Final Fantasy VII Remake Trailer Offers First Glimpse of New Combat

[RJ Dalton]

I like how they're just calling it "remake" and not trying to be the slightest bit clever.
Considering what happens when games actually try to be clever with titles in this kind of scenario, I may not even be all that sarcastic.

 

[Verrik]

Can we fuck off with this half turn based, half action game?

I loved the turn based stuff of FFX (the only FF I've played) 'cos it allowed you to think, turned a typical DMC style game into more a chess match. It was more of a puzzle game than a button masher and I think it's great that you can have an interesting puzzle game ... sure portal was good and other puzzle games do an ok job but a pretty chess, that doesn't look or feel like chess is great

This "active combat" started off with FFX-2 (as far as I know), which is universally thought of as an abortion of a game. Keeping that in mind, why are they still doing this half and half game play?

Am I in minority here? I was always of the opinion that if you want to play an action game you played an action game, God of War, DMC etc but if you want to play the thinking mans game, you throw in a JRPG.

Haha, FF10 was more of a puzzle game? FF10 was easy as pie, a cakewalk! Seriously, every turn based FF game was easy to beat (with the exception of some optional bosses, of course). I've played every FF game, and each of those games storylines could easily be beaten so long as you possessed basic reading skills.

Hell, the majority of regular monster battles and even some boss battles, could be beaten simply by "mashing" the Attack command lol.(While I played FF12 and FF13, I don't remember enough about those games to say whether they were more challenging than older FF games). If I want a turn based JRPG that requires ACTUAL strategy, I'll go play Fire Emblem I honestly don't get where this "Older FF games required strategy!" idea comes from...

Also, while a lot of people hated FFX-2, it was because of... pretty much everything OTHER than the combat.

EDIT: Also, also, wouldn't FFX-2's combat system be considered closer to the older FF games battle systems, since it included the ATB gauge, where FFX did not have the ATB gauge?

 

[Hairless Mammoth]

So they traded the Mr. T version of Barret for a Wesley Snipes, channeling Blade, version of Barret? Cool, I guess.

Although if they do that modern FF BS of only letting you control the lead party member, I'm out. If the combat has change to (semi?) real time, I better at least be able to swap who I can control and have many options for the AI. Still, I'd rather see the traditional turned based battles with tweaks to the Limit Breaks, Materia, and a few other systems. That's all an FFVII remake really needed (besides a better translation, Off Course!).

 

[anthony87]

The only thing that bugs me is Cloud's personality and how he carries himself because...

Spoiler: Major Spoiler reporting for duty!

...as I recall, didn't Cloud have Zack's personality at that point in FF7? Zack is described in Crisis Core as being like a puppy, short attention span and unable to sit still. He would to showboat to the point of recklessness, endangered a mission to play with young Yuffie (and keep her from getting hurt) and desperately wanted to be a hero.

It seems like everything relating to Cloud these days wants to portray Cloud the emo. Which is fine when it's post-Lifestream-dip Cloud or pre-Nibelheim-Incident Cloud, but makes no sense outside of that. Especially when it's the contrast between Zack and Cloud's personalities that makes Cloud's personality shift so drastic.

Considering that the only couple of lines that we hear from Cloud in the trailer are damn near the same as what he says in the original FFVII I can't help but think:

"the hell you talking about???

EDIT: Sorry, misread the first line there. As I understand it, Cloud didn't have Zack's personality as such, more like he had memories that were created from a combination of Hojo's experiments and the stories that Zach told to Cloud when they were friends. Personality wise he was always a bit of a moan in FF7.

 

[rcs619]

uh, Nomura, you do realize this is supposed to be FF and not a KH game, right? Because that's what I saw. Which isn't a good thing. This isn't going to end well for him.

Yep. This trailer ruined a lot of the interest I had in picking up this game. Kingdom Hearts is fun, action-RPG's are fun, but I don't play Final Fantasy because I want an action-RPG. I play to build a party, develop and load them down with menus upon menus of skills, and the story (back when the stories were good). Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one who liked the old games' systems. Give me menus and menus of skills and 2-minute long summon sequences over shallow, single-character action-RPG mechanics any day.

On the bright side, it's certainly nice looking, and it'll probably be a perfectly fine game to watch a Let's Play of. I just hope they don't go too crazy with it and turn the whole thing into one big Sephiroth circle-jerk.

I guess my next question, now that the battle system has been confirmed to be terrible, is... how much of the old game are they going to snip out? No way they reproduce all the old side-quests and side-events. They're probably going to strip the game down to the bone so that they can turn it into a big corridor full of set-pieces (like just about every recent Final Fantasy). I doubt they'll even have a proper world map, which is super disappointing. Flying around in the Highwind, trying to find all the secret nooks and crannies was one of the best parts.

