"We can't go on making games in this way": Final Fantasy 7's development was so chaotic, Tetsuya Nomura says it changed how the team approaches games

Final Fantasy 7's original developers have admitted the original game's production was so chaotic that they knew things had to change going forward for future games in the series.

Game Informer has recently interviewed both Yoshinori Kitase and Tetsuya Nomura about the development of the original Final Fantasy 7, and both don't paint a pretty picture. Nomura, for one, remembers coming into the Square offices and sometimes not knowing what to expect. 

"There were scripts and then suddenly things that are not even in the script that the character is now saying in the game that we've never even heard of," Nomura recalls. "Some departments just wanted to include the character saying these things. It was that kind of world then." 

What might have saved Final Fantasy 7, director Kitase remembers, is the fact that he worked closely with writer Kazushige Nojima to make sure everything made sense. "There were teams working on each character and the things that they say in the storyline, but then overall, Nojima-san was the final reviewer," Kitase says.

"That's bringing the whole storyline together. That practice was carried on for future titles to have that cohesion. But besides that, it was sort of an 'anything goes' type of world then," the former Final Fantasy 7 director and current Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth producer remembers. 

Final Fantasy 7's development was so chaotic that Square's own staff knew they couldn't continue making games like this: "After we had finished working on 7, we thought to ourselves, 'We can't go on making games in this way,'" says Nomura of the turbulent period.

And so they did change. Beginning with Final Fantasy 8, Square's developers started an approach where teams would now collaborate with one another instead of sneaking work into a game without first seeking the approval of a wider audience or someone senior in the development pipeline.

Obviously, Final Fantasy 7 turned out to be received rather well, in spite of its distraught development. So well, in fact, that Square Enix is in the midst of dedicating an entire trilogy of games to remake it for an adoring fanbase nearly three decades after it came out. 

Speaking of, Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth launches next month on February 29, exclusively for PS5. 

You can read up on our upcoming PS5 games guide for a look ahead at all the other exclusives Sony has lined up for the year.