With the release of the RPG action game Final Fantasy VII Remake on the next month. Square-Enix tries to show fans how they finally decided to remake one of the best series of Final Fantasy through a video that looks like they will be released regularly.
Episode 1
In the first episode “The Making of Final Fantasy VII Remake” from the series entitled “Inside Final Fantasy VII Remake”, Square-Enix began with a welcome words from its producer, Yoshinori Kitase.
Kitase explained that the beginning he decided to make Final Fantasy VII Remake was in 2012 when it was the serial 25th birthday. He then spoke to the original game producer on PlayStation 1, Shinji Hashimoto and Final Fantasy’s main Character Designer, Tetsuya Nomura. Both of them were surprised and agreed with Kitase’s proposal and decided to start making it again.
The video then continues on how Tetsuya Nomura, who is now appointed as Director and Concept Design and Naoki Hamaguchi as Game Design / Programming Co-Director, explained the difficulties they had to endure. One of the biggest is how the game can be balance. It’s need to be familiar to old fans, but also tempting for new fans who are new to Cloud, Sephiroth, and other characters.
They also explained how Midgar appeared to be designed in more detail than usual. How the game part 1 story will only be limited to Cloud and others coming out of Midgar but with more dense content than the original game. Hamaguchi said that this was the reason why the game needed two disks at the time of release.
The developers then continued how they look for solutions to solving the ATB (Active Time Battle) with actions that were combined into one and made it something special.
The music itself is now handled by three people: Keiji Kawamori, Mitsuo Suzuki, and Masashi Hamuaza. They tried to remake the original music that had been arranged by Nobuo Uematsu. They will also make new theme music for the game later with better technology.
As for the art direction, Tetsuya Nomura did try to pursue modern standards for realism. Explaining how the direction of his Advent Childern film in 2005 was the basis of making Final Fantasy VII Remake art direction.
Episode 2
In episode 2 the video focuses on explaining the background of the story and the introduction of the main characters.
Starting from the Producer – Yoshinori Kitase who explained that although Final Fantasy VII Remake will only cover the main storyline until Cloud and his friends leave Midgar, which in the original version only takes 8 hours to complete, in this version of Remake he wants gamers to feel the experience again in more detail. Therefore, the development team has added various elements and extra layers to the world.
Followed by an explanation of Midgar which is divided into several areas by Kazushige Nojima as the screenplay writer. Interestingly, even though it was created 23 years ago, Midgar still feels relevant to today’s life where people with high economic levels are described as living in skyscrapers while low-level people live in slums.
The explanation was then continued by Motomu Toryama as co-director (scenario design) regarding Avalanche, a group that opposed Shinra’s treatment of the planet. Shinra itself is an energy resource company that utilizes lifestream (energy planet) for its benefits. For more details, see the video below.
Final Fantasy VII Remake itself is planned to be released on April 10, 2020, exclusively for one year on PlayStation 4.