Bringing you yesterday's news from Japan and Asia, today.
Final Fantasy (Page 9)
It’s hard to say which game is more highly anticipated, Final Fantasy XV or Kingdom Hearts 3, but with both of them tentatively scheduled for a 2016 release date, we just might find out. Or not…because a recent tweet about the latest Final Fantasy game is causing us to believe that a 2016 release date could be a pipe dream. Although there has been no delay announced, if the date is pushed back it might be in part due to the rocky situation they are in: they need more rocks!
As the graphics in video games have become increasingly sophisticated, a new and unexpected expense has surfaced for design teams hoping to make their game’s environments as realistic as possible: the so-called “location hunt.”
While in the good ol’ days of pixel graphics, design teams could just look at some photographs or even paintings of real-world locations for inspiration, modern gaming’s open, 3-D worlds demand level and object design so advanced that it becomes a near-necessity for teams to travel to locales that closely resemble the digital worlds they’re hoping to create, getting actual eyes on, say, that volcanic mountain they plan to have the player venture through, or checking out the minute curves and angles of some military hardware they plan on dropping into the game.
Ironically, though, while the “location hunt” is still considered work, outside of the unlucky design team that has to go inside of a volcano for that epic RPG boss fight or something, these excursions can actually end up looking suspiciously like a vacation. Just ask the Final Fantasy XV design team, who recently posted a YouTube video of their location hunt.
Ever wondered what a wedding planned around your favorite video game franchise would look like? Newly married couple Grace and Chris have an answer to that question in the form of the following video taken at their stunning Final Fantasy-themed wedding ceremony filmed in Hawaii!
When Final Fantasy VII hit the PlayStation in 1997, it was one of the most graphically advanced games ever produced. For months leading up to the title’s release, gamers had been drooling over magazine previews plastered with work-in-progress screenshots of what developer Square was doing with its first foray into the bold new world of CD-based games and polygonal graphics.
Flash forward 18 years, and technology has progressed to the point that Final Fantasy VII looks pretty retro to most modern eyes. As a matter of fact, it’s so retro that not only is Square Enix is remaking it for the PlayStation 4, mobile phones now have enough power to run the original, which is why Final Fantasy VII has just been released in iOS form.
If you’re putting together a profile for a video game or anime character, the inclusion of certain bits of information are optional, such as favorite food, hobby, or breast weight. But just about every fictional character coming from Japan has an official birthday. As a matter of fact, it’s become such a standard bit of background information for anime and video game characters that you can search online and find dozens to sing happy birthday to on any given day.
This week, though, was the birthday of an especially popular figure: Cloud Strife. Not only did the hero of Final Fantasy VII hero receive plenty of warm wishes from fans, he also got an illustrated birthday card from his designer himself, Tetsuya Nomura.
With the recent announcement of a Final Fantasy VII remake, gamers are already starting to imagine which parts from the RPG classic will be making the trip to the PlayStation 4. While they haven’t been officially announced, we’ll probably once again see the scene where Sephiroth flashes video gaming’s most memorable stink eye in front of a fiery backdrop, the moment when Cloud and childhood friend Tifa share a heart-to-heart talk in a starlit playground, and also that one part where the spikey-haired hero wades into the water holding Aerith (I think he was trying to teach her to swim or something, but I don’t remember exactly).
But while none of those have been officially confirmed for the new game, there is one thing director Tetsuya Nomura has made clear. The part where the main character dresses up as a woman to infiltrate a brothel? Totally going to be in the new Final Fantasy VII.
To those unfamiliar with the history of video game developer Square (now merged with former rival Enix and renamed Square Enix), the title of the prolific Final Fantasy series must seem pretty ironic. After all, the franchise’s Roman numeral-numbered sequels now go all the way up to XV, and by the time you add in the sequel’s sequels, like the recently rereleased Final Fantasy X-2, and spinoffs like Final Fantasy Tactics (which of course has a sequel of its own, too), there doesn’t seem to be anything “final” about the series at all.
