Final Fantasy VII Remake Will Include "Dramatic" Changes

[Sleepy Sol]

VII isn't that beloved to me, so I'm kind of waiting to see if they majorly screw it up before I cry foul.

It IS Squeenix, so that's still a pretty strong possibility.

 

[CaitSeith]

I said this elsewhere but:

The combat should be restricted to one character with the other party members as AIs, the less input the player has during the battle, the better.

Also, materia is too confusing, so everyone will just have a linear progression skill tree whereby everyone will eventually be able to have access to the same pool of abilities and roles, thus making all characters equally viable, with the only difference among them being which type of weapon they hold.

If the player the character is controlling dies, it should be an automatic game over, regardless if the AI party members have healing or recovery magics/skills. It's the player's fault for not picking up on patterns of the enemies after all.

Should also make sure they take out the randomness of encounters, so make sure that most areas are linear by nature with a set amount of enemies for the party to kill. Just enough to make them strong enough for the next setpiece boss battle.

Actually, shouldn't make it too easy to just grind the same areas and overlevel for fights, so they should definitely add an arbitrary level and skill cap until they're able to beat the boss to unlock more abilities after events unfold.

Instead of Limit Breaks, every enemy should have to be dealt a certain amount of damage before any real damage can be done to them to increase gameplay length...I mean let the player truly enjoy the cinematic experience of the battle. /s

Ironically, it isn't that farfetched. Final Fantasy XIII is their second most sold FF game. Just think about it...

 

[gonenow3]

I can't believe people are upset about this. The combat system is quite dated, and I welcome some changes, so long as it's a good game, that's all I care about.

I think we should reserve judgement at least until we see it in action, what happened to innocent until proven guilty.

Sorry, but neither Square-Enix and gameplay changing remakes have good precedents. The game was already good with the "dated" combat system (otherwise it wouldn't had been so popular back then).

It was good but compared to current JRPGs and newer FFs it doesn't hold up that well. Even if they kept the combat the same a lot of spells and abilities would need tweaking to actually be usable (Most notably summons which are never worth using in any circumstances). SE haven't done that bad with remakes recently BBS HD was objectively better than BBSFM on the PSP and the same can be said for KHFM to 1.5. (I'll admit Kh2.5 was a disaster but that is due to the PS3 just being a bad console in comparison to the PS2). FFX-2 HD was also amazing if you compared it to the original X-2 which was pretty much a disaster if you played the J version.

I said this elsewhere but:

The combat should be restricted to one character with the other party members as AIs, the less input the player has during the battle, the better.

Also, materia is too confusing, so everyone will just have a linear progression skill tree whereby everyone will eventually be able to have access to the same pool of abilities and roles, thus making all characters equally viable, with the only difference among them being which type of weapon they hold.

If the player the character is controlling dies, it should be an automatic game over, regardless if the AI party members have healing or recovery magics/skills. It's the player's fault for not picking up on patterns of the enemies after all.

Should also make sure they take out the randomness of encounters, so make sure that most areas are linear by nature with a set amount of enemies for the party to kill. Just enough to make them strong enough for the next setpiece boss battle.

Actually, shouldn't make it too easy to just grind the same areas and overlevel for fights, so they should definitely add an arbitrary level and skill cap until they're able to beat the boss to unlock more abilities after events unfold.

Instead of Limit Breaks, every enemy should have to be dealt a certain amount of damage before any real damage can be done to them to increase gameplay length...I mean let the player truly enjoy the cinematic experience of the battle. /s

Ironically, it isn't that farfetched. Final Fantasy XIII is their second most sold FF game. Just think about it...

I mean the funny thing is FF13 does a better job at avoiding some of those points than FF7 does.

FF13 can skip more fights than FF7 can (Unless you do Yuffi warp or Hojo skip but those are actually glitches rather than intended). Although if you want to grind it benefits you more in FF13 than it does in FF7 since you max out on damage really early in FF7 compared to FF13

FF7 has fixed RNG that is controlled for the most part while FF13 still hasn't got that much RNG manipulation.

Personally I have no issue with instant game overs if you don't pick up boss patterns rather than spamming the same move 24/7. It should be challenging rather than the pitiful difficulty

 

[FirebirdXR]

I said this elsewhere but:

The combat should be restricted to one character with the other party members as AIs, the less input the player has during the battle, the better.

Also, materia is too confusing, so everyone will just have a linear progression skill tree whereby everyone will eventually be able to have access to the same pool of abilities and roles, thus making all characters equally viable, with the only difference among them being which type of weapon they hold.

If the player the character is controlling dies, it should be an automatic game over, regardless if the AI party members have healing or recovery magics/skills. It's the player's fault for not picking up on patterns of the enemies after all.

