“Hopefully it’ll be out by 2025.”

May 10, 2019 11:43 AM

Final Fantasy VII Remake [YouTube][TeaserTrailer] “After a long period of development hell, the Final Fantasy VII remake is finally back in the real world, with Square Enix dropping a short teaser trailer today and promising more to come in June. Previously, Square had said that the Final Fantasy VII remake would be episodic, and based on this trailer—which is entirely made up of scenes from the game’s first act, in Midgar—that may still be the case.” [via: Kotaku]
posted by Fizz (48 comments total)

I'm just going to start reading "episodic" as "more expensive".
posted by Sequence at 11:46 AM on May 10, 2019 [12 favorites]

Maybe it's just me but unlike some games that are remastered, I find Final Fantasy games very difficult to go back to and replay. It may just be that RPG game-play has shifted so much in the last 10 years that going back feels overly difficult/cumbersome. There have only been a handful of games that I find still hold up. Final Fantasy XII The Zodiac Age and Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD, but so many of the others just don't work for me. Then again, it's probably just me.
posted by Fizz at 11:50 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]

This is causing me many feelings.
posted by betweenthebars at 11:51 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]

Yeah, I’ve given up console games, but I played this a lot, years ago. Complicated feelings, indeed.
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:54 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]

I have no idea what I'm going to do about this. Playing this game for the first time was a life changing experience for me, as weird as it sounds to say that. Some of its scenes and music are imprinted very deeply in me. If I could experience that again, it would be wonderful. But, though they're calling it a 'remake' it looks to be quite different. This would be ok, maybe even preferable, if they can still catch the magic in a different from.

I tried to like FFXIII; I had such great memories of VII and IX. But it felt so different, and it just never clicked. The world felt more restricted, the interactions felt shallower, and the combat was really unengaging. The world felt so much less alive, despite the incredible graphics. I'm afraid this game will suffer the same faults, and this trailer is not encouraging.

And yet, I'm almost certainly going to buy it. Squenix, you crafty developers.
posted by dbx at 11:56 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]

The problem with an episodic release is that it runs into a problem I have with Mass Effect: I really wish I could play the 1st game with the 3rd games more advanced presentation and fun mechanics. The newest chapter highlights the age of the earliest one. By the time they're done, people will want a remaster of the remake. On the books for Q3 2035, I'm sure.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 11:59 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]

Remember when the thing about the Final Fantasy series was every game was a completely unconnected, new world and story? Then they they started making sequels and spinoffs, and now they’ve reached the logical conclusion, remaking this one game in perpetuity.
posted by rodlymight at 12:00 PM on May 10, 2019 [10 favorites]

Looks very pretty. Not quite sure what I think about it.

FFVII gets a lot of love, but I always liked the story of FFIV more, bad English translation and all. A modern retelling of that story would probably hit me the way a lot of people seem to feel about FFVII.
posted by biogeo at 12:01 PM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]

I would watch a nine hour movie trilogy about FFIV
posted by prize bull octorok at 12:05 PM on May 10, 2019 [11 favorites]

Rumor has it the Knights of the Round animation is thirty minutes long.
posted by ultraviolet catastrophe at 12:05 PM on May 10, 2019 [25 favorites]

I just hope the new gameplay mechanics don't prevent those who are disabled from playing it.
posted by adzm at 12:07 PM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]

I find that most of my problems with replaying the old ones have to do with the level of required grind. But then I also start to suspect that part of why I thought they were so deep was that I was spending four hours running in circles and killing the same couple enemies before I got to that seemingly-epic boss battle. The scale seems to change a lot of how I perceive the newer games. I loved FF15, but I was rarely impressed with the bosses and main plot; I could have just taken a whole game of road trip hunters and cooking progressively more complicated dinners.
posted by Sequence at 12:17 PM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]

Hey, are they gonna remaster the story? Such that it makes any fucking sense at all?

