General Gaming Final Fantasy VIII Remastered Information Thread

[Alpha1Cowboy]

This is one to grab for the switch to play in handheld mode.  

[crispy4000]

8 minutes ago, Alpha1Cowboy said:

This is one to grab for the switch to play in handheld mode.  

 

PC version will eventually be preferable.  This fork seems to be abandoned for now.

[Paperclyp]

8 hours ago, Keyser_Soze said:

 

Remasters are mostly a compatibly update so that they can get it to run on new systems (like ps4) and they clean up the graphics a bit so they look better at higher resolutions but it feels like they didn’t even do the bare minimum to call it a remaster. 

 

It could have been a free upgrade like he suggests or at the very least a discount for those that own it like the Dark Souls remaster.

 

but overall it sounds like there is very little reason to upgrade if you have the previous version on steam.

Remaster is a broad term and I’m sure it varies quite a bit in terms of what needs to be done. We don’t really know much about this development process, but 8 seems to have been a chore for them to work with given how long it’s been neglected. 

 

Regardless, I stand by saying if the remaster is so shitty, don’t buy it or wait for a sale. I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect it to be free just because you have the original version. A discount would be nice, sure, but you can let your money (or lack of) do the talking there. It’s not like the game has changed fundamentally, so waiting until it is more palatable doesn’t really put you out of a new experience. 

[XxEvil AshxX]

1 hour ago, Paperclyp said:

Remaster is a broad term and I’m sure it varies quite a bit in terms of what needs to be done. We don’t really know much about this development process, but 8 seems to have been a chore for them to work with given how long it’s been neglected. 

 

Regardless, I stand by saying if the remaster is so shitty, don’t buy it or wait for a sale. I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect it to be free just because you have the original version. A discount would be nice, sure, but you can let your money (or lack of) do the talking there. It’s not like the game has changed fundamentally, so waiting until it is more palatable doesn’t really put you out of a new experience. 

 

From what I understand, the source code for the original game was lost, which is why there this game went "ignored" for so long. They were probably able to take the game models and re-texture them based on old artwork, but the background scenes would've needed to be re-built from scratch and re-rendered, which would've not only been completely un-economical, but practically impossible.

 

Yeah it looks like shit. And yeah, it's probably never going to look much better. Even that mod mentioned above was upscaling and painting over the original image. What would happen when the background used FMV is anyone's guess.

 

FFVII looks like ass too. But everyone's been enjoying that assy looking game on multiple systems since it released so everybody's just kinda used to it by now.

[crispy4000]

44 minutes ago, XxEvil AshxX said:

 

From what I understand, the source code for the original game was lost, which is why there this game went "ignored" for so long. They were probably able to take the game models and re-texture them based on old artwork, but the background scenes would've needed to be re-built from scratch and re-rendered, which would've not only been completely un-economical, but practically impossible.

 

Yeah it looks like shit. And yeah, it's probably never going to look much better. Even that mod mentioned above was upscaling and painting over the original image. What would happen when the background used FMV is anyone's guess.

 

Both of these statements are incorrect, and not needed today to remaster PS1 era games.  What I posted was an AI upscale generated entirely from a machine learning algorithm.  There was no repainting.  Just 'zoom enhance.'  The same can be done with textures as well.  Even FMVs, though it isn't quite as effective as stills.

 

Give it a few months, fans will put in the work Square Enix should have.  They already did with VII (remako) and XI (moguri).
 

[XxEvil AshxX]

28 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

 

Both of these statements are incorrect, and not needed today to remaster PS1 era games.  What I posted was an AI upscale generated entirely from a machine learning algorithm.  There was no repainting.  Just 'zoom enhance.'  The same can be done with textures as well.  Even FMVs, though it isn't quite as effective as stills.

 

Give it a few months, fans will put in the work Square Enix should have.  As was done with VII (remako) and XI (moguri).
 

 

Even with a fancy algorithm to "zoom enhance" you're still just upscaling shitty low-res images to less shitty high res images. They'll never look as good as taking the original 3D models and re-texturing and re-rendering them at a native resolution. My terminology might have been inaccurate but the context was not wrong.

[Keyser_Soze]

51 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

 

Both of these statements are incorrect, and not needed today to remaster PS1 era games.  What I posted was an AI upscale generated entirely from a machine learning algorithm.  There was no repainting.  Just 'zoom enhance.'  The same can be done with textures as well.  Even FMVs, though it isn't quite as effective as stills.

