The Episodic nature of the game doesn't really bother (course I'm probably not going to be day one or maybe even year one purchase) but I can easily see them released as 8-10 hour blocks of gameplay for each episode. The first one would be the Midgard section, the second would do the Nibelheim flashback and everything up to Costa Del Sol and then so forth. If its cut down to bite size hunks like that, then the game could be anywhere from 7 to 15 episodes depending on how they cut it. If they are small 8-10 hour blocks, SE may make them about $15 to $20 dollars per episode and the series could be released with bi-annually depending on their production schedule. I'm actually assuming this whole thing may also be digital only with Episode 1 probably having a disk for old times sake but subsequent episodes will be pure digital just to save on resources.

Backtracking isn't going to be too much of an issue as the first disk is largely linear and the game only opens up once the Highwind becomes available about a third of the way into the second disk. I'm pretty sure the side content will be drastically changed anyway though I'm sure Chocobo Breeding, the Battle Arena, and the KotR quest will remain but be modified to some degree. "Extra story content" is pretty subjective as the stuff done for the remakes of FFIII and IV were minimal, with FFIV getting one new cutscene giving Golbez more backstory and III got the opening slightly changed to give the four faceless Onion Knights characterization that changed absolutely nothing about the game for better of for worse. Honestly, after the clustersmurf that was the Compilation, I would frankly be amazed to see SE find new ways to smurf up this game's plot anymore than it has to and I'm still expecting Genesis to show up in the Nibelheim scene in some capacity, despite that still being up in the air.

Course I don't really care at this point anymore. Everyone on this forum knows my feeling about VII so SE can whore this game as much as they want. smurf yeah, make Genesis a new party member and charge full retail price of $60 an episode and make it 21 episodes long (3 Discs times the allusion of 7) and have the ending ambiguously shoot us towards that FFVII-2 the Compilation promised us. Hell, I hope there is an entire section where you have to play as Cait Sith and only him, have his entire combat system be relegated to a slot machine to tie into both his Limit Break and the DMW from Crisis Core. It will be fantastic. Let the ending be changed where Holy saves the planet and resurrects Aerith and Zack while its at it. Then we can have Kitase say AC is still canon to the Remake just to make fans heads explode.