Final Fantasy VII - The Awful Scrapped Nintendo 64 Version

In today's video, we talk about the original Final Fantasy VII and early plans for the game, when Squaresoft was considering developing the game for the Nintendo 64.
#finalfantasyviirebirth #finalfantasyvii #nintendo64
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[@TopHatGamingManChannel]

Check out Instant Gaming to save money on your next video game purchase! - Get 31% off TEKKEN 8: www.instant-gaming.com/en/957... - Get 58% off FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE INTERGRADE: www.instant-gaming.com/en/591... - Get 24% off CRISIS CORE FINAL FANTASY VII REUNION: www.instant-gaming.com/en/122... - Get 63% off FINAL FANTASY VII: www.instant-gaming.com/en/168... Instant Gaming’s Home Page: www.instant-gaming.com/?igr=t... If you like my channel and would like to support me in a more personal way you can SUPPORT ME ON PATREON!: www.patreon.com/user?u=4432923 - Thank you so much!

[@greenkoopa]

🤐🐢

[@demonology2629]

I know this sounds selfish. But final fantasy never needed to leave the regular Nintendo era. But if I was to play another version it would be Final Fantasy on SUPER NINTENDO!!!

[@anthonysmith3415]

hey dont use AI art, it's not cool

[@casmx7300]

Final Fantasy VII literally sold systems. Not only do I believe that it single-handedly pushed the Playstation into the dominating position it held for so long, it personally sold me on a Playstation back when I was a teenager working at McDonalds. In fact, I actually purchased Final Fantasy VII first, before I actually owned a Playstation. I remember going to high school, working at McDonalds and just itching for my next paycheck so I could finally buy a Playstation and play my game. For a solid week, I read FF7's instruction manual several times a day, twitching with anticipation. I did finally get my Playstation and when I booted the game up for the first time, it was absolutely everything I had hoped for. Funnily enough, I had my Playstation and I had my FF7 but I did not have a memory card. I didn't realize I needed one. I had previously owned a Sega CD and while it has 'memory cards' in the form of full sized Sega Genesis cartridges, it had some small amount of built in storage to play and save your Sega CD games. The memory card cartridge(s) were completely optional in order to expand your storage capacity. However, everyone that ever owned a PS1 knows that a memory card was NOT optional in order to save your games. They were mandatory. This did not work well with a game like Final Fantasy VII. So, when I played my game and realized I couldn't save my game, my poor system was on for about 3 days straight before I convinced my brother's girlfriend (I didn't have a car at the time and walked back and forth to work) to run me up to Gamestop to buy a memory card. To this day, it's one of my favorite memories and I can honestly say, it's all due to Final Fantasy VII. Had it come out on the N64, I would have bought that instead. But I was so impressed with the Playstation that I never owned an N64 and have actually never owned a Nintendo console since (excluding handhelds like the 3DS). That game sold me on Playstation and I've never regretted it. Oh, and before people respond saying I missed out on some great Nintendo classics, I've played them. Between family and friends having them, I've probably played all the games worth mentioning. But, I personally haven't owned a Nintendo console since the SNES.

[@greghohenberger3185]

1000% this, they killed themselves by letting this game go anywhere but Nintendo.

[@loganbigmo]

@@greghohenberger3185It's funny how stubborn Nintendo is. They refused to switch to CD-ROM in the 90s, and even with the GameCube purposefully had mini discs, and in the late 2000s refused to adopt the trophy/achievement system that Xbox & PS did... and as of right now, 2024, they _still_ don't do achievements, even though PC games for Steam and Windows have even adopted it. They're really set in their ways.

[@udance4ever]

​@@loganbigmo yeah - the decision to go with mini discs shows you how paranoid Nintendo is about piracy. They witnessed how easy it was to burn audio CDs and even though they could have come up with copy protection, a mainstream disc format just meant it would be broken that much sooner.

[@billyjoejimbob75]

It was similar for me, but I just kept upgrading my computer.

[@CoderRaven19]

I got a PSX for FF VII and wish I got it for something else instead...

[@songoku9348]

Isn’t it ironic how decades later FFVII would eventually come to a Nintendo system, that uses cartridges no less?

[@ScorpBerserker]

Switch uses flash cards, not cartridges.

[@hayatorpg3896]

I know. I have it on digital for Switch

[@nickivy9758]

@@ScorpBerserker what even is a cartridge tho

[@zanychelly]

@@nickivy9758 Cards and Cartridges are fundamentally different, but both have a ROM in them.

[@zanychelly]

Only took Nintendo 20 years to sort of catch up…

[@beastinator456]

The Sega Saturn sitting there like 😐

[@3Rayfire]

Right?

[@andyukmonkey]

I do wonder if Sega ever attempted to get FF7 on the Saturn?

[@neubro1448]

@@andyukmonkey Maybe if Sega had never hired Bernie Stolar as Sega of America chairman who had worked for Sony of America. His draconian policies allowing what games to be released and his hatred of 2D graphics and RPGs.

[@Tremadog102]

@@andyukmonkey It does make me wonder if the game would have been possible on the Saturn. Not many developers bothered to learn how to utilise the Saturn's bizarre architecture so it probably would have been fairly compromised. We got Panzer Dragoon Saga which is a darling for the second hand gaming market but never had the cultural clout of Final Fantasy.

[@loganbigmo]

You miss 100% of the shots you don't take. Square was disatisfied with the N64, and Sony reached out to them offering them the PlayStation. Who knows, maybe if Sega had reached out to Square first and offered their disc format, they could've inked out a contract and secured FF for Sega consoles and Sega would still be a giant today. Or at least would've lasted a generation or two longer in the console market.

[@Yiiino]

It's not lost, it was never made.

