The fans of Final Fantasy VIII will no longer feel left out, as Square Enix has revealed at E3 2019 that the game is finally being remastered for modern systems and will be released this year.
Square Enix has gone about remastering some of its classic RPGs for modern systems, including several Final Fantasy titles. The past few years have seen remastered versions of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy IX, Final Fantasy X/X-2, and Final Fantasy XII, leading to games that had once been associated with the PlayStation brand coming to Nintendo Switch, PC, and Xbox One. The missing name in that group was Final Fantasy VIII, which was the last of the mainline original PlayStation titles to not receive an updated port... until now.
Related: Final Fantasy VII Remake E3 2019 Event Reveals Battle System Details and Tifa's New Design
Square Enix revealed during its E3 2019 conference that Final Fantasy VIII Remastered was in development and would be coming to Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Steam, and Xbox One in 2019.
The remastered Final Fantasy ports are upscaled in order to make them palatable on modern monitors and TV sets, which means cleaning up both the janky 3D visuals and the FMV sequences. There is no indication that Final Fantasy VIII Remastered will receive any new content, nor if the Chocobo World minigame will be functional, as that required the use of a separate peripheral on the original PlayStation.
It's surprising that it took Square Enix this long to remaster Final Fantasy VIII for modern systems, as there was a PC port of the game released in 2000 that is available to be used as a basis for an updated version of the game. There were rumors that the game was being held back by licensing issues regarding its music, as Square Enix neglected to mention the 20th anniversary of Final Fantasy VIII's Japanese release on any of its social media channels, suggesting that the company was downplaying the game's significance. The fact that Final Fantasy VIII Remastered is in development suggests that any outstanding issues with the game have been resolved.
It's great to see that Squall Leonhart and the members of SeeD haven't been forgotten and that an entirely new generation of gamers can experience one of the greatest Final Fantasy titles of all time. The fact that a Final Fantasy VIII Remake will likely be made after Final Fantasy VII Remake is released means that fans have something to tide them over until then, especially as that game will need to be expanded in order to make room for all of the fan theories that have been confirmed over the years.
Final Fantasy VIII Remastered is coming to Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Steam, and Xbox One in 2019.