a month away now, I hope we see more.

 

[Tashasaurous]

Also it'd be nice to see it alive and moving compared to the JPEG image it is on the background.

I think we can look forward to every location remade in this game. E3 is a month away now, I hope we see more.

If they keep it in the Remake, then I'm pretty positive that it will definately be moving since the technology is perfect for it this time, not like back in 1997.

 

[Diamonddark]

The submarine and ancient forest are high up my list. I hope the sub is as challenging/rewarding as it is in the original for mid levelling and they could really go to town on the enchantment of the ancient forest.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

Since they appear to be releasing it in installments/episodes, I wouldn't be surprised if the whole of the first installment is a much-expanded Midgar. I have always longed to go inside the shops and bars of upper Midgar - not to mention the theatre, where I hope to attend a performance of Loveless.

I am really looking forward to all the cave systems. I love caves.

 

[Octo]

^Yes. The original Loveless - which I always imagined would be like a Tennessee Willams play or something about normal type people living ordinary lives - and not the purple prose jibberish Genesis kept spewing.

The Fort Condor thing was a little weird in retrospect. It's like it was just plonked there - theres no town or anything to benefit from a reactor. Odd. And the condors themselves - I dunno, I think that whole bit was pretty heavy handed with the environmental message, even for FFVII.

 

[hian]

^Yes. The original Loveless - which I always imagined would be like a Tennessee Willams play or something about normal type people living ordinary lives - and not the purple prose jibberish Genesis kept spewing.

The Fort Condor thing was a little weird in retrospect. It's like it was just plonked there - theres no town or anything to benefit from a reactor. Odd. And the condors themselves - I dunno, I think that whole bit was pretty heavy handed with the environmental message, even for FFVII.

I know I keep on harping about this - but reeeaaally, the infrastructure of the world is such a huge mess.

Why does a tiny village like Nibelheim need a reactor? And if it does, why doesn't Kalm, Wutai or Rocket Town? All those places seem to have electricity but no reactor in sight.

Sure, for the experiments you might say - but let's break that down - even though Hojo is perfectly fine doing horrible experiments in the middle of Midgar, we're supposed to believe that Shinra had a sudden burst of stealthy inspiration, built a reactor in a place that can only be reached by 1.) passing through a swamp guarded by a giant snake 2.) crawl through a cavern filled with monsters 3.) cross the ocean on a boat 4.) scale a mountain, several rivers, and desert terrain, all for the sake of conducting an experiment they could have conducted on home-ground to begin with.
Eeerr... Okay, I guess?

Don't get me started on Icicle Inn though, which is supposedly a resort. How is that place operational? No, like seriously.

I'm seriously curious how, with the new realistic direction, they plan on making sense of the world.

 

[Tetsujin]

Why does a tiny village like Nibelheim need a reactor? And if it does, why doesn't Kalm, Wutai or Rocket Town? All those places seem to have electricity but no reactor in sight.

I thought the reactor was there because the mountains were rich with Mako energy. I assumed the reactors cover more than just the nearest town.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

I'm seriously curious how, with the new realistic direction, they plan on making sense of the world.

Me too. It's a very heavily edited world - the only things we are ever shown are those which are directly relevant to the plot. The example I always give is railways. Given how economically efficient railways are (and how much easier to monitor than road traffic) it makes no sense at all that, after having developed railway technology, as seen in Midgar, it is not used anywhere else in the world at all except for one track going from an abandoned mine to a reactor. Likewise, it simply isn't possible that the seaplane and the three (?) boats in the harbour in Junon represent the world's entire fleet. And it surely isn't possible that the chocobo farm is the only farm on the planet!

The land around Fort Condor and south of Nibelheim looks like good farming land. Probably quite heavily populated. Probably there's some old market towns there, maybe even a couple of cities. It would make sense if the location of the reactors was dictated to some extent by the geography of the lifestream - just as, during the industrial revolution, factories were built close to sources of water power, then close to coal mines, then close to ports to which the coal could be shipped - and I think we just have to assume sizeable populations in the surrounding areas helping those reactors to turn a profit (at least, until they were shut down)

I've forgotten (!!) - is the Nibelheim reactor still pumping out electricity during the events of the OG?

 

[Octo]

I always imagined that Kalm was so close to Midgar that they got their energy from there with powerlines or whatnot.

But the other places. Nope no explanations for that

 

[hian]

I thought the reactor was there because the mountains were rich with Mako energy. I assumed the reactors cover more than just the nearest town.

Yeah, that too. If the reactors are supposed to provide energy for towns far away, they would need some major pipelines or electrical lines connected by towers.

 

[Mayo Master]

Why does a tiny village like Nibelheim need a reactor? And if it does, why doesn't Kalm, Wutai or Rocket Town? All those places seem to have electricity but no reactor in sight.

I thought the reactor was there because the mountains were rich with Mako energy. I assumed the reactors cover more than just the nearest town.

That's right. You have many real world cases where a power plant was constructed near the site where resource used in power generation sits (lots of coal-based power plants are located near coal mines, for example). It's often cost-effective to send electricity via power lines rather than shipping the source material itself.

 

[Unit-01]

I remember bringing this whole problem up earlier in this thread. The towns are too small to be logical. Nibelheim for example I image is much bigger than we will ever be shown in any game including this remake.

I hope at least this game makes a lot of the locations more believable as places people actually stayed. Even with rocket town, in the original game there are plenty of houses off in the distance that we never get to explore courtesy of the game art.

Spoiler: What I'm talking about.

I can only agree with Hian's thought of how they will fix the infrastructure in the game. Midgar is the most believable but even then it has it problems. The new Midgar we are shown is gigantic in scale compared the original or even Crisis Core.

 

[Clement Rage]

I'm a little wary of devoting too much energy to making the world 'make sense', I feel like if they spend too much time building the world, other aspects of the game could suffer.