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7 Reasons Why You Will Never See a Final Fantasy VII HD Remake

There has been plenty of buzz about a Final Fantasy VII remake for years now. Ever since Sony unveiled the Final Fantasy VII Tech Demo for PlayStation 3 at E3 in 2005, fans have been screaming for a remake of the classic title that many consider the greatest game of all-time. Appropriately enough, it is now 7 years later and talks of a Final Fantasy VII HD Remake have once again picked back up and is becoming one of the largest video game rumors circling the Internet. Despite being a longtime Final Fantasy fan that would appreciate a Final Fantasy VII HD remake as much as anyone, I believe it will never happen and here are just 7 of the many reasons why you will never see a Final Fantasy VII HD remake.

7. There is no real market for a Final Fantasy VII HD remake. Let’s face it. Final Fantasy doesn’t sell all that well outside of Japan. Square Enix’s most recent release Final Fantasy XIII-2 hasn’t even reached 1 million sales in North America having barely reached the 700,000 units sold plateau. In case you’re thinking that’s a large total, you should know that Square Enix managed to ship out 800,000 copies of Deus Ex: Human Evolution last year alone. And while a Final Fantasy VII HD remake would make lots of money with a release in Japan, so would any other new title from the Final Fantasy brand thus nullifying the need for a costly and time consuming remake.

6. Remakes of this generation typically come from PlayStation 2 era and beyond. Many people would believe that remakes are a new trend in the gaming industry, and while remakes have never been more plentiful, remakes can be retraced back to at least 2001 when Nintendo created the Super Mario Advanced series that would reproduce many of the classic Super Mario Bros. titles with new enhancements and features for Game Boy Advance. Sony soon began capitalizing on this new trend as well bringing out many remakes for PlayStation Portable including Square Enix titles such as Star Ocean: First Departure, Star Ocean: Second Evolution and Final Fantasy I and II. The important thing to note here is that remakes typically come from eras one generation ago in today’s gaming market (e.g. Silent Hill HD Collection includes Silent Hill 2: Restless Dreams and Silent Hill 3 from PlayStation 2 but not the original PlayStation’s Silent Hill).

5. HD remakes do not make enough money to warrant a Final Fantasy VII HD remake. The best selling HD remake of 2012 so far is the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection which hasn’t even eclipsed the 1 million sold mark in North American and European markets combined. While the game hasn’t exactly sold poorly, you have to consider the lesser MSRP these titles release with combined with the effort and cost it would take Square Enix to produce a Final Fantasy VII HD remake. The game could not be ported directly from the original PlayStation or PC and be masked with HD quality clarity; all this would do is cause the lack of facial features and cow hoofs for hands become far more apparent than they were in years past. To put it simply, recreating the massive world of Final Fantasy VII and its characters would take many years that Square Enix would not be smart to invest the time and resources into for the returning profit on the project.

4. Square Enix would remake many other titles before considering Final Fantasy VII HD. Square Enix is one of the most successful game developers and publishers in the entire world, and they have a deep library of great titles from which they could produce HD remakes. One franchise that clearly stands out above all the others is the Kingdom Heart franchise. It’s not that Kingdom Hearts is necessarily better than Final Fantasy VII, but Kingdom Hearts I and II were both released in the last generation on PlayStation 2 and could be given the HD treatment far easier than Final Fantasy VII, and they would both greatly benefit from HD remakes. You must also consider there are other original PlayStation titles that may take precedence before Final Fantasy VII such as Legend of Mana, Chrono Chross or even a Parasite Eve reboot.

3. Square Enix have too many other highly profitable titles to focus on. For a Final Fantasy VII HD remake to be produced, Square Enix would probably have to place less emphasis on other profitable titles to invest time to creating the remake. In North America, this would mean games such as Final Fantasy XIV, Final Fantasy Dimensions and Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance getting placed on the back burner, and in Japan, Final Fantasy Versus XIII would take even longer to release. Square Enix is a highly popular publisher as well, so from a business standpoint, games such as Sleeping Dogs, Hitman: Absolution and Tomb Raider would also be much more important to focus attention on rather than remaking a classic title.

2. A Final Fantasy VII HD remake would have already happened by now. Looking back to one of my previous statements, remakes and collections of this era typically consist of titles from the previous generation, or in other words, PlayStation 3 remakes come from PlayStation 2 and so forth. Square Enix has recently revealed that a Final Fantasy X HD remake would be coming to PlayStation 3 in the near future further reinforcing this statement. If a Final Fantasy VII HD remake would have ever been released, it would’ve happened in these last years of the PlayStation 2′s life cycle or later during the remake frenzy era on PlayStation Portable. And despite all of the buzz surrounding a Final Fantasy VII HD remake, it would have either been released in a portable version with additional cutscenes on PSP or given a similar release on another platform. The window for the production of a Final Fantasy VII HD remake has opened and shut whether you want to admit it or not.

1. Square Enix has claimed no interest in a Final Fantasy VII HD remake numerous times. Notable comments on a Final Fantasy VII HD remake from Square Enix are possibly the biggest indicator of why there will never be a remake. “Would take as much as three or four times longer than the three and a half years it has taken to put this Final Fantasy (XIII) together! So it’s looking pretty unrealistic to happen!” “If we had the manpower and the time to work on a project, if we were to remake Final Fantasy VII with the quality of Final Fantasy XIII it would become a tremendous project.” These are just a few recent Square Enix quotes that immediately shoot down the prospect of a Final Fantasy VII HD remake, and most recently, Square Enix has notoriously stated that the team would only create a Final Fantasy VII HD remake if a new Final Fantasy title can exceed the quality of the classic titles. Fans have been very critical of most both Final Fantasy XIII and Final Fantasy XIII-2, so it seems the chances of a remake are looking slim to none. Still, a company’s statements on video games aren’t always completely known for their accuracy, so no matter what anyone says, you can always hold out your own hope that there will one day be a Final Fantasy VII HD remake.

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