2020-05-01_Official_PlayStation_Magazine_-_UK_Edition

009

T

he game’s focus might be on one city,

Midgar, but it’s filled with variety and

new things to discover as the story

draws you through its different

sectors. “The city has been rebuilt,

focusing on the same core keywords of the design

that we did for the original, which is it’s a very

dark location. It’s got a modern steampunk vibe

to it, but it’s also very eclectic and very different

in different places,” says Kitase. “The visual style

we’ve gone for isn’t a pure photorealism for

photorealism’s sake. We’ve gone for a slightly

more stylised approach that really respects and

works to the strengths of the original Final

Fantasy VII and its aesthetic decisions.”

On PS1 you might have spent a few hours in Midgar

(depending on how quickly you blazed through it),

but they were memorable ones, the visuals pushing

the boundaries of what you’d expect in a JRPG. But

they were from a top-down perspective and, while

cutting-edge for the time, had limitations, so our

imaginations filled a lot in. “The core concept the

development team have worked to is the idea of

experiencing the city of Midgar yourself,” says the

game’s co-director, Naoki Hamaguchi. “We’ve taken a

lot of care in depicting the structure of the city itself

as well as the lives of the people who live in the city

andintheslumsaroundit inreallyextremedetail.”

Thedifferentareasnowfeelevenmoredistinct,

andproperlylivedin.“Eachindividuallocation

withinMidgaralsohasitsownpersonalityand has

beendesignedtogivea completelydifferent

gameplayexperience,”saysHamaguchi.Atonepoint

inthegamewewalkthroughcitystreetsdevastated

byanexplosion,turningwhatwasonlya few

screensintheoriginalgameintoa richworldpacked

withconsequence.Cloudandhisfriends’journey

throughMidgarmightsetthestagefortherest of

FFVII,butit’sgoingtofeellikea completestory

initself.Though,ofcourse,theentireRemake

projectis seenbySquareEnixasonebig

undertaking.“You’llseetherestofthat

storyinthefuture,”saysHamaguchi. “The

developmentteamis nowfinallyreaching

thereleaseofthisfirstgame.And that

meansthatwe’renowina position

wherewe’reabletoconcentrate

ourfulleffortsondevelopment

onthesecondgame.”Q

BEHINDTHESCENES

CLOUD CITY

“OUR OBJECTIVE

HERE IS TO DELIVER

THE DEFINITIVE

RPG EXPERIENCE.”