Star Wars' Greatest Role in Gaming Is Hidden in Final Fantasy

Great ideas rarely exist in isolation, especially when it comes to fantasy. Even the most imaginative fictional worlds tend to borrow from those that came before them, taking familiar concepts and reshaping them into something that feels entirely new. As it turns out, Final Fantasy owes quite a bit of its identity to Star Wars, something longtime Square Enix developer Yoshinori Kitase recently discussed in an interview with IGN. But what makes his comments particularly interesting isn't just how much Star Wars influenced Final Fantasy. It's how that same creative exchange has continued across generations, with games like Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 demonstrating just how far a good idea can go when another creator takes it somewhere different.