Tetsuya Nomura's Life of Crime
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 8 ก.ย. 2024
- In this episode we take a look back at the career of Tetsuya Nomura, a once celebrated Final Fantasy character designer and concept artist who for many became a controversial figure when becoming a writer director for Square Enix IP's such as Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy 7.
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In this episode we'll cover the following topics:
Tetsuya Nomura's career path
Why people dislike Tetsuya Nomura
The Birth of Kingdom Hearts
FF7 Advent Children
FF7 Remake and Rebirth
Thank you for supporting Alleyway Jack
#finalfantasy #tetsuyanomura #kingdomhearts
![Final Fantasy 7 : Cut Content & History [Part 1] | Cut Content](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/8r1gWAqLnGU/mqdefault.jpg)
![Final Fantasy 7 : Cut Content & History [Part 1] | Cut Content](/img/tr.png)
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Nomura gets way too much hate from folks who understand nothing about how project development actually works. IMO, he's one of the greats and has an insanely impressive resume.
I for one will always appreciate his work especially his art style and his contributions to the FF7 universe.
Ah no he is disliked because his crappy ideas have been polluting FF for over a decade.
One of the best artists in Jrpgs. He even did character design work on Xenoblade Chronicles 2. A legend.
@@kjh4496 What ideas of his are bad and what games specifically did he ruin? He didn't do anything in XIII other than character design, his vision of XV never came out because he was put in charge of too many projects (and I doubt SE would have him helm their 3 biggest upcoming games all at once if they thought he was bad at running projects --- most folks can't helm one AAA game at a time and they wanted him to work on 3), and he wanted VIIR to be closer to the original game.
What, specifically, has he done to Final Fantasy that you don't like? In terms of writing, he's credited with the Cloud/Zack scenario in VII, Cloud's subconscious scenario in VII, Shadow's arc in FFVI and Setzer's arc in FFVI. Which of those ideas are bad?
@@ideal8499 *destruction of the FF7 universe
Nomura is a legend simple as that.
Nomura is not free from criticism nor he should be but I really hate when he is blamed for things that are out of his control or he had no ties to.
Nomura is one if the most dehumanized game developers of all time. People don't really hate the man, but a weird homunculi of an idea of who they think he is.
Did you know, Nomura also created lots of iconic monsters/summon from FF like Cactuar, Tonberry, Gilgamesh and Carbuncle.
Respect to the legend. I was kind of a mild hater before this vid and reading comments
Unfortunately you've done Nomura a disservice by not pointing out that he came up with the base storyline for FF7, which he then collaborated with Sakaguchi and Nojima to refine, as well as coming up with several gameplay ideas for VI and VII, particularly the function of certain jobs and the limit break system. He was also somewhat involved with VIII's story, as well as doing sprite background art for Chrono Trigger.
I was never really in the camp that hated Nomura or his work; in fact I enjoy most of his character designs because they carry that distinct look where you can instantly tell that it’s his style. For better or worse, I think that’s admirable. Of course, sometimes it can be excessive…
*cough* KH Cloud*cough*
Even so, he never struck me as an artist who was narcissistic or didn’t care about the projects he directed. I think he’s still an auteur overall and worthy of his reputation, because let’s face it, I don’t think many of us would have the courage to direct follow-ups to a game like FFVII or steering a series like Kingdom Hearts without being weighed down. Nomura deserves credit for that most of all, if you ask me.
For me Nomura is one of those rare people whos art has only gotten so much better overtime. There are so many artist that i love that when they finally start to refine their art style it loses the originality and identity that made me love their work so much in the first place example being Ken Sugimori. Almost like thay have chiseled out too much of the imperfections that made me love their work. Nomura's art though has only gotten better while keeping what made his style so timeless. I swear this dude pushes me to be a better artist.
Old school Pokémon art had so much character. It’s so lifeless now
Masanori Sato(the artist of the Mario and Luigi series box art) remained pretty great but then he used the mainline colors of Mario and Luigi(RIP teal Luigi)
His fashion design is getting out of hand and cringy. Too many belt loops and weird zippers n shit.
