Final Fantasy VII ported to the Famicom. Finally!
by Kyle Orland 
{ Feb 22nd 2008 at 10:30AM }
Of course, the conversion isn't perfect. According to a write-up from intrepid blogger CinnamonPirate (who unearthed the 2MB ROM from a Chinese blog) the polygonal graphics and cut scenes are gone, replaced with an impressively wide array of sprites, many stolen from other Final Fantasy games. The story remains surprisingly authentic, though, encompassing the entire three-disc epic while only leaving out a few optional side stories (bye bye, Yuffie and Vincent). The wide array of weapons, magic and materia from the original is a bit restricted in the port, but frankly, we're impressed that features like materia-leveling made it on to the 20+ year old hardware in any form.
The company behind the cart is apparently now primarily makes MP3 players, so our hopes for a Colecovision version of Final Fantasy XII will probably remain unfulfilled.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Anam @ Feb 22nd 2008 10:36AM
I guess that's sort of like a remake.
StarFoxA @ Feb 22nd 2008 11:03AM
No, it's a PREmake.
:D
bm @ Feb 22nd 2008 12:57PM
I think the word you're looking for is Demake.
FOXHOUND @ Feb 22nd 2008 10:37AM
Though it's nice of them to prove it 'could' be done, this is a colossal waste of time if it's not ported to recent smartphone/handheld devices or something.
XDragon @ Feb 22nd 2008 10:43AM
That's kinda cool; someone started a port of FFX for NES to but they didn't finish it. It would have been much more impressive to port it to a 16bit console so it would be a bit easier on the eyes.
Moofree @ Feb 22nd 2008 10:45AM
Looks impressive.
I'm still waiting for Grand Theftendo :)
Intentless @ Feb 22nd 2008 10:50AM
Its not worth it if there is no Vincent...
darkeyez @ Feb 22nd 2008 10:58AM
but it's soooo cute!@!
Benny @ Feb 22nd 2008 10:59AM
Ah, the naive few who thought the format wars were over.
Roto13 @ Feb 22nd 2008 11:09AM
2 megs is pretty huge for a NES game.
Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Feb 22nd 2008 11:10AM
Can we get a link to the rom, since its illegal anyway?
I seriously need to see this.
Kizul Emeraldfire @ Feb 22nd 2008 11:14AM
I'm with Crono — ROM please, and/or screenshots. >.>
Seroth @ Feb 22nd 2008 11:15AM
I hope FF7 gets remade on the DS. This kinda proves that it's entirely possible.
Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Feb 22nd 2008 11:28AM
Hell yeah it does. DS pushes polygons at least equal, if not greater than, the PS1, and if I can get a 2 gb flash card for my DS, Nintendo/Square should be able to get a 500 mb one (since all the space on the initial release was taken up by the MPEG1 videos) to put FF7 on.
They could even use the FF3/4 engine
Nate @ Feb 22nd 2008 12:20PM
Ummm... good luck with that. With Final Fantasy 1, 2, and Tactics already remade for the PSP, and Crisis Core coming out next month, do you really think they'd suddenly switch to the DS for a VII remake? Just because it's possible doesn't mean they'd actually do it.
BTW, VII looks fantastic played through remote play on the PSP ;)
Nate @ Feb 22nd 2008 12:22PM
Ok, open mouth, insert foot. I didn't realize they'd released other FF's to the DS. Please excuse my ignorance (and mocking tone).
I still think it's better suited to the PSP because of the bigger screen, though.
Donald @ Feb 22nd 2008 12:37PM
"do you really think they'd suddenly switch to the DS for a VII remake?"
Only if they don't feel like making hundreds of millions of dollars for some reason...
Nate @ Feb 22nd 2008 2:31PM
The PSP is a natural match for VII. The screen resolution is nearly the same as a standard definition TV, so you wouldn't need to modify the graphics much, the hardware is actually better than the PS1, so you wouldn't need to tone the rendering down, and the 1.8 gig UMD is enough to hold all three CDs worth of data.
What are you going to do with 1.4-ish gigs of data on a 256mb DS card? Drop all the graphics, cut scenes, voice overs.... basically make it a much worse game, just like they did for this famicon port. You'd have to reduce the graphics to fit on a screen approximately 1/4 the size of the SD TV FF7 was made to run on... and then you'd have to code up a bunch of stuff to make use of the touch screen so you wouldn't be "wasting" it.
A PSP port would be true to the original game. A DS port would be a pale shadow of a shadow of the original, and would do far more harm than good to the Final Fantasy brand name.
Donald @ Feb 22nd 2008 2:46PM
FF7 had voiceovers?
Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Feb 22nd 2008 4:37PM
Nate, again, you're forgetting that the original FMV's were MPEG1 encoded at 320x240. Many of them were used for dynamic backgrounds. I'm pretty sure you could easily compress all that crap using modern codecs down to fit into a DS cartridge.
And no, there were no voiceovers, and no CD audio either. We have the technology to shrink this shit down to a tiny fraction of its original self and retain the bulk of the experience.
Chimichanga @ Feb 22nd 2008 3:02PM
why does it say advent children?
Alex M @ Feb 22nd 2008 11:34AM
Come on, people! CinnamonPirate.com has all the screenshots you need.
Also, if you are queasy about playing a game, stopping, hacking the save to earn experience faster, continue playing, lather, rinse and repeat ad infinitum, DON'T play the game. It's horribly unbalanced.
Pointz @ Feb 22nd 2008 11:35AM
Nope the Crystal Chronicles engine has better graphics on DS. You have to see that game in action.
Yan @ Feb 22nd 2008 11:48AM
How come there's a picture of Advent Children (the FFVII movie) on the Famicom cart?
JPN @ Feb 22nd 2008 11:50AM
If they have to remove that much of the game to do this...what's the point of doing that in the first place?
Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Feb 22nd 2008 12:58PM
Why climb Mount Everest?
StevenRafael @ Feb 22nd 2008 12:16PM
He never explains why Red XIII is missing.
Gerwurztraminer @ Feb 22nd 2008 12:50PM
And here I was assuming it was for the Super Famicom until I got to the part about "20+ year old hardware".
ThornedVenom (Ludwig Defense Force) @ Feb 22nd 2008 1:12PM
The Chinese doing something good?!
But-but-but-but-but the media!!!
tactics @ Feb 22nd 2008 1:30PM
oh god it hurts so bad that this is in chinese. this game is friggin awesome... i just wish i could read it.
it's hard to remember... but i don't *think* the music is remade directly. sounds like new music to me.
anyways... this is SUPER sweet. just wish i could read it. :(
-"superfan" tactics.
Conda @ Feb 22nd 2008 1:44PM
haha, i stumbled upon that site years ago while they were still in the process of doing that... good to see they finally finished it
John H. @ Feb 23rd 2008 9:45AM
Impressed that Materia leveling made it? That's a fairly lo-fi feature to be impressed with.
The mathematical portions of the designs of nearly all games can be ported intact to just about any popular hardware you could name short of an Atari 2600, and that's because of lack of memory more than any limitations of its processor. Considering that we're talking about an RPG here and I'd say that it's far more impressive that they redid the graphics in a suitable fashion for the older hardware than that they got Materia leveling included.
Alex M @ Feb 24th 2008 4:19PM
I'm guessing they just included "Advent Children" in the title screen for the hell of it.
By the way, just so you know, this jackass ripped CinnamonPirate.com's post:
http://www.gamesniped.com/2008/02/22/final-fantasy-7-vii-for-the-original-nintendo-nes/
Thanks to the Creative Commons license, it might even be legal (not sure what happens when advertising is involved), but it's still lame and wrong.