Right now, Square Enix is running a Final Fantasy Farewell Stories 30th Anniversary Exhibition in the Mori Arts Center Gallery in Roppongi Hills, Tokyo. This event is running until February 28. 2018. During a talk at the event, Square Enix revealed four new screenshots from the in-development Final Fantasy VII remake. While these screenshots won’t be publicly released for a while, reports from the event have suggested Cloud, and other characters, have significantly altered character designs compared to what has been shown of the game so far.
Naoki Hamaguchi, development lead on the project, said that the new design “finally” received approval from Tetsuya Normura (director of the remake and original character designer of the cast). Conjecture: to me, this implies the design has been pushed by creative for a while, translation barriers notwithstanding. Hamaguchi apparently said either the “hard work paid off,” or Nomura considered the new final design “closest” to the original.
Apparently not only did the screenshots show the new Cloud, but Avalanche members Biggs, Wedge, and Jessie were also included. Attendees via Twitter suggested all of the characters differed in appearance compared to the original trailer from E3 2015.
Source: Gematsu