300°

Square Enix Sales Grow & Profit Drops YoY Following Release of Final Fantasy XVI & Pixel Remasters

Square Enix announced its financial results for the first half of the fiscal year, related to the period between April 2023 and September 2023.

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techraptor.net
gold_drake172d ago

i mean listen, all their gaas bs is not necessary.

ever crisis could have been a 30 quid game, a turn based experience instead of a mobile game.
the new kh could also have been a 30 quid game, especially with their controller support.

but im pretty sure the biggest failure and loss was definitely with forespoken.

Obscure_Observer172d ago (Edited 172d ago )

"but im pretty sure the biggest failure and loss was definitely with forespoken."

Their biggest failure was going exclusive with Playstation. Doesn´t matter how hard you try and deny it, but to left both Xbox and Nintendo out was a big mistake.

To make things worse, Sony didn´t made an acquisition offer so now SE will be on their own dealing with the losses of massive investments on both production/development and marketing that simply didn´t pay out.

Fortunately the new CEO is a multiplatform supporter and SE might see better results in profit margin in middle term with both Xbox and Nintendo on board again.

Nyxus172d ago

"with higher sales year on year due to the launch of Final Fantasy XVI and the Final Fantasy Pixel Remasters,"

Read the article please. FFXVI was a success. And JRPGs sell horribly on Xbox. Why do you think their latest release, Star Ocean The Second Story R, is on everything but Xbox?

Abriael172d ago

Lol @ "Losses."

It's absolutely hilarious to see how many console warriors don't understand that declining profit still means that a company made a profit (and not a small one), and behave like they're in the red and need to be acquired to be saved from bankruptcy.

Square Enix made a *profit,* and a substantial one, as it did for the past several years.

These "losses" you're talking about are entirely fictional. 😂

shinoff2183172d ago

Lol as if xbox gamers you know the ones that don't buy games would've been squares saving grace. Forspoken and ff16 probably wouldn't even run on the switch

Vengeance1138172d ago

LMAO making up stories to fit your own narrative again?

Way to ignore the FACT that FF16 literally saved them. That makes you sad doesnt it? Knowing your wrong? Trying super hard to deny it? You will always be the biggest failure of N4G lol

Obscure_Observer172d ago

"Read the article please. FFXVI was a success."

I read:

"with higher sales year on year due to the launch of Final Fantasy XVI and the Final Fantasy Pixel Remasters, while profit dropped year-on-year due *higher development cost amortization and advertising costs.*"

Which games do you believe to have "higher development cost amortization and advertising costs"?

"And JRPGs sell horribly on Xbox. Why do you think their latest release, Star Ocean The Second Story R, is on everything but Xbox?"

Because the previous CEO was a blind and certified Blockchain and Playstation supporter who, among others equally poor decisions, sold SE´s western division for cheap! The new CEO Takashi Kiryu, has a more pragmatic view on gaming and SE will be bringing more games to Xbox! FFXIV is just the beginning!

shinoff2183172d ago

Obscure your still ignoring the fact that xbox gamers don't buy games let alone jrpgs. Also the whole ps comment doesn't even make sense as switch has games from square not on Playstation. It's just an xbox thing

-Foxtrot172d ago

Mate, it's pretty obvious FFXVI missed out on Xbox because Square literally couldn't be arsed with Microsofts shitty parity rule for the Series S and X.

lucian229172d ago

wow your brain is dumb observer , lmaoooo

gold_drake172d ago

you say Nintendo and Xbox, but their games are so high end, that they wouldnt even run on the switch. and they'd have to make compromises due to the Series S.

and we know that they dont have a good relationship with xbox.

so your logic only makes half sense.

i agree that a multiplatform approach would make them more money, if it werent for the fact that their games dont sell on xbox. they never have.

final fantasy for example, is considered to be a playstation franchise, they sell the most on that platform.

also, exclusivity isnt just given free of charge. im pretty sure Sony paid them handsomely for it. and even had help from sony for 16 to run great on ps5.

andy85172d ago (Edited 172d ago )

Xbox, no. That 5% of sales was doing nothing. Switch could be argued but what 2012 looking game would we have gotten then? It'd have ruined it. And it was nothing to do with XVI in the first place

andy85172d ago

"SE will be bringing more games to Xbox, FFXIV is just the beginning". Sorry but how does porting a decade old game prove that. Where is Rebirth. And more to the point. Where is Remake part 1?

Hereandthere172d ago

Forspoken and ff16 can not run on xbox series s, its not worth the effort.

Stanjara172d ago

Last time I checked retailers are cutting down Xbox game sections, which indicates that Xbox players not only don't buy JRPGs, but they don't buy games in general.

New FF release going straight to GP for $5 mill I not happening.

