Short answers, pulled from the story.
Tetsuya Nomura is a Japanese video game artist, designer, producer, and director at Square Enix, born in 1970. He is best known as the lead character designer for Final Fantasy VII and as the creator and director of the Kingdom Hearts series. He also directed Final Fantasy VII Remake (2020) and served as creative director on Final Fantasy VII Rebirth (2024).
Nomura was hired by Square in 1991, initially working as a debugger on Final Fantasy IV. He moved into monster design on Final Fantasy V the following year before becoming graphic director on Final Fantasy VI (1994).
Nomura created the Kingdom Hearts series and has directed it since its inception in 2002. He assembled a team of over one hundred members from Square and Disney Interactive, designed the series' main characters including protagonist Sora, and received the International Game Developers Association's Excellence in Visual Arts award for the first game.
Nomura created the characters Cactuar, Gilgamesh, and Tonberry, and designed the leads for multiple numbered entries including Final Fantasy VI's Shadow and Setzer, Final Fantasy VII's Cloud Strife, and Final Fantasy X's Tidus and Yuna. He also devised the Limit Break mechanic for Final Fantasy VII.
Nomura co-directed the CGI animated film Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, released in Japan in 2005, sharing the director role with Takeshi Nozue. He also served as supervising director on Last Order: Final Fantasy VII, a shorter animated work released the same year, and was the lyricist for Advent Children.
Nomura left his position as director of Final Fantasy XV in December 2013 following what Square Enix described as changes in development structure. He had been directing the project since before its announcement in May 2006, when it was still titled Final Fantasy Versus XIII.