Should also make sure they take out the randomness of encounters, so make sure that most areas are linear by nature with a set amount of enemies for the party to kill. Just enough to make them strong enough for the next setpiece boss battle.

Actually, shouldn't make it too easy to just grind the same areas and overlevel for fights, so they should definitely add an arbitrary level and skill cap until they're able to beat the boss to unlock more abilities after events unfold.

Instead of Limit Breaks, every enemy should have to be dealt a certain amount of damage before any real damage can be done to them to increase gameplay length...I mean let the player truly enjoy the cinematic experience of the battle. /s

Ironically, it isn't that farfetched. Final Fantasy XIII is their second most sold FF game. Just think about it...

Is it really? As a whole I meant; which would include totals from the digital remastered releases of their older games?
Not doubting its initial release, though. Since it was built on an insane hype.

Hell, I bought it myself on release day.
But was it as a whole? Kinda doubt it.

Though, in a unsurprising turn of events. Lightning Returns sold so awfully that it was beaten by the HD remake of Final Fantasy X.
ON THE FUCKING VITA!!

PS: Love my Vita. ^_^

 

[Orga777]

Oh my god people don't seem to get it at all. First, what the hell did you guys expect? The same exact game with fancy new graphics? Don't any of you remember how limited and linear all the PS1 FF games were? If they did the same exact thing as before, all you would have is Final Hallway XIII... Except with annoying random battles thrown in every couple steps.

Second off, random encounters are extremely outdated. They were outdated by the time the PS2 came out. Compared to other JRPGs that came out at the same time like Tales of Symphonia, Star Ocean 3, Xenosaga, Persona 3, and even FFXII, FFX was way behind the curve. Random encounters are ancient mechanics and needs to stay dead. All it does is extend the length of the game to ungodly levels. That was nice in the 90s, where tech limitations left no damn choice, but that is no longer necessary today.

Third, a REMAKE is not the same thing as a REMASTER. A remake is a retelling of a story that was told before. Like what movies tend to do. A remaster is the exact same game, just coated with an HD skin that is used to cash in with by doing limited work by reusing the same game code. Since it is completely impossible to take the PS1 version of the game and just gloss it up in HD, they have to make a whole new pretty HD game from scratch, which costs a whole lot of money. Square will NEVER be able to make that money back by making an outdated, slow moving, linear RPG that is using ancient 90s game play mechanics. The only people that would buy that game are the diehard FF7 fanboys that haven't moved on, and, sorry, but there are not enough of you to recoup their losses on that, despite what some of you think. Especially when the budget for this game will probably triple the PS1 version's just because of graphics alone. Do you think rendering full environments in HD is cheap? There won't be any cost cutting pre rendered backgrounds here, folks.

Fourth, the game mechanics for VII were good for a Final Fantasy game. Even now, it is one of the better one's in the series... However, just because it is better than XIII's crappy mechanics does not mean that it isn't outdated and as old as dirt. Even other turn based JRPGs have better game mechanics than what Final Fantasy VII had. Compared to Shin Megami Tensei games, or heck, even modern Pokemon games, it is not really that good at all, actually. Changing that all up is a good thing, really. Just because something was good 20 years ago doesn't mean it still works today. Nobody is crying that new versions of old game series don't have outdated awful tank controls. Nobody cried when Silent Hill 2 or Resident Evil 4 dropped that nonsense as quick as possible. Nobody cried when Metal Gear Solid 2 dropped their awful lock on controls and overheadview, either. Because time moved on and advanced past the old limitations. The same has to happen here. If they are going to have Nomura waste time with remaking a whole new game when he has all this other stuff on his plate already, then he has to make a game that is acceptable by TODAY's standards. Not the standards viewed through 20 year old nostalgia glasses. So what if that entails action elements being added in? Nomura isn't going to make it like XIII where it plays all on its own. It will be better than that. I think that can be fun as heck juggling foes with Cloud and Tifa in midair. And without the limiting turn based mechanics, it can give each and every character their own personal feel and control, which gives them more personality.

Look. There are a lot of reasons to be worried about the remake. But updating the archaic game mechanics for a more modern feel is NOT one of them. Be more worried about the story and character changes. That is where the skepticism should come from. Not the mechanics. I trust Nomura in that area.

 

[gonenow3]

Oh my god people don't seem to get it at all. First, what the hell did you guys expect? The same exact game with fancy new graphics? Don't any of you remember how limited and linear all the PS1 FF games were? If they did the same exact thing as before, all you would have is Final Hallway XIII... Except with annoying random battles thrown in every couple steps.

Second off, random encounters are extremely outdated. They were outdated by the time the PS2 came out. Compared to other JRPGs that came out at the same time like Tales of Symphonia, Star Ocean 3, Xenosaga, Persona 3, and even FFXII, FFX was way behind the curve. Random encounters are ancient mechanics and needs to stay dead. All it does is extend the length of the game to ungodly levels. That was nice in the 90s, where tech limitations left no damn choice, but that is no longer necessary today.

