The company known for games like Final Fantasy VII and Chrono Trigger are not what they used to be. Why are they changing the strategies that made them the best JRPG developer ever? When will things turn back around for them in the future?
They started going down after Final Fantasy IX. Started being afraid of Microsofts action RPG's, and being left behind. Changing their summon spells trying to turn them into something other than over the top turn based events (FFX) which only succeeded in taking the melodramatic flare or soul out of them.
Speaking of turn based they started trying to run away from turn based, and traditional JRPG music, and the so called cutsy style!
They where afraid of the new Microsoft grown up hard core (looking) style action RPG. Ended up not pleasing the action crowd! And alienating the turn based crowed, which where scopped up by Mistwalker and Konami. Like Micheal Jackson song said: 'to high to get over (yeah yeah), to low to get under(yeah yeah), your stock in the middle'.
Now with FFXIII I think they are trying two kinds of Final fantasy at once. To compare the sales? Earth to Square most people that dislike RPG's will not switch over just because you disguise it. Some will but most will not!
What is with the music? Are you ashamed of your JRPG roots? Yeah a few do like the change but pay attention: Rock, RAP, techno, and moogles don't mix! (unless your drinking something strong).
What I'm saying is become your identity.
AND bring me my melodramatic Summon spells, and melodramatic Music back you fart knockers!
"They started going down after Final Fantasy IX. Started being afraid of Microsofts action RPG's, and being left behind."
What game(s) could you possible be referring to? Final Fantasy X was completed and on shelves before Fable was even ANNOUNCED. I can't recall any other major RPG on the Xbox, other than KOTOR, which was in early development when FFX was completed.
but the lackluster of SE are the thing nobody can denies at this point! I'm not saying that they supporting the 360 is wrong but what are those CRAPS they are putting on that machine? all these times, JRPGs have always been selling best in JAPAN and SE supporting the losing console in that very region makes them look STUPID! what are they thinking? if they went multiplat like CAPCOM, they will have never got the bad reputation like they do right now but they chose to go exclusive and then released CRAPS and that's why many hate them! they need to do something because I can see the doubts on the quality of FFXIII and vsXIII is on the rise!
try since ps1. the last good games they made were fft, ff7. after that they started drifting into homosexual male heroes, absurd art direction, and ridiculously cheesy stories. i wish they would go away already.
"try since ps1. the last good games they made were fft, ff7. after that they started drifting into homosexual male heroes, absurd art direction, and ridiculously cheesy stories. i wish they would go away already."
Homosexual undertones? A new and different art direction? Over-the-top, cheesy, and convoluted storyline? The funniest part about this comment, is that it pretty much sums up Final Fantasy 7 in a nutshell. Was the point of this post to be humorous?
That aside, I don't agree with your statement regarding FF7 as Square's last "good game". IMO, Final Fantasy VIII was hand-over-fist better than Final Fantasy VII (with Final Fantasy Tactics being my favorite... that is... if you consider it a REAL FF title), and the last "great" Final Fantasy was FFX for the PS2.
while I hate to comment on ANY hiphopgamer article as I dont believe in promoting POOR grammar and blatant ignorance, I will however say that most people have completely missed the big picture. This isn't about love for microsoft or the 360. This has more to do with a pissin match that SE decided to get into with Sony. It is becoming clear that SE wanted concessions from Sony this generation that they were not willing to make. This is why SE came out with those absurdly insane comments about their software making or breaking either console. Not only was the viewpoint narrow-minded and arrogant, it was also UNBELIEVEABLY false as sales have proved in the long run. Heres to SE eating A GIANT turd called CROW.
Square enix has lost their minds. They want to make western rpgs all of the sudden and back the 360. This has lead to their crap-fest of infinite undescovery type games. A successful company should never make a sudden "image change" because that will only alienate their fan base (SE used to have a huge fan base). From a stand point of making money this strategy is complete madness.
On a plus note the producer of FF versus 13 seems to want to take his development in a old school direction. I'm glad to see his team competing against this new SE strategy.
But anyways, I just got done playing with Star Ocean:The Last Hope and it is the worst written, acted and directed game I have ever played. I stuck with it because I really like Star Ocean III, but god even I have my limits. It screams "RUSHED". I'm a computer scientist and I could kick the crap out of who ever edited this game.
