I *don't* want a remake

[Skyblade]

There has never been a game in the history of forever that has warranted a remake more than this game. People have been wanting it for years and now that it is truly outdated, yet still highly demanded there is really no reason for them not to. Capcom gave us the Resident Evil remake so give us the damn FFVII Square!

There is also no game remake which would terrify me more. It would be so, so easy for Square to ruin the game. And I fear they would. My evidence: The Compilation. They've so massively warped and distorted the characters, themes, and even the actual events of FFVII already. I don't want a remake where we suddenly see Genesis in the Shinra mansion basement scene, or where Cloud's character has been changed to be a depressed wreck the entire game.

[escobert]

Reverse psychology is an awesome tool. Don't know if you guys know about this, but...basically, you make someone think the opposite of what you believe, and that tricks them into doing something stupid.

Works like a charm!

But as I've stated in other threads in other places, there is one way, and one way only, that a remake of FFVII will happen, and that is if you (yes, YOU) stop buying any and all things that Square Enix makes, until such time as it is announced.

...Though it'd probably be 10 years from the announcement to the release...

Discuss.

That's uh exactly the opposite of what Square says...

[Sephiroth]

Seeing how mistanslated all versions are and the story and characters not even understood by people who are adamant about understanding them but not even considering everything given, yes, a remake is needed.

[Cloudane]

I did want one... not so sure nowadays, I think maybe the moment has passed for me. It seems to be reserved as their last ditch thing that they'll push out if ever they're about to go down the pan and hope that it rescues them... sort of a "Final Final Fantasy", so to speak (I wonder if they'd start from 1 again if that happened! FFFII, coming soon to PS6). But I think it's past the time when enough people care for it to be a big blockbuster company-saving hit if they even did - it's gone past the Doctor Who 2005 style phase of "just retro enough that everyone looks forward to the reboot" and landed firmly in the Manic Miner kind of area of "people of a certain age harp on constantly about how awesome it was whilst anyone a decade or so younger just looks on with bemusement and wonders what the heck's so good about it"

Still I'd quite like, let's say, a "remastered" version with remade FMVs, higher resolution paintings and a few more polygons, but not so much a complete remake - they'd ruin it trying to make it too realistic (seemed to me they couldn't figure out how to make Cait Sith not look silly in the movie so just got rid of the moogle... it's things like that). There were also certain things like, Kalm was a tiny village in the main game and a huge city in Dirge, far as I recall. Sorry but I expect somewhere called "Kalm" to be a village, and that's an example of fleshing something out and messing up headcanon.

I think there is a lot to be said for the graphical style of the older games to be honest. A lot more than what many are giving credit for. The pre-rendered art offered an ambience that I don't believe 3D games can quite match up to. I cannot quite put my fingers on a descriptor to use in order to try and convey what I mean. There is a sort of sombre-moodiness to games that have pre-rendered backdrops. A hidden depth if you will humour me. I find it very atmospheric; I can say the same thing about the original Resident Evil games.

When they crossed over to a fully immersive 3D environment, there was a sort of artificiality to them. They can look pretty, but something is missing and I find the world a little more hollow and without definitive character. It's a little bit like a sensory overload, there are too many geometric shapes flying at me at once. I can only possibly equate it to technical perspective drawing in comparison to something more cerebral like water colours. Perspective drawing looks technical and whilst excellent - I feel it lacks some sort of soul and character.

Maybe it is just me. Anyone else get a similar flavour in regards to this?

Exactly, I do as well.
I think it's similar to the reasons they stopped doing the overworld - when the graphics were a bit less realistic, it was a bit more "acceptable" - in an industry striving for maximum realism - to have this sort of pseudo-3D where there's enough detail to tell you about the world they want you to imagine, but almost like a book, a lot of it is left to your imagination to fill in the rest of the detail while you imagine you are "there". As the games have become more realistic, you're now presented more of the world directly, and it may not have the style and depth that your mind was previously filling in.

I noticed this with Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus. They did a great job of bringing the world we knew to life, and yet I still found it much more "plain looking / drab looking" scenery than my head had created for the original game.

Not sure exactly how to say it either... it's maybe a bit like an uncanny valley thing? When everything was painted backdrops and deformed characters, perhaps it was easier to "convert" that to a vibrant fantasy world in your mind (it's almost like a dream - you can't literally see it in real world detail, but your imagination 'knows' what's there), but currently we're at a stage of realism where it's "there but not quite" - it looks real enough for your brain to accept it as the 'canon' environment for your fantasy instead of creating its own interpretation, so maybe the creative part of your brain kind of shuts down, but it's not as detailed and vibrant as your imagination would've created if it had the chance.

[Richard]

I myself am open to a remake. But it probably would not be what I have imagined.