Why So Serious? How Final Fantasy's Graphics Are Killing the Franchise

GotGame: One of the most frequently demanded projects in gaming is an HD rerelease of Final Fantasy 7. What could be better than one of the best games ever made re-released in glorious HD? Despite its age, it’s hard to look at the tech demo for FF7 on PS3 without drooling a little bit. Yet, every time I hear a fan asking for an HD release of Final Fantasy 7, I cringe. People recognize that Final Fantasy has been slipping in quality, and they’ve been speculating as to why that is.

[Godmars290]

Square Enix is not SquareSoft. They copy and parody what the other did, despite having "some" original devs still on staff, devs who came late to the former company, but they don't understand what they did. Became focused on graphics to the degree it overrode all else.

[MilkMan]

At this point LEGO games are selling more than FF.
Guess graphics aint everything.

[abzdine]

LEGO games look great!

[Tzuno]

Is not graphics is the S..t they sell in the name of FF. They build a name and now they think they can sell it any-day no mater the quality.

[Flavor]

The Japanese simply do not have the money, technology and talent to compete with Western dev houses.

Their fate was sealed the moment Msoft got behind the Xbox. I remember thinking that an American console had no chance ... how times have changed.

[Rainstorm81]

IMO Microsoft helped kill JRPGs, early in the 360 lifetime MS created Mystwalker studios filled it with talented devs, then released a few JRPGs like Lost Oddessy and Blue Dragon then abandoned the genre and studio for more profitable games like Gears or Forza. The same thing that probably led to FF downfall. Remember the megaton E3 announcement that FF13 was going to 360.....doesn't seem like such big news when you look back.

Mystwalker was made just to lure PS2 RPG fans to 360, just like Kinect was made to lure the casual Wii crowd...Although these tactics worked, it added nothing to gaming.

Here's hoping here's hoping Ni No Kuni bring JRPGs back to to their former glory and not just thrive on handhelds

[akaFullMetal]

The article is spot on, and is the reason why I haven't played a final fantasy since FFX.

[erikthegman]

final fantasy ix was the perfect balance

[ozzywazzy]

Ni No Kuni, doing RPGs right 2013.

[Hicken]

So it talks about graphics killing the franchise, but spends the whole thing talking about the games getting more serious. I assume the AUTHOR assumes that the increase in realistic graphical ability has taken away the humor in the series.

But a lot of the humor was cheap humor. Much of it was funny because we were younger, and still gets a chuckle out of us now because we remember it fondly. Cloud in a dress is funny, but it's not like it couldn't be done with current graphics.

What it REALLY sounds like is that the franchise grew up and this person doesn't like it.

There are other reasons to criticize the series, but lack of humor isn't really one of them.

[JustinWeinblatt]

Cloud in a dress certainly could be done in modern graphics, but I don't think it would work nearly as well. HD Cloud in drag is just... weird... But, the graphics (and technology in general) do affect things in more ways that I really didn't get into. Take for instance the play in the Golden Saucer. If they wanted to do this in HD, that means a ton of new and expensive assets to create, voice work to be done, models, and so on. HD and realism really do tie their hands a bit.

Humor is also important beyond the immediate gratification of seeing a man in drag or a dog in a sailor suit. It also helps the pacing of the story. The Golden Saucer scene takes place right before the heaviest moments in the game, ie the Temple of The Ancients and the aftermath. Basically, this scene lets the audience cool down, relax a little, and catch their emotional breath before a huge moment. It also gives the characters a sense of depth and empathy they wouldn't have otherwise had.

Perhaps humor is not the thing you notice most about Final Fantasy games, but I think it was a subtle but important facet of the games. It's one of those little things you don't really notice that increases your enjoyment immensely.

Perhaps you feel differently, and that's fine. At any rate, thank you for reading and commenting. :)

[KingofGambling]

For any jrpg fans out there, please tryout Ni No Kuni a demo is on PS3 and if you liked it please go out buy to support the jrpg community. I know I am.

[CLOUD1983]

I try many times in the past years to think a way of how an FFVII remake can work out, & the reason is so difficult for every1 to think a solution is this silly/humorous side of it that there is no way to work in HD graphics.

So the answer I find to this prob is simple & follow the principle of how the old gr8 Squaresoft did it, as every1 who already play the game remember the characters was not always blocky & LEGOish :) during battles the graphics was realistic & very detailed, so that's the answer!

I wont have prob to have chibi-style anime chars out of battles in order for this infamous comical scenes to work out as there is no other way really to do it, they can amaze us with dazzling graphics in everything else like environment, backgrounds, world map, character models during battles, skill effects, animations, summons etc.

And this solve the prob & SE can start working on it as soon as possible because there is more than 10 million ppl out there who r going to buy this thing if they decide to do it sometime soon, the characters the story the setting everything they need to start is there all they have to do is to re-skin it with as much care, love & respect they can master.

Because we r not talking about any game here, but for the KING of JRPGs, the game who create millions of JRPG fanatics all over the world, so what is in stake here is the dreams, the memories & the tears of all those ppl, a wrong move can lead to Earth split in two & the GATES OF HELL to open & engulf the whole SE building in an instant.

[black911]

Whats killing the franchise and just about every other once great franchise is the fact that its not a playstation exclusive anymore. Especially Resident Evil.