Square one again passing the blame

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Lakados

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https://www.gamedeveloper.com/busin...s-declining-game-sales-on-weak-catalog-titles
Basically, their games didn't sell and users aren't buying cosmetics and they are trying to pass the buck hoping some of their new mobile games will generate revenue...
Turns out their financials in previous years were propped up by games and IP they offloaded as they downsized and the stuff they decided to focus on isn't panning out.

They keep putting out bad games and don't seem to realize they are the problem.
 
SqureEnix management has been shit since the merger happened. It's sad really, they'll put put some excellent titles and then almost immediately squander that with some of the biggest pieces of garbage in the industry and then they'll wonder why things don't sell. It's a company in desperate need of a complete management overhaul. Get rid of every single person on the board of directors and put people in place that can refocus the company around the projects that are actually working for them.
 
Brackle said:
LOL....Square.....release a good fucking game then.
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That's the worst part about all of this. They do release good games! They just also turn around and release some of the worst games at the same time. Their HD-2D titles have all been great, FFVII Remake was excellent, the Crisis Core remaster/remake was solid, and a few others. They are fully capable of releasing great stuff, and a lot of it even sells reasonably well. But then they throw money at stupid projects like their terrible mobile games, Avengers, Babylon's Fall, Balan, and so on. Not to mention their NFT bullshit and desire to sell high-priced collectables instead of better capitalizing on their successful products. SE genuinely does not seem to have any clue what they're doing and are just throwing shit at every wall in sight to see if any will stick.
 
Derangel said:
FFVII Remake was excellent
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One of my favorite games I have played over the past few years. Can't wait to see how the story continues. If they made more games like that and less shovel-ware or set unrealistic expectations, they would be doing fine.

Derangel said:
the Crisis Core remaster/remake was solid
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Yes it was. Flawless for an updated PSP port.

Guardians of the Galaxy was also excellent but I think it suffered a bit from marketing and people expecting it to be like the shitty Avengers game. But they're not with Square anymore anyways.
 
Derangel said:
That's the worst part about all of this. They do release good games! They just also turn around and release some of the worst games at the same time. Their HD-2D titles have all been great, FFVII Remake was excellent, the Crisis Core remaster/remake was solid, and a few others. They are fully capable of releasing great stuff, and a lot of it even sells reasonably well. But then they throw money at stupid projects like their terrible mobile games, Avengers, Babylon's Fall, Balan, and so on. Not to mention their NFT bullshit and desire to sell high-priced collectables instead of better capitalizing on their successful products. SE genuinely does not seem to have any clue what they're doing and are just throwing shit at every wall in sight to see if any will stick.
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FF7r was trash. SE is trash. FFXIV is only thing propping SE up for the past 10 years. Oh yea it is trash too.
 
Derangel said:
That's the worst part about all of this. They do release good games! They just also turn around and release some of the worst games at the same time. Their HD-2D titles have all been great, FFVII Remake was excellent, the Crisis Core remaster/remake was solid, and a few others. They are fully capable of releasing great stuff, and a lot of it even sells reasonably well. But then they throw money at stupid projects like their terrible mobile games, Avengers, Babylon's Fall, Balan, and so on. Not to mention their NFT bullshit and desire to sell high-priced collectables instead of better capitalizing on their successful products. SE genuinely does not seem to have any clue what they're doing and are just throwing shit at every wall in sight to see if any will stick.
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None of those are proper AAA games. There was no decent AAA game published by them since Shadow of the Tomb raider.
 
M76 said:
None of those are proper AAA games. There was no decent AAA game published by them since Shadow of the Tomb raider.
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It was decent from a PC tech perspective as the Tomb Raiders are, but the game itself was so generically boring, it was bad and the worst of the reboot series by far
 
staknhalo said:
It was decent from a PC tech perspective as the Tomb Raiders are, but the game itself was so generically boring, it was bad and the worst of the reboot series by far
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It is the worst of the reboot series no doubt, but still the best original AAA game squenix has released, which makes them look even worse. Hopefully after being released from their influence we will see Tomb Raider and even Deus Ex return to form. DeusEx hasn't even lost form, it was trending up until SQ ruined it with their scheming.
 
vegeta535 said:
FF7r was trash. SE is trash. FFXIV is only thing propping SE up for the past 10 years. Oh yea it is trash too.
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Yes, yes, we’re all aware of your thoughts.

M76 said:
None of those are proper AAA games. There was no decent AAA game published by them since Shadow of the Tomb raider.
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FFVIIR was a AAA game.

M76 said:
It is the worst of the reboot series no doubt, but still the best original AAA game squenix has released, which makes them look even worse. Hopefully after being released from their influence we will see Tomb Raider and even Deus Ex return to form. DeusEx hasn't even lost form, it was trending up until SQ ruined it with their scheming.
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The first couple reboot games were decent, though I think the first was the better of the two. That said, I’d like to see them go back to the basics of the series.
 
