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In a fresh interview with Tetsuya Nomura and Motomu Toriyama, Famitsu dug up a few interesting tidbits about Final Fantasy XIII‘s development, on topics ranging from character design to load times. Some of the more noteworthy bits include:

– Oerba Yun Fang, the mysterious black-haired girl from the Tokyo Game Show trailer, was originally male. When s/he was changed, the developers upped her sex appeal and lowered that of Lightning. Clearly, sex appeal is a zero-sum resource that must be apportioned wisely.

– Sazh was originally supposed to have a hat atop the afro, which, of course, still contained the chocobo chick. Exactly what kind of hat was left open to the imagination.

– Toriyama let slip that a character name “you always see in a Final Fantasy game” will be revealed down the road. Although this basically narrows it down to Cid, it was not explicitly stated. However, this character will have a major role in Final Fantasy XIII.

– Save games run to about 500kb in size, with trophy data taking up to 3080kb. There will not be an option to install the game to a hard disk.

– The only load times, according to Toriyama, will be in the transition from town to field.

Nomura also shared a few details about other upcoming titles, including Final Fantasy Versus XIII. Test footage showed a sample of the game’s engine with simple placeholder enemies, simply to demonstrate how the engine handles large environments. Nomura likened the gameplay to “an extension of Kingdom Hearts” but with more of a Final Fantasy feel. There will also be a partner system, although it was not elaborated upon.

Source: IGN