[@Serko070]

indeed, clickbaity bs

[@runnersdialzero1244]

Yeah, and calling a non-existent game "awful" is... uh, really silly.

[@chemergency]

It never technically made it past a single Behemoth character model that was attempted on an N64 devkit that they struggled to render smoothly which factored into the decision to commit to PlayStation. None of the work done for the FFVI SGI demo counts because that's not technically N64 hardware, though it is worth noting that the same hardware was used for the prerendered backgrounds in Super Mario RPG and the FMV's in FFVII.

[@mrnygren2]

@@runnersdialzero1244 It would have been awesome but with the N64 limitaions - nobody would have known how much better the PS1 version would have been though.

[@NefariousDreary]

It says "scrapped". Did he change the title?

[@newcorpses]

Hmm. The "N64 version" was an FFVI tech demo, and it doesn't even look bad. The models look similar to what they eventually ended up using for VII. I don't think that demo looked "awful," and if they had ended up making a shorter, less-impressive FFVII for N64, it most likely would have ended up being a good game, albeit a different game that was compromised from their lofty vision. We'd probably still be talking about how groundbreaking the game was, much like people are still talking about Ocarina of Time today.

[@currywurst2434]

Yep, it would have probably been a different game. Full 3d, shorter because of that, not as cinematic. Could have been more impressive in a different way graphically, but for a story driven game it was probably the right choice to go with a system with CD rom and prerendered backgrounds. Honestly i do prefer the old PS1 FFs over the new, including their basic 3d overworlds, everything was more artistic, now its like Kingdom Hearts with too realistic looking charakters and multiculti NPCs that could be real word tourists in Disney Land. Power limits on hardware can have benefits. It was all about story and artistical fantastic places.

[@Flynn01979]

Considering that version of the game never got out of the early alpha stage. Squaresoft, never made more than a tech demo. It's kind of unfair to label a project that never came close to being finished awful. It's hard to say what the game would of been like on the N64.

[@stinkfinga4918]

No it isn't lol just look at games that went to both PS and N64, the PS versions are objectively better.

[@tombstoner6360]

*would have been like

[@Absolutely_puck_fakestine]

​@@stinkfinga4918What games ?

[@Absolutely_puck_fakestine]

@@stinkfinga4918 Shadowman 64 was a masterpiece on n64, awful on PS. Ff7 on n64 would have been great, the only problem would have been the cutscenes. Same with resident evil, they are compressed beyond belief. Other than the size problem, the games are always better on n64, if well adapted/developped.

[@davisbowe8668]

@@stinkfinga4918 The World is Not Enough says otherwise.

[@nodarkthings]

I remember well all the excitement and expectation over FFVII on the N64!! I was so excited. We used to discuss it in the echoes on fidonet, just before I got the internet. We would speculate wildly about how it might come out on the "Bulky Drive" (as the 64DD was referred to at the time) and how it could be a vast open world with data being written and read from the drive. I miss those days. I did end up buying a Japanese N64 in the summer of 1996 for about 600 quid (a huge amount for me). That summer was so good....

[@skins4thewin]

Lol sorry to hear that man. Could've just bought a PS1 and been much happier. Always felt kind of sorry for the kids who were bought an N64 for Xmas instead of a PS1. I owned both & within a couple years of their launch it was pretty clear which one was the superior console.

[@pattersong6637]

64DD discs having a capacity of 64 MB made the whole thing pointless. Even though that was better than all but 3 N64 carts ended up doing in real life (and those three only tied it), if they had gone the 64DD route and committed to it they'd STILL have a giant storage capacity shortage vs the PS1 while sacrificing the "No loading times" advantage of cartridges just for a little extra space. 64 MB isn't THAT much bigger than the 32 MB most major N64 games ended up at and would still be about a tenth of what a CD could hold. That said, I guess the 64DD would've opened up the possibility for multidisc games. Even so, though, what, would they have put out a 15 disc version of FFVII?

[@dooshmasta]

Eerie to see the Japanese cover art for dragon quest right after finding out that Toriyama Akira passed away a few days ago.

[@dooshmasta]

lol of course he gets a mention for Chrono Trigger. No one in the west seems to know that he made 6 Dragon Quest games with Enix before they started Chrono Trigger.

[@magnawaves]

Eerie how? DQ isn't going to magically disappear because lost Toriyama too soon. You're watching a video game video, you're more likely to see that stuff.

[@Jimusmc]

@@dooshmasta yeah we did, most dragon quest protagonist has the goku hair.

[@brichan1851]

I’m betting the third part will be released on the 30th anniversary of the original game.

[@ianbraun271]

And probably on the PS6

[@Fall-oo6mt]

​@@ianbraun271I'm not sure we're gonna have a PS6 in 2027. The PS5's lifespan is probably gonna be about 8 years, like its predecessors.

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

Then part 4 will be rele-look we all know Final Fantasy VII is going to keep being milked until the farm dries up. Maybe we'll get a re-remake, Final Fantasy VII Re;Rebirth Saga, a VII part series to milk a single 90 hour game into several empty 100+ hour versions.

[@Patrick19833]

I remember watching the previews back in the 90s lol It took me a few hours to download the video. I do not miss the dial-up days at all, but I did miss my childhood.

[@Defensive_Wounds]

The slowly loading jpeg images on web sites that scanned top to bottom and was pixellated AF then slowly got less and less and less pixellated over time until it was fully loaded...lol It was a revolutionary thing when the dual switch for phone lines came out which meant no longer would your internet be turned off if a phone call came in! Otherwise you were cut off the internet and had to re-dial up with the dial up modem!

[@s7r49]

LMAO I remember I downloaded fallout2 from an FTP over 56k modem in like 1998, it probably took me a week and a half. xD

[@Xunkun]

2-3 HOURS to load the 30 second Phantom Menace trailer..................... If only we knew.......

