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Final Fantasy 10's developers chose to move away from sci-fi after finding out that The Lord of the Rings was being adapted into a big-screen trilogy, and hoping they could be a part of the "next big global trend."
Square Enix is now celebrating 25 years since the original Final Fantasy 10 first launched, and in an effort to stop fans crumbling into dust, the company released an interview between Takashi Tokita (of Chrono Trigger and Parasite Eve fame) and series producer Yoshinori Kitase about the iconic game's production.
While Final Fantasy frequently flips between the sci-fi and fantasy genres, Final Fantasy 10 was originally supposed to follow on from Final Fantasy 7 and Final Fantasy 8's more tech-forward approach. According to Kitase, that quickly changed.
"During development, we initially took a more sci-fi approach at first, but when we thought about what would be trending in Hollywood around the time of FF10's release, we learned that The Lord of the Rings was in production," Kitase explains. "So we thought fantasy was going to be the next big global trend, and that was one of the reasons we decided to go with fantasy rather than sci-fi."
The timing worked out perfectly, too. Final Fantasy 10 began development in 1999 and came out in 2001, just a few short months before The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring and Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone made waves in theatres.
Yuna's pilgrimage and Frodo's trek aren't too dissimilar when you take a step back, either. Both are tragic characters carrying a literal burden too heavy for anyone else, tasked with saving the world from a calamity that'll likely kill them in the process. But Final Fantasy 10's sci-fi routes still show up here and there in the final game, as well.
"It began with Mr. [Kazushige] Nojima wanting to explore a fantasy atmosphere that wasn't rooted in medieval Europe, but instead drew from more Eastern influences, since both FF7 and FF8 had maintained a sci-fi tone," Kitase adds.
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