The current state of FFXIV and Square Enix's plans for future Dragon Quest games

Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn, Square Enix's reboot of their MMO franchise, has already surpassed the company's previous entry in the series, Final Fantasy XI. With over 600,000 active subscribers, FFXIV has more active players than FFXI did at its peak.

This information came from Square's online financial results briefing, posted earlier today. In the document, Square also outlines their plans for other online games as well as the future of the Dragon Quest franchise.

For online-based titles, such as the in-development Nosgoth, the plan is to "transform the fixed-price model into variable earning models." In plain terms, that means shifting to free-to-play, although it's unclear if this initiative would affect the Final Fantasy MMO franchises.

Another slide in the document also clarifies that domestic studios (in Japan) will focus on "titles for smart devices" while overseas studios will shift to "production of online-based titles."

Included in those smart device titles will be sequels to games in the Dragon Quest series, Final Fantasy Agito, and "many other popular products." The document says Dragon Quest X, a currently Japan-only MMO, "will appear on the 'd-game' platform as a cloud game for smart devices." There are no specific plans laid out for Western releases.

We've reached out to Square Enix for further comment and will update this story when we have more detailed information.