 

[xaszatm]

So much for "You guys showed us that traditional sells" huh guys?

You showed Nomura nothing. This is not a man who cares about Final Fantasy's traditional game design, and did not care about it back when other directors at Square were still big fans. This is a man who is less inclined to make this a typically paced turn based game than he is to make it a damn musical. Love him or hate him, he hardly speaks for the direction the company as a whole is taking in terms of turn based combat in games.

Uh, are you sure? Because his style for Flare over Substance can be found all over the Final Fantasy franchise now. All the fuck over it. There are currently NO Triple-A turn-based RPGs coming from Square-Enix that aren't simply hand-held titles. Nomura fucking annoys me and his multi-belted, pretty-boy character designs all look the same to me at this point.

Frankly, the system looks a lot more like FFXV, which is hardly anything like Kingdom Hearts. I'm not ready to call foul on it just yet, because for years Nomura has specifically said that he does not WANT to do a remake, but if he did, he would be wanting the team to go with a completely new combat system, because he doesn't really know how to direct anything else. But I'm also not someone that even WANTED a remake of FFVII, so I don't have much of a dog in this fight to begin with.

Sure is pretty, though.

Kind of cheating but DQXI is coming to the PS4. It's kind of cheating because it's also coming to the NX and 3DS (though the PS4 version is still a AAA game graphics wise) and because the DQ team pretty much as full reign to do whatever it wants regardless of what Square wants because they're the Dragon Quest team.

 

[anthony87]

Well, there was a thread in the forum about this already. So, I think I'll be lazy just this once and quote myself here.

Spoiler

Yeah, that's about what I expected. Too soon to say that they completely changed it. And it looked like you could control other characters like Barret. It honestly didn't show enough to say for certain how it works. Materia is too important to the story to remove it from the game, so I'm certain that is still in there. It looks like there is a gauge in the corner.

Upon closer inspection, that looks like a Limit gauge. And it seems to slowly build as you attack and to deplete when you aren't. But it seems that once maxed it lets you use some Limit skill. I certainly recognized Barret's Big Shot Limit, but not Cloud's attack. So, yes, I feel confident that it is an Action type system, like in FFXV.

Color me intrigued, though not entirely happy. I wasn't really sure what I wanted from the combat. I'm a huge Final Fantasy fan (especially of VII), but I'm not so childish as to call this crap. I think it could work. Crisis Core was a solid game, for example, and I think XIII could have been okay with some minor tweaks. Looks like they may have learned some lessons, but I wanna see more before I pass my Judgement [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iV3KBvtgPjE].

That being said, it looks fucking beautiful. Cloud looks like he might be the classic FFVII Cloud rather than emo Cloud ("I don't care about your politics"). Graphically, it is beautiful and brings Midgar to life. The voice acting seemed okay, though the Wedge voice seemed a little off to me. And I think we saw how they might be doing the whole voice talking to Cloud moments, too. The music felt like a modern version of the classic music, and like it didn't forget it's roots.

Looks like we saw some cut scenes as well as some actual walking around. It occurs to me that the scene of them watching an explosion happens in normal gameplay. I swear I saw Cloud get pushed back slightly there.

I suspect this is an early build. Based on what news I've heard and how this all comes from very early in the game, didn't even show Tifa or Aerith, I'm expecting it will get more polish and probably be released in 2017, around the 20th anniversary.

Oh, and...

And I'll just add that with the still images, I'm able to appreciate the models just a little but more. And I'm really appreciating that the models look very faithful to the original. Even Biggs, Wedge, and Jesse. They look exactly like I imagined they would. Okay, maybe I wouldn't have given Wedge shoulder armor, but otherwise pretty faithful.

Just to add onto some of what you said regarding the gauges and combat (because why not?). If you look at the 1:20 mark in the video you'll see what looks like Cloud's action menu disappearing. Assuming I'm correct and not just drunk it seems that while the ATB is filling up you won't be able to do much besides (perhaps?) move around the area. From my assumptions it's looking like the big gauge on the left is the ATB while the teeny tiny one on the right is the Limit Break.

Whatever the gauges mean....OHMYGODITSSOPRETTY!!!!

 

[FPLOON]

Granted, I was sold before, but I digress...

Other than that, I'm really digging the hybrid vibes of the combat right now...

 

[Verrik]

uh, Nomura, you do realize this is supposed to be FF and not a KH game, right? Because that's what I saw. Which isn't a good thing. This isn't going to end well for him.