[@baronhausenpheffer]

It really is interesting to consider what an N64 FF7 would have looked like. I've heard it said that it would have taken a crazy amount of cartridges (12? 24? 100?) to port the game to N64 exactly as it was on PS1, and I don't doubt that. However, "Resident Evil 2" gives us a road map of how an ambitious multi-disk game might have been translated to cartridge. More than anything, it would involve nerfing the audio down to midi levels and substantially reducing the number of animated cutscenes, if not getting rid of them altogether in favor of subtitled screen caps. Even then, it might have been necessary to push it to at least two cartridges requiring some sort of elaborate password or save data recognition system to make it work, and two cartridges might have made it unacceptably pricey to produce. Part of me still wishes Square-Enix had attempted it, though, because it would have been a cool point of comparison, a godsend for the awful N64 RPG scene, and Nintendo could have marketed the absence of load times as a perk of their version.

[@GoeTeeks]

I mean, if they had to split FF7 into 2-4 cartridges, they could have used the memory pak to carry over data between cartridges.

[@GreatMossWater]

Maybe it would've been like the remake that's split into several separate games.

[@RandomTTV]

Do you get withdrawal symptoms when you don’t use Akuma’s 3do theme in a video?

[@Jordan.930]

Would've been sick on the n64 - they would have to remove the cutscenes but it would've had next to no loading times

[@JohnnyProctor9]

Wasn't it planned to be an entirely different game due to the limitations of the format? It would likely be an improvement though, I LOVE the unlicensed Chinese NES demake!

[@TIDbitRETRO]

They might not have had to. Don’t forget they managed to port Resident Evil 2 to the N64 and it kept all of that game’s CG cutscenes.

[@RainerLuizFonseca]

FF7 would not be the same without it's cutscenes, they were mind blowing for their time and transformed what could have been a good RPG into a masterpiece. Square would later be known for producing the highest quality CGI in the entire history in the years that followed. To this day, having top notch CGI still plays a a critical role in gaming, just see what Blizzard has created over the years and how memorable their games are because of that

[@user-rb1zh3pl5p]

Too bad i wouldve bought both

[@jonah1976]

With super blurry textures and 15 FPS, oh boy!

[@brycetheoddball]

Toriyama just passed rest in piece

[@G.L.999]

"Peace".

[@PowerSynopsis]

@@G.L.999 wrest inn piece

[@G.L.999]

@@PowerSynopsis "Rest In Peace".

[@Spacefrisian]

Imagin having several Final Fantasy ideas before the actuall version came out for it, 1 of those being Xenogears which than became a game franchise on its own.

[@jimmyju76]

that's pretty much how many franchises come about

[@songoku9348]

If Nintendo had the CD rom format for the N64, boy oh boy the N64 and PS1 would’ve had an intense heated rivalry. Nintendo would’ve potentially dominated and won. Imagine having OOT and FFVII on the same system.

[@Elyseon]

Not to mention that Nintendo was also responsible for the existence of the Playstation. They have a history of treating partners and fans badly.

[@joseavalos9988]

the lacking of a cd drive wasnt the only flaw of the N64

[@treytavares1727]

There would be no rivalry cause the PS1 would be the N64. Nintendo created their own worst enemy.

[@AkiKimurr]

​@@treytavares1727impossible to predict what would've happened. It's just a thought experiment after all. Though couple things are clear: games would cost waay less and more developers and publishers would consider going multi-plat or even exclusive for N64 as well. So, yeah, we can't know what would've happened, especially since pretty much every fifth gen opponent had a headstart of at least a couple of years, yet it definitely would've been interesting to witness, especially with a substantial power advantage N64 had.

[@pablocasas5906]

To be fair, if Nintendo would've choses discs instead of cartridges for the Nintendo 64, I'm sure that some games would've been very different in terms of design

[@overwatch761]

Not going CD was the N64s biggest downfall. As for the game running better on N64 or PS1 - Randomly comparing unoptimised code isn't a performance measure by any means. Take for instance we see many console to PC ports struggle today despite running on PCs at over 2x the power. The N64 was a complex system like the Saturn and had piss poor development kits that were completely unoptimised for making games. The N64 also required an insane level of advanced technical knowledge (most of which is now only available and being learnt today - basic optimisations in DKR led to an 2x performance increase on real hardware) The PS1 was simply basic and straightforward, combined with CD and an easy to use GDK sum up why it was the best system to develop on in that era.

[@Brian0wns]

If I recall at the time the reason Nintendo went with a cartridge system is because CDs for gaming were kind of new but have been around for music for a while by then - and I think they were scared that piracy would be a lot easier with a CD system. The ironic thing is that years later it was a lot easier to emulate the N64 than the Playstation. As a kid I was kind of mad that there were no good turned based RPGs on the N64.

[@currywurst2434]

There was piracy on PS1 though (that didn't stop its success). A friend built a chip into mine so i could play a copy of Chrono Cross (wasn't released in Europe afaik).

[@garretdrake2347]

paper mario?

[@GamingNightsNeoMasaki]

R.I.P. Akira Toriyama

[@aegisring]

Using his death for likes? You make me sick

[@Kaepora2]

@@aegisring I highly doubt posting something in Memorial to a legend for likes is even a thing. Likes mean nothing. Touch Grass.

[@GamingNightsNeoMasaki]

@@skidmc he was mentioned in the video…if you guys actually watched it…

[@aegisring]

@@GamingNightsNeoMasaki which proves my point, you're only farming likes

[@seancondon5572]

@@aegisring my friend... you... need to chill. I have some fine (and not-so-fine, but still very acceptable) cigars and Japanese Whiskey for you to chill with. Just... Chill... Like I've been doing the last 36 hours or so.

