Tetsuya Nomura

[Wolf Kanno]

This is a discussion about one of the key players at SE. What are your thoughts about him? Gripes, praises, critiques, and comical amusings...

My personal feeling is that he can't write or create good characters. Out of all the games he has personally worked on I have only liked four of them for their characters and stories. Brave Fencer Musashi, FFVIII, KH, and KHCoM. Even thses games have their fair share of faults, but I find them at least tolerable.

Now I feel he's a good artist, though I prefer his more anime style (FFVII and the KH series). He can also do action scenes very well. Though KH2 and FFVII:AC were both rather disappointing in their plots, few could argue that the action scenes weren't incredible.

But it bothers me that these qualities seem to be used in order to cover up the fact that the plot is poorly written and the characters are rather bland.

Now perhaps the real problem may lie in the fact that he is now the main star over at SE. He may have been stretched too thin and needs a little time off to build up those creative juices. I also understand that he's not solely responsible for the mistakes made in his games but he is technically in charge...

I fear for FFXIII

[Kawaii Ryûkishi]

Everything he creates is plagued by a general lack of subtlety or integrity. His character designs increasingly adhere to the latest wacky fashion trends from out of Harajuku, while his characters themselves are imbued with a corresponding dose of juvenile angst. In other words, he does whatever it takes to appeal to the lowest common denominator of brain-dead teenage girls.

[Captain Maxx Power]

In other words, he does whatever it takes to appeal to the lowest common denominator of brain-dead teenage girls.

Last time I checked the major demographically slice of the marketting pie was not brain-dead teenage girls. Heck, not even plain old girls. What logical reasoning could make Tetsy to go down such a route?

[Kawaii Ryûkishi]

There are many possible reasons. Maybe it's because they know the male demographic will now buy whatever they produce as long as "Final Fantasy" is in the title, so they may as well try for the female, too.

[Sefie1999AD]

I think Tetsuya Nomura is more like a hit-or-miss kind of a guy. IMHO, he has done some really great titles, such as FFVII, KH, KH2 and FFVII AC, but he's also done some titles that I consider to be clearly weaker, such as FFVIII, FFX, FFX-2 and FFVII DoC. When he manages to produce something good, it's usually really good, but when he doesn't, it's usually disappointing. There's not really many Nomura titles in the middle.

[RiseToFall]

Now I have question about Nomura. I know which character designs he was responsible for, but I'm a little confused as to which plots he worked on. I know he worked on KH, KH:CoM, KH:2 as well as Advent Children. But what about VII, VIII, X, and X-2 , was he responsible for their story line's also ?

[Mirage]

I don't think he writes the story, but he's the director or something nowadays. In the early years he was just the character designer.

[chionos]

Nomura lacks genuine artistry. I like some of the games he's been a part of--FFVII, FFX, KH--but in general I think he's pretty worthless. I'm not a big fan of his character designs for the most part. Amano's characters were vibrant, seductive, and vital; it's a shame they were never fully realized in 3d. That's the main difference between the two. Nomura's characters are very easily translated into 3d and fit the mold of the games very easily, but Amano's are so subtle and visceral that SE was never able to make the transition very well.
I hate to bash the guy because he's been instrumental in FF's success, but I wonder sometimes at what cost. I don't really like the general direction the (FF)games have gone since he arrived. His designs fit a game like KH, but I don't like them in the Final Fantasy world. I'm very glad that Matsuno directed FFXII instead of Nomura. And although they're a little coarse sometimes, I like Yoshida's characters more than Nomura's. Even if it's not a critical hit like some of the other games, I've enjoyed the break from Nomura. He has this annoying tendency to create empty beauty. Vanity.

[Kawaii Ryûkishi]

Now I have question about Nomura. I know which character designs he was responsible for, but I'm a little confused as to which plots he worked on. I know he worked on KH, KH:CoM, KH:2 as well as Advent Children. But what about VII, VIII, X, and X-2 , was he responsible for their story line's also ?

Off the top of my head, I know he had a writing credit in FFVII. And after the success of that game, I'm sure he had some amount of influence in the following installments, credited or not.

[RiseToFall]

Thanks for that Kishi.

Now did anyone else think that Akihiko Yoshida borrowed quite a few things from Nomura in terms of character design for FF XII. Now I'm not saying that he completely copied Nomura, but there are some subtle hints of influence from him, and I don't mean just the mini skirt (look below). I don't know, maybe it's just me.

I also completely agree with chionos on the fact that Amano's art can not be implemented into 3D. When I look at Amano's original art, and then look at the character in 3D it's quite clear that his art style is extremely hard to convey in a game. Though lately I've been wondering what it would look like with a Okami type visual style.

Sorry, getting off topic. The two pics below are geared towards my first paragraph.

[kissgirls]

I think when he made ffvii ac he copy some characters off of other final fantasy

Like Rinoa mix Garnet, with the outfit looking alittle like rinoa's making Tifa's AC outif and Look.

And i think...not sure but when he made YuRiPa, (they had there own looks) that gave him an idea for the villans of AC.
*Yeah yeah in my other topics and this drives people crazy,i didn't think they looked like each other but i study there looks and they do)

Yuna's face and hair length Gave the Idea for Kadaj
Rikku's face and hair length gave the idea for Yazoo
Paine's face and hair length gave the idea for Loz

Cloud looks like Shuyin mix Tidus.

So he could be runing out of idea's for characters looks

[Wolf Kanno]

I've heard Yoshida mention in a few interviews that the similarities were not intentional in his character designs.

I prefer Amano over nomura as well. Amano always had interesting monster designs and his characters were always gorgeous. When I saw the opening to FFVI in FF Anthology my jaw dropped at how well his designs worked for the scenes. It's a shame that we have finally reached a technological level that would allow SE to properly convey his artwork and he no longer works as a character designer...

I feel the real problem with the games that Nomura has worked on is the fact that they tend to have the common theme of being potentially good. His games have several wonderful ideas to work with and yet they never use any of them well or just completely drop them, making them irrelevant. The GF's taking your memories from FFVIII, the entire concept of the Nobodies, Roxas' role, the list goes on...

[The Man]

All of my favourite Final Fantasy titles (FFVI, FFIX, FFV, etc.) were not designed by Nomura. The more I see out of him in new Final Fantasy titles, the more I understand that that's not a coincidence. I especially think the tendency towards creating sequels is a sign of a lack of original ideas and an abandonment of the principles that made Square an interesting company in the first place.

I'll still play FFXII, but honestly, I'm looking a lot more forward to finally being able to play DQVIII when I graduate college and have time for gaming again.

[Kawaii Ryûkishi]

Nomura had nothing to do with FFXII. That game is all Matsuno, Yoshida, and Sakimoto. They're good people.

[The Man]

Yeah, I know. That's the main reason I even want to play it. xD