Final Fantasy VI AI remake stuns series creator as developers push back

A fan-made AI video showing what a modern Final Fantasy VI remake might look like went viral on May 17 after series creator Hironobu Sakaguchi reacted with enthusiasm on X. The clip, posted by @auuo, recreates several of the game's most iconic sequences in realistic 3D, including Sabin suplexing the Phantom Train and the Opera House scene where Celes takes Maria's place to deceive Setzer. It has since surpassed 600,000 views.

Sakaguchi's reaction was brief and unguarded. "What is this!?" he wrote on his X profile. "That's amazing!" He shared the clip to his own timeline, which gave it a second wave of attention. Whether Sakaguchi immediately understood he was watching AI-generated footage rather than a fan-built render is not clear. The response suggests that he may not have done something. Either way, his name being attached to the video was enough to spark a full debate.

The pushback

Akitoshi Kawazu replied directly to Sakaguchi. Kawazu worked as a combat designer on the original Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy II and later created the SaGa series. His response: "No, Sakaguchi-san, please stop at the first line." He did not leave it there. In the same post, Kawazu said that he had recently spoken to an American tourist at a sushi restaurant in Shimokitazawa who said he loves Final Fantasy VI and the character Mash and that the conversation reminded him of how well the game would translate to a 3D remake, even if the AI video itself is not the way to do it.

Fan reaction split cleanly along familiar lines. Some viewers praised the visual ambition and said the clip finally showed what a modern FF6 could look like in capable hands. Others pointed out what capable hands the AI notably lacked: the character Terra towering over NPCs at an implausible scale, faces that looked rigid and expressionless, and a metallic visual texture that stripped the its original warmth. "Faces that look like dead husks with no semblance of character or soul," wrote one reviewer at Nintendo Life.

The game still has no remake

Final Fantasy VI was released in 1994 on the Super Nintendo and remains one of the most requested games for a modern remake. Square Enix has not announced one. The director of the Final Fantasy VII Remake trilogy, Naoki Hamaguchi, has said he would prefer to support a new creator rather than lead another remake himself if such a project were to happen. For more on the legacy of classic Final Fantasy games, Notebookcheck recently spoke with Final Fantasy Tactics composer Hitoshi Sakimoto, who revealed that the FFT soundtrack is rooted in rock.