Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is oftentimes a moving and poignant game. The title chronicles the party’s perilous journey from Midgar to the Forgotten Capital. And it has a number of heartwarming and heart wrenching scenes along the way, including the ending. However, like the 1997 original, it’s also a deeply eccentric and downright funny game at times. Yesterday at New York’s Tribeca Festival, director Naoki Hamaguchi and producer Yoshinori Kitase talked about some of the more humorous moments of the game and answered some fan questions.
Keeping Final Fantasy VII Funny
In the original Final Fantasy VII, the middle section of the game features a dolphin-riding minigame, a potentially embarrassing parade, and the chance to perform in a stage play with the object of your affections. It gets pretty wacky. And hey, it was the 90s. So it may have come as a surprise to find that Rebirth kept all of these moments and more in reimagining that section of the game.
In fact, it even added some wacky moments. During the talk, moderator Zachary Small of The New York Times asked about a specific bar that players may encounter, filled with patrons of the bald variety. How did this idea come about?
“The level design team really sought to depict the livelihoods of the people living in this world,” explained Kitase through a translator.
Hamaguchi noted that writer Kazushige Nojima crafted the initial bar scenario. The team at Square Enix then fleshed out the narrative with Rude and his bald friends, exploring their identity, since being bald is “sometimes a tricky situation in Japan.”
As for which funny ideas they left on the cutting room floor? “Not too many of the funny scenes were cut. We really put almost all of them in,” Hamaguchi explained, taking time to consider the question. “I’m sitting here trying to think of one.”
Ultimately he couldn’t. But both Hamaguchi and Kitase seem to appreciate adding humor wherever possible, evident by their choices of favorite dates for the Loveless section of Rebirth.
The Best Loveless Date?
“This might be rare to see but my favorite is the one with Vincent and Cid,” Kitase noted. Vincent also happens to be his favorite Final Fantasy VII character. If players don’t actively bond with any one character, they get the wacky outing with Vincent, Cid, and Cait Sith.
Likewise, Hamaguchi noted that people expect his favorite date option to be Aerith or Tifa. But that’s not the case. “My number one is Red XIII,” he said proudly. “I really love cats and animals.”
This seems par for the course for the two. Kitase shared that the two are very good friends. “There’s a big relationship of trust,” added Hamaguchi. They joked and laughed about the biggest disagreement they had: the font size for emails.
Biggest Inspirations
Keeping the quirky train rolling along, Hamaguchi paused when asked about inspirations for Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. He then revealed the perhaps surprising Disney movie that the team looked to: 2017’s Beauty and the Beast. It didn’t inspire much in terms of story (unless we get a ballroom dance with Vincent’s beast form in Part 3). Rather, it proved a good “reference for remaking something.”
Otherwise, the team looked at other open-world video games such as Horizon: Zero Dawn, Ghost of Tsushima, and The Witcher. Hamaguchi enjoyed these in particular and found them helpful for inspiring the open-world areas of Rebirth. In general, the team aimed to create minigames that would both tie into the narrative but also allow for player customization.
A particular point of pride in these regards? The reimagined Rufus’s Parade section. A minigame that Hamaguchi “was really happy to reconstruct this time around,” finding the original a bit simple.
While Kitase noted that he didn’t have as much narrative involvement with Rebirth, he did have an inspiration for a villain when directing the original Final Fantasy VII. “We looked to Jaws as a reference as an icon of horror,” he said in regards to the antagonist Sephiroth. “A terrorizing figure that isn’t depicted until the end.” Players hear about Sephiroth for a while before eventually meeting the infamous warrior.
The Future of the Final Fantasy VII Remake Trilogy
Naturally, folks in attendance wanted to see if they could pry out some hints about the upcoming third and final part of the Final Fantasy VII remake trilogy. But the creators kept fairly coy.
“That’s a tricky question,” Hamaguchi said in response to Small asking about Rocket Town. The director then advised players to “wait and see.” Featuring in the original game as the home of pilot Cid, Rocket Town doesn’t appear in Rebirth. Instead, the game introduces the pilot at Gongaga.
Not to be deterred, an eagle-eyed fan mentioned that Final Fantasy VII Remake has a track titled “One-Winged Angel – Rebirth” and asked if Rebirth has a similar soundtrack allusion to the next game’s title.
“Woah, you really came in [with that question]!” laughed Hamaguchi. “I don’t know if we can answer that one,” he remarked, before praising the fan’s keen eye.
In case you’re wondering, the tracklist for Final Fantasy VII Rebirth does have a similar song listed: “One-Winged Angel – Reborn.” Personally my money is on the final track of “Aerith’s Theme – Return to the Planet” having an influence. Final Fantasy VII Reborn seems too similar to the second installment and Final Fantasy VII Return has a nice finality to it. Or Final Fantasy VII Return of the Cetra. No? Just me? Well, we’ll likely find out at some point in the next couple years.
Still, the creative team did hint a little more strongly at an especially popular aspect of Rebirth: Queen’s Blood. It would come as a surprise if the addictive card game doesn’t return in Part 3. But will it reappear once the trilogy wraps up?
“We are wondering: are there ways we can use Queen’s Blood in the future?” Hamaguchi answered, noting the popularity of the game on its own. “So it’s a thought.”