Correction, SquareSoft didn't go crappier when they merged with Enix but instead they got better until Yoichi Wada, the President and the Vice President of Square Enix, Michihiro Sasaki saw that there was more profit in making Remakes and medicore games that were mostly towards the American Audience rather than their own Country, which I remind you that most of their profit comes from japan as evidently from Final Fantasy sales on an average of 3.1 million in japan alone. Final Fantasy VII sold 3.93m Final Fantasy VIII sold 3.64m Final Fantasy IX sold 2.80m Final Fantasy X sold 3.02m Final Fantasy XII sold 2.42m All in Japan
Yoichi Wada Once said "it's very difficult to hit the jackpot, as it were. Once we've hit it, we have to get all the juice possible out of it".
And I assume that this jackpot is probably Xbox360 as they have yet to actually support PS3 with anything, heck even Crystal Defenders is not even on PSN except for JP but it is on Wiiware and XBL everywhere. Just because they thought Xbox360 is the American Market as it has more ground in the US than PS3. Funny Thing is though that Square Enix's released psp games such as Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions, have sold more than any JRPG on Xbox360.
Also Michihiro Sasaki said "We don't want the PlayStation 3 to be the overwhelming loser, so we want to support them, but we don't want them to be the overwhelming winner either, so we can't support them too much."
Iono about you but Square Enix has yet to support the PS3 and have really dropped the ball this Gen which I believe their not making the right decisions at all such as trying to break into the American market. They should just focus on making JAPANESE RPGS rather than making supposedly appealing RPGS towards the west such as Last Remenat and Infinte Discovery and start with establishing the plot, characters and art of the game first.
Hopefully, Yoshinori Kitase (director of FF13) and Tetsuya Nomura (Director of FFVS13) will continue Making High Quality games that square was known for. High hopes Final Fantasy 13 and Final Fantasy Versus 13, They better not let me down on at least this game.
But I have to agree. Whatever idiot thought that they could give [email protected]$$ed support for the 360, not giving it the PS3 while at the same time put their 2nd biggest franchise out on it, needs to be fired.
I hope you're not talking about Star Ocean, because that's not their 2nd biggest franchise. Their biggest franchise is Final Fantasy and their second is Dragon Quest. Dragon Quest seems to be a Nintendo exclusive as well.
They drank the M$ Kool-aid believing they could make it primarily on a shooter console.
Props for Microsoft though for trying to break from that image, but it is what it is.
From here on out, M$ won't be buying up "loyalty" in this economy and will have to make due with the momemtum they've built on their install base. But once the PS3 price drop happens, we're going to start seeing a dramatic shift. The same shift that Japan's sales have indicated in recent months.
Hopefully the writing on the wall will wake up JP devs to focus on the system that will maximize their profits.
Square-Enix HAS been making a lot of bad games lately.
Last one I liked from them was probably Grandia III and even that was just OK.
But my point is that while they're sucking, they've also made poor business decisions supporting a console that isn't big in Japan, essentially abandoning their fan base. That doesn't make sense!
how is it a poor business decision? especially if they get paid by someone? I am not saying they are getting paid by anyone, but if they are then how is that bad? That is just you acting like a little girl because you don't have a 360 and you are a fangirl. You probably only think they make bad games becuase they aren't on the PS3, if these aweful games were made only for the PS3, the here on N4G they would be the greatest games ever and Square would be the best. But they aren't so they aren't.
Seriously dude, stop talking down to people. You are no better then anyone here. Saying this guy is acting like a little girl and calling him a fangirl is pretty pathetic of you.
The only person I see here acting like a little girl is you. This guy didn't disrespect you at all yet you feel the need to belittle him.
Stop making assumption about people. If he said that he didn't like Squares games that is all you know about his opinions on the subject. Yet for some reason you assume that if the games were on the PS3 he would all of a sudden love those games.
So how about you take your "fangirl" self to the Open Zone where that kind of crap is much more tolerated.
Because to abandon base for a quick paid is short term goal. Many of SE sales and fanbase are from Japan. SE hardly pumps out anything above mediocore these days. The ones that are good are nothing more than ports and remakes.
I don't get it, some people here say square sucks because the went multiplat, other say because "square soft" merge with enix, or maybe because square got a new president.
I find it funny that some 360 owners are taking a personal offense to the statement, "Square-Enix HAS been making a lot of bad games lately." Some people are acting like SE recent crap-fest automatically makes the 360 inferior or something. This is not the case, it just means SE sucks lately!!!
There are some 360 owners out there who are willing to back up SE business decisions, but are not willing to support their business decisions by actually buying SE games for the xbox 360.