@@BassMetal88 That’s what makes his style fun and unique.
People keep going after Nomura because he’s the easier target. the fans don’t actually know the names of the actually story writers. because he primarily has final say in approving the story he’s taking the fall.
Kazushige Nojima, Yoshinori Kitase(yes, he wrote some scenarios himself), Jun Akiyama, Daisuke Watanabe, Motomu Toriyama(fuck you) AND Sakaguchi himself. That should cover just about everybody i know off. Side note, Nomura's flaw in terms of developement is his need to include EVERYTHING on a single package which means making it harder or less sustainable to understand the games he's involved with in terms of plot, characters or lore (he makes pretty good designs tho).
@mikirapz1169 what the hell did Toriyama ever do to you? it's because of Final Fantasy XIII isn't it
@@madambutterfly1997 Anything to do with XIII? yes, yes it does. 😥
@@mikirapz1169 how dare you…XIII SAVED ME
You know what.. you’re right I don’t know enough to hate on Nomura like I have. I just associate advent children with him that I hate. The man is a legend though and I don’t know the behind the scenes. I love his character designs
5 minutes in and you have not mentioned one actual crime he commited
I know three things about Nomura. 1. He made cool iconic legendary designs; 2. He’s hot; 3. He’s not the one who made FFVII’s story convoluted. Overall sounds like a great guy! Now I’m going to watch this video to learn more
What did you learn?
Amazing research and great video! I’ve never been happier to sub. I’d be interested in videos covering the work of the writers themselves. Some of the writing in FF is amazing
The verbose complicated Nomura stuff is my favorite part of the Kingdom Hearts games lol
If something he is not lazy with story telling. I get nomuraisms might be frustrating but half of the time it's someone elses ideas like Kitases and they are anyway contributed to Nomura
4:18 based alleyway jack for that statement!
I think he fell flat with color choice at the least. In the 80s and 90s, characters were full of color and life. At a certain time, however, it became evident that Tetsuya Nomura became obsessed with the color black. It seems like every single character he created wore 95% black. This design choice (or lack thereof) has gone on for about two decades. I believe that "signature" of his is one component that people attach to him and are sort of tired of it.
Yeah or the "overuse" of belts and zippers.
truly one of the greats
Cope
I love Nomura and his work
So who's next to come out the flames of "AND WHAT?! Huh, What Are You Going To Do About It" In your thumbnail?
I’m a huge fan of KH and Nomura’s work in FF too. People blow the story of KH out of proportion. It’s no more complicated than your standard JRPG or anime or manga plot. Storyline is totally understandable, what often confuses people is the lore.
KH1 was okay, but just felt like a children's game (because it is). However, KH2 became strange, and KH3 was weirder. RPGs have never been perfect in terms of storytelling, but they've been much better previously.
The Kingdom Hearts spin-off stuff is so overblown. Handheld spin-offs across multiple consoles was the norm in that era but people act like Nomura was breaking some kind of taboo by throwing a spin-off on a handheld console. On top of that only ONE game was on the PSP and the rest were on the current Nintendo handheld. You could play three of the five spin-offs on the DS alone and a fourth on its successor system the 3DS. One game was on the PSP. People act like Nomura dropped 20 games on them in a day. It was five games released over 8 years and the majority of which could be played on a DS, a system that sold 154 million units.
I still think the criticism is deserved there tbh. Imagine spending that much on each hardware for one game or two games on each hardware just to get the storyline. It is a bit of an investment you gotta admit. It's one thing if it was maybe one game but KH had a bit of a canon lore thing to catch up on at the time at on 5 systems too. PS2, Gameboy Advanced, NDS, 3DS, PSP all ranging from $100-$250 USD each.
To give credit, Noruma definitely changed his mind on this in recent years with the re-releases and thank God for those, but you gotta admit there was definitely too much money spending for a coherent plotline after KH1. Unless we count watching for free on TH-cam?