[@ruediix]

The lack of the ability to compress 3D motion sequences at the time really put a damper on the game's ability to fit in the small storage space of an N64 cartridge. While by the end of the N64 era, the largest N64 cartridges could hold 2-4 times the capacity of 64DD disks, this was well too late for this. The Playstation clearly had weaker rendering capabilities, but the massive storage of the CDROM could work around this by simply using FMVs to handle backgrounds instead of rendering the backgrounds in 3D or with tile graphics. The big issue with the Playstation is it had much less CPU power leftover after rendering an average scene. However, your typical menu-based JRPG did not need a lot of CPU code. There is virtually no physics to simulate and only simple script calculations. There is absolutely no need for the extra CPU time that the N64 offered. The N64 was also harder to optimize for. This probably showed in the benchmarks he was running. Unless your benchmark is fully optimized for the N64 hardware, it will have horrible results. Most notably is memory random access latency. This also means that one has to optimize the game to run it

[@resievil]

Is that Tifa from the thumbnail AI generated or from something? I swear I remember it from like an EGM but I can't put my finger on it.

[@Amdecreations.]

I remember the prototype image of FF7 for the Ultra 64 on EGM magazine. I'm glad Square moved to the PlayStation, but I wonder if it was still possible to do FF7 on the N64 but use silicone graphics like Donkry Kong and Killer Instinct.

[@trashinho872]

I remember this well, as I had the N64 and was super excited for this game. The switch to PlayStation was a big deal at the time since it showed the limitations of cartridge gaming, and I was sad because I didn't have one. I ended up spending a whole lot of time at my friends house just so I could play this.

[@Jonabob87]

This stuff about the PS1 being more powerful than the N64 is counter to literally every other source I've seen talking about the differences between the two.

[@Lazumaus]

I believe the 64 was more powerful then the ps1. the big difference was the ps1 had discs which could hold more and have better sound quality and FMV"s. For example, RE2 on ps1 has two discs, but a lot of voice acting and FMV's. While on the 64, it's on a single catridge, the sound is crunched down and the FMV"s are more re-used to save on space. So in the end it all comes down to DISC vs Cartrige, and at this point in time square believed and rightly so that it was disc or nothing.

[@mbii7667]

Where can I get that Tifa artwork in the thumbnail?

[@TopHatGamingManChannel]

I made it using AI

[@raidomegnuo2868]

@@TopHatGamingManChannel you did used it a lot during the video. Well, if it's supposed to be used for comedic purposes it's fine.

[@gamble777888]

So freaking long ago now, but yea I remember the hype of FFVII on the N64. It really did shift the entire gaming landscape forever when Square jumped ship. Crazy to think if Nintendo had made the simple decision of going wth CDs that it's extremely likely Sony isn't even a player in the market today.

[@captain3186]

What I loved so much about the 5th Gen other than the Quirky games was that there were games that NO WAY could run on the competing Platform. There were games on PS1 that N64 couldn't do in a million years and games on the N64 that would melt a PS1. Gaming was truly special at that time. Glad I owned Both Platforms + Saturn in their Respective Time.

[@neodeckard5158]

Intriguing story you have here, and yes, there was a lot of visual improvements that really helped Final Fantasy VII to become the most sold Playstation game of all~ I have an idea for a new video: Retro gamers know that Sunsoft was (And is returning to be) a prestigious game developer on the NES, getting notorious as said console was getting older and more sound gimmicks and chips were getting added into their games~ The one thing that puzzles me is, why have they fallen so bad after the release of "Gimmick!"? What was the reason their SNES releases in U.S. were mostly, if not only made by U.S. companies? Why almost every Japanese release has failed to get out of Japan, including Albert Odyssey and some Ufouria/Hebereke games? Such a nebulous time period. 2 decades of little to no games in the 21st century until they have decided to come back and make new games again... As of myself, I am currently enjoying their recent release of Hebereke 2(Ufouria The Saga 2), as you can see. Yes, it's a long text, but just as long as probably reading the manual of the Japanese release of the first Ufouria.

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

The best seller on PlayStation was Gran Turismo, not Final Fantasy VII. (Also the ONLY time a first party title was Sony's best seller on a system) Don't take that away from them.

[@PaladinLarec]

I'm old enough to remember that issue of Diehard Gamefan (and I still have it) where they showed those FF7 shots on "ultra 64". I remember drooling over it and being hype thinking Celes and Locke were coming back. I hated Sony but ended up being a PSX just to play FF7. Don't regret it.

[@TheBlackSeraph]

I ended up buying an N64 because I thought given the SNES' track record of great RPGs (I didn't know about the schism between Nintendo and Square or Enix) the N64 wouldn't disappoint. It did, since the only PAL RPG I know of is Holy Magic Century (Quest 64).

[@interoffice5402]

I was obsessed with that issue. I made up some convoluted lore in my head about those Celes, Locke, and Shadow making an appearance or the world getting a 3D remake of FF3 that had come out, back before such a thing was even really considered.

[@KellicTiger]

I still want to hop into an alternate universe where the colab between Nintendo and Sony on the Nintendo CD had actually happened for the SNES. The games that would have resulted from that device would have been absolutely epic and the subsequent N64 with a optical drive would have been....earth shattering.

[@zhizn_snake]

How do we know it would have been "awful"? N64 had its own set of advantages over PS1, even if it was at the cost of CD quality music and storage space. Many argue FFVI was a better game than the more successful VII, and that was on the technically inferior SNES.

[@mattyryon]

They mean from a technical standpoint and what Square wanted to do with 7

[@cmdrls212]

That was the siggraph tech demo of ff6. Not ff7

[@videogameobsession]

Where in this video is the FF7 N64 tech demo shown? I scrubbed around, but didn't see it here.