Third, a REMAKE is not the same thing as a REMASTER. A remake is a retelling of a story that was told before. Like what movies tend to do. A remaster is the exact same game, just coated with an HD skin that is used to cash in with by doing limited work by reusing the same game code. Since it is completely impossible to take the PS1 version of the game and just gloss it up in HD, they have to make a whole new pretty HD game from scratch, which costs a whole lot of money. Square will NEVER be able to make that money back by making an outdated, slow moving, linear RPG that is using ancient 90s game play mechanics. The only people that would buy that game are the diehard FF7 fanboys that haven't moved on, and, sorry, but there are not enough of you to recoup their losses on that, despite what some of you think. Especially when the budget for this game will probably triple the PS1 version's just because of graphics alone. Do you think rendering full environments in HD is cheap? There won't be any cost cutting pre rendered backgrounds here, folks. Fourth, the game mechanics were good for a Final Fantasy game. Even now, it is one of the better one's in the series... However, just because it is better than XIII's crappy mechanics does not mean that it isn't outdated and as old as dirt. Even other turn based JRPGs have better game mechanics than what Final Fantasy VII had. Compared to Shin Megami Tensei games, or heck, even modern Pokemon games, it is not really that good at all, actually. Changing that all up is a good thing, really. Just because something was good 20 years ago doesn't mean it still works today. Nobody is crying that new versions of old game series don't have outdated awful tank controls. Nobody cried when Silent Hill 2 or Resident Evil 4 dropped that nonsense as quick as possible. Nobody cried when Metal Gear Solid 2 dropped their awful lock on controls and overheadview, either. Because time moved on and advanced past the old limitations. The same has to happen here. If they are going to have Nomura waste time with remaking a whole new game when he has all this other stuff on his plate already, then he has to make a game that is acceptable by TODAY's standards. Not the standards viewed through 20 year old nostalgia glasses. So what if that entails action elements being added in? Nomura isn't going to make it like XIII where it plays all on its own. It will be better than that. I think that can be fun as heck juggling foes with Cloud and Tifa in midair. And without the limiting turn based mechanics, it can give each and every character their own personal feel and control, which gives them more personality.

Look. There are a lot of reasons to be worried about the remake. But updating the archaic game mechanics for a more modern feel is NOT one of them. Be more worried about the story and character changes. That is where the scepticism should come from. Not the mechanics. I trust Nomura in that area.

For the record FF7 didn't have random encounters other than one area at the very end of the game. It ran on a step counter system so all the encounters were fixed same as FF8 and FF1-5.

 

[Orga777]

For the record FF7 didn't have random encounters other than one area at the very end of the game. It ran on a step counter system so all the encounters were fixed same as FF8 and FF1-5.

That isn't good, either, dude. The point still stands that it is completely outdated in today's RPG market.

 

[gonenow3]

For the record FF7 didn't have random encounters other than one area at the very end of the game. It ran on a step counter system so all the encounters were fixed same as FF8 and FF1-5.

That isn't good, either, dude. The point still stands that it is completely outdated in today's RPG market.

I mean its exactly the same as a lot of current JRPGs just you can see the fixed encounters in current JRPGs rather than them being hidden. I'm not denying FF7 is horribly outdated but a lot of that is to do with the graphics / the combat system rather than the random encounters (Which is more of a personal choice thing when there are no encounter items to remove them if you don't want to deal with them)

 

[EbonBehelit]

Squeenix may as well push come game-changing additions to the remake, since they can't win either way: such is the insane nostalgia FF7 holds that this remake could literally be exactly the same as the original but with a fresh coat of paint and people would still declare it inferior.

I actually wish they'd ditch the turn-based battle system entirely: it's an antiquated mechanic that makes playing the older FF games an absolute slog, especially if you're playing them legit since you can't turbo through the grind.

 

[Lunar Templar]

oh good ... they're 'fixing' what isn't broken ...

Now I'm worried about what they'll do to 'fix' the story, cause they fuck that up I'm just gonna play the PS1 FF7 again.

FF7's combat is a broken mess if you knew what you were doing with it. Its objectively outdated and needs refining and if they didn't do that then what is the point of making the remake as you said yourself there is the PS1 version.

Half the fun of a JRPG is figuring out how to break it and get over power to the point of near god hood.

Besides, I have absolutely zero faith in them not fucking it up what with how 12 and 13 turned out. They should just stick to what worked just fine instead of the horrid and needlessly complicated chore to figure out of a combat systems they've been going with as of late.

