Final Fantasy 7 Remake, Pt. 2 Rebirth

[GreyZone]

Originally Posted by monster

You don't see any problem with selling a "full-length" video game that actually requires you to remember to keep a save data from another "full-length" video game?

It's one thing if they're sold together as one entire game, but if they're making separate "episodes" that are released at separate times, then each entry should be standalone.

If Final Fantasy 7 is to be remade as a multi-part series, then it should be treated as a multi-part series, not merely a single game anymore.

We don't even know HOW they are going to sell it. We don't know if the episodes will be sold as disc seperately or if the episodes will be digital only, while the full game will be released in disc form later on.

We also don't know how much it will cost... perhaps they'll do it via a season pass that can be purchased for slightly higher than regular AAA price like somewhere around 80-100€, so who knows?

[Chosen_Hero]

Originally Posted by Tong

I'll address some points.


No, it's not obvious because that would mean I'd need the first game in order to play the second. And even if the saves carried, how different would be the second game without the save?
If we assume this episodic format is going to be like FF13's, that brings another issue... by the end of the first act your party/character will probably be high leveled, in a point where it wouldnt make sense in the original game!
An easy way to solve this is to add a low level cap, but by doing that you already ruin any replayability. I'm not liking this.

Again, "of course"? No, it's not that simple. The maps are supposedly going to be MASSIVE in this game, massive enough to justify the episodic format! Do you honestly think they can fit all the maps in a single disc? Which also happens to be THE reason they're splitting the game like this?
And yet again, the only way I see this backtrack thing working out is to have all the games/episodes (classic game had multiple discs afterall), but the this would imply in very questionable business practices.

Except it does because half of Emerald's attacks only make sense underwater and his design was clearly meant for him to be an underwater weapon (I doubt that thing can even fly).

And I'm probably going to get the game anyways, but that doesnt mean I'm going to accept everything they give to me or do to the original masterpiece

1) So are you expecting to reach level 50 or level 100 in the Midgar? Think about this like back in the original release where levels carried over to each act just fine... on a PS1, this is a non issue, experience and level gain can and will be adjusted for pacing considering that this is a continuous story, FF XIII is a bad example due to the fact that each game is basically removed from each others story arc and leveling in each differs especially when you take that mess of a story (imo) into account.

2) I was almost asleep by the time I typed that so I may have misunderstood something (too lazy to go back and check), but SE could just as easily try recreating the feeling of changing discs considering the episodic format, and I will say, yes in a away I do think that everything can fit into a single BD, but due to how FF7 originally opens up its world SE would need to come up with a way to unlock the open world little by little as you progress until you get the airship and the world fully opens up and then you are free to travel anywhere you want, how will they do this? I don't know, can it be done? Yes.

3) Again, it doesn't have to solely be an underwater battle, it could be a multi-layered battle where you fight it multiple times and each time you fight it has less and less hp, you never know if this fight will be one of the things they change considering the nature of the battle in the original, expecting the whole game to be a 1:1 translation of the original is fundamentally flawed in the first place, it's a remake/reimagine things are going to change and only Kitase and Nomura know how, let's worry when the game development os closer to that part.

--------------------------

(Checking my PS3 version of FF7 as I type this)

So act 1 in the original game encompassed one continent up until the part where you fight Sephiroth in the boat, think about that, a whole continent that the remake has to bring to life (because in the original release there are just a handful of important places to actually visit) and populate with more towns and points of interest, keep in mind that at this point the best mode of transportation is going to be chocobos but even then that's half way through the first act and that takes quite a long time to get.

Then we have act 2 with yet another continent where the Golden Saucer is located at, where travel consists of using a tank/truck thing and then after that in act 3 the whole world opens up with yet another continent and new islands that couldn't be reached before (in one of which the summon Knight of the Round is located at) by using the airship, heck the place where Wutai is located at is kind of like it's own continent.

But here is the crux of the matter, you don't need the whole... let's call it planet or hemisphere (choose you favorite) unlocked from the beginning, so I personally believe them when they say that he maps will be MASSIVE and can and will have enough content to justify an episodic format.

Sometimes I wonder if all the people complaining about the game being cut into parts even played the game in the first place.

