Final Fantasy 7 Remake's Nintendo Switch 2 port is being hailed as one of the best-looking third-party titles on the platform to date. However, there are inevitably some differences, and the way Cloud's hair looks is one of them. Players have noticed that the protagonist's 'do doesn't look quite as pristine on the Nintendo console as it does elsewhere, and Naoki Hamaguchi has given as detailed an explanation as to why that is as you'd hope.
In an interview with Automaton, Remake and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, director Naoki Hamaguchi was asked about the hair differences in the Switch 2 version. Hamaguchi felt a bit like he was skirting the issue at first, noting that it's important to ensure there is gameplay parity for Remake and Rebirth across all platforms.
Why Cloud has frizzy hair on Switch 2
But when pressed for a better explanation as to why Cloud's hair can sometimes appear frizzy on the Switch 2, Hamaguchi went all the way in and gave the most detailed explanation FF7 fans could have hoped for, even after starting his answer by saying he'd try to keep it simple.
Buckle up, because he didn't.
“Hair is made up of extremely fine elements, so if you render it as is, individual hairs can flicker at the pixel level,” explains Hamaguchi. “To address this, we implemented a special process where each strand of hair is switched on or off at the pixel level from frame to frame. Combined with TAA (temporal anti-aliasing), this allows the hair's fine lines to connect smoothly across frames.”
TAA is a technique Square Enix uses to combine information from the frame you're looking at at any given moment with information from previous frames, layering them and making character outlines appear less jagged. This is where the Switch 2 freedom issue comes in, back to Hamaguchi.
“Nintendo Switch 2 has a handheld mode, which comes with some extra limitations. To reduce the processing load, there are situations where the game is forced to lower its internal resolution. As the resolution drops, the TAA becomes less stable, and the rough, jagged edges of the hair become more noticeable.”
Don't worry, you won't get a washed-out resolution in handheld mode
The director is quick to note that this doesn't mean you'll get a lower resolution when playing Remake on handheld on the Switch 2. However, Square uses DLSS to compensate and ensure that doesn't happen. DLSS uses AI to predict how an image should look. That alone should, in theory, retain the crisp look that Cloud's hair usually has on other platforms. However, DLSS doesn't play nice with the method Square uses that toggles hair pixels on and off from frame to frame, and that's what causes the frizziness.
There you have it. If you were wondering why Cloud's hair doesn't look quite right on the Switch 2, now you know. Hamaguchi has promised that Square will continue to try to optimize all versions of the game, so there's a chance the issue will be fixed one day. I imagine most of the studio's Switch 2 efforts are dedicated to Rebirth's launch on the platform this summer. Maybe Cloud's hair won't be quite as frizzy in that game. I hope it looks good when the game will take up more than 100GB of the console's very limited storage space.