 

[chozo_hybrid]

I can't believe people are upset about this. The combat system is quite dated, and I welcome some changes, so long as it's a good game, that's all I care about.

I think we should reserve judgement at least until we see it in action, what happened to innocent until proven guilty.

Sorry, but neither Square-Enix and gameplay changing remakes have good precedents. The game was already good with the "dated" combat system (otherwise it wouldn't had been so popular back then).

Even so, people should stop reacting so harshly to something we have no real information on. Also, some of that is subjective, I know people (for which I am NOT one) who liked the systems used in the last few games. We just need to learn to wait and see, the internet gets too riled up too easily.

 

[Elementary - Dear Watson]

If RED XIII ends up as a cat I will physically hurt someone.

And if you can actually tell what Cait Sith is from it's sprite without looking at his portrait in the guide then I will also throw a fit.

 

[gonenow3]

oh good ... they're 'fixing' what isn't broken ...

Now I'm worried about what they'll do to 'fix' the story, cause they fuck that up I'm just gonna play the PS1 FF7 again.

FF7's combat is a broken mess if you knew what you were doing with it. Its objectively outdated and needs refining and if they didn't do that then what is the point of making the remake as you said yourself there is the PS1 version.

Half the fun of a JRPG is figuring out how to break it and get over power to the point of near god hood.

Besides, I have absolutely zero faith in them not fucking it up what with how 12 and 13 turned out. They should just stick to what worked just fine instead of the horrid and needlessly complicated chore to figure out of a combat systems they've been going with as of late.

Yes that is half the fun. But when that option is obtained stupidly early (AKA as soon as you get Cait Sith) and the game becomes literally just 1 button for all fights then it is a problem. Options and strategy are what a JRPG should be not spam 1 button which is what FF7 was. For all the hate you are throwing at FF13 at least it required actual tactics and thought going into a battle and DURING a battle rather than you relying on the same strategy with no change up depending on the fight. FF7 was really repetitive and has aged pretty poorly while other JRPGs have adapted and added much needed depth to the genre. Change is for the good in this aspect.

 

[AdamG3691]

Oh good. DLC to keep Aeris alive.
I've always said the cliche characters, predictable plot, repetitive combat, and exceptionally corny JRPG dialogue would have been SO much better if that one chick had survived.

I personally wouldn't mind that as long as they made it explicit that her being there was not part of the story, she was an awesome white mage... I may also be bitter about losing half of my best materia when she buggered off for no reason

 

[gonenow3]

Oh good. DLC to keep Aeris alive.
I've always said the cliche characters, predictable plot, repetitive combat, and exceptionally corny JRPG dialogue would have been SO much better if that one chick had survived.

I personally wouldn't mind that as long as they made it explicit that her being there was not part of the story, she was an awesome white mage... I may also be bitter about losing half of my best materia when she buggered off for no reason

In the PC version you can keep her alive till the very end so it will probably happen.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Eh. That's honestly fine, as long as they ensure the gameplay isn't boring tripe.
I liked FF7's gameplay as it was; the materia system is the only "Tabula Rosa" FF character system I liked at all (because each character was still just distinct enough to matter).

But today, I can see it not really flying, even on the wings of Nostalgia. Some types of gameplay age very well, as games like Shovel Knight can attest. But others don't age well at all. FF7's main issue is that even if you weren't trying to break the game, it was always just way too easy.

 

[Geisterkarle]

So if I understand the comments here correctly, 90% of the combat complaints could be fixed with changing Cait Sith's limit and removing/changing Powersoul! Well, that is ok, go for it Square Enix! And I don't think even any FF7-combat-defenders here will miss that... But they will probably do something more drastic! And THAT is the problem!

 

[Lightspeaker]

So if I understand the comments here correctly, 90% of the combat complaints could be fixed with changing Cait Sith's limit and removing/changing Powersoul! Well, that is ok, go for it Square Enix! And I don't think even any FF7-combat-defenders here will miss that... But they will probably do something more drastic! And THAT is the problem!

Its going to be that FF15 crap of an action-RPG style. I can bloody well feel it. -_-

 

[nyysjan]

As a person who never really got into FF XIII (17 hours into the game, before i no longer could tolerate the damn combat system or tunnels), this news makes me even more worried than i was.

Everygame from FFVIII onward has been worse than the last in one aspect or another.
In IX i did not like characters, in X i hate linearity, XII was too short (and combat kinda sucked), and XIII was boring and linear (and i did not like most of the characters).

So, going from those precedents, they'll make it linear, boring, short (you too long for how boring it is) and with boring/unlikeable characters.

 

[BareHope]

Ah well, either it bombs and Squeenix needs to release FF VI to the PC to recoup losses, or it will be good and Squeenix will release FF VI to the PC for cross-selling purposes.

Either way, everybody wins.