[monster]

Originally Posted by GreyZone

We don't even know HOW they are going to sell it. We don't know if the episodes will be sold as disc seperately or if the episodes will be digital only, while the full game will be released in disc form later on.

We also don't know how much it will cost... perhaps they'll do it via a season pass that can be purchased for slightly higher than regular AAA price like somewhere around 80-100€, so who knows?

You're right, of course, that we don't know all the details yet. I'm just pointing out a scenario where they are sold separately, in which case they should provide standalone entries.

[GreyZone]

Originally Posted by monster

You're right, of course, that we don't know all the details yet. I'm just pointing out a scenario where they are sold separately, in which case they should provide standalone entries.

If I look back at my experience of playing ME2 without save import... yea I heavily recommend people NOT to do it, as it's a noticable inferior experience. But I guess having the "option" to start a fresh new game in "part 2" etc. with predefined items, lvl, etc., while "importing" still works as it should (=level, items etc. all still available from the part before), then it wouldn't be a loss, I guess. But I would still recommend not to do it, espacially not for people who never played the original.

[sayde]

Originally Posted by Shadow5YA

But unlike multi-part series like .hack, or Mass Effect, FFVII is not a new installment with an entirely new story.

Never played mass effect, But I did play each of the 2 .hack trilogies and I gotta say, I'm very tempted to believe this is part of the reason why SE decided to team up with Cyberconnect2. Because even though the circumstances are slightly different, I'd argue that each game within each trilogy was not part of an entirely new story. Each installment was very story dependent on the game before it and/or after it and when one part ended, it left so many cliffhangers that it really did feel like the end of a single episode of anime series (complete with a "next time..." preview at the end of the credits" and everything). It wasn't like a Xenosaga or a FFXIII were each title could technically be a standalone title with it's own relatively conclusive plot. In those .hack games, you really were sort of expected to play the entire trilogy from start to finish and it was clear that they had developed the entire plot from the get-go. They just didn't release it all at the same time.

And as far as multi-part games go, both .hack and Mass Effect also reused many of their maps, models, and other assets across multiple episodes. There's no reason to believe this Remake won't do otherwise, which again goes back to people already knowing what to expect.

I actually hope that's not the case. In other words, I hope backtracking to previous locations from another disk won't be possible unless you have that part. Otherwise, I'll be finding it very difficult to see why they had to resort to this multi-part format to begin with. FFVII is filled with a lot varied & different looking locations. So if each of these locations are to be getting the same treatment as midgar, then I can fully believe Kitase when he claims that everything needs to be spread out across multiple parts to work. But if we find out that all those assets are indeed contained on every part and that backtracking everywhere is possible with access to only part of the game, I'll be pretty irked because that would mean the entire world of FFVII could indeed fit on a single part afterall.

It would take Hideo Kojima levels of budget breaking in order to add the amount of content needed for it not to be a disappointment, and to justify each part being likely full priced games.

I truly think that's exactly what Square Enix is trying to go for here.

Originally Posted by Tong

I'll address some points.

No, it's not obvious because that would mean I'd need the first game in order to play the second. And even if the saves carried, how different would be the second game without the save?

This goes back to why I think they decided to work with Cyberconnect 2. Because this company has already handled this sort of situation before. You wouldn't need the 1st part to play the 2nd, but you'd be missing out on a lot of different powerful items & equipment, quests, and obviously all the story content that goes with it. IIRC, jumping right in from the 2nd or 3rd part would get you some basic starter equipment and some money, but nothing crazy. Conversely, if you played and beat the preceding installment, everything carries over from levels, to items, to equipment.

Originally Posted by Tong

If we assume this episodic format is going to be like FF13's, that brings another issue... by the end of the first act your party/character will probably be high leveled, in a point where it wouldnt make sense in the original game!
An easy way to solve this is to add a low level cap, but by doing that you already ruin any replayability. I'm not liking this.

In the .hack series, you had some post game content to keep you a little busy at the end. But they did cap your levels though. (The enemies got capped too.) HOWEVER, since this isn't the .hack series and this is a game that has other things to level up than characters, that could maybe mean that even though your characters reach level cap, you can still level up materia as much as you want.

half of Emerald's attacks only make sense underwater and his design was clearly meant for him to be an underwater weapon (I doubt that thing can even fly).

