Cognition Dissemination: How Could Nomura Be Handling These Final Fantasy VII Remake Leaks?

The existence of a Final Fantasy VII Remake demo quickly became one of the worst-kept secrets in gaming history in a hilariously short time. Once evidence of its data was discovered through a logo within the PlayStation Network database (not even the first time this happened in the last month), it didn’t take long for every gaming website under the sun to report on it despite it happening on Christmas Eve. It became a case of when we’ll get it, and how we’ll be able to get it. Square Enix knows this is a highly anticipated game, so it wouldn’t be a surprise if they didn’t simply want to release the demo to PSN. They might attach it to a PlayStation Network subscription or a preorder bonus.

Anyway, that’s not the real story here anymore. Someone managed to download the entire demo and played through the whole thing. (The playthrough has since been deleted from YouTube, unsurprisingly.) It goes through the bombing mission, making it an extended version of the demo the press and gaming show attendees were able to play a few months ago. It looks to be robust enough for anyone who plays it to see if they’ll like this remake. But the point remains that this was supposed to be a surprise, so it’s a hell of a screw-up on Sony or Square Enix’s part — or both of them.

Actually, wait, that’s not the real story here anymore either. It didn’t take long for dataminers to raid the demo’s files look for treasure, and oh did they find it. It turns out the files contain data for the whole goddamned game. There are now massive spoilers all across social media and message boards, which feature character models for every character in the game and details of story changes this first episode of the Remake saga will have. Even worse, there’s even data in the files for the next part, as preliminary assets exist for locations and characters outside Midgar. It’s a minefield for anyone trying to go into this version fresh, but that’s still possible if you know where to avoid.

Here’s a big question: How do we think director and lead character designer Tetsuya Nomura is feeling about all this? He was very clearly irate when Kingdom Hearts III (for which he served the same creative roles) leaked last year through an early copy, and spoilers for the game were all across the internet well before its late-January release. Now, history is repeating itself, with FFVII Remake spoilers available online a whole two months before release. The reasons why it happened are different here, but it’s achieved the same result.

At the time, Nomura suggested ending simultaneous worldwide releases as a consequence, a nonsensical idea given the number of problems it would have created rather than solved. It’s not like games don’t leak in Japan, not to mention that westerners would have needed to dodge spoilers from legitimate releases in Asian territories in addition to potential leaks, which made it clear which audience he really cares about. Given that FFVII Remake is also releasing simultaneously worldwide, someone must have talked some sense into him. But it wouldn’t be a surprise if he’s feeling vindicated now, even though he shouldn’t because his solution was inane.

Nomura hasn’t commented just yet, if he will at all. The only disappointment thus far has come from scenario writer Kazushige Nojima, who mentioned on Twitter that the leak “sure tramples over a lot of things.” That’s nothing compared to Nomura’s response to KHIII above, of course.

The biggest difference between this incident and the KHIII one is how Square Enix is more at fault. Why in the world was all this data within the code for the demo at all? Dataminers will never pass up an opportunity to raid folders, and if that didn’t happen now, it would have happened when the full demo released. It’s hard to believe that no one at the company realized this could happen, but Square Enix can be oblivious at times.

It’s a certainty that Square Enix will take precautionary measures in the future, but who knows what those could be. It’s unlikely that they’ll end worldwide releases, since that wouldn’t solve anything and this particular issue had nothing to do with the actual release. They’ll more likely respond by simply no longer providing demos before releases, even though, again, it’s their fault they left all this data on the demo in the first place. Demos are already scarcer than they once were, especially for RPGs. Games in the genre don’t tend to demo well because of how slow a burn they are in their earlier hours. Hopefully Square Enix (and other companies that still provide demos) doesn’t go this far, but again, we’re discussing a company that doesn’t always follow logic.

Good luck to anyone who wants to dodge all the spoilers while waiting for the full Final Fantasy VII Remake release on March 3rd, but it should be possible depending on where you go and who you know. In the meantime, we’re still waiting for Square Enix to provide a date for the wide release of the demo, which they might get on after removing all the story data from the files. Surely they wouldn’t do anything silly like cancelling the demo release after all this, right? Right?

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