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[liquidtmd]

Is this the first number we've seen without including marketing?

I've always seen it listed in the hundreds of millions due to marketing, I don't recall it ever being split up or actually confirmed.

Fantastic article.

First time for me hearing that number too.

 

[MilkBeard]

He's been saying time and again that he doesn't want to do AAA development anymore. Just recently again in the Glixel interview:

Glixel: So, Final Fantasy will be 30 years old. What would you say if Square Enix wanted to bring the original development team back to make a commemorative, anniversary project with Yoshitaka Amano, Nobuo Uematsu, and you?

Sakaguchi: Well, we would have to make it in pixel art. It would be fun if it was a promotional video or something, not a full-length game. It’s a lot of work to make a game.

Glixel: I’m curious what you would had done if you had the technical power we have right now back when you started making games.

Sakaguchi: I might not even think about making games. It would look too intimidating. It’s not something I could make on my own.

Glixel: How many people made the first Final Fantasy?

Sakaguchi: By the end, probably 20 people. But at first there were only four of us.

Glixel: So, we wouldn’t have a game by you if the technology in 1987 was what it is today?

Sakaguchi: No, I don’t think so.​

But I could see him make another mid-budget console game, like The Last Story. Maybe something for Nintendo again. Didn't he say they'd announce a new console game this year? He also said he'd be planning to open up a new studio in Tokyo.

It's such a shame he has lost desire to work in AAA games. I completely understand, because the bigger the team gets, the less personal control a creator can have on a project. He probably liked working with a tight group of people. Plus, he's just too old now to devote the time and energy to make a new game that pushes the limits like VII did.

I will look forward to whatever Sakaguchi puts out next, but I will definitely still be sad that he won't be helming a huge game that pushes the boundaries of game design anymore.

 

[Kinhow]

Good old Square... WTF happened???

Enix happened.

 

[sixteen-bit]

Thanks for the heads up, OP. Saved for later reading.

 

[LordOfLore]

This should be added to OP:

 

[vato_loco]

Incredible read. Well worth the time, I completely reccomend it to anyone remotely interested in the game and its history.

Thanks!

Enix happened.

Actually The Spirits Within happened.

 

[Meowster]

Good old Square... WTF happened???

Amazing GOAT Director Kitase retired and shitty Producer Kitase doesn't know how to control his directors.

 

[LordCiego]

Fantastic article.

Reading about Sakaguchi, I think its best for his legacy not having worked on the big budget projects of today, he seems to be a very insticts based guy and with how budgets can spiral out off control things could have gone bad for him, just look what happened to one of his ex-partners doing FF XV.

Also reading about Microsoft in this interview, then seeing the Scalebound canceled thread, is doing wonders for my opinion of Microsoft's business organization skills for Japanese developers...

Was going to post this, but I think its just a Microsoft culture thing in general not only with Japanese developers.

 

[TheStruggler]

well I hope its mostly oral and not to....brief baby, you know oral and brief

 

[I speel my dreenk]

Incredible article, and an impressive undertaking. It's really cool to get these sorts of insights from Japanese developers, especially from that era - and specifically from a game I love.

 

[jmdajr]

This whole thing was amazing. Very inspiring.

Plus, I felt like I was back in the dorm playing the game and ignoring my classes. Great memories.

 

[Linkura]

I'm not even a fan of FF7 (though I am of JRPGs and FF in general), and this was an amazing article. A ton of insight on the creation and localization process. Bravo, Mr. Leone.

 

[Muffdraul]

Loving this article very much, perfect timing for me. FFXV made me very nostalgic and I've been thinking a lot about FFVII lately. Not just the game itself, but the whole deal. FFVI was the game that made me fall in love with the series, so the time between FFVII being announced and its release (both in JP and NA) was a very magical time for me.

 

[Regulus Tera]

Good old Square... WTF happened???

I don't think this is a case of them becoming greedier and more about them not having had someone able to manage expanding scopes in game development since Sakaguchi left the company.

 

[mcw]

Holy shit, this thing is fucking incredible.

 

[LordOfLore]

He really thought he could be a big time Hollywood producer:

 

[HeelPower]

This should be added to OP:

These people are true legends.

 

[Asd202]

Wow at that Nintendo quote. Salty as fuck

 

[thelatestmodel]

Bloody hell, this article is massive. Amazing job by Matt Leone and all involved. A definite keeper, one for the archives.