The merger with Enix wasn;t as bad as some believe, They still had quality games... The rubbish started when this gen started for Square... They really have fallen badly
I would argue that it started when square started making poorly made spin-offs (i.e. FF X-2 and FFVII: Dirge of Cerberus) and relying on remakes rather than developing new good IPs.
all of the main canon FF have been good RPGs, yes even FFXII and FFXI (which really shouldn't be considered in the main canon, but it is a fantastic hard-core MMORPG).
Where in that post did he say anything about MS paying for "fangirls" on N4G? No where. He didn't even say anything that remotely hinted at anything close to that. So how about you go some where else.
Nobody EVER blamed MS for what's happened to SE this gen but if Mony wants to call people names over this he should at least understand what's going on.
MS, as is their right, have dealt with SE so they could slow sales of PS3 in Japan(surely that's pretty plain to anyone, no?)which, intil now has had an effect. SE, on the other hand, proudly trumpeted that FF13 and Vs would be PS3 exclusives until less than a year ago caising many fans to fork out for PS3s. Wouldn't you feel slightly let down by a company that did a turnaround like that to you?
The icing on the cake is that when they said they'd make multis they only showed up on 360 and weren't as good as they should be-get it nobody is getting a good deal out of this(PS3 or 360 or PS36Wii gamers)and SE are hurting their name in their biggest market-at home as they want to chase their western dream.
Buying the failing Eidos looks shaky as well, doesn't it? The fact that they didn't have the balls to let down the people in Japan who bought PS3 because of their words is telling but when they let us in on their plans to release KH as a 360 exclusive expect more wailing and gnashing of teeth. MS must have put some serious cash SEs way as they aren't selling games on the system they told their fans to buy and if they don't have to sell games to break even the quality of the games will fall and guess what-it has.
I think SE behaved poorly but don't think I'm, butthurt over this. I've got all threwe consoles and the real problem is that SE can't make a decent game these days. Also I can't see MS bankrolling them for much longer if the PS3 continues to outsell everything in Japan as then NOBODY gets anything from this lousy deal.
the ps3 is getting up there...they wait till it slows down again and BAM FF7 gets announced Ps3 sells 10 million that year alone.. then another 10 million when it comes out.
They've been going downhill ever since Tetsuya Takahashi left (creator of Xenogears). After he left, Hironobu Sakaguchi left (creator of Final Fantasy), and as the passing of time happened, we see them go even more downhill with all of their handheld games and lose all that money. And to put the nail in the coffin, they just bought Eidos. You usually buy a company that's doing well, but SE just went and bought a company that's also losing money.
When those guys left and also the music composer and the founder of FF left for mistwalker and some left for enix (before the merger) and some left for Konami it was all over. A major talent drain that is why FFXII took so long to come out too many people kept leaving. They need a identity. Are they going to make Pure action rpgs, and pure turn based RPG's and not try to merge them. And chose a style for the games (music, art and environment) and stop trying to make all games appeal to all people and cultures? Get a identity for the FF series. If you are going to abandon it to mistwalker do it already! If not come strong and bring me my summon spells you fart knockers! There is a reason that Blue Dragon is so loved in JAPAN it is stealing from the FF series even the the founder of the company can't steal something he invented.
Note to be multiplat you gotta have games on both consoles (Wii is not counted because SE is mostly supporting the 360 when they said they were also gunna support the PS3 (Which has not happened))
EDIT: Ok, now time for the real comment. To be honest I had a great time with FF12. The gameplay was good and the presentation was spectacular. It seems to me that Squares focus on western audiences has failed them completely. Instead of putting out innovative RPGs that westerners was be more attracted to they put out the same old JRPGs and put them exclusively on the 360, giving them even less of a chance to do well.
I think that Square still has talented people working there. Game like Dragon Quest have yet to disappoint, and FF13 and Versus are looking really good. I'll jump on the Square hate bandwagon but only because of their incredible stupid publishing decisions.
Thank god i thought i was the only one who saw that. I said that IU and last Remnant sucked a long time ago. People were flaiming cause i said that the story's are not compelling anymore. Why Because these stories have been done to death in jrpgs so much that the story lines were predictable (including FF12). Instead of making something different with the western audience they just made the same crap. They loli characters and ect. that appeals to Japanese people not westerners.