Like, I beat it. I watched the whole story. I just never thought it held together. It made more sense than 8, but that's not saying a lot.

FFVII gets a lot of love, but I always liked the story of FFIV more, bad English translation and all. A modern retelling of that story would probably hit me the way a lot of people seem to feel about FFVII.
-
I would watch a nine hour movie trilogy about FFIV

Final Fantasy IV was so important to me as a kid that I spent a solid decade failing to write a story that is also very important to me because I kept mimicking the love triangle from FFIV, which only works in FFIV, I now realize, (spoilers for a 28-year-old video game, I guess?) because of the face-heel-face turn of one of the involved characters. Without that drama, the third wheel character just comes off as unlikeable and creepy! Who would have thunk?
posted by Caduceus at 12:20 PM on May 10, 2019 [6 favorites]

I could have just taken a whole game of road trip hunters and cooking progressively more complicated dinners.

So Zelda: Breath of the Wild ;-p
posted by Fizz at 12:24 PM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]

Maybe it's just me but unlike some games that are remastered, I find Final Fantasy games very difficult to go back to and replay.

The way I avoid this difficulty is not having any time to play any RPGs since the SNES era. So, assuming it's already been remade or there is a plan to remake it, I expect my eventual revisit of FFVI to go pretty well.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 12:30 PM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]

So what do we think: Vincent and Yuffie as DLC? Emerald Weapon as DLC?

Will they remaster and re-release Advent Children just so the plot to VII makes any sense?

Definitely would have rather seen a remake of IV or VI but hopefully this works so maybe we'll get to see some other total remakes. It looks nice at least....
posted by davros42 at 12:30 PM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]

As someone who has only played an hour or two of VII, I've had a tough time trying to decide if I should just wait for the remake or start my VII playthough over from scratch. Knowing that the remake will have substantial changes, including potentially to story, and that it will be episodic (so no resolution for years, and likely well into the PS5 generation at this rate), makes me wonder what it is I even want out of the games at this point, let alone which option would be best for me.
posted by chrominance at 12:46 PM on May 10, 2019

I'm probably going to end up buying this and end up never playing more than fifteen minutes of it because I simply do not have time in my life for long games anymore (even if I sometimes miss them).
posted by dinty_moore at 12:53 PM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]

Maybe it's just me but unlike some games that are remastered, I find Final Fantasy games very difficult to go back to and replay.

I have the opposite feeling actually, I think they hold up better than almost any other type of game. Have recently replayed FF1, FF7, and FF9 and all were good --- and FF9 was the only remastered one, really.

In general I still prefer turn based or semi-turn-based (FF7/FF9/FFX/etc) games to action-RPGs like FF15 or the FF7 Remake. Of course the new turn based ones can be fun too (Lost Sphear, Bravely Default, Octopath Traveler).

It might be different if I had not played these games the first time around, though.

I'll probably play the Remake, but if its episodic I won't play until all episodes are released. I doubt it will be as much fun as the original, but I could be surprised. After all, one of my favorite recent RPG games was Nier:Automata which was very action-RPG heavy, so it is possible for me to love those games. FF15 does not give me confidence in a good gameplay system, however, since FF7:Remake seems to be similar to that.
posted by thefoxgod at 12:55 PM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]

I loved FFVII when it came out. It redefined for me what a video game can be. That being said it's really hard for me to go back and play it now. It's an incredibly ugly game visually - for some reasons that were intentional and some that were limitations of the platform. The fixed cameras that change controller orientation between screens, the cyberpunk landscapes that make it difficult to actually see what's going on, etc. I love the modern FF style a lot going all the way back to FFX. That being said, I don't own a Playstation and I am old and I don't really like real time battle RPGs like Kingdom Hearts.
posted by muddgirl at 12:58 PM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]

In general I still prefer turn based or semi-turn-based (FF7/FF9/FFX/etc) games to action-RPGs like FF15 or the FF7 Remake. Of course the new turn based ones can be fun too (Lost Sphear, Bravely Default, Octopath Traveler).


