Square Enix’s upcoming remake of Final Fantasy VII will see “dramatic changes” made to the game’s combat system, director Tetsuya Nomura has said.
The original version of Final Fantasy VII used a system known as Active Time Battle for combat encounters, whereby characters only carried out actions after a gauge at the bottom of the screen had filled, lending combat a pseudo turn-based feel. Nomura told Official PlayStation Magazine (via GamesRadar) that he’s looking to change that for the remake, however, in an attempt to make the game feel more up to date.
Well, it has been nearly 20 years since Final Fantasy first came out.
Details on exactly what changes will be made weren’t mentioned, though Nomura did promise that the differences made won’t be so extreme that fans won’t recognize the game. “We’re not going to be changing it into a shooter or something like that,” he told OPM. “We are going to be bringing dramatic changes, but we want to make sure it’s still recognizable.”
One likely source of inspiration for the remake’s new combat system could be the upcoming Final Fantasy XV, which features a real-time combat system - itself an iteration on the combat system seen in Final Fantasy XII and, more recently, Final Fantasy XIII: Lightning Returns. Final Fantasy XV‘s system can be sampled in the recent Episode Duscae demo, which shipped as a limited-time bonus for fans who purchased the recent remake of Final Fantasy Type-0.
Other changes planned to be made to Final Fantasy VII are more elusive. The remake’s visuals are being rendered in a style more reminiscent of the 2005 movie Advent Children, and Square Enix has stated that it doesn’t want to make alterations to the game’s story or gameplay so different that it ends up trampling all over fans’ memories of the original. But such is the level of dewy-eyed adulation surrounding Final Fantasy VII that it’s likely many will be upset however minor the changes end up being.
The Final Fantasy VII remake was announced during Sony’s briefing at this year’s E3 back in June. The game’s reveal was just of several surprise announcements during the show, which also saw Shen Mue 3 announced and The Last Guardian re-emerging from development limbo. The remake is currently slated to be a PlayStation 4 exclusive, though no release date has been given.
In case you missed it, you can check out the announcement trailer for the Final Fantasy VII remake below.
Dale Morgan
Latest posts by Dale Morgan (see all)
- No Man’s Sky Developer Settles Lawsuit With Sky TV - June 20, 2024
- E3 2016: Microsoft Unveils New Xbox, Project Scorpio, For Holiday 2017 Release - June 13, 2024
- Injustice 2 Announced, First Trailer Inside - June 8, 2024