[@syncmonism]

If Nintendo had committed to including the 64DD floppy drive with the system from the beginning, or at least to releasing it very early on, then that likely would have actually worked out very well, but there was also a lot of financial risk to doing that, as it would have meant adding a huge amount of cost to the system which Nintendo would have had to pass on to the consumer, and/or may have had to sell each system at a loss. A CD drive also likely would have worked out for them as well, but also would have added a lot of cost, OR, if they had gone through with their Sony partnership, there would have been other downsides to that arrangement, though it's easy to see with the benefit of hindsight that without having to compete directly with Sony, that console would have absolutely dominated the market. Those floppy disks would have set the minimum capacity available to each game developer at 64MB, which while it is still a lot less than the capacity of a CD, that would have still been a huge improvement over the typical 8-16MB size of a cartridge (8MB cartridges were the standard early on, with typical sizes increasing over time as the cost of the ROM chips came down over time). It is my understanding that the floppy disks would also have been a lot cheaper to manufacture than cartridges, especially in terms of Yen (or dollars) per MB, which would have made multi-disk games entirely feasible as well. This would have been more than enough capacity to be able to include the same amount of content that even larger Playstation games had, aside from FMV video, which they couldn't use as much of, and/or would need to reduce the quality, and there would be more limitations to what kind of music could be used, and how it could be compressed. The much larger size of CDs might sound like a big advantage, but for this generation, that much capacity was far some necessary, and it came at the expense of long load times and slow seek times, and the 64DD had about three times shorter seek times, and had about three times faster loading times. 64MB floppy drives would have actually been very well suited to this generation of consoles, if only Nintendo had actually committed to releasing it early on and started releasing its own games using that format.

[@potatonots]

Final Fantasy VII was the reason I bought a PlayStation. I was such a noob to non-cartridge gaming I didn't realize you needed a memory card to save, until I made it to the first save point. Left my game on while I went to town, 15minutes away, to purchase one. 😅 I also share the birthday with Cloud, so I was super invested to role playing the game as a green eyed white boy.

[@DocVolteer]

Say what video was at 20:08 ?

[@angryalbertan9353]

Glover 64 trailer.

[@Zhello79]

​@@angryalbertan9353lol that game was a classic 😂

[@DocVolteer]

Thank you@@angryalbertan9353

[@tysonpham2153]

Resident Evil 2 on N64 can run well with cutscene included but to my knowledge, i think is kinda expensive. I can see why Square doesn't want to release it

[@riskybitness]

What I find remarkable about this is that Nintendo's answer to their cartridges not having the storage of CDs was to introduce... slightly different cartridges. Those "disks" really just look like differently shaped cartridges! What were they, some kind of zip disks? Anyway if you want some more FF info for your videos, I have a few pretty good FF videos on my channel although I stopped uploading a year ago. I'm a big fan of Final Fantasy so I know a lot of trivia.

[@candicedebebe6276]

Great video, repeated yourself a couple times for filler I felt. Still very informative and awesomely presented.

[@TrentCantrell]

To a teen who had managed to download a tiny low resolution preview of the N64 demo, it looked amazing. Ultimately, I followed Final Fantasy to the Playstation. Knowing what I do now of Squaresoft's history with Nintendo, I'm surprised they stuck around as long as they did. Squaresoft had games in production for the SNES CD (Mana) when N just decided to drop it and Nindtendo was an infamously difficult company to work with in that period. The only downside to the move was that Squaresoft's love of CG animation led to them thinking they they should create movies. Such a pity that they forgot it was their stories we loved them for.

[@jasonjones7461]

Imo the best rpg on N64 was the infamous "Quest 64". It bugs me that it gets so much hate because it wasnt a bad game at all. It was FAR from perfect and had a few really frustrating characteristics. But overall its a solid rpg. The magic system was excellent and despite absolutely no equipment to found in the game, your ability to customize your characters build was surprisingly deep for those that understood how it worked. You could choose how you wanted to play the game, from being a "healer", to prioritizing defense, or offense based magic, or even the outlandish physical combat mastery build. I had a great time with multiple playthroughs, one of which had me prioritizing leveling up "attack boost" type magic and spells that added affects to physical weapon hits. The game didn't outright tell you, but the more you used your physical "Staff" to attack, the more powerful it becomes. It levels up as you use it. Combined with physical boosting magic you could have a unique playthrough where Brian is a badass warrior haha. Most ppl also failed to realize that "quest 64" was a remake of a GBC game "Brians Quest". The gbc title even features the same clever magic system. "Quest 64" had nice character models, animations and great music too. My ONLY complaint is a big one though...all battles take place without changing to a battle screen. So it was prerty easy to get turned around in the heat of battle and not know which way you came from. Despite being a cartridge, the world and the dungeons are MASSIVE and you have little in terms of a map or navigation help. This results in many frustrating revelations that you were walking the wrong way and wasted a good 20 min doing so.

[@TopHatGamingManChannel]

Paper Mario is great too, but you can see why it wouldn't destroy cartridge space.

[@Sugurain]

Maybe it looked impossible at first because of the initial capacity of cartridges. The maximum capacity in 1996 was 8MB, that's what Mario 64 used. Later games, like Resident Evil 2, Pokemon Stadium 2 came in 64MB cartridges, that's an 8X increase in capacity. Similarly, the largest 64DD disk was 64MB, but like super floppies of that era (Ex: Zip drive), larger capacities could become available later on. I believe the largest Zip Drive produced was 700MB in size, that's as big as a CD-rom. Maybe something similar could've happened on the 64DD, where FF7 could've been released in 3 64DD disks. Dual access was also possible with the 64DD, so part of the game could come in a standard N64 cartridge, and the rest in the magnetic disks. I'm not saying FF7 would be possible on the N64 right away, but that it COULD'VE happened later in that system's life. If not FF7, then maybe FF8 or 9.