I also straight up can't handle the post-XII combat systems. I do not find them fun. I tried XII for a while and never really got into it, though also that entire game was just various shades of brown, which didn't help. Maybe my TV was bad. Hmm.

I really need to hit up some of these new gen turn-based games like Octopath Traveler and I Am Setsuna. It might even be a justifiable use of time at the moment.
posted by Caduceus at 1:00 PM on May 10, 2019

My favorite thing about Final Fantasies post-VII is imagining the characters getting dressed in the morning.

Like... so you put on your sleeves first? Then you, what, buckle them to your pants. OK. And then button on your... no wait, you'd have to put your shoes on before your pants because they have a little strap thing. Oh, but that's only on the left leg, so maybe you put your right leg on, then your shoes-

You know what, let's table the trousers thing and start sorting out buckles, that's gonna take a while.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 1:07 PM on May 10, 2019 [27 favorites]

I hope this game can hold up to the weighty expectations that nostalgia for that time in my life has placed upon it.
posted by The Hamms Bear at 1:14 PM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]

So what do we think: Vincent and Yuffie as DLC? Emerald Weapon as DLC?

A special underwater materia and revive materia as DLC.
posted by betweenthebars at 1:17 PM on May 10, 2019

And just when I thought user names derived from "Sephiroth" were on the wane.
posted by Brocktoon at 1:25 PM on May 10, 2019 [8 favorites]

So, assuming it's already been remade or there is a plan to remake it, I expect my eventual revisit of FFVI to go pretty well.

I'm in the middle of revisiting FFVI -- that game holds up. I replayed FFVII a couple years ago, but I forgot until recently just how much better FFVI is. FFVII is a bit of a hot mess by comparison.
posted by The Great Big Mulp at 1:25 PM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]

(my username on pretty much every other platform is operafloozy so if a FFVI remake came out you bet your ass I would find time to play it. I'd take vacation time for it.)
posted by dinty_moore at 1:36 PM on May 10, 2019 [6 favorites]

Will there be a long and uncomfortable cross-dressing quest, though?
posted by GenjiandProust at 2:00 PM on May 10, 2019 [4 favorites]

I hope this game can hold up to the weighty expectations that nostalgia for that time in my life has placed upon it.

right? so far no extruded nostalgia product has yet been able to un-make any of the life decisions that have widened the gulf between my present self and my idealized past version of me who's still stuffed full of optimism and potential, but maybe someday somebody will throw enough money at J. Michael Straczynski to make him reboot Wheeled Warriors and that, that my friends, that just might make everything good and whole again

failing that, I'll take a Funko Pop figure I can place on my desk such that it hovers half-seen in my peripheral vision for the rest of my working life, like some kind of revenant

let the past die. kill it, if you have to
posted by prize bull octorok at 2:06 PM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]

The original FFVII landed in just the right place and time that it ended up being (as video games go) super important and emotionally engaging for me in a way that the actual content of the game can't remotely justify, so I have all kiiiiinds of weird skeptical feelings about how the remake is gonna be as something to play. But also am totally interested in playing it, partly because of that long lingering affection that I should probably know better about and partly because FFXV was enough actual fun for me that it healed some of the wounds the previous few games inflicted on the franchise enthusiasm that FFVII had rekindled in the first place.

I started an all white mage FF1 playthrough on a NES Classic last year at one point as kind of a shared nostalgia stunt with a friend in the neighborhood, on the notion that we'd trade back and forth grinding those little wizards into a survivable fighting force. They've been sitting in my closet somewhere around level 6 since before the solstice, and I don't know whether that bodes well for having the patience for FFVII again or speaks to how much room there is to be grindy and not fabulous and still not be as bad as grinding white mages in FF1.

