I used to be in the Trials of Mana remake style camp, but I think I'm now in the FFVIIR camp. If you are going to remake an old game, you might as well go all out. Just keep the spirit of the game intact but modernize and update what makes sense to you. Some of these old games just don't translate well to modern gaming standards.

Also, if you want to play that old style the original game is still available to you. This was a little different with Trials of Mana which was not officially released outside Japan for a number of years. So maybe it made more sense to do that one more faithfully.