One of the funniest things about this as well: some of Nomura's decisions were influenced by fans, so even though he may have wanted the story to go one way, the fans wanted it another. One good example of this is the return of Roxas, Xion and co. One of his interviews mentioned that originally Nomura planned an ending where they wouldn't return, but due to popular demand, he decided to bring those characters back. Now, those same fans blame him for the storytelling in KH3. Just thought I would mention this as well. I don't care what anyone says I'm a huge fan of Nomura's works (including the storytelling) and can't wait for the next KH.
Do you like Masanori Sato?
Overall, I do think the criticism surrounding Nomura, while not entirely undeserved, does get overblown. As a character designer, the man is fantastic, full stop. As a storyteller, he's had more mixed results, but I still hold a positive opinion of him, all things considered.
His work on the characters and story of OG FFVII was critical in making that game as timeless as it was, and while I didn't love Advent Children, I do think it had some interesting ideas, that just weren't realized as well as they could have been. The Remake trilogy seems to be trying to fix that. Hopefully it'll work out.
As for Kingdom Hearts...yeah the lore of that series became increasingly hard to follow for me with each new entry, and I can't say I'm a fan of how the writing for that series has been handled. By the end of KH3, I just kinda stopped caring about the actual narrative, and mainly kept going for the characters, and gameplay. I still consider myself a fan of the games themselves, just not because of their writing. 😅
Finally there's the new Final Fantasy VII Remake Trilogy, and while I obviously won't be able to make a definitive statement on my feelings until the third part is released, so far...I'm actually loving it. The characters (with the possible exception of Cid) feel true to the characters we remember from the original game, while also being more fleshed out than ever. I personally think the main narrative is still faithful to the original where it needs to be, while also adding more context that enhances the story and themes of the OG in a lot of ways. As for the completely new, "other worlds" stuff, I personally haven't found myself that confused by it so far. There are still questions to be answered, but I think what we've been given so far has been presented in such a way that is relatively easy to follow. Now, part 3 could be the game that messes everything up, and turns the whole thing into an absolute mess, but with how the previous two games have been handled, I'm actually feeling surprisingly hopeful that this won't be the case, and I'm looking forward to seeing how the trilogy wraps up.
this is how Nintendo have to do the remakes fate of my love for the franchise is on the line
He and Squaresoft/Enix make dope games. I liked some. Didn't like others. Either way this man is in the same echelon as Hironobo Sakaguchi, Hideo Kojima, Patrice Desilets, etc.. They help shape our childhoods through their imaginations. Awesome vid. Great narration.
No Versus XIII?
There’s a great piano track used a couple times in this vid, what is it? I’ve heard it in a few NSP vids too and can’t put my finger on which game it’s from
maybe the piano version of ff7 battle theme from advent children?
Starts playing about 0:06 should have said a time
@@kevinmcdonald6560 I’ll look it up thanks
@@kevinmcdonald6560 not that one unfortunately
@@johnwatchesyoutubeandstuff3947 ahh...it is from advent children, called for the reunion
I think Nomura is as talented a director as he is an artist. Anything he touches has stylish presentation and gameplay tied to the emotion of the characters by the lore, which is what people generally praise in any other video game. The only problem I have with Nomura's directing is that he's way too willing to give convoluted lore the spotlight. I think he just wants to make sure that all the work going into the games gets a chance to be appreciated, rather than letting that stuff exist in the background to be discovered, as his predecessors would do in older Square games. There's nothing wrong with that approach, but for me personally, it has a weird fish-eye lens effect on the world building which makes it slightly less immersive.
Oh come on. He really are a genius. For me he’s like kojima. Love his artstyle. Love kingdom hearts. Yes, I agree that’s third one some like weaker than it’s predecessor. But overall I like all his works. And you forget the world ends with you.
And storywise. I think American gamers like simple storytelling. If it becomes confusing it’s automatic bad for them. Funny thing are all final fantasy games has confusing story. Cloud/zack, time travel in ffviii. Hole story of ffx. But I think that’s makes them so good and people still loves it
Huh, I don’t absolutely despise him anymore.
What is the music at the beginning?
For the Reunion - it's from FF7 Advent Children
I’m surprised he didn’t get any criticism for his involvement in FF13 - even though I loved the games.