The other thing about FFVII is that they still let you meaningfully change the names of your characters to any damn thing back in the original, because voice acting was still basically not a part of the franchise, and so for a long time I had no idea what the fuck the names of any of the characters were. Me and my friends just made a dumb series of puns and then quietly made them rock-solid canon in our minds afterward. Aerith? No, that's Annamann. Tifa? No, Opia. Cait Sith? Nope, Cornuc. Cornuc, Opia. Annamann, Opia. I can't even remember what we called Cloud.

Rumor has it the Knights of the Round animation is thirty minutes long.

Final Fantasy VII But Every Time You Summon The Knights Of The Round It's The Entire Film Of Monty Python's The Holy Grail But 15% Faster
posted by cortex at 2:38 PM on May 10, 2019 [12 favorites]

What I want more than FF7 remake is FF8 on any modern platform (but really I mean Switch). Preferably with a FF9-style remaster, but I'd take just "FF8 on Switch". Currently FF8 is only on PS1 (I do still have one, but meh) and a terrible and incredibly old Windows port (which probably won't really run anymore? Plus playing games on PC = ugh).
posted by thefoxgod at 2:58 PM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]

I'm in the middle of revisiting FFVI -- that game holds up. I replayed FFVII a couple years ago, but I forgot until recently just how much better FFVI is. FFVII is a bit of a hot mess by comparison.

FFVI is a great story. I replayed it in college (came out when I was in elementary school) and loved it so much that I named the main character in my first published book "Terra."

We're totally the fanfic generation.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 3:09 PM on May 10, 2019 [11 favorites]

I'm ride or die for SNES FIII (is this FF VI in that wrong numbering scheme, whatever). That game had so much story it literally could have ended at the end of the World of Balance and it wasn't even close. The hits just kept coming. That and Chrono Trigger on the same system were just earth shattering to me at that time in my life.

I never got into 7. Just didn't do it for me.
posted by RolandOfEld at 5:21 PM on May 10, 2019 [6 favorites]

FFVII hit me and my friends at just the right age, right time, right place...it's the first RPG I really really loved (Sorry, Secret of Mana) and while it has its flaws and whatnot, I don't give a shit. I'm here for it. My body is ready.
posted by lazaruslong at 5:27 PM on May 10, 2019

This will be released right after Sony announces the end of PS4 production.
posted by trackofalljades at 6:23 PM on May 10, 2019

I cannot see how they could remake FFVII and capture both the nostalgia people have for it, and the expectations of a market that expects much, much better from their games.

Oh who am I kidding, it's going to be much prettier and play terribly.
posted by Merus at 7:28 PM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]

My experience playing FFVII was on PC. The one with Yamaha's S-YXG70 software synthesizer. Made all Dragon my Warrior II MIDIs sound much more epic. Had to play at a quarter of the screen size because my graphics card wasn't up to it. Made it out of Midgar before getting something better. That was a revelation. I had no joypad, so I played using a huge Microsoft Sidewinder Forcefeedback ProJoystick. Ugh, that scene where Cloud hands over the Black Materia to Sephiroth. Aerith's death didn't affect me much at first because of course they would revive her as part of the plot, and now suddenly my stomach is twisting into knots at the memory of reading long forgotten game forums trying to figure out how to revive her and wtf Square.

I replayed it to see Zack's memories. Maybe the plot didn't make sense, but the emotion sure did. Tiny polygon Cloud in agony in front of a pixelated, Mako sucking cancer on the planet.

Anyways, this looks cool, but I do not have the time to action RPG me up a golden chocobo.
posted by Mister Cheese at 8:49 PM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]

Maybe she'll make it this time.
posted by RobotHero at 6:19 AM on May 11, 2019 [1 favorite]

My poison would be a story like FF6, mechanics like FF5, and art and music like CT.

