Famitsu have revealed the interview they had with Tetsuya Nomura during his visit to “Magic 2017” in Europe last month, exposing some intriguing information about the Final Fantasy VII remake, which keen fans will no doubt find long overdue… even if it is merely the highly innovative decision to turn the title into a stealth cover shooter.
As implied with the previously released screenshots, players will now be able to duck behind cover during battle as well as to hide from patrolling troops, adding stealth elements to the game now that battles take place in real-time as opposed to random encounters.
In regards to the gun-armed Barret, Nomura revealed that – in addition to also being able to use cover – he will able to do things “characteristic to that of gunners”; with the vague statement unfortunately leaving fans to theory-craft the possibilities.
Nomura has said that players will also be able to switch between characters and will want to do so depending on the situation, such as swapping to Barret in order to hit unreachable enemies; Nomura also mentioned that the game’s first boss battle will likely be more cataclysmic in scale, as the Guard Scorpion has been given more tools in its arsenal.
The environment and objects will also unsurprisingly be destructible and allow for added depth in battles, with parts of enemies able to be destroyed (such as the aforementioned Guard Scorpion’s legs).
When Famitsu brought up the subject of the ATB gauge and what seems to be the name of a skill on one of the screenshots, Nomura stated that those mechanics would be revealed later on – however, he did mention that the “materia” command represents the materia players have equipped that can be used during battle.
The entire interview (which includes details regarding Kingdom Hearts III and more) is available online now.
Each day before the bed I read a prayer, which include words like “Squenix” and “Plese don’t f♥♥k it up…” among others.
I’m still laughing at every fanboy that said it’d be a proper remake, when I told them it’d be nothing more than a reskinned FFXV.
Gonna be difficult to swap to Aeris after she DIES.
Hahaha!!! They just had to f♥♥k it again no? If any of you want to play a long demo of this game play dirge of cerberus
As if they’re making you play with Barret and Vincent all the time.
Yeesh, if anyone replying to this article had read practically ANY of the interviews from back when Final Fantasy XIII was released regarding the new vs the classic battle system, then you’d already know what’s going on with Final Fantasy VII -REMAKE-: Active Time Battle, where one character acts and the others remain “ready/readying”, does not work that well with realistic character/HD graphics anymore. That isn’t my statement, that’s FFXIII director Motomu Toriyama’s statement on behalf of Square-Enix regarding the present & future of Final Fantasy.
Direct quote: “If we were to implement a turn-based system on a high-def system, the time that characters stood completely still on standby would seem too long, and the battle scenes would now seem visually realistic.” (Game Informer #204, pg. 15)
And just be be clear, I bought Final Fantasy VII day-one. I got the T-Shirt that went along with it. I even bought some of those Extra Knights toys of Cloud, Tifa, and Aerith while I was at it because I was a college teen with a bit of disposable income. I love the original, but it has aged POORLY in the last 20 years, and simply implementing the original battle system (or a variation such as in FFX) will do nothing but make -REMAKE- feel archaic by modern standards and player expectations. Especially since, like any business, they’re trying to attract new/younger customers rather than solely cater to an aging demographic.
I’m not sold on the new ideas they’re tossing around, but thus far it sounds better than Final Fantasy XV’s battle system. It’s leaner, it’s more chaotic, it has the potential to be more strategic, and it’s fully interactive. I’m also not sold on the ‘episodic’ release idea, but hopefully it’ll be more like .hack// and less like Resident Evil: Revelations 2.
But at least I understand why Square-Enix can’t use the old battle system.