Final Fantasy VII Remake Director Explains Why Cloud's Hair Looks Rough on Switch 2

Last month Square Enix released Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade on Nintendo Switch 2. The port was well-received for its clarity and performance, but some players noticed Cloud’s hair could appear fuzzy or pixelated. In a February 23 interview with Automaton, director Naoki Hamaguchi outlined the technical cause.

The team uses TAA (Temporal Anti-Aliasing) to smooth character outlines by referencing past frames, and hair is rendered with a special process that alternates drawing individual hair dots each frame so fine lines appear to connect smoothly when combined with TAA.

When the Switch 2 runs in portable mode there are additional restrictions that force a lower internal resolution to preserve performance. That lower resolution makes it harder for TAA to produce a stable image, which can cause the graininess and jaggedness players have seen; because the port uses dynamic resolution, hair quality can vary from scene to scene.

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