Petebloodyonion172d ago

If Xbox gamers don't buy games then why Square released Final Fantasy Crisis Core reunion?
Why did Sony need to pay for FFXVI exclusivity?
Actually, why does any 3rd party company like WB, EA, Ubisoft, etc put their games on Xbox if Xbox gamers don't buy games?

badz149171d ago (Edited 171d ago )

@Obsecure

xbox fans don't even buy their flagship games like Halo and Forza, why do you think they would be buying Final Fantasy?

"Sony didn´t made an acquisition offer..."

and seriously GTFO with your industry consolidation idea! not every dev and publisher should be bought by the big console makers! you're what's wrong with this industry!

FinalFantasyFanatic171d ago

Yes, the extra 100 sales from having the games on Xbox would have made a huge difference, probably.

Personally I think Square-Enix has gone from an amazing company to an overall meh company, they're still making bank anyway, even when games "fail to meet their expectations" (e.g. TWEWY NEO).

shinoff2183171d ago

Pete ,talk to ms. They said it themselves.

andy85171d ago (Edited 171d ago )

@petebloodyonion using Crisis Core wasn't a great example as that only sold 5 or 6% on Xbox. And SE went directly to both Sony and Microsoft about FFXVI. It was only on Sony because MS didn't want it enough

+ Show (15) more repliesLast reply 171d ago
-Foxtrot172d ago

Kingdom Hearts is just a massive head scratcher to me

They finally have the chance to softboot the story and have it easier to understand but they are like "NAH...lets do an MMO game not many will play"

gold_drake172d ago

yea its .. a choice.

especially now that Nomura has such a .. not bad per se, but definitely A reputation due to his convoluted contribution that is KH.

FinalFantasyFanatic171d ago

I personally think they screwed up big time with KH3, not to mention how fragmented the game's story was over multiple hardware until recently, a soft reboot to begin a new saga would have been a good idea.

Nyxus172d ago

Good for FFXVI. Hopefully it keeps selling. As for the Pixel Remasters, they could probably have sold even more if they hadn't limited the amount of physical copies as much as they did. Not sure why they don't just do a reprint...

Relientk77172d ago

I haven't bought the Pixel Remasters because I want a physical copy. Too bad they only made like 14 copies of them. Man, they are dumb, would of sold like hot cakes.

Nyxus172d ago

Yeah I really don't get why they don't make more. I can understand it for the CE but the regular one should simply be available in their own store at least.

Eonjay172d ago

I am starting to notice a trend with SOME Japanese companies. They put for an unusual amount of effort to try and mitigate their success. Some simply just chase failure. They could see how fast their initial shipment sold out so instead off simply restocking it they would rather fail and complain about sales. Its a weird inferiority complex where they look for opportunities to underdeliver.

-Foxtrot172d ago (Edited 172d ago )

It still makes me bitter they refuse to do more copies

I won't buy it digitally I refuse, I'll wait almost another decade until they do another collection if I have to,

Even the collectors edition they did was lacklustre, they could have put a lot more thought into it

I'm just hoping their "get out of jail free card" will be making more copies for the PS5 since they never sold a PS5 version and that's how they'll get around it. Maybe a version which added improvements or goodies.

jznrpg172d ago

If they would have released more copies of Pice Remaster they would have sold more copies of Pixel Remaster especially for PS

Eonjay172d ago

I might have even considered getting it for Switch too. But Square wanted to make sure they underperformed in sales and disappointed their fans at the same time.

z2g172d ago

Maybe stop putting all your eggs in one platforms basket….

tay8701172d ago

Switch isn't powerful enough to handle FF16, and it would have sold like hot garbage on xbox. It would have made no difference putting it on xbox. Would have been a 90/10 sales split between sony and xbox. Now if they released it simultaneously on PC, that probably would have made a difference. Still only has a 6 month exclusivity for ps5, so pc port will be right around the corner.

Eonjay172d ago

Yes I was about to say... it is coming to PC.

thesoftware730172d ago (Edited 172d ago )

I would bet SE disagrees with your assessment, as they have pledged more support for Xbox, they even held an event to announce it.FF: online is incoming with more support to follow.

SE themselves must have realized that more gamers, no matter how you spin it, will account for more sales in the short and long run. It is also apparent that their current strategy is not working, good thing you are not running a gaming company, it sounds like you would stay the course and go bankrupt.

shinoff2183172d ago

Software730

Square pledged, but how much did that cost ms

andy85172d ago

@thesoftware730 sure more sales is always nice. But if you think it was worth them making not one, but two new versions for a tiny tiny majority of sales you're nuts.

thesoftware730172d ago (Edited 172d ago )

Shin, and Andy,

Both of your questions are irrelevant to the fact that SE is the company, and they pledged to bring more games.

I don't care how much MS paid them, none of us really do lol.

@Andy, it's obvious that if MS paid them or they plan to make some money from GP or sales, they think it's what is best for them, and worth it.
Currently their strategy is not working in the right direction...so Sony alone can't save them, PC and Xbox is the way to ensure max sales, just like most big 3rd parties.

