To commemorate the great significance of Final Fantasy 7 as a cultural export, Japan has designated today, January 31, as "Final Fantasy 7 Day," the anniversary of the game's release on PS1. The list of anniversaries posted on the Japan Anniversary Association (JAO) website (opens in new tab) introduces the game as "a huge hit in Japan and abroad" and expresses the hope that "more people will enjoy FF7, which has been newly developed with the latest technology as a remake series. It seems like it's getting faster every year, doesn't it?

To be clear, this is not a national day of celebration with parades in the streets and work days off, but simply an official annual commemoration of the importance of FF7 to the medium of gaming, and especially to the Japanese gaming industry. JAO's list of "FF7 Days" includes There are also "Wet Towel Day" and "Yamamoto-ya Egg Sandwich Day" (which, well, sounds incredible), which are a bit different from Golden Week (open in new tab) level festivities.

Nevertheless, to mark the day, Square Enix released an official statement from Yoshinori Kitase, producer of the original FF7 and FF7 Remake (opens in new tab). Kitase recalled that January 31 was not only the release date of the game, but also "the day when many big things started moving for those of us involved in games," and "a day when we were overwhelmed by the breakneck speed of the evolution of game technology, but also had big dreams for the future"

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"The establishment of this official anniversary," he writes, "has made me remember these things constantly and hold them dear to [my] heart. It would be strange if we forgot about them without the anniversary, but it is nice to see the impact of the first game and the contributions of its developers officially recognized.

The story of the FF7 remake will continue this winter with FF7 Rebirth (open in new tab), and work has begun on a third and final game to follow it. When it is released, it will be a PS5 exclusive, but it is not out of the realm of possibility that it will eventually be released on PC as well. With any luck, that will happen sooner rather than later. Perhaps it will be released on the same day as FF7.