Yep. This trailer ruined a lot of the interest I had in picking up this game. Kingdom Hearts is fun, action-RPG's are fun, but I don't play Final Fantasy because I want an action-RPG. I play to build a party, develop and load them down with menus upon menus of skills, and the story (back when the stories were good). Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one who liked the old games' systems. Give me menus and menus of skills and 2-minute long summon sequences over shallow, single-character action-RPG mechanics any day.

On the bright side, it's certainly nice looking, and it'll probably be a perfectly fine game to watch a Let's Play of. I just hope they don't go too crazy with it and turn the whole thing into one big Sephiroth circle-jerk.

I guess my next question, now that the battle system has been confirmed to be terrible, is... how much of the old game are they going to snip out? No way they reproduce all the old side-quests and side-events. They're probably going to strip the game down to the bone so that they can turn it into a big corridor full of set-pieces (like just about every recent Final Fantasy). I doubt they'll even have a proper world map, which is super disappointing. Flying around in the Highwind, trying to find all the secret nooks and crannies was one of the best parts.

You might want to take a closer look. Some people are finding that there is still an ATB gauge, or some form of it, still in the game.

 

[Lightspeaker]

None of you are reading the other comments, are you?

Spoiler: I would like to show you all this

I'm not saying it is going to be ATB, but it certainly could be. There is evidence of it in the trailer. Or perhaps some hybrid. We'll see if we get more gameplay trailers.

Actually I am, but that picture proves jack all. There have been MANY systems they've implemented into FF games over the past decade that 'look a bit like' ATB systems but are a far, far cry from proper turn based RPG combat systems. And as far as Squeenix is concerned I have absolutely zero faith in their ability to make a competent FF game anymore. Once again, its been fourteen years since they made one.

FF13 was a hybrid and had fairly awful gameplay because of its action game influence.

FF12 was similarly a hybrid and was easily the worst entry in the entire franchise. An absolute sickening abomination of a title that seemed designed to be an MMO but in single player form.

They need to just stop with this insanity honestly. Its utter nonsense. If this turns out to be just a remodelled FFXV system then its going to be terrible; because the XV system is pretty damn awful.

You'd think, having published Bravely Default recently, they'd know what a proper, traditional Final Fantasy should look like. I blame the MMOs personally. FFXI seemed to melt their collective brains. They've not made a good Final Fantasy since that launched.

 

[Mister K]

Can we fuck off with this half turn based, half action game?

I loved the turn based stuff of FFX (the only FF I've played) 'cos it allowed you to think, turned a typical DMC style game into more a chess match. It was more of a puzzle game than a button masher and I think it's great that you can have an interesting puzzle game ... sure portal was good and other puzzle games do an ok job but a pretty chess, that doesn't look or feel like chess is great

This "active combat" started off with FFX-2 (as far as I know), which is universally thought of as an abortion of a game. Keeping that in mind, why are they still doing this half and half game play?

Am I in minority here? I was always of the opinion that if you want to play an action game you played an action game, God of War, DMC etc but if you want to play the thinking mans game, you throw in a JRPG.

Actually, the "half-turn-based" combat was in every game EXCEPT FFX. But I too never really liked it. I always preffered to have either fully turn based combat (like in Persona and FFX) or completely action-ish one.

The only thing that bugs me is Cloud's personality and how he carries himself because...

Spoiler: Major Spoiler reporting for duty!

...as I recall, didn't Cloud have Zack's personality at that point in FF7? Zack is described in Crisis Core as being like a puppy, short attention span and unable to sit still. He would to showboat to the point of recklessness, endangered a mission to play with young Yuffie (and keep her from getting hurt) and desperately wanted to be a hero.

It seems like everything relating to Cloud these days wants to portray Cloud the emo. Which is fine when it's post-Lifestream-dip Cloud or pre-Nibelheim-Incident Cloud, but makes no sense outside of that. Especially when it's the contrast between Zack and Cloud's personalities that makes Cloud's personality shift so drastic.

I don' think he had Zacks actual memories. He had his brain messed up with and mixed his own memories with everything he thought about as cool and is associated (to him) with Zack.

So they've finished the what, first hour of the game?

I'm honestly not impressed, but I can't figure out if it's the english dub or the fact that the first part of that game bores me to tears after all of these years. Also, it looks an awful lot like the straight corridors of ffxiii. I'm really hoping the combat is stil ATB turned based; I don't recall an hd remake necessarily entailing an overhaul of the gameplay.

I hate to say it, but even if it sucks I'll probably still get it on a steam sale (assuming a pc release).

Remember all those decisions and turns you had to do before fighting Giant Red Scorpion Boss? Of course not, it all was pretty damn linear. Not defending the game, just pointing out.

