14 DAY TRIAL // Fans of the Final Fantasy franchise have long asked the developers and executives at Square Enix to remake their favorite titles, the seventh full entry in the series, and re-release it on modern platforms and on mobile devices.
The company has long refused and offered a number of explanations, from the complexity of the project to the lack of a sizeable audience, but it seems that the real reason for the lack of a Final Fantasy VII for modern device is the problems that the series has recently had.
Yoichi Wada, who is the chief executive officer of Square Enix, has told shareholders that no remake of FF VII will be delivered until the company manages to create a new entry in the long-running series that delivers a higher quality experience than the classic launched on the PSOne.
This basically means that recent releases like Final Fantasy XIII, its XIII-2 expansion and the XIV MMO have not been good enough to satisfy gamers.
Wada believes that a full remake for Final Fantasy VII might irreparably damage the franchise because it would make fans less interested in picking up any future titles linked to it.
Final Fantasy VII was originally launched only on the PSOne during 1997 and was the first game in the series that made the switch to 3D graphics.
It sported character design imported from the anime genre, a high number of cutscenes, a deep story line with well-defined characters and a number of never-before-seen group mechanics.
The game quickly gained a following and became the standard against which other Final Fantasy titles were judged (although some consider Final Fantasy VIII to be the best).
Final Fantasy XIII and its expansion disappointed in terms of sales and currently Square Enix is getting ready to launch the 2.0 version of the much-troubled MMO Final Fantasy XIV.