+ Show (2) more repliesLast reply 172d ago
Barlos172d ago

They're not all in one basket - many are multi platform.

That'll all change after Sony buy them though

kayoss172d ago

They keep this up, they will be forced to sell.

Abriael172d ago

It's funny that this wishful thinking always comes up.

I'll let you into a secret. Square Enix is a profitable company. Dropping profit still means that they made a profit, and not a small one.

There's nothing "forcing" them to sell to anyone.

Obscure_Observer172d ago

"It's funny that this wishful thinking always comes up."

And yet they sold its western division for peanuts and got Luminous Productions shut down after Forspoken´s fiasco!

So feel free to say whatever you want about SE "still getting profit" but that company´s recent history is nothing but proof that they deal with their "problems" in a rather drastic and very volatile way.

Abriael172d ago (Edited 172d ago )

They sold the western division to focus on what they do best, their Japanese games and Japanese division.

The western division was much more expensive to run and didn't bring enough returns to justify the budgets it required, so they divested it. It has nothing to do with "drastic" and "volatile" and other companies like Sega should do exactly the same. Capcom did as well, and they're doing great.

Square Enix is a solid, profitable company. It's simple as that.

Show all comments (55)
260°

Steam’s Refund Policy Change Won’t Affect You Unless You’re A Lowlife

Steam is changing its refund policy, but you probably won’t be affected

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thegamer.com
thorstein15h ago

Should have happened a long time ago. People wanting refunds after 50 hours in game.

fsfsxii11h ago

Pc gamers will take this as an excuse to pirate things

KyRo10h ago

I'm not sure why you're getting disgrees. Whilst not all PC gamers are petty, an awful lot of them are lol

Crows9010h ago

Entirely untrue. Not any more petty than console gamers. The only large difference is console gamers don't have much of a choice.

Michiel19891h ago

Not sure why you're getting agrees. an awful lot of console gamers are overemotional twinks ready to go to war over a plastic box, I'll take being a pc gamer then.

Speaking about overgeneralizing much.

qalpha11h ago

Daily reminder that 'TheGamer' is a corporate-generated, anti-gamer, anti-consumer, clickbait web site. They are mostly A.I. generated articles that villainize gamers. They provide nothing positive and actively try to provoke and divide the community through extreme view points and politics. Do not give them any clicks.

Inverno11h ago

Only scumbags? As if people don't play their games on console put in the most amount of hours and return it to GameStop and trade it in for another game. But also how many people are actually do this? And what games have been allowed to be refunded?

DustMan10h ago

You can refund any game you've purchased as long as it hasn't been longer than two weeks, and you've played less than 2 hours. I wish they would change it to 3 hours because some RPG's have so much exposition that you may only get an hour total of complete gameplay. That's my only knock on it. I've refunded plenty of stuff I was just curious to try. I typically stay away from Early Access titles which are the only ones affected by this policy change.

Inverno9h ago

Apparently early access doesn't count, only complete games with a play early preorder bonus.

Gaming4Life198110h ago

I definitely know if I want a refund in 2 hours.

SegaSaturn6692h ago

I never liked refunding anything. Even if a film is bad, i dont want my money back. Sometimes things just aren't for me, and it's not the creator's fault necessarily.

Show all comments (13)
100°

Media Molecule’s Next Game is Going to be a New IP

A job listing published by the UK studio reveals that its next project will be another entirely new IP.

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gamingbolt.com
Inverno1d 6h ago

The only PlayStation dev I care about tbh.

Inverno10h ago

Dayum did I hit a nerve. Sorry for not liking most of this gens games coming from PS, not really doe.

Cacabunga1d 6h ago

Hopefully doesn’t take them a complete gen to release it

TheColbertinator1d 1h ago

Good. Something not boring, not one of those "make your own game" crap and also on Steam would be nice.

Stopac23h ago

I too like to look for things in the wrong places.

110°

Outriders Dev's Next Game Has Been Canceled After Publishing Agreement With Take-Two Fell Through

Outriders developer People Can Fly's next game has been canceled after its publishing agreement with Take-Two Interactive fell through.

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twistedvoxel.com
Tacoboto2d ago

"the capital group of PCF Group S.A."

If you're getting funding from a group that needs two different ways of Acronyming itself, things will not go the way you want them to.

banger882d ago

If it was more online-only crap then good riddance.

jjb19811d 14h ago

Outriders was crap. They slapped that game together and threw in a loot system to get players' attention. This game was absolutely jank and the always online nonsense made it stutter like crazy. People Can't Optimize.

thorstein1d 13h ago

I liked Outriders but I could see where the artistic vision was compromised. The way the industry is now, it wouldn't surprise me that upper management would scrap something that didn't pull in money via gaas, mts, or other means.