 

[OniBarubary]

This is some fucking amazing journalism right here

 

[CrichtonKicks]

Is this the first number we've seen without including marketing?

I've always seen it listed in the hundreds of millions due to marketing, I don't recall it ever being split up or actually confirmed.

Fantastic article.

The thing about the $40 million budget is that it's simultaneously incredibly high (AAA games 10 years later would be made for half of that) but also an entirely reasonable degree of risk. As they state in the article, there was plenty of sales data on the series to make Square confident that they would be profitable in Japan alone even spending that kind of money.

I think current publishers (SE included) would do better to manage their risk and keep budgets in line with reasonable sales expectations.

It also highlights how dumb the investment in Spirits Within was shortly thereafter because there was no evidence that the film market was ready to support an older skewing animated film to the extent needed to make the movie profitable.

But, man, reading the article makes it apparent how much SE has fallen as an organization. With FF7 they were able to put together a staff to make timely decisions on pushing technology forward and still deliver the game in a reasonable time frame on a new platform.

It's hard to believe the same company behind "HD towns are hard!" was at the forefront of 3D graphics technology a decade earlier.

 

[The Emperor]

Well done Matt Leone and everyone else

Incredible article, one of the greats in videogaming journalism, much like the game it is about.

Tetsuya Nomura
Character and battle visual director, Square Japan I’m a little bit fickle, so I’m not the type of person to work on one thing and focus simply on that. Say, if I’m drawing — I wouldn’t work on one single piece at a time. It would be more like four or five and I’d rotate between them. Or if I’m working on a design document for a game and I feel I need a change of pace, I’ll start drawing something instead. Or if I need to draw, I might work on different projects to change my mood and get that sort of refresh. So that’s how I prioritize those kinds of things. But if there is a deadline, of course I’ll prioritize that first.

LOL this bit scares me though and I can see how this came to fruition over the last decade with how Nomura has worked

 

[Big Papa Husker]

I've never even seen that prototype FF7 SNES screenshot......holy shit is that cool.


Definitely going to read this after work

Is there a larger version?

 

[Celine]

I've never even seen that prototype FF7 SNES screenshot......holy shit is that cool.

I don't think it's a screenshot from a SNES prototype.
More like a concept screen of a 2D version.

Is there a larger version?

 

[The Antitype]

There really was something special about FF7.

It caught a zeitgeist in a way thats hard to describe. The graphics were new sure, but the main characters were relatably emo at a time before emo was tired and cliche. You were racehorse breeding and crossdressing the same time you playing eco-terrorist and mercenary.

It was just a weird, perfect mix of all the burgeoning anxieties of the time, mixed with accessible gameplay and beautiful presentation.

It was flawed and perfect at the same time.

 

[Celine]

There really was something special about FF7.

It caught a zeitgeist in a way thats hard to describe. The graphics were new sure, but the main characters were relatably emo at a time before emo was tired and cliche. You were racehorse breeding and crossdressing the same time you playing eco-terrorist and mercenary.

It was just a weird, perfect mix of all the burgeoning anxieties of the time, mixed with accessible gameplay and beautiful presentation.

It was flawed and perfect at the same time.

I agree.
FF7 schizophrenic nature is one of its strongest asset.

 

[dmr87]

And I thought I couldn't get more hyped about the remake.

Insane article, well done Matt!

 

[jett]

Yeah, “king,” yeah. [Laughs] Actually, you know, at most of the management meetings at Squaresoft in Japan, without him, there were no decisions made. He told the management committee when a game was going to be completed and what kind of marketing he wanted to have. So yeah, he was the king. He was controlling the entire operation.

The Gooch really was Squaresoft. Imagine where this company could be today if he hadn't made that one single blunder.

 

[T.Slothrop]

The most interesting stuff to me was from Hiroshi Kawai. He gave the most honest portrait of the company and the personalities working there.

 

[eyeball_kid]

I'm still getting through this amazing article. I'm amazed at how much Square bet the farm on FF7, spending so much on development. Miyamoto seemed like a Jobs kind of figure, willing to go big and commit fully on something he felt was the right direction.


It's interesting how in a way FF7, and Yamauchi's hubris and unwillingness to listen to Square, started the end of Nintendo's dominance.

