Final Fantasy Resonance Aims to Give JRPG Fans What Clair Obscur Already Delivered

In a recent interview, Hiroto Furuya dug into the real reasons behind the comeback of turn-based JRPGs. For the director, this resurgence has nothing to do with passing market trends and everything to do with a generational shift among developers. « I feel like a lot of us creators who had grown up playing turn-based games are now creating games ourselves, » he says. The recent success of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 captures that movement perfectly, in his view: « When we’re talking about Clair Obscur, I believe they are creators who grew up playing JRPGs. »

That logic stretches far beyond video games, Furuya points out. « It feels like there’s this general movement towards revisiting and potentially reassessing or reworking some of the experiences we personally had when we were younger, » he says, pointing to anime and manga as parallel examples. The director sees today’s renewed appetite for turn-based combat as part of that broader shift: « Creators are now revisiting past projects, remaking them, and reimagining them. That may also be a factor contributing to the resurgence we’re seeing right now. »

Against that backdrop, Final Fantasy Resonance positions itself as a direct heir to that philosophy. The game lifts FF5‘s Job system and pairs it with FF6‘s character traits, all wrapped in an HD-2D presentation that faithfully echoes the pixel art of the FF SNES era. It’s a stance that brings Square Enix philosophically closer to indie studios like Sandfall Interactive, proving that veteran and younger developers alike are converging on the same creative nostalgia.

Here’s the full rundown of everything Hiroto Furuya shared on the gameplay, story, and inspirations of the title:

• Pure turn-based combat -> a direct return to the series’ roots
• FF5 inspiration -> customization through the Job system
• FF6 inspiration -> character trait system
• Stagger system -> modern combat mechanic already battle-tested in recent FF games
• Over 20 Visions -> a wide variety of summons to unlock
• Esper summons -> a direct nod to the FF SNES era
• Crystals at the heart of the story -> potentially more central than in any other FF entry
• A father-child storyline -> the emotional core of the narrative
• A spiritual successor to FF4, FF5, and FF6 -> a tribute to the classic Final Fantasy entries
• Plot drawn from FF Brave Exvius -> with reworked dialogue and story beats
• Concept born 6 or 7 years ago -> a long-running project reimagined for consoles