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The debacle surrounding Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth’s use of yellow paint has resurfaced with director Naoki Hamaguchi saying it was “necessary,” when in reality there’s already an obvious solution that exists used in games like Tomb Raider. Speaking to Gamesradar about the yellow paint debacle, Hamaguchi said, “I think as a game, there is definitely a need for that kind of thing in a lot of ways”.
The Final Fantasy 7 Remake and Rebirth director elaborated, “The need to guide players around from a gameplay perspective and show them what can be done, what they need to do, there are definitely times where that is needed”. Rather than the existence of yellow paint itself, Hamaguchi believes it is “more of a debate about how it’s done”.
Lastly, Hamguchi admitted there will always be people who believe it “doesn’t fit at all,” but he is of the opinion that “there is definitely a need, and it’s something that is definitely worth looking at”.
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth’s Yellow Paint Solution Used in Tomb Raider
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth is not the only game heavily criticised for using yellow paint, and other games have attempted to avoid the whole debacle by using white paint instead. Yellow paint is a lot more offensive to the eyes than white, making it a much bigger immersion breaker, but the obvious solution is to allow players to freely disable visual signposting just like Eidos Montreal did with the underrated Shadow of the Tomb Raider.
Naoki Hamaguchi is right that signposting is necessary to help players navigate, but there should be the option to disable it for players who want full immersion. Shadow of the Tomb Raider had an exploration difficulty level that on Hard completely removed white paint, and that was back in 2018.
Again, Hamaguchi is right about wanting to include visual signposting, but there should be options for players to disable. There are also other examples of signposting added by developers, and Final Fantasy 7 Part 3 would probably benefit from ditching yellow for white.
Speaking of Final Fantasy 7 Remake Part 3, there’s no release window for the game but Hamaguchi has said “development is “going extremely well” with a “lot of the content already playable”. The director has also shared that Square Enix is “actively considering” DLC for the finale, leading to hopes of a playable Advent Children.
As for Lara Croft, if the next new Tomb Raider game still “continuing” with help from Amazon doesn’t include the same depth of settings as Shadow, we will have taken ten massive steps backwards.
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