Shinichiro Kajitani
Vice president, Square USA

At that time, Square was really close to Nintendo — we were basically like a second party for them. So when their new system was in development, we gave them lots of advice, like, “You’re going to need a CD-ROM drive for it,” “You don’t have enough bandwidth to do what we’re trying to do,” and, “With what you have now, we’re not going to be able to make an RPG.” We gave them lots of advice. But [Nintendo president] Yamauchi-san at Nintendo basically refused to listen to any of it. And that’s when Sakaguchi-san and the management team at Square decided, “OK, we’re going to go with Sony now.”

It's surprising to hear one of the team be so openly critical of a colleague. If he felt that way about Nomura, there must have been quite a number of people who felt that he had gotten a big head.

Hiroshi Kawai
Character programmer, Square Japan

I might sound a little condescending here, but he seemed like a very dedicated artist back during Final Fantasy 7. I don’t know what about 7 itself, or perhaps it was actually Final Fantasy 8 that changed the tide, but he seemed to become a very different person at that point, where the authority that he gained from Final Fantasy 7 and Final Fantasy 8 got to a point where he became sort of untouchable in a similar vein as Sakaguchi-san. You couldn’t really fight against him.

This EA exec seems like a total disrespectful, arrogant douchebag. No wonder Square U.S. hated him, even without considering the cultural differences:

John Riccitiello
President and chief operating officer, Electronic Arts (1998-2004)

It was trivial. I mean, first off, the most senior person that was working on the deal [at Square] in the U.S. would have been a junior manager at EA. They were young and inexperienced. … There was a guy, Iwasaki or whatever, at that point. He was also a pretty junior guy, and a good guy — nothing wrong with him. ... There was definitely a little bit of friction. … If you were taking a look at “the battlefield,” it would look peaceful and harmonious from 30 feet in the air. But in the foxhole or under the table, some of the children were foot fighting a little bit, I guess. But it was never much more than that, really.

 

[T.Slothrop]

I'm still getting through this amazing article. I'm amazed at how much Square bet the farm on FF7, spending so much on development. Miyamoto seemed like a Jobs kind of figure, willing to go big and commit fully on something he felt was the right direction.


It's interesting how in a way FF7, and Yamauchi's hubris and unwillingness to listen to Square, started the end of Nintendo's dominance.



It's surprising to hear one of the team be so openly critical of a colleague. If he felt that way about Nomura, there must have been quite a number of people who felt that he had gotten a big head.



This EA exec seems like a total disrespectful, arrogant douchebag. No wonder Square U.S. hated him, even without considering the cultural differences:

Not saying he isn't arrogant, but John Riccitello, as game company CEOs go, is one of the most successful of all time. So I think he was just being very honest because he was the head of that company and likely brokered the whole deal.

 

[sonicmj1]

I didn't think Matt Leone could top his Street Fighter 2 oral history, but he did it. This is staggering in scope.

I'd almost certainly pitch in for a Patreon that gave me more of these articles. Just saying.

The Mistwalker/Microsoft Japan situation sounded like an absolute nightmare.

Hiroshi Kawai
Unreal, in terms of graphics, it's very capable and very, very impressive. But it was still essentially in alpha stage when they were trying to push it onto us. ... And even the devs [at Epic], their attitude — I'm not saying this with any disrespect, but it was one of those, ”If you don't like it, don't use it" [situations]. Their devs were very clear from the get-go, saying, ”This is what Unreal's made for, and if it fits your needs, great. If it doesn't, you're on your own. If you need documentation, read the source code. If you need help, write us in English." ...

And while we were making a little progress on that front, we were running into personnel issues in terms of trying to hire people. Microsoft has this interesting sort of hiring scheme where, even if you say you had $100 million in your budget, you would be capped to this thing called ”headcount" and it would be completely independent of your budget. So you may only have a headcount for two full-time employees even though you have a massive budget, and you could not increase that. You'd have to essentially trade horses with some other team who's willing to give up their headcount, and even then it's still a precious commodity.

Yoshihiro Maruyama
We couldn't use Microsoft employees to complete the projects because their overhead was very expensive. So we had no choice but to create a separate company. ... It was a paper company just to hire developers.

Hiroshi Kawai
So despite having this new company ... we were just calling it NewCo at the time, before it became feelplus — and although we had this shell of the company to work with, we still couldn't get our devs. And I don't know who got wind of it first, but ... there was a role-playing game that was being developed by a company called Nautilus, who was a subsidiary of ... Aruze, who was primarily into pachinko games in Japan. ...

