Naoki Hamaguchi was the key to the coordinated development of Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth

Surpassing its predecessor not only in technical finish, but in gameplay systems, variety, open-ended design and countless other details, there's no doubt that (at least as of today) Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth should be in the running for Game of the Year.

And to make all the pieces fit into a greater whole, especially coming in a work as highly anticipated as these Final Fantasy VII remakes are, producer Yoshinori Kitase spoke to The Washington Post praising the work of the team and more specifically its director, Naoki Hamaguchi.

"Hamaguchi set goals from the beginning and made sure the whole team shared and understood them," Kitase said. "Furthermore, these objectives were broken down into medium-term goals to be achieved every three months, and we would organise a webinar to keep the teams up to date so that we could all stay on top of things."

In addition, Kitase confirms that the development of the third and final part of the FF VII: Remake story is already well underway thanks to the effort and designs it will inherit from Rebirth, although there will be changes. The key challenge for the final game is to rebuild its world to accommodate the Highwind airship, "I definitely want to address the same thing that is expected from our experience with the Highwind to explore the world," said Hamaguchi.

It's unclear when this third act of the Final Fantasy VII trilogy will arrive, but the 30th anniversary in 2027 of the original work suddenly doesn't sound so far-fetched.