A divisive figure. I would acknowledge artists have good and bad ideas. Some are one trick ponies, some one hit wonders and some can be steady good but not great. Nomura was great at what he was good. But ffs don't let him near story stuff. Square always had better ppl for that anyway.
I laughed throughout most of this video lol it’s just crazy how he got away with so much
Im a HUGE fan of his Character design, but Story tellin' NAH bro... It's Mostly Overly Bloated & Convoluted ... IMO, but he has designed sum of my All time Favorite Characters in Final Fantasy...
I think even his writting has huge potential but what would help him tremendously I think is some other writer that assists him or even takes the lead to order his chaos a bit, so they act as some sort of duo - like back then in KH1 where it wasnt only Nomura (and you can tell because it feels a bit different as well imho). I dont remember anymore but it could even be that KH1 was not even written at all by Nomura or was it partly?
One who knows nothing, cannot understand anything
This title made me laugh. XD
I can understand the discontent from some, especially regarding Kingdom Hearts. My first was 358/2 Days when it came out, and I didn't really understand what was going on, but I got very attached to the main characters. And since then, I've played both KH1 and KH2 and watched playthroughs for most of the others. KH1 in particular, I absolutely loved --- and I did quite enjoy KH2 even though I think the storytelling is horrendous. But eventually, like a lot of people, I got kind of tired of having character arc resolutions fall flat or be clumsily thrown together while new elements I didn't care about were constantly being added. It felt like the series became more about waiting for the next lore dump than following a story. And I think, after the first game, all the Disney World hopping started to feel increasingly superfluous to the narrative itself despite being a core part of the gameplay. The games are fun but extremely messy, and I think they suffer from trying to be too many different things at one time.
Even so, I feel like it's become really popular to hate on Nomura over the years and blame him for the problems of everything he's involved in, when ultimately he's just one guy. Even as someone who's hardly an expert on the industry or Square as a company, I recognize there's typically a lot more nuance to these kinds of situations than what people perceive or even what's made available to the public eye.
The best part of Kingdom Hearts is the first four games: KH1, Chain of Memories, KH2, and 358/2 days. Everything after that, the writing and storytelling goes downhill. After KH3, I no longer have any interest in the franchise.
KH2 is the best game in the series in my opinion, and is likely the general consensus. The story is good overall, but the problem is that the Disney worlds begin to feel superfluous. In KH1, the Disney and final fantasy elements were part of the story, in 2 they feel like fan service and window dressing around the real story which is Sora Vs Organization XIII. Still, the story has the best highs in the franchise, it just begins to get away from its roots while, in my opinion, telling a compelling story and seeing three friends finally reunite. To me, that’s where the story should’ve ended.
@@jairekambui7738 I mostly agree (though I do still personally like KH1 best) and I do think the story could have ended there. Or, at the very least, I think Sora, Kairi, and Riku shouldn't have been the main characters anymore after 2 if they planned to make more games. Sora's main motivation the whole time was to find and reunite with them, and he succeeded. That was the arc, and KH2 brought it to a close. There were so many other characters introduced in Chain of Memories, KH2, and BBS that the story literally could have kept going without Sora as the main character, and it still would have worked. Instead, Sora had to be everyone's savior while pretty much every other character got shafted. Not saying Sora had to be thrown aside entirely because there were still other characters connected to him like Roxas and Ventus, but like... he, Riku, and Kairi could have taken a back seat.
@@supremeoverlorde2109 My other problem with where the story went after days is that the plot had this obsession with saving characters. Roxas is my favorite character in the series and his story really shines in 2 and 358. I really feel like it could’ve just ended with Roxas accepting his place as part of Sora again. It would’ve given the games a real sense of stakes and loss, as Sora remembers all the sacrifices people made for his sake and the sake of the world. Instead, because we need a new story arc to continue the series artificially, KH 3D says no one is really gone and that Sora has to save them all so they can have a new big battle against a NEW organization of resurrected and time traveling villains for some reason. It begins to become absurd and just continuing for the sake of continuing. The series is all about fan service at this point instead of telling a story. Even at the end of KH3, everyone is happy and Sora disappears, then is immediately seen in the dlc and KH4.