I think they were no longer interested in maintaining that team. They were saying, ”If anybody's interested in taking this team on, we're here to listen." And they had a full dev team there, and the dev team had been making role-playing games at that point. So the powers that be thought, ”Hey, why not just combine those guys with existing Microsoft guys and we now have double the capacity, so look out."

Well, unfortunately it didn't, because the guys from Nautilus — I guess they were kind of given the cold shoulder. I mean, they were essentially being kicked out on the street, although they didn't end up being on the street because we picked them up so quickly, but they were kind of treated that way, so they were very suspicious of the guys from Microsoft. And especially the devs were absolutely not interested in using Unreal. They were saying, ”You cannot trust code written by a third party. We have no idea what's in it. We won't be able to customize it." Yadda, yadda, yadda. So we have 10 engineers from Nautilus, 10 plus engineers from Microsoft, and they're not talking to each other.

Tatsuya Yoshinari
It was really difficult working in that environment with two separate teams and hierarchies because the management lines weren't clearly set as far as who reports to whom, and who's whose boss and everything. For example, Kawai-san, who had been my boss at Square, went over to feelplus, and basically for the first time, he was no longer my boss. And that was pretty strange, that this guy who had been my boss for a while suddenly wasn't anymore, even though I was still working with him. And even though he technically wasn't my boss anymore, the guy who was in place as my manager wasn't really exactly the best fit for the job. So to be honest, deep down, I never really considered that guy to be my boss. I trusted Kawai-san a lot more. ... So yeah, it was a bit difficult working with two separate teams and two separate hierarchies with really kind of vague and not very clear-cut management report lines.

 

[HeelPower]

Its weird how FF7 is such an important game.

It says so much about the history of games at that point.Indicative of Nintendo's approach,Sony's approach and the direction games were headed in general.

Not only is it a great game,its a reflection of so many things at the same time.

 

[dracula_x]

"How we designed Polygon's Final Fantasy 7 oral history" → https://storytelling.voxmedia.com/2...esigned-polygons-final-fantasy-7-oral-history

This style played with the nostalgia of old video games, incorporating
pixel art and the colors used in Final Fantasy 7’s branding.

Using Polygon’s branding as a guide, this was the approved styling for
the feature.

 

[iMerc]

It's interesting how in a way FF7, and Yamauchi's hubris and unwillingness to listen to Square, started the end of Nintendo's dominance.

absolutely. but there was a lot more to it than just that. this article is excellent, but it doesn't cover a lot of what went on during that time in relation to the groundwork that led to the split.
it wasn't simply "oh technical limitation. ok, we'll go with sony now". that's a massive oversimplification. the technical limitations of the n64 was simply the final nail in the squaresoft/nintendo partnership.

their r'ship already soured significantly during the end of FFVI, bahamut lagoon, & treasure hunter g.
this is actually a noteworthy aspect of why super mario rpg came to existence in the first place.


but absolutely excellent article, and a shining example of the rare occasion where gaming 'journalism' actually lives up to that name.

 

[Sgt. Kabukiman]

Just started reading this and watched the first video. This is an exceptional article, kudos to Polygon.

 

[Schopenhauerian]

One interesting thing in here is that they basically say that it was more about the N64's performance capabilities being unable to handle the game than storage space, though the storage space was a concern.

...Square leaving Nintendo for Sony is the stuff of legends and hearing about the technical limits of the PSX vs N64 stuff was super interesting...

...It's interesting how in a way FF7, and Yamauchi's hubris and unwillingness to listen to Square, started the end of Nintendo's dominance...

Also interesting to consider Sega's proximity, both to Sony and to the Silicon Graphics N64 prototype, which I haven't seen mentioned very often in this context:

http://www.sega-16.com/2006/07/interview-tom-kalinske/
Tom Kalinske (former CEO, Sega of America): ...In fact, taking it to the next step, at one point Olaf, Mickey Schulhoff (former Sony of America CEO), and I discussed that since we had such a great relationship from working on the Sega CD... I remember we had a document that Olaf and Mickey took to Sony that said they'd like to develop jointly the next hardware, the next game platform, with Sega, and here's what we think it ought to do. Sony apparently gave the green light to that. I took it to Sega of Japan... But Sega of Japan didn't want any of that...

Sega-16: That sounds a lot like what happened with the Sony/Nintendo CD-ROM. Sony was willing to enter into a joint hardware platform but was ultimately rejected by Nintendo in favor of Phillips.

