Final Fantasy VII is one of the most seminal game releases in the history of the industry, and an incredibly significant part of PlayStation’s own history.
Now, as Square Enix is embarking on a journey to remake one game with three games, we’re learning why Square has decided to keep all three of these games exclusive to PlayStation consoles.
In an interview with the Washington Post, producer Yoshinori Kitase cites keeping Final Fantasy VII: Remake, Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth, and seemingly the third game exclusive to one platform has been a core part of the success of the first two games so far.
“Had it not been on a single platform, the world map would not be seamless, and game design may have had to regress significantly.,” said Kitase.
Kitase also pointed to Square Enix’s ability to retain its employees, keeping the majority of the Remake team together as they move from one part of the trilogy to the next.
“By carrying over the bonds we created with teammates from the first installment, we could avoid any time-wasting detours that would come with assembling a totally new team.”
Rebirth’s director, Naoki Hamaguchi also got a special mention from Kitase, who credited Hamaguchi with being a big role in the development process being clear and efficient.
“Hamaguchi would set goals early on and made sure they were shared and understood by the entire team. Further, these goals would be broken down to midterm goals that we needed to achieve every three months, and we would host a webinar for a show-and-tell where the teams would update one another, and we could all stay on top of everything.” said Kitase.
Square Enix taking the route to make all three games exclusive has clearly helped the team scale their efforts and development times appropriately. So far, we’ve gotten two excellent games on this journey to remake one game with three.
Hopefully the third game sticks the landing, which you can bet it will, since it seems it’ll also be exclusive to PlayStation, and can enjoy the benefits of single platform development Kitase laid out in the interview.