Each character in Final Fantasy 7 Revelation's ragtag party will be able to equip four different classes, called FITS here in this game, and director Naoki Hamaguchi says the process of making them reminded him how tough game development has gotten in recent years.
Final Fantasy 7 Revelation might be remaking the last act of Final Fantasy 7, but it's reaching even further back into Final Fantasy history with a job system called FITS (deep breath, Function Integrated Tactical Suitwear). Each character has four FITS that'll change their combat capabilities and give them a snazzy new outfit - so far, we've only seen Cloud dressed up as a Warrior and TIfa in a Black Mage fit.
"It did make me realize all over again how hard it is to develop games these days. When you look at some of the early Final Fantasy games that have job systems, you could put a lot in there," Hamaguchi tells GamesRadar+ in a recent interview from Final Fantasy 14 Fan Fest Berlin.
He's definitely not wrong. Take Final Fantasy 5, one of the series' classic pixel art games that let you mix-and-match each party member with over 20 jobs. Games have only gotten way more graphically intensive over time, and every playable character in Revelation's cast has their own bespoke animations. A far cry from the days where the pixels that represented an FF5 character all awkwardly shimmy forward to attack.
These days, wanting to have 20 or 30 jobs isn't really feasible for a standalone game, Hamaguchi continues via a translator. In fact, it's "just insanely difficult" unless you're an "ongoing title" that's adding content "bit by bit," as is the case with MMORPG Final Fantasy 14.
Still, the jobs that are available in Final Fantasy 7 Revelation apparently do a lot of heavy lifting to shake up the trilogy's combat. "The FITS system has four different outfits for each character, and each of those is quite a defined role. In the end, that has added quite a lot of breadth of strategy for players to engage with, so I think it has resulted in a really good addition to the battle system," Hamaguchi explains. "Even though we only have four FITS, we have a lot of characters, so it was quite a lot of work."