Tom Kalinske: Yeah, but I think ours preceded that though.

Sega-16: So Sony essentially brought their ideas to the two big guns in the industry, only to be turned down and forced out on their own...

Tom Kalinske: ...we all knew that there would come a day when the Genesis would no longer have a life, and we'd have to move on to the next technology... When we started the CD-ROM efforts, clearly those were the early days of using optical discs for video games...we had been contacted by Jim Clark, the founder of SGI (Silicon Graphics Inc.)... So the [Sega of Japan] team arrived, and the senior VP of hardware design arrived, and when they reviewed what SGI had developed... they basically said that it was kind of interesting, but... they had lots of little technical things that they didn't like: the audio wasn't good enough; the frame rate wasn't quite good enough, as well as some other issues. So, the SGI guys went away and worked on these issues and then called us back up...This time, Nakayama went with them. They reviewed the work, and there was sort of the same reaction: still not good enough...They had spent all that time and effort on what they thought was the perfect video game chipset, so what were they supposed to do with it? I told them that there were other companies that they should be calling... Needless to say, he did [Clark and Yamauchi apparently met in 'early 1993'], and that chipset became part of the next generation of Nintendo products (N64)...

iMerc also mentions Super Mario RPG:

...it wasn't simply "oh technical limitation. ok, we'll go with sony now". that's a massive oversimplification. the technical limitations of the n64 was simply the final nail in the squaresoft/nintendo partnership. their r'ship already soured significantly during the end of FFVI, bahamut lagoon, & treasure hunter g. this is actually a noteworthy aspect of why super mario rpg came to existence in the first place...

I'd just recently asked about Super Mario RPG in another thread: seems like something of an unusual arrangement, given that it was a partnership between Square and Nintendo that overlapped temporally with Square's move to Sony with FF7. Would definitely be interested to hear how you think it fits into the picture.

 

[AZUMIKE]

Just finished this. Definitely an excellent collection of interviews that tell an intriguing story about FFVII.

 

[TheKastorian]

Such a great article for -possibly- the greatest RPG of all time.

Also:

Hiroshi Kawai

Character programmer, Square Japan

I'll say this. I'm impressed with what Nintendo [was] able to do with the 64 hardware. Mario, Zelda — their devs must be top notch to be able to do that. But that's essentially the extent of what you can do with the hardware. And you would get nowhere near anything like a Final Fantasy running on it.

I guess this confirms that the PS1 was indeed a more capable piece of hardware compared to the N64.

 

[Go_Ly_Dow]

This is a wonderful read.

Gonna finish it tomorrow.

 

[Barrel Cannon]

Polygon occasionally has golden articles like this. Thanks for posting this OP

 

[adz2ka]

I don’t remember the specific title I was jealous of, but it was from the Suikoden series — whichever title that was out at that time. It loads a lot, and I was thinking that it stopped the game too often, but the quality was really high. That was kind of the trigger to make me think in a different way.

Nobuo Uematsu on listening to the Suikoden soundtrack

 

[TheJollyCorner]

The jump in the overall sound (i.e. more realistic instruments) from FFVII and VIII was always interesting to me. I recall liking VII's melodies, but ultimately being disappointed in the sound quality. Uematsu's MIDI 'electric-kazoo' sound was charming during the 8 and 16-bit eras, but I recall going into VII with much higher expectations due to the CD quality. Even as the man himself points out, Suikoden's OST was amazing in both composition and instrument quality. It sounded like a generation jump from the previous gen.

It's not that I expected some boombastic fully-orchestrated OST for VII, but I certainly expected something a bit more than a minor step up from the 16-bit era.

His explanation makes a lot of sense now (i.e. he didn't want the music to add to the loading times). Glad he corrected it with VIII. I'll never forget the first song I heard from VIII, which was Breezy, and being ridiculously happy that it actually sounded like a real acoustic guitar.

 

[mikezilla2]

thanks OP

 

[eyeball_kid]

absolutely. but there was a lot more to it than just that. this article is excellent, but it doesn't cover a lot of what went on during that time in relation to the groundwork that led to the split.
it wasn't simply "oh technical limitation. ok, we'll go with sony now". that's a massive oversimplification. the technical limitations of the n64 was simply the final nail in the squaresoft/nintendo partnership.

