Remakes that Aren’t Remade

February 17th, 2009

I’ve noticed a bit of a trend in the past few years that’s slowly snowballed into a bit of an epidemic, that is the misuse of the term ‘remake’. I’m not sure if you’ve noticed it too. The misuse is most apparent on the portable platforms but the same applies for the consoles too. Take a look at this list of guilty suspects:

Valkyrie Profile Lenneth (PSP)
Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions (PSP)
Star Ocean: Second Evolution (PSP)
Chrono Trigger DS (DS)
Okami (Wii)
New Play Control! Series (Wii)
House of the Dead: Return (Wii)
Resident Evil 4 (PS2, Wii)
Resident Evil GameCubes (GCN)
Super Mario ports (GBA)
Final Fantasy ports (GBA)
Banjo Kazooie (XBLA)

All games that are nothing more than reworked ports of previous titles with a few significant spruce ups. No doubt the changes are pretty significant like redone script, new areas or new controls. But a remake? Probably not. How can we classify these games as remakes in the same vein as:

Resident Evil (GCN)
-overhauled graphics and sound
-new content added
-gameplay tweak
-redone script
Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 (GBA)
-remade into isometric perspective
-many element downgraded for GBA
Tales of Symphonia II (Wii)
-same game world
-new story, characters, environment
-many original areas remixed
Prince of Persia Classic (XBLA, PSN)
-overhauled graphics and sound
-new game modes
-high score boards

I honestly don’t think that it’s fair to group the two together. For marketing sake though I guess the word ‘remake’ has a better sound to it and as such -like fish to water- the games media have wrote about the first list of games under the guise of remakes. I’m not convinced, where do you guys stand?

Why we aren’t going to see a Final Fantasy VII remake

June 17th, 2007

final fantasy vii playstation 3 remake

In the early days of the Playstaion 3 many buddying developers released conceptual gameplay clips in order to show what the system was capable of producing in real time. Square Enix, not to be left out released a trailer of their own based on the most popular entry of their Final Fantasy series; FFVII. This trailer was purely conceptual and they had no intentions of releasing a FFVII game on the Playstation 3. Now despite saying this the FF fanboys across the globe went rampid speculating that SE were secretly developing a FFVII remake for the console.

Now fast forward to a few days ago where SE character designer; Tetsuya Nomura denied the speculation that SE have a FFVII remake in the pipeline. Now despite him saying this, a few (perhaps) desperate people still believe that SE are secretly going to remake the game.

Now don’t get me wrong, I love the Final Fantasy series, especially the Tactics series. But I don’t think that a re-make will happen and hence I present to you 5 reasons why:

1.This first reason has already been mentioned and that is that its been denied by Tetsuya Nomura. So this proves that there will be no remake in the near future at least. Although SE seems to recognise that fans badly want a remake. So I guess the possibility is still there.

2. One of the reasons why people seem to think that the remake is taking place is because SE are going gun-ho with Final Fantasy remakes at the moment. The DS has received a remake of Final Fantasy III and there’s one for IV on the way, the PSP is also receiving remakes; of the original 2 games. Then there’s also the re-releases of the older titles, such as FF Origins on the PSone or Dawn of Souls for the GBA.

Now what this trend shows is that they are only remaking the 2D games of the series, therefore if this trend holds up they won’t be remaking the first 3D FF title; FFVII.

cloud strife final fantasy vii
Don’t be angry cloud, you’ve been in enough games as it is!

3.This point follows along the same line as the previous point. The Final Fantasy series has always been a popular RPG series but this popularity exploded when Final Fantasy VII was released back in the day. Now many many gamers began their FF experience with the seventh iteration and overtime have caught up on the older titles thru the remakes, re-releases etc. Therefore why would SE need to remake the game that basically started it all for most of us?Games like FF III weren’t even released in PAL territories so it being remade doesn’t encourage more remakes.

4.Square Enix have recently been expanding the the Final Fantasy series beyond the traditional ‘numbered’ series. They have expanded out to series into groups, here’s my rough breakdown:

-the traditional games
-the Ivalice Alliance – Tactics, Relevent Wings etc.
-spin offs Chocobo titles
-focus series Final Fantasy VII(Crisis Core, Dirge of Cerebus etc.)/ Final Fantasy XIII set
-the movies and animated series

Now, it seems a little silly for Square Enix to remake the title for the Playstation 3. It would have to be very ambitious, being on such a powerful platform. Obviously much time would have to go into making it right. Now such a production doesn’t fit into the previous mentioned scheme. Square have already announced their big set of FFVII related content and a remake wasn’t included. In fact Crisis Core hasn’t even come out yet now. So it would seem a stupid to announce a remake now and not have previously included in the set. The game also wouldn’t fit in with the new action driven gameplay of XIII. There’s just no place for this game.

5. The final reason comes from the lack of success from the movie Advent Children. Sure its a movie which makes it different but the movie downright sucked. I just couldn’t stand it. Isn’t this proof enough not to stir the grave of a legendary game? And we all know that SE would make the remake like the movie. Ugh!

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Tags: final fantasy vii, remake