In recent years, there’s been no small measure of debate over the potential ramifications of writers not mapping out their entire stories before bringing them to film, television, or even video games. The standout example of endless critique must surely be lobbed at the Star Wars sequel trilogy, most squarely upon the critically-battered head of Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker, which, if nothing else, united so many people on either side of the electric fence that is The Last Jedi in their steadfast scorn of that not-so-grand finale.
Despite its status as a colossal adaptation of a JRPG classic which featured a narrative with all the important tidbits intact — namely, a beginning, a middle, and an end — the Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy’s team leads have nevertheless had their work cut out for them. After all, a decision was made not to merely retell that beloved plot, but to reimagine it. Some have wondered how much of the landmark project’s own reconfigured plot was envisioned early in the making of Remake itself. Was Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth’s own storyline already in their minds? Was the as-yet untitled third chapter’s? Now, trilogy director Naoki Hamaguchi has an answer that should serve as welcome news to many players: yes.
The Story Had A Rough Outline; The Gameplay, Not So Much
As part of a terrific interview with Alex Donaldson over at Eurogamer — full disclosure, I have worked for Donaldson in the past, but no, I truly do think he’s a sterling interviewer — Hamaguchi-san had the big question popped as to just how much of this trilogy’s divergent storytelling had been envisioned prior to the release of 2020’s FF7 Remake. “…To go back to the start of the Remake project,” Donaldson queried, “Did you guys know the shape of things? […] How much was pre-determined, and how much is based on fan feedback, figuring stuff out game-to-game?”
“In terms of the overall plot, how the story was going to go, and the overall themes and direction for the Remake… that was very much all down at the beginning when we started the project. Obviously, the details of how specifically that’s going to be presented, how that’s going to be shown in game, that wasn’t there yet. It was very much a rough outline, a basic plot summary, really.” -Naoki Hamaguchi
Hamaguchi goes on to clarify that the actual end points for Remake and Rebirth had not been decided. And it is, of course, important to emphasize that the director says it was a basic plot summary; it’s not as though there were partial scripts written. But having that summary handy, knowing the broad strokes of this trilogy’s expansion, its reinterpretation, of the original Final Fantasy 7, has almost certainly helped to shore up a sense of continuity.
That said, some fans have questioned the relatively slim impact of Remake’s ending implications in Rebirth, theorizing that the mixed reception steered Rebirth in a somewhat separate direction. Sounds like that wasn’t really the case!
“It was very much a plot outline,” Hamaguchi continued. “None of the details were in there and obviously some of the big themes of the gameplay and some of the other scenes were very much able to be changed and tweaked around as we went through working on the series.” He cites Aerith’s singing performance at the Gold Saucer in FF7 Rebirth as a key example of how the story has broadened in scope and specifics over the course of development. “…Partway through the development on Rebirth, Mr. Kitase actually came up to me and said ‘well, if we’ve got this theme song I’d really like to have that as something in the game where they actually sing.'” All hail veteran Final Fantasy overseer Yoshinori Kitase for that one.
As for the course of each installment’s gameplay, that’s another matter. Suffice it to say, Rebirth opened things up in a big way relative to Remake’s narrower approach, which stands to reason regardless, given the first game’s set in Midgar, and the second covers a fair bit of the world at-large. But there’s more to gameplay design than “bigger or smaller”, and even then, nothing was initially set in stone:
“And just about the time when we finished setting down the map, we roughly knew exactly where we were with the first game in terms of the gameplay experience and where everything would fit together. We had a good idea of what it would look like. That was when we started thinking about, what do we change for the second one? What do I want to add? What do I want to expand upon? What completely new experiences do we want to put in there?”
Hamaguchi goes on to note that this is “very much the same for the third game.” As Rebirth’s development period was drawing to a close, the director began to contemplate in earnest what sorts of “new experiences” and “emotional impact” the finale might bring.
The interview, which I’ll go ahead and link a second time as I close things out, is well worth reading in full. Hamaguchi has been plenty chatty of late, but he always seems to bring something new to the conversation table, and he certainly did so here.
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth
4.5/5
- Released
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February 29, 2024
- ESRB
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T For Teen Due To Blood, Language, Mild Suggestive Themes, Use of Alcohol and Tobacco, Violence