@@jairekambui7738 Yeah, it's true that they really couldn't just let anybody die. Even the villains. The Organization felt like a real threat in Chain of Memories, and KH2, and it was interesting seeing another side of it in 358... but by KH3 I couldn't take it seriously anymore.
It was nice seeing the other trios reunite, but none of them really contributed anything to the plot in KH3 apart from said reunions and beating up some Organization members.
IN MY OPINION (caps for the FF fanboys) Nomura has descended into self-indulgence. Like many other legendary veterans in creative fields, he has amassed so much clout and past success that no one wants to call out his stupid ideas. That goes doubly in Japanese society where social position (especially when it comes to age and seniority) is much more important.
I compare him to Ridley Scott. IMO, Scott is one of the greatest visual directors of all time. He's up there with Kubrick in being able to compose amazing shots. One thing, however, that he lacks is human understanding. There are stories of him not doing well directing novice actors, and that's why he likes to work with experienced actors like Russell Crowe again and again. Scott also doesn't seem to be able to tell a good script from a bad one. Back in the day, when he had to collaborate and compromise with his writers and producers, his work was legendary. But ever since Gladiator made a ton of money and won a bunch of Oscars, Scott's work has been very hit and miss (mostly miss)
Now I don't blame Nomura alone for Square's issues. Square has a ton of systemic issues that have been the roots of all their recent failures. But one of those issues is team leads not having enough oversight. These development cycles that go on forever, blow massive amounts of money and sometimes have to be restarted is proof of that. The veterans need to be reminded of how they thought back when they were young and hungry.
One final note that is incredibly important is that Nomura is the creative director of the FF7 remake series and KH. He sets and oversees the creative direction of those series. He doesn't come up with every stupid idea, but every decision (especially major plot decisions) go through him for approval. As the captain of those ships, he gets the lion's share of the praise if they do well or the blame if they don't.
I don't hate Nomura. I think he can do great work. But I don't think he should be where he is in terms of power and influence. When Sakaguchi was forced out, Nomura more or less was slotted into the place of the series' overseer. While some people scapegoat him for every problem at Square, the last 20+ years of FF, the time when most fans would agree the series has lost its way, has been characterized by him mostly being its guiding hand.
Personally, I want to see the post-Nomura age of FF. FF16 could have been the start of that, but the toxic backlash by certain fans stuck in the past (and Square overestimating the popularity of the series in their sales expectations) might have convinced Square to just go back to the same Nomura well forever more.
Nomura hasn’t been involved in a new mainline FF game since 8, outside of character designs. The closest would be FF15, but a lot of stuff was reworked from when it was originally Versus13. There is no Nomura age of FF. Nobody really took over once Sakaguchi left. The closest people would be Kitase and Nojima. Nomura is heavily involved in FF7 stuff and KH as a whole, as well as some spinoff stuff, and I think it’s fair to put blame on him for stuff people dislike with those properties. He is largely absent from everything else though, and it doesn’t make sense to blame him for those things.
Yeahno, FF16 should not have been such a derivative Game of Thrones clone. Sorry but I don't come to Final Fantasy for medieval sex in the hallway. >_>
might be a hot take but I miss his fanstical/colorful character designs over these drab/dark new ones.
not a fan of tetsuya as a writer, at least not after KH2.
@@TheColeTruth same. KH2 was where I dropped off originally, but I'm currently playing back through KH sequentially to see if my opinion changes
Artistic Design Work, AWESOME, Character design, AWESOME.
Kingdom Hearts, I hate it, but it's obviously not for me so I won't way it's a bad game.
Advent Children, absolute dogshit...