"Shaun and Jen" streamed through FF7 not too long ago, and, it was just too slow to watch. Combat takes too long to load, too many cutscenes... However they did name Tifa Antifa which is her name now.
posted by fleacircus at 6:49 AM on May 11, 2019 [2 favorites]

(Sorry, Secret of Mana)

Secret of Mana was the one that really could have benefitted from this, not the remake it got. Its whole system was an early attempt at the kind of action combat that they clearly want to be doing, and it aged incredibly poorly, and I don't know anybody who played it originally who can still tolerate the thing. And yet for some reason when they remade that, they kept all the shitty bits, but this is getting the whole action combat upgrade that people mostly don't want.
posted by Sequence at 7:40 AM on May 11, 2019 [4 favorites]

Warning in advance of my WOT - it's a freeform post that's part rant, part commentary on the massive decline in the series and how much this remake is best avoided by anybody with fond sentiment of VII. Not a regular poster.

I played all of the Nintendo releases in the series as a kid...FF1 was perfection for the time, and FF2 and FF3 (or whatever you want to call them) are stone-cold masterpieces. At no point in my life have I ever considered them unable to stand the test of time. If anything, a better-translated version of 2/IV would be the best story of the series. Both SNES games are so much better than any PS ones including VII, but VII is better than anything afterward except for 12...12 is a misunderstood masterpiece IMHO.

As a 6, 8, 10, 12 year old, the first games were all things I played multiple times and to the point similar to 100% progression today. We're talking 150 hours in FF3 probably, to the point that I'd run the final part with just Mog by himself wearing THAT armor.

Whoever up top said that the beauty of the games was the new, huge, self-contained adventure that was full of characters in a brand new world is 100% on point. I vividly remember getting the physical copies of 2 and 3 for SNES and it being topped only by maybe Super Metroid (if we're talking unboxing dopamine). Reading those monthly game mags and imaging what FF3 might contain based on 6 screenshots and a few paragraphs did wonders for my imagination. I mention all of this because of the the jump from 2d/Nintendo to 3d/Sony represents what I think is an analogy for VII original/Vii HD Remake 2021. ANYWAY.

When VII came out it was 3d and PS1 and all that, and I played it to death, make no mistake. Even though I'd argue it's not a great game, at the time it was special and it is a classic for a reason. In a community like this I'd imagine almost everybody who posts played it and was a fan. That said, most of us know just how much it doesn't stand up to the test of time and how making this HDified version is going to just highlight everything shit about VII and what makes post-SNES FF cringey at time.

The gameplay became a cakewalk, the emoness began, it's not good in 2019. It's just not. Cloud was terrible as the protagonist, and I reacted to its story then as I expect most people will react now (or see it if they only have that fun nostalgic memory of it currently). As I said, in 1996 I played it to the ends of that island with Knights and killed the 1,000,000 bosses, but I still realized it wasn't even worthy of holding 2 or 3's beer. Why they made the protagonists mopey emos and the female cast mostly babes who swooned over them I don't know, but in HD it'll be worse than it was with 34 polygons per character model.

It was everything wrong with the direction of the series, and it only got worse with 8 and everything after. 8 does start with Squall being unwilling to hook up with Quistis and instead asking her to help him find his manic pixie ballroom dream princess, right? After she asks him to the garden for a late night dtf assignment? I thought so, because it does.

Final Fantasy in summary format:

FF1 - only true wizards beat this without grinding 10 levels before the end; props if you Red Mage
FF2 - hard as hell, but stick it out and eventually you'll spam Meteo
FF3 - if you can do some maths, it'll be fine
FF5 - this was real?
FF7 - if you died more than 1 time in the entire 4 disc game, I'm sad for you; invented cosplay
FF8,9,10,10mk2, 11, 13, 13.1, 13.2 - who fucking cares
FF12 - radically different, very hard, only one I gave up on eventually, kinda
FF15 - we all went to prom, save the $60
FF16 - true return-to-form 80 hour sprite based mastery, couldn't believe they just released it without any marketing and outdid all of the first 4 US titles combined (and then called it a wrap)

Where is all of this going? Don't buy VII remake, don't support this shit, even if it's FINAL FANTASY VII. Games as a whole have dropped in every way, and paying for trash like VII HD just ensures that we'll never, ever again have a big awesome new world, full of characters and a universe that's just full of balanced and expertly crafted content for us to explore.