I'm not sure it's wise to anticipate or expect this particular battle to resemble the original game. Because there's literally so many things they can do now to make this battle far more visually entertaining and not so silly. I mean Emerald WEAPON is not a fish that's going to die if he's out of water for too long. So there's no reason why they can't completely redesign his attacks to have it fight you on board the top deck of a sinking ship. Or perhaps he can generate a gigantic whirlpool that opens up the sea floor in the center which could be used as the battle ground. Besides, do to the more action-oriented nature of this combat system, attacks are going to have to be added, redesigned, and changed anyways. So there's no sense in limiting the possibilities to what was only possible on the ps1.

[Tong]

Originally Posted by Chosen_Hero

1) So are you expecting to reach level 50 or level 100 in the Midgar? Think about this like back in the original release where levels carried over to each act just fine... on a PS1, this is a non issue, experience and level gain can and will be adjusted for pacing considering that this is a continuous story, FF XIII is a bad example due to the fact that each game is basically removed from each others story arc and leveling in each differs especially when you take that mess of a story (imo) into account.

Well, remember they said each part is going to be a full sized game so why wouldnt I expect at least to get that powerful after like, I dont know, 60+ Hours of gameplay? Assuming this is what we should expect from a full RPG game.
Or maybe we shouldn't assume that it's that big, maybe the first midgar part in the remake would be a 10~20 hours long game, then yes, it would be like the pacing from the original game, however you have an extremely short game!

But you're right, maybe I should just wait and see what they can do. Who knows maybe they will even surprise us positively!


@sayde .hack was originally made with the episodic format in mind, so there are ways around possible issues.
What SE is doing with FF7R is unprecendent, no other game has done something like that as far as I know! And not because it's innovative or anything, and yes because the concept has many flaws.

[GreyZone]

It seems that the "script" for PART1 is done.

[Se7enSword]

Yes, the scenario is complete.

They want add delver further into Biggs, Wedge, and Jessie.
They have an idea about the number of installments that will be released, but they’re not at the stage where they can say anything.
They’re not talking about online right now.
The scenario of the first part up until its ending is already complete.
They’re getting technological assistance from the Kingdom Hearts team with Unreal Engine 4, since they’ve been using it with Kingdom Hearts III.
Cloud’s hallucination scenes will be more meaningful.
As for the cast, they’re continuing plans with the voice actors from Advent Children, but there are some that still haven’t been offered yet. Red XIII only made a cameo appearance, so his voice is likely to be changed.
Separate from Limit Breaks, there is another unique system. They can’t show it yet, but the it’ll be different depending on the player’s fighting style.
Nothing has been decided about guarding yet.

http://gematsu.com/2015/12/final-fan...nario-complete

[GreyZone]

Separate from Limit Breaks, there is another unique system. They can’t show it yet, but the it’ll be different depending on the player’s fighting style.

I guess that's what the left-most bar from the trailer is for. It seems the Braver and Big Shot "limits" are actually part of this "unique system" in the remake, instead of being limit breaks.

But it's interesting to know this... it means that there will be even more custumization other than materia this time.

[FlareKnight]

Some nice bits of information, though sadly still holding back on the things I'd rather know about right now.

Seems like it will be quite the battle for them to get part 1 out sometime in 2017. Still figuring out how the heck they are going to make guarding work in this new battle system.

All we can do is keep waiting for more detailed information I suppose.

[Wandering Soul]

So in addition to already having limit breaks they are adding another system. It seems like they want to add more ways to customize the characters and make they distinct from one another.

[GreyZone]

I am not sure if it can be trusted, but someone at Neogaf once posted the amount of lines and words from FFXIII and FFVII. The results was that FFVII had more than 3x the amount of lines compared to FFXIII...

And that's not all... once all the text get voiced (though a part may still remain in text form) it would inflate the lenght of the game even more.