Some gamers will be quick to point out, though, that had the original Final Fantasy not been a hit, Square wouldn’t have had the financial resources to keep going and would have had to shut its doors, and the title is a nod to that desperation. Others will correct them, saying that in fact the “Final” portion of the title was chosen because Hironobu Sakaguchi, the driving force behind the creation of the series and its most popular installments, was going to quit the gaming industry if the first Final Fantasy wasn’t a success.
But as Sakaguchi himself recently revealed, neither of those was really the reason Square decided to call what would go on to be its defining game series Final Fantasy.
Following several years of building dependable, affordable, yet almost utterly soulless automobiles, Toyota is trying to get back to creating and market cars with a sense of joy and playfulness. After all, it’s a waste to treat driving as just going from Point A to Point B in the dullest way possible instead of the fun journey it has the potential to be.
That’s why in its newest commercial, Toyota is invoking the spirit of adventure with a fleet of yellow hybrids running about the countryside with the musical accompaniment of one of the most instantly recognizable pieces of Final Fantasy music ever composed.
Tetsuya Nomura is the mastermind behind this upcoming Batman figure, the likes of which you’ve never seen before. The 44-year-old video game artist/designer/director of Square Enix fame (he’s a veteran of both the Final Fantasy series and Kingdom Hearts) personally designed this version of the Dark Knight, and if you’re a fan of both his work and DC Comics, you’d better ready your wallet now!
Shawn Wasabi mashed up a list of his favorite songs and sound effects to create the original track “Marble Soda.” Wasabi uses a Midi Fighter by DJ Techtools to assign 153 different sounds used during the song. Among them are “Fushizen Na Girl” by Perfume, “PONPONPON” by Kyary Pamyu Pamyu, “Prelude” from Final Fantasy VII, and Pikachu’s iconic “Pika!”
The Nippon Cosplay Photo Contest at St. Fest. 2015 posted its winners on Monday. Unlike other cosplay contests that judge strictly on costume creation and styling, this contest focuses on the photographer and the composition of the photograph. Votes were tallied for a month and a half via the internet and the event venue itself.
Those of you with an interest in the Final Fantasy series, mobile gaming, and/or the male form might remember when we took an early look at Mevius Final Fantasy a few months ago. The most ambitious original mobile title yet from publisher Square Enix, the Mevius development crew is made up of Final Fantasy veterans, and the visuals that have been released are far beyond what you’d ordinarily expect from a smartphone title.
But while Square Enix apparently isn’t skimping on the production budget, it was willing to give the game’s male hero a skimpy outfit, as the first promotional images showed the main character dressed in a costume that showed off plenty of his tanned and toned back and buttocks. If that was right up your alley, though, we hope you already got a good eyeful, because Square Enix has since rethought the design and changed it to one that exposes less skin.
What’s the first Final Fantasy game you played? I came somewhat late to the party, and my first experience of Final Fantasy was Final Fantasy VIII. After a childhood spent playing Sonic, suddenly finding myself in a semi-realistic world with massive potential for exploration really blew my tiny mind back then. In VIII, the headmaster of the military academy is a middle-aged, bespectacled dude with a paunch called Cid. But as Final Fantasy fans know, Cid is actually a character who appears in different forms in (pretty much) all of the Final Fantasy games. The dude’s been regenerated more times than the Doctor in Doctor Who! So we decided to take a look back at all of the Cids in chronological order to see how he’s changed over the years.
When video game developer Square Enix gave the largest preview to date of its upcoming role-playing game Final Fantasy XV, it rubbed some fans the wrong way. Just about every installment since the series switched to having set characters has featured female adventurers, but the company announced that the playable cast of Final Fantasy XV is entirely male.
While details are still scarce about the separate but concurrently in-development game Mevius Final Fantasy, newly released screenshots of the smartphone title also feature only a male character. With a Y-chromosome suddenly seeming like a necessary bit of adventuring equipment, does this mean Final Fantasy has consciously decided to turn its back on the many female fans who’ve helped it achieve the success it enjoys today?