OT: Lets just say that I am cautious. I really do hope that I'll be either able to control all party members or at least tweak them using something like gambits.

 

[Mister K]

I think its awesome that theyre doing this but Im a little sad that Final Fantasy VI is a far superior game in every respect and its apparently going to drift off into the neither and be forgotten simply because the current generation of gamers has never heard of it.

Think about it that way:
It will stay untouched, unburdened with tons and TONS of unnecessary spin-offs, side stories, dumb nostalgia hype. And I doubt that in the future those who play games because of the gameplay and story, not because of hype and/or pwetty graphics, will not play FFVI. Besides, how many people of those that I've mentioned, would NOT think: "Huh, this is a seventh game. I should try other six ones"?

 

[crimson5pheonix]

Can we fuck off with this half turn based, half action game?

I loved the turn based stuff of FFX (the only FF I've played) 'cos it allowed you to think, turned a typical DMC style game into more a chess match. It was more of a puzzle game than a button masher and I think it's great that you can have an interesting puzzle game ... sure portal was good and other puzzle games do an ok job but a pretty chess, that doesn't look or feel like chess is great

This "active combat" started off with FFX-2 (as far as I know), which is universally thought of as an abortion of a game. Keeping that in mind, why are they still doing this half and half game play?

Am I in minority here? I was always of the opinion that if you want to play an action game you played an action game, God of War, DMC etc but if you want to play the thinking mans game, you throw in a JRPG.

Actually, the "half-turn-based" combat was in every game EXCEPT FFX. But I too never really liked it. I always preffered to have either fully turn based combat (like in Persona and FFX) or completely action-ish one.

snip

Minor correction, the first three games didn't have ATB.

 

[Sheo_Dagana]

So much for "You guys showed us that traditional sells" huh guys?

You showed Nomura nothing. This is not a man who cares about Final Fantasy's traditional game design, and did not care about it back when other directors at Square were still big fans. This is a man who is less inclined to make this a typically paced turn based game than he is to make it a damn musical. Love him or hate him, he hardly speaks for the direction the company as a whole is taking in terms of turn based combat in games.

Uh, are you sure? Because his style for Flare over Substance can be found all over the Final Fantasy franchise now. All the fuck over it. There are currently NO Triple-A turn-based RPGs coming from Square-Enix that aren't simply hand-held titles. Nomura fucking annoys me and his multi-belted, pretty-boy character designs all look the same to me at this point.

True enough. Square has kinda let Nomura define the company's core output at this point. I don't know why, beyond him being the only successful veteran director they have at this point, because the man is obviously insane and the suits seem to be absolutely terrible at actually putting the screws to him and getting him to listen.

They do seem to want to go another direction in some cases, XIV's changes being a good sign, but they really do need to make some more visible attempts to change if they want to win back the people they lost with XIII.

On a side note, I like Nomura as a game director and for the focus he puts on animation. His character designs and writing are hit or miss with me though.

Frankly, the system looks a lot more like FFXV, which is hardly anything like Kingdom Hearts. I'm not ready to call foul on it just yet, because for years Nomura has specifically said that he does not WANT to do a remake, but if he did, he would be wanting the team to go with a completely new combat system, because he doesn't really know how to direct anything else. But I'm also not someone that even WANTED a remake of FFVII, so I don't have much of a dog in this fight to begin with.

Sure is pretty, though.

Has he really been saying that? That's amazing. Combine that with the fact that he didn't even know they wanted him to direct it until it was announced and this really looks like Square just has no clue what in the world they're doing with Nomura.

And do you really find the system in XV that different from KH? I thought they played pretty similarly.

FFXIV's combat works well for an MMORPG, but not at all for a traditional Final Fantasy game. You can take that style of combat and apply it to an MMO, but not to a regular-ass game. Which this demo looks nothing like anyway.

I'm sure Nomura knew that at some point he would have to direct a FFVII remake, as it was brought up at conventions on numerous ocassions, with him sounding disinterested and the SE jumping in to say that "as long as the fans wanted it, they wouldn't rule it out." Is that really someone we want in charge of a remake? I think the generally apprehensive reaction to this trailer is proof enough. But again, I have no dog in this fight. I only hate Nomura's continued involvement in the franchise.

And yes, FFXV is very far off from Kingdom Hearts. FFXV tries to find a half-assed balanced between action and turn-based gameplay and, as the demo has displayed so far, fails miserably. Kingdom Hearts is all action. It would be better if they just made it more like Kingdom Hearts, though I am loathe to say so.

