Square Enix new strategy: fewer but more quality titles, shift to multiplatform releases!

Oh snap, looks like Square is done with console exclusives. Hopefully Square Enix can have a resurgence the same way Capcom did. Thoughts, SW? Can Square Enix make a comeback?

PlayStation has no money hatted games

Yeah, the era of exclusives, especially for PlayStation, should've ENDED at PS3, Square...

Is the Japanese Ubisoft bought themselves a new brain? Possible. Maybe they saw Capcom increasing salary of all their employees by 28%, and began computing the fact that good games sell well, and everybody is happy. Imagine that.

Triple A games feeling the burn of exclusives. So much for Rebirth and 16 selling well.😂

The great shift is happening.😎

Sink or swim baby... You don't get to have games that cost a ridiculously unnecessary amount of money to make and then get cute with who the customers are....

This is all over my Twitter feed, everyone is all over it. “They couldn’t make money on PS.”

Every time Xbox has an L, you can expect within the next few days Sony has another L. Pretty big L here, taking away a franchise cows very proudly beat their chests over. Sony wasn’t kidding when they said more of their games would go to PC, even day and date, I just don’t think anyone expected it to be Final Fantasy. One more checkmark in the “why own a PS anymore” column.

3rd party exclusives should just go away.

@pclover1980: Apparently it is going away and so is first party 😂 The great shift is happening.

One by one... They are. The business model doesn't work with today's development costs.

I don't want to see more of their shitty overpriced games on Steam.

Stay with Phony.

Come on in cows... don't be shy

More movement to multiplatform due to development costs

Everyone is copying Microsoft

Poo cows. lol :P

Exclusive games are dropping like flies! 😱

Now that exclusives are dwindling the next step in gaming is for portable licenses. 😊

Wouldn't be an issue if the people who praised said exclusive games.......actually bought said exclusive games.

Now that Square Enix will put the games on Switch 2, hopefully that doesn’t hold the graphics back lol

The good ole ignorant comment about holding back graphics.

The quest for ever refined graphics is part of what's killing AAA games. If square can innovate gameplay they will be successful... Has little to do with graphics.

And more indies too!

Consoles are on the way out. Not just exclusives.

@TheEroica: You‘re a Steam Deck guy, we already know you’re good with 2008 graphics 😆

@SolidGame_basic: oh I like pretty graphics... But they're the bottom feeder of the game world. Also much of the reason game companies have never looked weaker. I'd rather a Renaissance on gameplay focus than another generation of bloated games with little substance... It would likely keep costs down to develop in this way and could possibly save your Sony from entering the red soon.

This mindset is what is killing Sony and I dont think you realize it.

They've made the same game for long, and because they are "cinematic" and look good they get high scores.

Even the PS fanbase (me included) are tired of playing the same third person action game with RPG and stealth elements, with limited innovation and great graphics. They even fund the same kinds of games when they dont have their own first party titles (the only exception being Helldivers 2)

Look at what Nintendo did with Switch hardware. They sold 140m because the games are fun to play.

Pushing graphics has Sony with razor thin margins, spending 2-300m on a game is absolutely ridiculous.

Nintendo will save you like always.

Now Sony games are not fun to play 😄 is that why they sell well and win awards??

This is true. Some folks just haven't seen the writing on the wall.

If they are selling so well as you imply, why are they shifting all their games to multi-platform?🤔

Boo!! Square should only work with Nintendo going forward. Bring it all home Square!!! j/k

It makes a lot of sense of course. I guess whatever Sony is paying Square for exclusives is no longer cutting it. I wonder what the dealio is with the FF7 projects though as I think Sony have some involvement in that in terms of development?

@Pedro: it’s quite simple, they want to make even more money 😎

I dont think you read my post. When have I ever said Sony's games werent fun?

I said people are getting tired of them, which is reflected in the sales and margins.

I also mentioned about scores in my post. I dont know if there is anything I could say that would convince you to see what the industry is (and is becoming) without you somehow taking it as an attack on Sony.

Sony's games score well and yes, occasionally get awards for GOTY or whatever. My point is GAMERS are buying them less and less. Can you explain that? Explain why they are operating with a 5% margin?

