When it was confirmed that Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth was sticking with Remake's PlayStation exclusivity, it came as a blow to Xbox players. However, for those of you lucky enough to have bagged a PS5, you're in for some luck, as making Rebirth solely for the Sony console seems to be speeding development along nicely.
In a recent interview with Dengeki Online, executive producer Yoshinori Kitase spoke about Rebirth's ongoing development, and how working with PS5 hardware has sped things along. He also suggests development is going much easier than Remake and Intergrade's, as these had to be released on both PS5 and PC across a relatively short timeframe.
"Thanks to the shift to the PS5 environment over there, the development of "FFVII REBIRTH" [is going] smoothly", Kitase said in the interview. "It's a really amazing development speed for a title of this size.
"After the production of Final Fantasy 7 Remake, it took about a year to develop the PC version and Intergrade, and then Rebirth was started. So the actual development period is less than three years."
Kitase elaborated on this further in an interview with Gamer.ne, explaining why the PS4 and other platforms were left behind. Here, he says that he felt the "PS5 specs were necessary", as Rebirth will explore a "vast world after escaping Midgar". He says that sticking with the PS5 means that it can be played "comfortably", which from the sounds of it, is something we can expect to do soon.
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth is set to launch winter 2023. With development going so well so far, it seems that possible delays are far off the horizon. Before that, however, we have Crisis Core: Reunion to look forward to. This remake of the original PSP game has a release window of this winter, so it's not far off at all. Unlike the main entities, it will be available across PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and Nintendo Switch.