Probably not, since while it’s not certain whether or not Mevius Final Fantasy will allow female gamers to create a character in their own likenesses, it’s absolutely certain that the game is planning to provide a generous serving of extra-lean beefcake.
Nearly 20 years after the release of Final Fantasy VII, the iconic Japanese RPG is still regarded as one of the best video games ever made. And although fans may have been disappointed by the recent announcement that the game won’t be given a facelift for its PS4 debut, Final Fantasy VII lovers can wallow in their grief by an amazing video compiled from 200 original works of arts from more than 100 artists. The artwork recreates key scenes from the video game, taking viewers on a very nostalgic walk back to the many days spent on their PlayStations with Cloud and his friends.
Great stories make great games. But when all is said and done, when you have finished the game, saved the world and beaten down the bad guy, the thing that sticks with you the most is the music. Especially in roleplaying games, a grandiose soundtrack will elevate your game from memorable to unforgettable. There has been a trend in the past decade or so to perform live symphonic versions of famous video game music. These concerts have been incredibly popular around the world, but how would you like to hear the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra whisk you away to a fantasy world? Now, you don’t have to wait for their next concert!
Although director Hayao Miyazaki gets the lion’s share of the credit for the sterling quality of Studio Ghibli’s anime films, you can’t discount the contributions of Joe Hisaishi. The veteran composer’s musical scores are timeless and ethereal, and there’s no better visual compliment to their mix of trepidation and adventurousness than the moving pictures of Japan’s most respected animation house.
The beautiful projection mapping that accompanies this stirring piano cover of the ending theme to Castle in the Sky Laputa is a close second, though.
Although video game developer Square Enix had dabbled in a few direct follow-ups here and there, whenever the counter for its Final Fantasy role-playing franchise rolls over to a new numbered sequel, the company completely ditches the old cast of heroes and villains, and even the previous game’s world.
But even if the narrative is starting from scratch each time, that doesn’t mean the games aren’t connected. For example, every Final Fantasy has scenes where the player rides on airships or horse-sized flightless birds called chocobos. The cursor is always a white glove with a pointing index finger, and major victories in battle are marked by the sounds of the series’ instantly recognizable “Victory Fanfare.”
Gamers have already heard the short but sweet melody played by the NES, Super NES, and PlayStations 1 through 3, and this month, they can look forward to hearing it someplace new: at the register of Lawson convenience stores when they purchase special items.
Two decades ago, Sony had displayed about as much skill in producing video games as Nintendo had Hollywood movies. Sure, Sony had published games sporadically under its Sony Imagesoft brand, but it’s hard to build much consumer goodwill with such a small catalogue of titles, especially when most of said titles are terrible.
Then, on December 3, 1994, the company launched the original PlayStation. While the 3DO and CD-i of fellow electronics manufacturers Panasonic and Phillips would both end in ignominious failure, Sony would go on to slice itself a very large piece of the pie in its new industry, dominating two generations of console gaming and remaining competitive ever since.
Of course, hardware isn’t worth much without fun games to play on it. Thankfully, Sony’s systems had plenty of hits, as shown by a poll of Japanese gamers’ 20 favorite PlayStation games.
There are two things that I think stand out as particularly memorable from my oldest brother’s wedding ceremony. One is the stuttering mess of a toast I gave as his best man. The other is that he and his wife cut their cake with an honest to God sword, since my brother, being a member of the Marine Corps, got married in his dress uniform, complete with Mameluke saber.
It definitely made for a much more dramatic effect than slicing up dessert with some puny kitchen knife, and you might now find yourself wondering how you could incorporate a similar idea for your own wedding reception. Thankfully, you don’t even need an official work blade, just a love of iconic video games, as demonstrated by the couple in Japan that cut their cake with the The Legend of Zelda’s Master Sword.
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