FFXIII was sold at full AAA price...
now look at it from SE's point of view:

You can remake FFVII which has 3x more script content than FFXIII, so expenses will also be higher. You want to sell it and ride the nostalgia train, but the extra income from the nostalgia factor doesn't compensate for 3x the lenght of the script. You have the followng options:

1. Just "accept" the loss of potential profit because you are such a nice person (The Bullshit choice that fans are "demanding" from SE, although beside publicity there would be absolutely no upside for SE)

2. Shorten the script so it's closer to the lenght of the usual modern AAA RPG (The choice neither the fans nor the devs want)

3. Take the risk of creating the whole game but with a much, much higher price than the usual AAA game (which would reduce the sales immensly and in total not make the game profitable, also fans would have to wait for a looooong time)

4. Don't make the remake in the first place (the choice that SE made for as long as Wada was CEO)

5. Release the game in parts (the choice that SE made now)




So tell me which of the other options would have been more logical to you? It seems fans want "1." but as we could see that simply led to SE choosing option "4." instead, until the CEO changed and they finally decided to use method "5."



















Oh and by the way, new info:

Quote

Sorry; dynamic content not loaded. Reload?

source: http://www.mognetcentral.com/threads...-22#post-30587

[kenjiharima]

Just a question I recall Wedge does speak to Cloud "You're doing this for the planet just like us right?" on the original game, but on another place.

Also can't wait for Aeris Tifa and Yuffie

[Kyero Fox]

You also had a choice of replies I believe. one being "not interested"

[FlareKnight]

Originally Posted by GreyZone

I am not sure if it can be trusted, but someone at Neogaf once posted the amount of lines and words from FFXIII and FFVII. The results was that FFVII had more than 3x the amount of lines compared to FFXIII...

And that's not all... once all the text get voiced (though a part may still remain in text form) it would inflate the length of the game even more.

FFXIII was sold at full AAA price...
now look at it from SE's point of view:

You can remake FFVII which has 3x more script content than FFXIII, so expenses will also be higher. You want to sell it and ride the nostalgia train, but the extra income from the nostalgia factor doesn't compensate for 3x the lenght of the script. You have the followng options:

1. Just "accept" the loss of potential profit because you are such a nice person (The Bullshit choice that fans are "demanding" from SE, although beside publicity there would be absolutely no upside for SE)

2. Shorten the script so it's closer to the lenght of the usual modern AAA RPG (The choice neither the fans nor the devs want)

3. Take the risk of creating the whole game but with a much, much higher price than the usual AAA game (which would reduce the sales immensly and in total not make the game profitable, also fans would have to wait for a looooong time)

4. Don't make the remake in the first place (the choice that SE made for as long as Wada was CEO)

5. Release the game in parts (the choice that SE made now)




So tell me which of the other options would have been more logical to you? It seems fans want "1." but as we could see that simply led to SE choosing option "4." instead, until the CEO changed and they finally decided to use method "5."

Oh and by the way, new info:

Quote

Sorry; dynamic content not loaded. Reload?

source: http://www.mognetcentral.com/threads...-22#post-30587

Was there really a need for the massive gap in the comment there?

Not really going to make a selection from those choices since even the premise of the whole argument is admittedly flawed or at the very least unproved. I'm sure the random poster who threw out that statement is a nice person, but I'm not going to base an argument on their guess. Loss of profits....yeah I suppose making a video game is in itself a loss of profits. Make the game, sell the game. Option freaking 6.

They made the choice to add more stuff to it in order to actually make it possible to pad out the game into multiple parts. Understandably they want to make as much money from this as they humanly can. It's a big cash cow of a series and people will without a doubt buy each full priced part. At most what could they have charged for this as a single game 90? 100? Here they can get $200 plus for the whole thing for adding only so much extra content in there. Smart move in the end, there's no doubt there.

I'll get a ticket when it's on sale. Will still be hard to get this thing for less than $100 even buying pieces at the right time or used, but will do what I have to do there.

[Shadow5YA]

Somehow I doubt the first episode (or any of the episodes) will be ~60+ hours long unless you artificially extend your playtime by doing multiple playthroughs.

[GreyZone]

Originally Posted by FlareKnight

Was there really a need for the massive gap in the comment there?