I wasn't aware of prior conflicts between Nintendo and Square, but I was more so referring to the N64 hardware. If Yamauchi had listened to Square, they might have shipped a machine that could keep compete with the PS1, had more impressive 3D games, and may have even still had FF7 on their platform (though it probably would've been multi). Things could've been very different if Yamauchi had taken Square's criticisms of the hardware to heart.

The jump in the overall sound (i.e. more realistic instruments) from FFVII and VIII was always interesting to me. I recall liking VII's melodies, but ultimately being disappointed in the sound quality. Uematsu's MIDI 'electric-kazoo' sound was charming during the 8 and 16-bit eras, but I recall going into VII with much higher expectations due to the CD quality. Even as the man himself points out, Suikoden's OST was amazing in both composition and instrument quality. It sounded like a generation jump from the previous gen.

It's not that I expected some boombastic fully-orchestrated OST for VII, but I certainly expected something a bit more than a minor step up from the 16-bit era.

Yeah I agree, the cheesy MIDI soundtrack on FF7 definitely stood out as a bit antiquated compared to the rest of the game. Would've sounded better if they had just done chiptune sounds than that 90's Yamaha keyboard sound he went with.

FF8, I really think it should have released on the PS2. Uematsu mentioned the loading times, and that was definitely noticeable on FF8. And in general, the graphics engine on FF8 was just pushing the PS1 hardware too far. Texture flickering, bad aliasing, just looked really rough even at the time.

 

[Zhao_Yun]

Amazing article! I hope we will get a similar article on FFXV's development at some point since that would be really interesting!

 

[Schopenhauerian]

The jump in the overall sound (i.e. more realistic instruments) from FFVII and VIII was always interesting to me. I recall liking VII's melodies, but ultimately being disappointed in the sound quality. Uematsu's MIDI 'electric-kazoo' sound was charming during the 8 and 16-bit eras, but I recall going into VII with much higher expectations due to the CD quality. Even as the man himself points out, Suikoden's OST was amazing in both composition and instrument quality. It sounded like a generation jump from the previous gen...

...Yeah I agree, the cheesy MIDI soundtrack on FF7 definitely stood out as a bit antiquated compared to the rest of the game. Would've sounded better if they had just done chiptune sounds than that 90's Yamaha keyboard sound he went with...

I can see where you guys are coming from, but when playing through it as a kid, FF7's soundtrack never struck me as anything less than amazing.

I'd already played through Suikoden and Wild Arms on the PS1, and of course really liked Shiro Hamaguchi's orchestral arrangements (Final Fantasy VII Reunion Tracks) when they were released in late 1997, but none of that actually did anything to dampen my appreciation for FF7's OST.

And while I certainly wouldn't want the instrumentation to stay the same in FF7R, I am actually a bit worried about how they're going to handle Uematsu's compositions. Hopefully it's as good as what Hamaguchi did with the Reunion Tracks.

 

[eyeball_kid]

I can see where you guys are coming from, but when playing through it as a kid, FF7's soundtrack never struck me as anything less than amazing.

I'd already played through Suikoden and Wild Arms on the PS1, and of course really liked Shiro Hamaguchi's orchestral arrangements (Final Fantasy VII Reunion Tracks) when they were released in late 1997, but none of that actually did anything to dampen my appreciation for FF7's OST.

And while I certainly wouldn't want the instrumentation to stay the same in FF7R, I am actually a bit worried about how they're going to handle Uematsu's compositions. Hopefully it's as good as what Hamaguchi did with the Reunion Tracks.

I did think a few songs worked well... Aerith's theme, the chocobo theme, the Gold Saucer, and Costa del Sol (if I'm being generous). Battle music was alright. It mainly failed when using synthesized instruments other than piano; the low quality made the songs stand out as being "videogamey", especially during scenes that were supposed to be dramatic.

I think using orchestral sounds like the treatment of One Winged Angel on the Reunion tracks could work well. I think if they replaced the cheesy MIDI instruments with real brass instruments and the like, the OST could sound fantastic.

 

[Fuu]

Still reading this amazing article, but legit LOL @ using the "this guy are sick" screenshot among other serious ones. Got me good.

 

[Tagg9]

Still reading this, and everyone else should as well. Outstanding journalism work.

It's amazing to read about Nintendo's (and specifically Yamauchi's) arrogance during the 90s. Truly astonishing that they had the gall to refuse to listen to probably their largest third-party partner. It's no surprise that they went 10 years without developing a game for a Nintendo console.