 

Give it a few months, fans will put in the work Square Enix should have.  They already did with VII (remako) and XI (moguri).
 

 

According to the comments in that RPS article they already have AI upscaling for the 2013 version of this game.

[crispy4000]

1 hour ago, XxEvil AshxX said:

 

Even with a fancy algorithm to "zoom enhance" you're still just upscaling shitty low-res images to less shitty high res images. They'll never look as good as taking the original 3D models and re-texturing and re-rendering them at a native resolution. I don't know how my statements are incorrect.

Apples to apples comparison between PS1 / AI upscaled:




I consider that to look a whole lot better.  A marked improvement.  Not merely "less shitty."

 

My point is that the technology is here.  When the original rendering methods/files aren't available and a ground-up remake isn't on the cards, this is the route to take.  And not just for pre-rendered backgrounds, but textures too.  It's what I would consider a bare minimum for a remake of a two to three generation old game.
 

Applying a generalized upscale like SquareEnix has with its latest PS1 ports is just nasty.  And lazy.



So yes, it is feasible for this game to look much better than SE's remaster without too much effort.

[crispy4000]

17 minutes ago, Keyser_Soze said:

 

According to the comments in that RPS article they already have AI upscaling for the 2013 version of this game.

 

Yeah, looks like it.  The one that's out there doesn't seem quite as high quality as what was done with VII and IX.  Possibly because the latter used different upscalers (ESRGAN and Gigapixe, not Waifu2x).

 

Hopefully the remastered release sees someone take a another crack at it.

[Greatoneshere]

Unless the remaster is better, I just emulate PS1 games and use mods to make it look as good as possible. It's easy to do and often better looking than the remaster (though I prefer official releases, the remaster does need to be better than emulation for me to bother). 

[Dodger]

I bought it but that’s only because I need FFT ported over with achievements/trophies you fucking cowards

[crispy4000]

 

[Greatoneshere]

32 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

 

 

It certainly and undoubtedly looks better than the original (even the background graphics) but the foreground 3D graphics and background 2D pre-rendered graphics certainly do clash even with the backgrounds being somewhat improved. I'd probably emulate instead, but it's not as bad as I expected either (but it does garishly clash). 

[Dodger]

It’s only $20. If you’re interested just buy the fucking game and save the cheapness for some $60 game with loot boxes 

[crispy4000]

13 minutes ago, Dodger said:

It’s only $20. If you’re interested just buy the fucking game and save the cheapness for some $60 game with loot boxes 

 

I'm interested in the game when modders remaster it properly.

[RedSoxFan9]

 

[Paperclyp]

6 hours ago, crispy4000 said:

 

I'm interested in the game when modders remaster it properly.

Properly is in the eye of the beholder. 

[Keyser_Soze]

19 minutes ago, Paperclyp said:

Properly is in the eye of the beholder. 

 

The beholder has detached retinas if they think it looks good now.

[Paperclyp]

2 minutes ago, Keyser_Soze said:

 

The beholder has detached retinas if they think it looks good now.

It looks $20

[Keyser_Soze]

8 minutes ago, Paperclyp said:

It looks $20

 

$5 or less (but square games never get that cheap SAD! )

[crispy4000]

1 hour ago, Paperclyp said:

It looks $20

 

It looks like they chose an outdated upscaler for the backdrops.

It looks like a CRT filter option should have been added to better hide that mess, at the very least.

It looks like the battle menus run at a choppier framerate than the original.

It looks like analog movement is gone.

It looks like rumble is gone.

It looks like they should have cared a bit more about this project than to release it in this state.

It looks like the user reviews and reports reflect that.

It it looks like modders will have to fix it on PC.

It looks like the consoles are stuck with a mixed bag port job.

It looks like the remastered moniker should have been omitted (as with the semi-recent FFIX ports).

It looks like they didn’t want to do that because the original FFVIII is still for sale on Steam.

 

What the game itself is worth in dollar amount is beside the point.  This isn’t a good remaster.  It’s half baked.  If I ever do get it, I’m waiting for a deep discount after it’s been prettied up.

[projectmayhem]

I'm having a good time with it. 

[Paperclyp]

11 hours ago, projectmayhem said:

I'm having a good time with it. 

As am I. 

 

Forget how good the music is. 

[Pikachu]