It's one of the loudest questions fans are asking. Now that we know the Final Fantasy VII Remake will be divided into chapters, are we still getting that beautiful open world to explore upon escaping Midgar, or will it be disappointingly changed into a series of linear paths?
Today the Japanese gaming magazine Dengeki published a short question-and-answer session with the game's director, Tetsuya Nomura and its producer, Yoshinori Kitase. The interview was translated and put online by the website
Gematsu. One of the questions the magazine asked was whether we were getting an open world map or not, and Kitase said....he wasn't ready to reveal that. “We can’t say anything yet, but we don’t plan on fussing about whether it’s a so-called open-world or sandbox. But since Nomura is more focused on the creation of the scenery, we want to express an environment character actions affect the scenery.”
The pair cleared up a few more things. They mentioned the FF7 remake would have full voice acting, but I think everyone expected this already. They also said they were looking into keeping the "fan favorite" minigames (I'm guessing that would be most of them), possibly improving on them a bit.
They revealed production is still early. “We’re at the stage where we can say we’re finally getting started. We have ideas regarding battles, too, but it will take time to drop them into the actual game.” They also confirmed the relationship status affected by your responses to people's questions would be in the remake....and so would the Honey Bee Inn. (See what you've all done? Did you really want to see THAT in HD?)
Finally Dengeki asked if people could expect anything special to happen upon the 20th anniversary of Final Fantasy VII's Japanese release, in January of 2017. Kitase's response? “I can’t say anything at the moment. (Laughs.)”