Not really going to make a selection from those choices since even the premise of the whole argument is admittedly flawed or at the very least unproved. I'm sure the random poster who threw out that statement is a nice person, but I'm not going to base an argument on their guess. Loss of profits....yeah I suppose making a video game is in itself a loss of profits. Make the game, sell the game. Option freaking 6.

They made the choice to add more stuff to it in order to actually make it possible to pad out the game into multiple parts. Understandably they want to make as much money from this as they humanly can. It's a big cash cow of a series and people will without a doubt buy each full priced part. At most what could they have charged for this as a single game 90? 100? Here they can get $200 plus for the whole thing for adding only so much extra content in there. Smart move in the end, there's no doubt there.

I'll get a ticket when it's on sale. Will still be hard to get this thing for less than $100 even buying pieces at the right time or used, but will do what I have to do there.

There's the fact that, long before the announcment of the remake, SE staff have been saying over the years that a FFVII remake would be, without a doubt, a "massive project" that the staff even doubted to be possible at all. Unless you introduce some absurd conspiracy theory that all of this has been planned for over 5 years, then I'd say the current remake staff is not lying and the game really requires special measures in some way, because the fully recreated game without additions would already be more than a usual 60/70€ AAA game.

Also your assumption that everyone would buy every single part, even if it sold at 60€/$ (which is also your assumption) each, falls apart the moment when you realize that this game is not only a "nostalgia cashgrab", because in that case we would without a doubt still have ATB. You may have missed the fact that it's also supposed to bring in new fans, who would not blindly buy every "part" of a game for an AAA-title price each.

I still think they will probably make the parts not cheap, but also not AAA-price each. My personal guess is that it would be 3 parts each costing 40€/$ or 4 parts each costing 30€/$ making the total cost for the whole package before price cuts about 120€/$, which would be reasonable, as long as the content and additions are good.




I have always been missing a Vincent arc, because he really only gets a few lines here or there and the Lucretia Cave (which amounts to nothing aside from his final weapon and final limit). Yuffie although also being an optional character like Vincent, at least had a city (technically even a whole continent but it only had 1 city) dedicated to her and even two storylines (Materia-theft and Pagoda) that came along with that. Vincent really needs more content dedicated for him.

[Shadow5YA]

Dirge of Cerberus's story was hilariously bad. I don't know why you would want a story arc dedicated to what is essentially an NTR subplot

[GreyZone]

Originally Posted by Shadow5YA

Dirge of Cerberus's story was hilariously bad. I don't know why you would want a story arc dedicated to what is essentially an NTR subplot

I never even played Dirge of Cerberus and I never mentioned it in my post. I was only talking about Vincent not having his own character arc in FFVII itself. It doesn't have to be anything related to Hojo - no - actually it would be for the best if it's something completely unrelated to that plot thread. For example an arc about Vincent's early Turk life or something along those lines. If they really want to tie in the compilation stuff into it a bit, then this would probably be the best point to tie in something from Before Crisis, because that game actually was about the Turks. Who would be better to connect BC to FFVIIR if not Vincent, a former Turk?

[sayde]

Sorry for anyone who utterly hated every aspect of DoC, but since they did confirm attempts are being made to better tie in the compilation to the main story, then there are indeed some story elements introduced in that game which will more than likely have to appear in the remake.

I mean its almost sort of unavoidable when you consider the huge amount of development given to Vincent and the fact that one of his transformations is a WEAPON. (and one of the two most powerful WEAPONS at that)

Whats more is that it turns out he was well aware of this throughout the events of FFVII--which brings up a lot of potential questions. Of course, none of this was mentioned or brought up during the original game because these concepts hadn't been conceived at the time and Chaos was nothing more than just another transformation given to Vincent by Lucrecia. But now that these details exist I'd expect scenarios to be added and/or changed to accommodate it. I mean there's no way the issue doesn't get brought up during the main game when Vincent knows full well how dangerous it can be if he ever loses control. This development may also affect Vincent's limit breaks. How's Chaos going to be handled now? Will he get an entirely new final transformation to replace Chaos? Or will an optional (non canon) quest be added to allow him to get the protomateria so he can control it and use it freely in battle?

Either way, I'm looking forward to seeing how much of an affect Vincent and Chaos will have on the plot now that Vincent is likely going to become a mandatory addition to the story.