No, it didn't. It went completely the other way. The art direction for VII was cartoony, exaggerated, and stylized, and it worked brilliantly. The tech demo went for ultra realistic and, as a result, Cloud looks absolutely horrendous. Just about as bad as he was in Crisis Core and Advent Children, if not a little worse.
The best Cloud has looked since the move to PS2 and beyond era graphics has been his appearances in the Kingdom Hearts series, mostly because that game followed FFVII's art principles, even if, on the whole, the art wasn't as dark.




Reply With Quote