I don't understand why people are blaming Microsoft for SE current state. I mean it's like people blaming the axe while SE hits itself on the foot. Microsoft are here to do business just like Sony & Nintendo. Up till now SE has produced nothing but mediocre games for 360 & they have totally neglected the PS3. I am a bit concerned about the quality of Final Fantasy XIII & versus XIII as well. Having a name of FF before the title doesn't ensure a great game. They really need to up there game if they want to win back there audience. -- By the way why are we still approving HHG? They don't have any news and all they do is mindless flame bait articles.
I think the reason why a lot of people are blaming Microsoft partly because Microsoft lead SE into more short term goals and to abandon the core audience. I understand that the west is a big market but I guess a lot of gamers feel that Microsoft has lead SE into a wrong approach. I'm positive a lot of PS3 gamers bought their system for JRPG yet MS convince SE to make 360 exclusive where there is a small demand/market for JRPG. The fact that they abandon their loyal customers for quick bucks combine with the fact that all the games that do come out for the 360 are nothing more than mediocore really has shaken loyal customer's faith in SE. I agree, I'm skeptical about the quality of FFXIII and Versus.
What makes you think that Microsoft approached Square-Enix and not the other way around?Right now Microsoft has been stronger in the west than Sony and Square-Enix have stated time and time again that they want a stronger western presence especially since the Japanese game industry is no longer the force it used to be.
If Square met microsoft and they worked something out is it Microsoft's or Square-Enix fault?Microsoft has an obligation a publisher and console manufacturer to get content from other sources into their system and blaming them for trying is just ridiculous.
Afterall Microsoft published and funded the development of Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey by Mistwalker studios and so far, those games, especially Lost Odyssey are head and shoulders ahead of anything that Square-Enix has published or developed on HD consoles.
Their inability to push the JRPG genre into next gen territory by releasing games with - bad voice acting - outdated graphics - terrible story lines - and un evolving gameplay
especially when compared with their counterparts from the west makes the blame fall 100% on the shoulders of Square-Enix and no one else.
Anyway, isn't Sony a minority shareholder in the company?So why are people not asking Sony what their invest in buying shares in Square-Enix is for if not to benefit their on product?
Greens right about SE being at fault for the decisions. MS prolly were the ones that made the running though as, for the time being, they are the only people to get anything from the deal.
SE accepted, took the fast buck and hoped they'd get help in making western style games but then use a badly suited engine to try.
Don't blame MS-they only wanted to hamper PS3 Japan sales which they did , for a while anyway, manage but they failed in selling their own console which shows how poor, imo, the games from SE as dev and pub have been this gen.
Question also remains-do PS3 only gamers really feel that if SE can't get it right on the "easier" architechture of the 360 what mess would they have made on the "difficult" PS3?
But, whatever, MS never made promises to PS3 opwners, SE did and went back on it after people had already bought consoles on the strength of their word.
Sony, even as a minor shareholder have no clout beyond Nomura's opinion at SE and that's apparent isn't it? Sony have done nothing wrong either the bad choices have been made by SE and their games are suffering while most of their fans bought a system they haven't yet made a game for and the one they bought it for has gone multi. allied to this they give 360 owners cack games and alienate them. Then they buy Eidos? Somebody just shoot them and put the dying horse out of ir's self inflicted misery.
It's because of M$ that they lost their minds, obviously blinded by western $ now they are turning to western style of making rpgs and abandoning sony. Next thing they are going to release a First person Final Fantasy for 360
has nothing to do with making the games you ignorant fanboy, the subpar releases rest solely on square or are you so stupid as to assume that the games would somehow be better on the ps3
Screw Mistwalker, they kept their typical artstyle from the previous final fantasies, oh how original. hell the music was even the same. atlus knows how to be different while sega truly knows how to push the hardware
i dont think they had a mind at the beginning of this generation
Please hire an editor.
automatic fail.
but to stay on topic.
square-enix went to the crapper when squaresoft merged with Enix. its been discussed MILLIONS of times. try to keep up.
But I have to agree. Whatever idiot thought that they could give [email protected]$$ed support for the 360, not giving it the PS3 while at the same time put their 2nd biggest franchise out on it, needs to be fired.
They drank the M$ Kool-aid believing they could make it primarily on a shooter console.
Props for Microsoft though for trying to break from that image, but it is what it is.
From here on out, M$ won't be buying up "loyalty" in this economy and will have to make due with the momemtum they've built on their install base. But once the PS3 price drop happens, we're going to start seeing a dramatic shift. The same shift that Japan's sales have indicated in recent months.
Hopefully the writing on the wall will wake up JP devs to focus on the system that will maximize their profits.