[@TheBlackSeraph]

This would only be possible if you assume that the hardware for the N64 and the PSX are comparable, and can handle data/memory the same way, which is unlikely. Even then, you'd need a standard N64 cart (multiple disk spanning, anti-piracy/cheat detection), a controller pak (save files), an expansion pak (improved textures/polygons, dynamic resolutions) and multiple 64DD carts (the actual game, who knows how many). I doubt that FF8 or FF9 would even be possible.

[@G.L.999]

You were close with the largest Zip disk storage size; however, the largest at that time was actually '750MBs'(100MBs more than the PS1 CD) in size! Though I don't know how expensive or cheap a Zip Disk drive of that calibur would've cost Nintendo to onsider manufacturing at the time!

[@lucascostanzo2046]

​@@TheBlackSeraphThe game would have to be rewritten from scratch to work with the N64 hardware, but that's possible since multiplatform games existed back then. The best example would probably be Resident Evil 2, which even includes FMV on the N64.

[@lucascostanzo2046]

​@@G.L.999 More than a CD for sure, but surely less than a standard high capacity N64 cartridge. Hahah

[@MatrixEvolution17]

that artwork in the thumbnail looks cool who did it? What's the name of the artist who drew it? I would love to know the name of whoever drew it. Please tell me who drew it.

[@TopHatGamingManChannel]

Arty Officiaco Intelligencio

[@StudioKelpie1993]

Do find it funny how Nintendo eventually went to discs for 3 console but then going straight back to Cartridges for the Switch which Third Party Devs just decide to release their games Digitally on Switch with a few Cartridge based games

[@rakhmathadita3917]

3:10 love you for using sakaguchi clip from mega64

[@JMrealgamer]

If not for Dragon Quest we wouldn’t even have FF. We wouldn’t have a lot of other RPGs either. I’m thankful for Yuji Horii getting Akira Toriyama and Koichi Sugiyama together for that one. Chrono Trigger the first ever game with a new game plus and multiple endings Yuji Horii also headed up with Akira Toriyama and Sakaguchi from FF fame. Yasunori Mitsuda did most of the music and passed out due to overwork so Nobou Uematsu had to step in and help out a bit. Yasunori Mitsuda does the music for Xenogears as well as Xenoblade Chronicles games as well. Geniuses in their own rights.

[@interoffice5402]

Damn I remember following all of the magazines during this time for updates and rumors about what was happening with FF7 before it went to the PS. The screenshots of that tech demo did things to my imagination and I can say the disappointment that it wasn't staying with Nintendo was real, especially with the background of the console warring between Sega and Nintendo.

[@RetroArcadeGuy]

The game is basically printed in both discs with finite unique data mostly pertaining to the disc swap and which may well still fit into one single CD and still have space left for the whole OST (which it's tracked music like MOD files) and some FMVs. Most (if not all) of the maps , sounds, models and data are shared between discs. Theoretically, if Square didn't cry about the cartridge's space and remade the cutscenes using a graphical engine, they could've ported the game 100% albeit without FMVs, as they would be rendered in-game, music would had a bit of hit in quality but wouldn't sound something far like the music found in Ocarina of time and for backgrounds they could've used the same techniques used in RE264. RE2 is the best example of an impossible port done right, and this is a 2 discs game on either system ported at.

[@172louis]

What was also shocking was the fact of wondering how can FF games go from FF3 staight to FF7 just like that. Then we nerds started searching and realising. And those other titles was already being translated super quick in versions found on the internet if you were clever. Mind was blown. 🤯 Man the memories.

[@OrnEmpireRetroCovers]

Wow, imagine if Sony and Nintendo had joined forces to develop a disc based system... .... .... ....

[@drift180x]

I’m having a bit of a laugh thinking about an alternate universe where FF7 is on N64 and is 30 discs, imagine the size of the box that would’ve come in!

[@Biglover29]

I missed turn based combat like was in the original FF7

[@perydwyn]

Its worth remembering that a lot of sales of FF7 were to people not even aware of the kind of game it was. I personally knew no less than 7 friends in the 90s who bought the game based on word of mouth only to play it once, hate the style of gameplay and then never put it into the disk drive again. I think that is why no other Final Fantasy on PS1 sold as well, because a large number of those who bought ff7 were burnt and never went back to the series.

[@Elyseon]

Having finally picked it up again after many years (never finished it and never had a Playstation), the most jarring part is the contrast between the character models and interactive elements with the horribly low quality backgrounds.

[@step2058]

@@ElyseonThose backgrounds aren’t low quality at all. Those were 2D high definition artworks. It’s the exact same thing Resident Evil did. It’s an art style and a beautiful one at that. If you prefer 3D backgrounds that’s great but nothing beats the magic of 2D. It’s like playing a game on a painting.

[@mexmexican8619]

I doubt it was that significant. I think sales were lower for the others simply because the hype wasn’t there.

[@pablocasas5906]

I was about four when FFVII was released, but when I started hearing about the game's legacy I was intrigued about it and I learned about its history and I find it weird that in most of the promotional material for the U.S. market they barely shwed actual gameplay, instead showing the, at the time, impressive GCI cutscenes. I can imagine some people thinking FFVII was some kind of action game and being dissapointed with the pre-rendered graphics and superdeformed-looking game models

[@saiyan_princestudios9790]

What are you talking about? I literally no nobody who didn’t love it. It made jrpgs popular in the USA and made FF even bigger in the USA too. What were you a child expecting a fighting game? lol

[@Smaxx]

5:20 I'm not sure. I'd say those buildings definitely look pre-rendered, not created as individual pixels. I could be wrong, but I think a few games claimed to have used rendered graphics/backgrounds, such as Secret of Evermore, Terranigma, and Kirby Superstar/Kirby's Fun Pack. Yet they definitely don't share the art style seen in Donkey Kong Country series or Super Mario RPG.

