Final Fantasy 7 Remakehas the perfect blueprint for futureFinal Fantasygames' design. By now, it’s hardly a secret thatFinal Fantasyhas struggled to adaptto the modern gaming landscape. There wasFF15’s troubled development cycle andultimately unfinished state, thenFF16’s often-dull story and pointless sidequests - although both of these games had a lot of positives, they pale in comparison to the series' highest points.
Butthe remake side of theFinal Fantasyfranchise has been unusually consistent in recent years. It hasn’t been perfect (does anyone else still care aboutCrystal Chronicles?), but for the most part, it’s delivered. TheFF7 Remaketrilogy is the crown jewel in the franchise’s remake efforts, and the first game especially holds the key to making qualityFinal Fantasygames going forward, without falling victim to the pitfalls of modern gaming.
FF7 Remake’s Midgar Is An Unusual Approach
One City, Open World
FF7 Remaketakes an unusual approach to its map design, but it’s all the better for it.Historically,Final Fantasygames have included globe-trotting settings - a select few even took us to the moon. Either way, they usually depict huge worlds that require multiple methods of traversal, and up to hundreds of hours to fully explore.
ButFF7 Remake, adapting only the first few hours of the originalFinal Fantasy 7,is set entirely in one location: the massive city of Midgar. It’s not a fully open world - you unlock new areas in a very much linear fashion. But there’s genuinely a lot to see and do in each new area, which keeps exploration interesting, but prevents the game from getting bloated.
Now,Midgar benefits from its status as a sprawling, diverse metropolis. Each area you visit feels meaningfully distinct from the last, be it the dust and rust of the Sector 7 slums, or the neon lights and seedy alleyways of Wall Market. That allows it tofeellike a world unto itself, even if it’s only a small part of theFF7setting.
Final Fantasy Has Struggled With Open-World Exploration
FF15, 16, & 7 Rebirth Have Yet To Get It Right
Throughout recentFinal Fantasyreleases, a common issue has beenthe series' approach to open worlds.Final Fantasy 15started out well enough, with a sizable map full of optional activities - but not too many so as to make it feel bloated, and few of them so unique or important that you felt like you had to do absolutely everything.
Some interesting survival mechanics, like dangerous monsters at night, campsites and restaurants dotted around the map, and ever-shortening daylight hourshelped keep exploration interesting- something you had to think about and plan for actively, instead of just something you did on the way to the next story mission.
ButFF15’s underbaked driving controls threw a wrench in the works. Meanwhile, an overly linear second half cuts your exploration of its world unduly short.
FF16took a different approach, with, overall, a much more linear structure. It’s akin toFF7 Remake’s map, where you unlock new areas as you progress through the story, and can generally travel back and forth from them freely.
Butmost ofFF16’s map feels empty, dotted only with optional enemy fights and the occasional upgrade material. NPCs are almost entirely limited to its major settlements. When you dostumble upon a sidequest, it’s usually pretty underwhelming in terms of both story relevance and reward.
FF7 Remakedid a great job at mapping, butRebirth, not so much.Rebirthfocuses on the middle ofFF7’s story, which covers a much larger area of the world, and suffers from Ubisoft-style sidequest bloat as a result.
Meaningless towers that must be activated to reveal portions of the map, a million different rare enemies to be found and fought, and mini-games that overstay their welcome: all three arefixtures of theFF7 Rebirthexperience.
Its open world suffers as a result, and as it drags on, each new activity starts to feel less like a worthy distraction and more like a chore. Although some of the side content is great, I really hopefutureFinal Fantasygames take a different direction- perhaps one inspired byFF7 Remake, if notRebirth.
A Final Fantasy Game In One City Could Be Great
Infinite Possibilities In A Small Space
It’s not typical for the series, buta single-cityFinal Fantasygame could work brilliantly. An urban environment - be it modern like Midgar, or more classically fantasy like Dalmasca - would make it much easier to avoid concerns of bloated side activities or empty exploration, while still providing a large area with a diverse variety of regions to discover.
Other great RPGs can serve as a proof-of-conceptfor a single-cityFF. My mind goes immediately toDragon Age 2, one of the more divisive entries in the series for this very reason. But it’s undeniable that the way it tracks changes in the city of Kirkwall over multiple years is undeniably fascinating, easily one of the game’s brightest spots.
For a more recent example,look atYakuza/Like a Dragon, in which almost every game is set in a small-yet-condensedneighborhoodof just one or two cities. This is a series known to beloaded with mini-games and sidequests, but since they’re so easily accessible on such a condensed map, you don’t feel pressure to complete them as you unlock them. As a result, it takes a lot longer for them to get old.
And look at whatAssassin’s Creed Miragedid for the Ubisoft bloat when it limited the game to a single large city. It’s probably the single most approachableACgame for that reason: its Baghdad map feels a lot less daunting than, say,AC Shadows' massive slice of central Japan.
Exploration has always been an important part ofFinal Fantasy, and I’m sure there are some fans who’d balk at the very notion of a scaled-down entry. Even so, the series needs a bit of a shakeup to avoid its recent open-world pitfalls, and a single-city setting just might be the way to do so. Hopefully, it takes the right lessons from the success ofFinal Fantasy 7 Remake.
