It's Hironobu Sakaguchi's 53rd birthday today and we have 10 facts about the father of the Final Fantasy series that we hope you'll enjoy! The facts range from his work on Final Fantasy to his work currently so without further adieu, let's jump right in.

1. Before Final Fantasy, Sakaguchi made Dating Sims

In fact, his title Nakayama Miho no Tokimeki High School was one of the first dating sims to be a mainstream hit and Yoshio Sakamoto, co-creator of Metroid, worked on it.

2. Sakaguchi is in Final Fantasy VII

You can find a portrait of Sakaguchi in one of the houses inside Rocket Town.

3. His favorite Final Fantasy game is Final Fantasy IX

Sorry to all you Final Fantasy VII fans, Sakaguchi's favorite is Final Fantasy IX. To be fair, it is pretty much a love letter to the original games of the Final Fantasy series which Sakaguchi was heavily involved in.

4. Master Eraqus is designed to look like Sakaguchi

You can definitely see it in the face. He even has Sakaguchi's signature goatee. This was said to match Disney's Yen Sid whose name is spells out Disney when read backwards. We just hope that Sakaguchi might some day cosplay Eraqus, although we won't hold our breath.

5. The Last Story is the first game Sakaguchi directed Since Final Fantasy V

Bear in mind that Final Fantasy V was released in 1992 and The Last Story was released in 2011. Granted, Sakaguchi was involved a great deal with the Final Fantasy games until his departure from Square, but he hadn't directed a game for nearly 20 years. Even Final Fantasy IX was directed by Hiroyuki Ito.

6. He's a bit of a goof

Especially as of late, Sakaguchi has proved that he can be silly. For proof you only have to look at his Twitter page or watch his famous Mega64 video below:

7. His mother's death heavily influenced Final Fantasy VII's story

Although his mother passed while he was making Final Fantasy III, Sakaguchi stated that it wasn't until the development of Final Fantasy VII that Sakaguchi decided to put a theme about "life" into a Final Fantasy game and it was partially to help him with the grief that he felt.

8. Sakaguchi's goal is to have his games surpass films

As we can see from his work on Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, Sakaguchi really has a huge love for film and he stated that instead of having games match films' storytelling, he wants to surpass them.

9. Sakaguchi's original pitch for Final Fantasy VII became the basis for Parasite Eve

Sakaguchi originally wanted Final Fantasy VII to focus on a man named Detective Joe and that it would be set in New York or a place like it. While this didn't make it into Final Fantasy VII, Detective Joe went on to become the basis for Aya Brea and Parasite Eve.

10. Garland is Sakaguchi's favorite Villain

For the man that created Final Fantasy, it's no wonder that Sakaguchi's favorite villain is the first villain of the Final Fantasy series, Garland. Garland is also the game's first named character to appear in the entire Final Fantasy series.



That's it for our fun facts! We hope that you enjoyed them and that you might have discovered something new about the man who created Final Fantasy.