[@vidjenko8349]

I like to think if Mother 3 was ever released at the same time on the N64, it would blow this game out of the water.

[@captainfach]

I love this video as well as your Final Fantasy 7 for NES video. I know you probably won't see this comment but I would love to see more of the cool bootlegs that were made back in the day. I saw this one and Minish Cap for NES and it got me quite intrigued and wanting to know what other kinds of bootlegs existed back then. I haven't seen any videos on those kinds of bootlegs, only rom hack style things that people have done

[@TopHatGamingManChannel]

Have another NES bootleg video coming later this week

[@captainfach]

@@TopHatGamingManChannel no way, that's awesome! Thanks, mate! I'll be there!

[@zipzeolocke2]

I think the only great thing about using Nintendo cartridges was loading speed. There are no loading screens with Nintendo games that use cartridges because they use RAM memory instead of CD's. The only downside using the extra storage with CD's is that reading them is a slower process

[@erikgilson1687]

It's nuts that I not only didn't know this was a thing, but also that it was being hyped as THE reason to own a Nintendo 64 when it came out

[@natecw4164]

It's amazing to think: If they'd simply integrated cartridge swapping, as they'd initially promised devs, this could have been one of very few multicart N64 games. It'd have been incredibly different than either of these versions... Fun to think about

[@aztecwhistle9122]

Sir Tophat you're killling me with all of the pictures of Mario cryimg 😂

[@mrh3894]

what was awful about it? It was never a game. What the fuck.

[@PikaLink91]

Gotta love how he asks for subscribers both 1/3 into the video and at the very end. Either way, I always watch till the end before subbing to see if the content is actually someting I wanna support.

[@turtlehermit6047]

Quest 64 enters the chat.. Lol I grew up playing dogs on nes and super.. I fell in love with them in the PlayStation era.. But when I played quest 64 I hated it so much.. The most impressive game I seen made for 64 was probably resident evil 2.

[@Andinus3000]

This decision ultimately turned me into a playstation and xbox user until the Wii came out, and I wanted Smash Bros Brawl, (a roommate in college had a gamecube and introduced me to Smash Melee), it just goes to show that video game franchises can have big swing when it comes to console success.

[@cellshade87]

20:06 What game is that? It looked like a 90's CGI cutscene with Loony Toons humor. Everyone was getting hit with a ball then their face distorts. 🤣 I thought the first character was an early CGI test of Cloud but then he gets hit in the face with a ball. 🤣

[@3Rayfire]

I remember that fire storm. Nintendo was pissed. It was pretty unprecedented, Nintendo had ruled for a decade, it was a huge flip.

[@darksakurattv]

Who doesn't know about Ehrgeiz? It wasn't a FF figure; it had Cloud and Tifa in it as hidden characters.

[@TopHatGamingManChannel]

Only the Arcade version - the home version featured Cloud on the box, Cloud, Tifa and Sephiroth were available from the beginning and Yuffie, Vincent and Zack would hidden characters. Over 1 in 3 of the roster members were from FF7.

[@Stephan5916]

To me, this was a very good video. I already knew the info regarding FF7 not being on the N64. The N64 not having a CD-Rom was a MASSIVE mistake.

[@chrislaws4785]

You know, i would LOVE to see them make the ORIGINAL 2D version of FF7 that was scrapped, but using today's HD2D graphics like in Octopath Traveler.

[@thebudman1980]

If you call usb flash a cartridge. It can fit more than any disc media. Disc media is obsolete for anything other than games that work offline. Movies that work offline. So when you travel or your internet isn't working. Or your staying in a camper somewhere. Couldn't afford your internet bill but can still play your games for something to do.

[@Beeezledrop]

Funny, how the Final Fantasy 6 tech demo character models look way better than the Popeye ones from the Playstation Final Fantasy 7.

[@magnumrpg]

had no idea this was even a consideration i mean i no about a ff6 3d demo fight but not n64 version of 7

[@DimitrisDr3am]

I'm playing through ff7 on my retroid pocket 4+ at the moment and other than the cutscenes, calling it "3d" is kinda a stretch. So far the hardest part of the game is finding my way through an area because I keep missing where you walk under a train, or up a pole lol. I don't remember having this problem in the 90's though so maybe maybe I'm just old.

[@teruienages962]

Not seeing exactly what makes any of it "awful"

[@TopHatGamingManChannel]

So did you miss all the stuff about the Nintendo 64 being too limited to be able to support the game and Nintendo behaving too ignorant to switch to CD Rom that generation?

[@holzman00]

That doesn't make it "awful". The game would have just been different if it was on N64, not necessarily bad.​@@TopHatGamingManChannel

[@Lightpaladin720]

he don't care

[@Supersayainpikmin]

It's funny, these days I'd wish they would have gone with a gorgeous, 32 bit 2D style, something like Wild Arms or Albert Odyssey. 3D games, including FF7, look like ass to me from this generation. Also, I kinda have my doubts that FF7 would struggle running on N64; FF7 isn't particulalry impressive technically for the PS1 (though TBF, it and the N64 prototype were first generation games).

[@Scott-bh2qb]

You must be young. FF7 was the most graphically impressive game ever seen when it was released.

[@Supersayainpikmin]

@@Scott-bh2qb I was born after it came out so I have 0 nostalgia for the 5th gen 3D look. I still think there are a lot better looking games than FF7 on PS1. One thing I do like on the technical side is the seamless transition between gameplay and FMV.

