Tetsuya Nomura (野村 哲也, Nomura Tetsuya; born October 8, 1970) is a Japanese video game artist, designer, producer, and director who works for Square Enix. He was first hired by Square Enix as a monster designer for Final Fantasy V in 1992. Later, he worked as a secondary character designer with Yoshitaka Amano for Final Fantasy VI in 1994. For Final Fantasy VII in 1997, he helped create the original story with Hironobu Sakaguchi. This was also the first time he worked as the lead character designer, a role he continued for many future games in the Final Fantasy series and other Square Enix titles, such as The Bouncer and The World Ends with You. He also designed the characters Cactuar, Gilgamesh, and Tonberry.
In addition, Nomura created and directed the Kingdom Hearts series starting in 2002. He has also worked as a creative producer for The World Ends with You series. He directed the 2005 film Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children and directed Final Fantasy VII Remake in 2020. He also served as creative director for the follow-up game, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, released in 2024.
Early life
Nomura’s father encouraged his interest in art and games from an early age by making small drawings and creating unique Sugoroku board games for him. Nomura began drawing when he was three years old and made his own Sugoroku games during his elementary school years. As a child, he spent much of his free time playing baseball, swimming, fishing, and building fortresses. In middle school, his father told him that a time of computers was coming and then bought him his own computer. Nomura played the game Legends of Star Arthur: Planet Mephius on it and started making his own video games by learning programming. He first tried a Nintendo product with the tennis and ping-pong version of the Color TV-Game console and later borrowed a Family Computer during high school. Around that time, Dragon Quest became Nomura’s favorite game because it surprised him and introduced him to video games that included stories. His art teacher in high school recommended the work of Final Fantasy illustrator Yoshitaka Amano. Nomura also created his own manga during class and planned to make a career out of it, though he later gave up the idea. He attended vocational school to learn how to create artwork for magazines and advertisements. Nomura then looked for a job in advertising at a publishing company. However, he eventually applied to Square after seeing a job ad that included a drawing by Yoshitaka Amano.
Career
In 1991, Nomura was hired by Square and first worked as a debugger for Final Fantasy IV. Later, the company divided its staff, and he joined the team working on Final Fantasy. After receiving training from artist Tetsuya Takahashi, Nomura designed monsters for Final Fantasy V. At that time, each developer kept a plan book with ideas to share with the game director. While others typed and printed their plan books, Nomura wrote his by hand and added many drawings. This impressed director Hironobu Sakaguchi and event planner Yoshinori Kitase. Nomura then became the graphic director for Final Fantasy VI. For this game, he created characters Shadow and Setzer, along with their stories. Their designs were reused from earlier ideas he had for Final Fantasy V.
After working on smaller projects, Nomura became the principal character designer for Final Fantasy VII, replacing Amano. He drew characters in a stylized and chibi style and created the idea for "Limit Break" attacks. He also helped shape the story, including events like Aerith's death. In 1998, Nomura worked on Parasite Eve and Brave Fencer Musashi. He then designed characters and monsters for Final Fantasy VIII using his own style of drawing. He worked with art director Yusuke Naora to create more realistic graphics. He also wrote background stories for characters and designed fight sequences. Later, Nomura worked on several projects for Square, including the 1998 fighting game Ehrgeiz, which used characters from Final Fantasy VII.
Nomura was the character designer for The Bouncer, a 2000s beat 'em up game, before returning to Final Fantasy as a character designer for Final Fantasy X in 2001. He worked with the team to ensure characters' clothing looked the same in videos and in-game scenes, unlike in Final Fantasy VIII. In February 2000, he began working as the director of Kingdom Hearts with a team of over 100 members from Square and Disney Interactive. He first learned about the game during a discussion between Shinji Hashimoto and Hironobu Sakaguchi about using Mickey Mouse in a video game. He was inspired by Nintendo's Super Mario 64. After talking with Disney staff, Nomura convinced them to use original characters and serve as the character designer. The game's protagonist, Sora, became his favorite character he had designed.
After Kingdom Hearts, Nomura returned to the Final Fantasy series with Final Fantasy XI and Final Fantasy X-2. For the Compilation of Final Fantasy VII metaseries, he again worked as the character designer. A sequel to Kingdom Hearts began development after the release of Kingdom Hearts Final Mix, an international version that added more clues about the series' plot. Nomura continued his work on the series with Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories for the Game Boy Advance in 2004. He had planned to work directly on the PlayStation 2 sequel, Kingdom Hearts II, but fan interest in playing the original game on a portable console led to Chain of Memories, which connected the first and second games.
Later, Nomura became the director and lyricist for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, released in 2005 in Japan. This was his first film role, and he redesigned the characters. He joined the film's crew after producer Yoshinori Kitase contacted him and became director because of his connection to the character Cloud Strife. He shared the directing role with Takeshi Nozue.
Kingdom Hearts II was released in 2005, resolving hints from the first game's secret ending. Because the game was set a year after previous titles, Nomura made sure the story was easy for new players to understand. After Square Enix finished the updated version, Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix, Disney expressed interest in a sequel. Nomura said, "We have various ideas, but we're not at the point where we can say that." He wanted to focus on subplots instead of using Sora temporarily, leading to the creation of Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days in 2008, which explained events before Kingdom Hearts II. In mid-2007, Nomura mentioned wanting a mobile spin-off game that played differently from other Kingdom Hearts titles. The result was Kingdom Hearts Coded, later remade for the Nintendo DS in 2010.
Meanwhile, Nomura designed main characters and planned The World Ends with You for the Nintendo DS. In 2009, he was the main character designer for Final Fantasy XIII. The PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360's improved graphics allowed Nomura to add more detailed elements, like Lightning's cape and facial features. This required more work from the art team compared to earlier games. He did not take an active role in designing non-playable characters. In 2008, he was the character designer for Dissidia Final Fantasy, originally planned as a Kingdom Hearts spin-off with Disney characters. He later changed the idea to use Final Fantasy characters instead. His designs changed the look and style of Amano's illustrations.
In 2010, Square released Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, a prequel explaining scenes from Kingdom Hearts II and its updated version. In early 2011, Square released Dissidia 012 Final Fantasy, which included new characters and gameplay ideas Nomura had planned earlier. For Final Fantasy XIII-2 in 2011, Nomura only designed the faces of new characters, while other staff designed their clothing. After the remake of Kingdom Hearts Coded, Nomura and his team planned Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance, a game to set up events for Kingdom Hearts III. It was released for the Nintendo 3DS due to the console's quality. Nomura confirmed plans for an "HD Technical Test" to celebrate the series' 10th anniversary and attract new players. This event took place on March 3, 2012, with footage from
Accolades
Nomura was awarded the "Excellence in Visual Arts" award by the International Game Developers Association for his work on the first Kingdom Hearts game with Shinji Hashimoto. In IGN's "The Top 100 Video Game Creators of all Time," Nomura was ranked number 84.