Square-Enix knows exactly what they're doing with Nomura. It sells in Japan on the visuals alone, and I'm sure some Western fans are lured in by all the prettiness that is to beheld. Personally, the Final Fantasy franchise hasn't interested me since FFX and it shows no signs of changing that anytime soon. FFX may have proven that they can succeed without Hironobu Sakaguchi, but the legacy thus far has fallen short since his departure.

 

[Revnak_v1legacy]

FFXIV's combat works well for an MMORPG, but not at all for a traditional Final Fantasy game. You can take that style of combat and apply it to an MMO, but not to a regular-ass game. Which this demo looks nothing like anyway.

I was using it as an example of Square admitting that the had been going at things from the wrong direction for a while.

I'm sure Nomura knew that at some point he would have to direct a FFVII remake, as it was brought up at conventions on numerous ocassions, with him sounding disinterested and the SE jumping in to say that "as long as the fans wanted it, they wouldn't rule it out." Is that really someone we want in charge of a remake? I think the generally apprehensive reaction to this trailer is proof enough. But again, I have no dog in this fight. I only hate Nomura's continued involvement in the franchise.

He knew it would get made, but not that he would have to direct it. There's a ton of quotes where he talks about how the decision to have him direct was made without his knowledge. I also don't really get what your issue is with Nomura specifically. Your issue seems to be with the main franchise games, where he's done character designs for as many games before X as after, and where he's so far only written one that came before X. If your whole issue is the games that came out after them, shouldn't your issue be with the guys who actually directed those games? I mean, its not like he made XIII's pacing and script a load of nonsense. I don't believe he even worked on XII.

And yes, FFXV is very far off from Kingdom Hearts. FFXV tries to find a half-assed balanced between action and turn-based gameplay and, as the demo has displayed so far, fails miserably. Kingdom Hearts is all action. It would be better if they just made it more like Kingdom Hearts, though I am loathe to say so.

What? It has almost the exact same amount of action as Kingdom Hearts does. You mash attack and then cast abilities with rapid methods for moving around. There is nothing turn based about it.

Square-Enix knows exactly what they're doing with Nomura. It sells in Japan on the visuals alone, and I'm sure some Western fans are lured in by all the prettiness that is to beheld. Personally, the Final Fantasy franchise hasn't interested me since FFX and it shows no signs of changing that anytime soon. FFX may have proven that they can succeed without Hironobu Sakaguchi, but the legacy thus far has fallen short since his departure.

They let the guy drag out a pet project for nearly a decade, which he nearly turned into a musical. They then set him up to direct a remake of a game which is completely outside of his style without telling him beforehand. I don't think they know what they're doing with him. Let him direct his own stuff, but put him on a leash. Don't tap him to make games that are completely outside of his style, instead tap a director with a bit more variation in their toolkit. This may wind up being a game I enjoy, because I love Nomura's directorial style, but I honestly don't know why they're having him make it if their plan is to make something even vaguely resembling the original, because Nomura has never made anything like that, and I doubt he actually would if asked.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

It's like the 90's all over again. If they release it on PC maybe I'll actually play one FF game in my life.

 

[elvor0]

Already feels like its going to be style over substance. That bit on the bridge in the trailer; in the original there's 6 guards with guns, Cloud knows he's out matched and makes a run for it, here? Yeah fuck it, fight em all with flashiness.

Essentially you can garner the theme this is going to have by the end of Crisis Core, again in the original Zack is gunned down by 2 shinra guards who promptly run over and fill him full of holes, while in CC he fights off a whole battalion of troops. The characters in FF, while powerful are still human, and knew when to stand down and when they were out matched. I mean if you accept the "fight off a legion of troops", how do you reconcile moments like where the team are captured by guards in the Shinra building?

I can understand wanting to flash up the combat a little bit, its a tough sell to people these days, but they could've easily reconciled that by having X-2s combat system. It's the ATB system, but sped up and way more fluid.

I'm also worried that Cloud is going to be portrayed as Advent Children style Cloud and not the character from the actual game, going by his voice acting. Yeah, Cloud did have /moments/ of coldness or emotional distress(especially after the reveal), but he's not Squall.

 

[Geisterkarle]

I don't know if this is a KH-esque fighting style, because I never played it. But for me the most important part about the combat is: I want to direct the whole team! I don't want to run around alone and hope some AI-sidekicks do the correct things!

At least I want something like Star Ocean: Second Story (to bring another game into this argument ) where it is definitely action-based, but you can control all heroes and I liked that it was quite a skill to get the full potential of your team!

Overall it seems, that "we" don't need the flashiest graphics for the remake, and don't care about minor changes in the narrative, but we want good "mechanics"! So take notes out there!!