Now, listen real close cuz I'm gunna tell you a little secret here. THE FUCKING PROBLEMS WITH FF7 REMAKE ARE NOMURA'S GODDAMN FAULT. Did he write the plot, I don't know, did he write the script, I don't know, does it make any difference, no, it doesn't, do you know why, CUZ WHETHER HE WROTE IT OR NOT HE APPROVED IT, HE WAS THE FUCKING GAME DIRECTOR. Whether it was your terrible idea or someone else's idea you rubber stamped makes no difference. When Nomura read what they were planning he should have taken them off narrative development, burned their dogshit plot/script and started over. You wanna sit in the director's chair and get paid the big bucks, YOU WEAR IT WHEN THE GAME YOUR IN CHARGE OF FUCKIN SUX. Nomura was director of Final Fantasy 7 Kingdom Hearts Edition, HE BORROWED THE WHISPERS (A TERRIBLE PLOT DEVICE) STRAIGHT OUT OF KINGDOM FUCKING HEARTS...
This man's CV is outstanding no matter what the haters say. He's clearly exceptionally talented and more than a character designer.
@gregtroyan you just described why, every FF after 10 was complete trash, Ff7 remake and rebirth included
Incidentally ff5 was great, and exactly coz that dude was removed 😂
I CANNOT STAND Tetsuya at all. He has a 'thing' for weak characters and logical fallacy plots and power consistencies. All the games and plots he wrote and directed FFVII and FFXV had characters that were weaker than even strong humans in certain scenes in game. Cloud not being able to lift oxygen tanks or break out of ropes or jail cells or clamp robots when he is supposed to be super human. In FFXV the pansy boy crew can't even lift a car with with their power and struggle to push their broke down car with all four trying. So if they are weaker than real life worlds strongest men how do they fight demi gods and demons??? Oh that's right god but be giving them strength with the holy spirit because they are weak otherwise it is the only explanation.
Take a note square IF YOU ARE GOING TO MAKE CHARACTER BEAT UP GIANT MECHAS AND GODS MAKE THEM SUPER HUMAN IN ALL PLOT SCENES AND MAKE THEM HAVE THE ABILITY TO SHOOT BEAMS AND FLY IN PLOT SCENES!
At least FF's 1-3 made had consistent plot power as did FFVI and somewhat FFVIII. FFVII, FFX, and FFXV where the worst about it though ew.
verbose
“OH look it’s the guy who made Tabatha take the blame for that shit game FF15 when it was his project and he ran to KH3 like he had nothing to do with it and the hilarious part is KH3 definitely didn’t live up to the hype for waiting 14yrs for that game. 👀👀👀
OH look it's another angry rabid fan. 👀👀👀
"I'm going to ignore that Versus 13 was supposed to exist, but it got canned and Nomura was forced to work on Final Fantasy 15 instead just so I can rage about someone creating games that do not pander to me."
@@MastaGambit Not a fan at all just speaking the fact's that are literally out there if you do this little thing called research. 🤯
@@kenshin391 Nomura was forcibly taken off of XV in 2013, Tabat went -out of his way- to scrap Nomura's original story and characters (save for the main 4 and some side characters), radically change the themes of the game, cut entire sections and dumb down the gameplay. The original combat director even left after 2015 because Tabata's team had taken over.
FFXV was a thoroughly Tabata game.
If you love button mashing poor man's wanna be Witcher 3 rip offs and bastardizations of classic jrpg franchises then ya tetsuya nomora is great.
Not a single game that he's made has ever attempted to approximate the Witcher 3. He doesn't like traditional fantasy very much.
@@comfylain have you even played ff15
@@shedijon Yes. He didn't make that game.
He started development on Versus XIII in 2006, then development was halted until 2011. He was removed from the project and the new director, Hajime Tabata, took over, in 2013. He had nothing to do with the final project, and all that it used was his characters. The story, combat and world were all drastically and completely changed from his original vision that you can see in the 2011 trailers for Versus XIII.
@@comfylain ah yes right so besides being project director for 6 years ya he didn't make 15
@@shedijon He literally didn't. Follow the development cycle of the game and stop spouting off uneducated opinions as though you know a single thing about it.
He worked on a game called Versus XIII from 2006 to 2011. It was cancelled, then "rebooted" as Final Fantasy XV in 2013, but he was immediately let go from the project, and everything about it was radically changed from his original vision.
Essentially nothing, not a single thing, that he worked on, apart from character designs, made it into Final Fantasy XV.
Awful writer
Motomu Toriyama is a legend to