While Final Fantasy XIII (FFXIII) and its two sequels aren't the most revered of Japanese role-playing games (JRPGs) it appears that they have influenced the making of Square Enix's Final Fantasy VIIRemake.
The news comes via magazine GameInformer, posted gaming forum on NeoGAF. It spent quality time at Square Enix's Tokyo office playing the soon to be released Final Fantasy XV (FFXV). Naturally, Final Fantasy VII Remake was a point of discussion. You can expect each of the episodes in the Final Fantasy VII Remake to be a full fledged JRPG experience.
"In regards to FFVII remake. Looking at the FFXIII saga as a model of release (three full-fledged games). Each game will be the size of a FFXIII game is specifically stated. In other words full scale 30+ hour RPG, and they also say plot wise nothing is off the table in terms of changes," the magazine reads.
While narrative changes to a game as celebrated as Final Fantasy VII might seem like heresy for many a diehard fan, its creators are confident in doing right by them.
"They clarify they aren't changing everything but [Yoshinori] Kitase [the game's producer], [Tetsuya] Nomura [its director], and [Kazushige] Nojima [writer on the game] feel since they were involved with the original game that they have the liberty to add / change what they want while still making fans happy. They also state they want FFVII Remake to have a much shorter development cycle than FFXV."
(Also see: Final Fantasy XV Platinum Demo Left Us Surprised)
It's a shrewd move to keep the series' faithful aware of what to expect and it means that we'll be getting three "proper" releases despite their episodic nature. Don't expect them anytime soon though. Unlike most Western publishers, Square Enix tends to announce its big projects years prior to release.
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