We'll got more 2 years delays on what ends up being an alpha-version of a high-school road trip to prom simulator featuring pokemon, or whatever. I'm a bit LoFi for MeFi and I apologize, and I don't post much (not a problem I'm sure), but I do feel strongly about this topic of broken games and ruined nostalgia.
posted by GreyboxHero at 1:43 PM on May 11, 2019 [1 favorite]

The gameplay became a cakewalk

Dude, it's okay to say it's not for you and most of this stuff I support, but you know, I've got a day job. If you want hard out of FFXV, you can mainline the story quests below recommended level and do the sidequests later or in a separate playthrough or skip them entirely. Or go play Sekiro. If you just don't like the action style, that part I understand, but finishing a game I paid $60 for should not be a privilege. You don't have to be a jerk to everybody else to express that the game isn't to your own tastes.
posted by Sequence at 9:58 PM on May 11, 2019 [2 favorites]

I never played FF 15, I thought it was pretty clear that I'm largely joking? I very much like the action-style, hence FF12 being one of my favorites. My critique is more the plot and style of character they've used since VII, but I have no intention of trying to say that what's special to you is wrong. It's just not special to me.

MeFi isn't a place I like to post because I'm pretty knowingly tone deaf to the feel here, but I actually do feel pretty strongly about not supporting cash grab remakes that will, IMHO, tarnish positive sentiment and memories (vs. making newer, better, more interesting games like they used to). This game, especially given its 5+ year endless teasing, is one of the worst offenders and I don't want to have FFVII become anything beyond what it was, when it was.

Sorry I offended you, and you're more than welcome to like FF15.
posted by GreyboxHero at 10:15 PM on May 11, 2019 [1 favorite]

It's interesting, I'm both excited for this and terrified of it - like many people, FF7 was a pretty formative gaming experience for me. I played through a bunch of it recently, and still enjoyed it, though i only got through a couple of hours.

Also: Though it seems to be the consensus here, not everyone agrees that the original has aged badly - as a point of example, Kim Justice's amazing 3 hour documentary tribute to the game . (To be fair, I will never miss an opportunity to tell people about KJ's amazing work)
posted by jaymzjulian at 3:28 PM on May 12, 2019 [1 favorite]

One more weird thing: I actually originally played FF7 on PC and not Playstation, with a shiny new 3dfx card - this actually helped a lot with the graphics! Modern playstation emulators with texture filtering do this even better, of course. But of course mid-90s polygons will never be for everyone.... but I will die on the hill of FF7 being a really good use of 90s graphics technology, and one that has aged far better than most of its contemporaries.
posted by jaymzjulian at 3:31 PM on May 12, 2019

Everyone else has weapons, she just runs up to stuff and punches it really hard. There is no way this lady isn't hueg.
posted by RobotHero at 5:12 PM on May 12, 2019 [3 favorites]

Its whole system was an early attempt at the kind of action combat that they clearly want to be doing, and it aged incredibly poorly, and I don't know anybody who played it originally who can still tolerate the thing.

I'm a bit late on this one, but I played through SOM again a few months ago (I haven't played the updated version). I think the combat is just fine, for the most part. I won't say it isn't a little clunky (particularly in some of the boss fights that require timing), but it doesn't take long to get used to.
posted by The Great Big Mulp at 9:12 AM on May 21, 2019

Secret of Mana is really a multiplayer game to me. The chargeups and cooldowns can make a pretty fun cooperative rhythm, also piling on some poor little rabite is hilarious.
posted by fleacircus at 1:54 AM on May 22, 2019 [1 favorite]