Yeah, good luck with that.

Just as it is simple that they are not making enough on PS.😏

The thing about Square is they are disappointed in every release they have. It's like every report concerning them is where they are saying the sales numbers aren't what they expected.

I would love to see more multiplatform games again though. I used to switch back and forth between consoles for multiplatform stuff, but in the last few years everything is a damn exclusive.

Multiplatform is a good call, but fewer, bigger budget releases is disappointing news. Stuff like Octopath Traveller and Triangle Strategy were among their best recent games.

Now have that guy list the budget vs return on a few of them:

• Foamstars
• FF7 Remake
• FF7 Rebirth
• Forspoken
• FF16 (and DLC)
• Babylon's Fall

Id wager the budget for all of these games dwarfs all others, probably combined.

@pc_rocks said:

@SolidGame_basic said:

Yeah, good luck with that.

You do know that i am the one supposed to make fun of the Japanese Ubisoft, right? Stay in your lane, they're mine.

Hmmmm...that's a lot of bullshit.

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1. Enhance development productivity by shifting from quantity to quality and focusing on fun.

Translation: "We are risk-adverse, and instead of looking into why our multitide of titles failed, we are just going to generalize that 'quality, not quantity' is the lesson here because everyone knows that and it's an easy thing to sell to people instead of admitting we just suck."

So basically they're just saying "Hey we messed up, but it's an innocent mistake is all!" lol.

Lame. Copout.

2. Diversify earnings opportunities by shifting to a multiplatform strategy

I'm fine with this.

I mean, it's a no-brainer. And whatever executive was saying "no multiplat" should be fired. But overall a good strategy.

I just hope that they accommodate the PC and other platforms better. Japanese ports to PC tend to be very, very, very lazy. Dragon's Dogma 2 was a good Japanese port/multiplat release, and even that has some serious quality of life and UI issues (it's cumbersome).

3. Create greater foundational stability by rebuilding overseas divisions from the ground up and new HR and management systems.

This seems to contradict point 1. So you want to focus on quality but fewer titles...but you want to open up more studios?

Sounds like they're looking into more ways to exploit consumers on a regional level, i.e. "North Americans like BR games, while Chinese gamers like free-to-play and will pay by the hour with subs" and so on. That's assuming a lot though I admit.

As for creating new HR and management systems...why? The company I work for has about 15 people making product, and about 30 managers....and it sucks. Serious "Office Space" vibes lol. Management and a culture of "failing upwards" is the problem, you don't solve this by making more management.

Maybe you should focus on a grounds up approach; more studios, more titles, more developers....let them manage themselves.

4. Strike a balance between shareholder return and growth investment.

Ah, so this is ultimately a business decision, not a company or quality or consumer decision. The ol' "what's good for the shareholder is good for the customer" [misguided] belief.

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Honestly, I wouldn't believe any of this crap. Their best game recently is Powerwash Simulator, probably a decent profit off that game vs investment, yet they can't do well with the Final Fantasy IP? Oi vey.

Honestly, the TL;DR: version of this is "We've been coasting off old IP's and nostalgia for so long we forgot how to actually create something good and now we are going to do some business voodoo to make it sound like we still know what we are doing".

Some some good ol’ cow cope from prominent fanboys on YT/Twitter.

“This is a good thing that SE is going multi-plat”

Really? So a series that cows regularly hung over lemmings heads as a big exclusive, it’s suddenly ok that you’re losing that talking point? But when it happens to Xbox, the world is coming to an end.

“Lemmings act like we considered SE exclusive…they really weren’t.”

Really? Because there’s a massive years worth of history of cows saying FF is exclusive…I mean it’s literally undeniable, but you’re gonna try to deny it?

But Sony first party will never go to pc...remember.

They need to get their bigger games like Strangers of Paradise and, Star Ocean on Nintendo as well.

I personally think those are larger omissions than getting games on Xbox.

I remember how Sony fanboys acted when it was announced that Final Fantasy XIII was also going to the Xbox 360. Good times. 🤣😂

Yeesh

Final Fantasy poor performance on the PS5 is causing layoffs now.😏

Alot of FF fans here gave texasgold a hard time for calling out poor sales, looks like he's getting the last laugh