[@Scott-bh2qb]

@@Supersayainpikmin it was one of the first big releases on the PlayStation. It’s not nostalgia, it’s fact it was the most impressive graphically at time of release.

[@biohead66]

@@Scott-bh2qb I was 12 and it was the coolest thing I had ever seen. Took me a year to finish.

[@tugaygunes4816]

thumbnail artist?

[@ShuckleIX]

2 minutes and you still haven't said a single piece of information relevant to the title or interesting to the people that would likely click on this video

[@tritran7003]

Patience is a virtue, child.

[@BryanM86]

Took 10 mins of skipping to get to it

[@BryanM86]

@@tritran7003thanks grandpa

[@MykeondaMic]

wow this was entertaining and i had no clue as a kid who first had an N64 before we got the ps1. and thanks for releasing these right after rebirth. this shit slaps cuz im all into rebirth

[@deepblue8143]

I'm from Phoenix AZ, ever since Rocks comment this is all I hear now, thanks! 2:51

[@anon_y_mousse]

I wonder how many compromises they would have had to make to bring a stunted version of FF7 to the N64. That's not to say that the N64 was particularly low powered, but rather that it just wasn't quite at the same level as the PS1, and it definitely had a massive shortfall on RAM and storage space.

[@GrandTheftWatto]

the rendered backgrounds and FMV are actually weak parts of FF7 - the gameplay suffered as a result. it may very well have been a better game on the N64, albeit a smaller, less flashy one.

[@emcg4131]

Sony made the right move. I didn't buy a Playstation until FF7 was released. Also, I remember going to the movie theater to see the commercial for FF7 that was shown before the previews.

[@dwayneellis2003]

I am so glad it didn't come out on the N64. No way would it have fit on 1 cartridge and it would've been blurry as hell, effectively killing the series

[@RevenantAD]

Good to see you mate excellent video

[@richardwatson5730]

I've been on an Akira binge since the news dropped. Rip to a legend that brought us not only phenomenal anime, but to include amazing games. The console is irrelevant, artists live forever. Here's hoping whomever takes the torch does justice to his vision.

[@ghostlithium]

Super cool video and perfect timing. Final Fantasy Rebirth is killing it 💯🔥

[@Odelayderado]

If they can make resident evil 2 run on the N64, I don’t know why they couldn’t make this run. Also they could’ve used the DD to do it in Japan.

[@brianmcdonald7017]

Would have taken 2 cartridges

[@Lowie81]

Awful? I remember seeing the first screens of this game back in the day and for the time it looked awesome..

[@rustyjones7908]

You know, I don't remember Terra having her bum cheeks hanging out on the snes...

[@TC_Smitty]

I bought a playstation specifically for FFVII when it released.

[@CrownedPrincely]

OKAY good video abt the topic man but are you using AI art bro??? 😭 20:44

[@TopHatGamingManChannel]

Indeed, I am a small independent creator and have absolutely no way of hiring a large team of artists to bring my visions to life. But since AI Art has existed - I have been getting the best click-through rate in this channel's history. I adore AI, it has changed my life.

[@CrownedPrincely]

@@TopHatGamingManChannel MAN I get it, it's expensive to hire an artist. However, AI art is created from scraping the data and using the art of artists who did not consent to their work being used, and you are making money off of these videos. There are a great many ways you can provide visuals without using AI art, including art from creators by asking their permission, using gameplay, or going into programs like aftereffects to use motion tracking and adding a subscribe button to cloud's buster sword. I only say this bc it's truly not ethical to be using AI art my guy, and there are more creative and better looking ways to draw people in 😭

[@mathprodigy]

Ain't no way they could have done this on N64 unless everything was 2d with no polygons 😂

[@aaroncarlsback7239]

Omg it would have been necessary about 30 cartridges to run FFVII full game! 😅😂

[@AZodiacCancer]

This was my first FF7 and game console. It will always hold a special place in my heart and I absolutely love(d) Rebirth.

[@MrEMBT]

What a funny video 😂😂😂😂 All of those Money-Mario images of him crying when in the end Square came back to Nintendo to make a deal and publish GBA games. I wonder if Sakaguchi is still wearing his PS jacket today?? Or maybe he gave it to Square to cover/hide the sales number of FFVII-Rebirth 😂😂😂😂😂

[@redfoxbennaton]

That's disgusting. So the N64 Disks size where actually really small? WTF?!

[@ravenbob4293]

Well is was PS1 disk 700mb vs N64 cartridge 64mb.

[@redfoxbennaton]

@@ravenbob4293 making a disk as low as the highest cartridge is such a pointless scam

[@G.L.999]

@@redfoxbennaton Could've at least doubled the storage to 128MBs if need be at the time.

[@redfoxbennaton]

@@G.L.999 Or just use CD's but no Nintendo wants to patent everything.

[@G.L.999]

@@redfoxbennaton Or just double the magnetic Zip disk storage from 64MGs to 128MGs. Besides, Sony already patented the CD, so why shouldn't Nintendo have the right to patent a media of their own to make money? But I guess in your little world, only Sony can patent something and Nintendo can't based on your logic.

[@Shalakor]

Nintendo's "choice" to not use CDs deserves a pretty big asterisk, since they certainly made many attempts towards using disk technology before the 64 even came to be, almost directly resulting in things like the CDi and PlayStation existing in the first place when those attempts fell through. Way more than any single one burned bridge involved in this story.

[@channelofstuff6662]

i bet FFVII would of looked better on the n64 and in full 3D just no FMV's. square didn't work on the n64 but it would of been a thing to see.

[@TonyRead31]

Did you really have to put video footage of Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth in the video? Some of us don't want to be spoiled!