Derangel said:
The first couple reboot games were decent, though I think the first was the better of the two. That said, I’d like to see them go back to the basics of the series.
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The first was without a doubt the best, but 'you and Jesus kill bad guys' was still a lot of fun
 
A company's reputation is an important factor in making sales in certain segments and I think Squeenix might have botched things up with how FF7R (and KH3?) was handled, among various other variables. They certainly don't do themselves any favors with their press releases, that's for sure.

I suppose it's only a consolation but I've actually been looking at their backlog the past two weeks... It's very interesting to play a since long released game for the first time. From my point of view, at least the RPGs - in the best case, they tend to do many things very well in a game but utterly neglect one important facet - which brings it down as a whole.

I wish Square and Enix would unmerge.
 
Yossarian22 said:
A company's reputation is an important factor in making sales in certain segments and I think Squeenix might have botched things up with how FF7R (and KH3?) was handled, among various other variables. They certainly don't do themselves any favors with their press releases, that's for sure.

I suppose it's only a consolation but I've actually been looking at their backlog the past two weeks... It's very interesting to play a since long released game for the first time. From my point of view, at least the RPGs - in the best case, they tend to do many things very well in a game but utterly neglect one important facet - which brings it down as a whole.

I wish Square and Enix would unmerge.
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They don't need to unmerge they just need fresh blood in management and no I don't mean putting Yoshi P in charge. Sony could shake things up by buying them finally.
 
These the guys that did Lineage ][?

fantastic game. wonder where its at nowadays.
 
Square Enix is the type of publisher that THQ and Midway were back in the PS3 and 360 era. Barely holding on.
I think that the only thing keeping them afloat is a devout sense of traditionalism and the blind faith of unreasonably expectations.
 
M76 said:
I missed that, but I doubt it is for me, since I have not seen any of the movies.
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It has no connection to the movies and draws more from the comics, but I never read a comic book in my life and it was just fine. I would recommend it because it is one of the best traditional single player games to have come out in recent years. No timed seasonal missions, no DLC sprinkled out over the course of 2 years. Just a regular, 100% story driven, level/mission based game.
 
M76 said:
I missed that, but I doubt it is for me, since I have not seen any of the movies.
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That honestly makes it easier, the hardest part for me was the fact the faces and voices don’t match the movies at all. The story has nothing to do with the MCU either and it’s a solid stand alone.
 
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Lakados said:
That honestly makes it easier, the hardest part for me was the fact the faces and voices don’t match the movies at all. The story has nothing to do with the MCU either and it’s a solid stand alone.
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Yeah, it's more in line with the comics :).
 
Lakados said:
That honestly makes it easier, the hardest part for me was the fact the faces and voices don’t match the movies at all. The story has nothing to do with the MCU either and it’s a solid stand alone.
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Then maybe I'll check it out after Hogwarts Legacy.
 
vegeta535 said:
They don't need to unmerge they just need fresh blood in management and no I don't mean putting Yoshi P in charge. Sony could shake things up by buying them finally.
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Having fresh blood is probably not enough. They also have to dump Nomura. Fire him, management, time ghosts, loot boxes/gaccha shit (Ever Crisis), NFTs all into the sun.

Square-Enix is approaching Shinra levels of greed. So I don't know that a Sony acquisition would help. Couldn't say.


Tactlesss said:
Square Enix is the type of publisher that THQ and Midway were back in the PS3 and 360 era. Barely holding on.
I think that the only thing keeping them afloat is a devout sense of traditionalism and the blind faith of unreasonably expectations.
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I wish they were all on the same page in terms of "devout sense of traditionalism". The latter is true: they have blind faith in their customers to expect and accept the unreasonable. At full price, even.

The mistakes of FF7R and KH3 (a total shame) along with going on course with their plans show that the current management has little to no idea to what made them so popular in the first place. I think that they've lost the plot a long time ago.

Meanwhile I'm going back to play Nier series and researching games (or any media, really) with intelligent & interesting storytelling that isn't politically charged. I might be in some sort of minority but these things are becoming increasingly hard to find as we move forward in time.
 
Yossarian22 said:
Meanwhile I'm going back to play Nier series and researching games (or any media, really) with intelligent & interesting storytelling that isn't politically charged. I might be in some sort of minority but these things are becoming increasingly hard to find as we move forward in time.
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I wish you smooth sailing. Try not to lose too many brain cells along the way.
 
While they've had a few bangers over the past years e.g. Deus Ex(es), Tomb Raiders (I loved these games), I just can't get past the maga/boy band ascetics and bad localization in most of their games. I'm sure it's just my inflexible Western sensibilities, but just can't get past the cringe.
 
The Enix side is still producing some excellent JRPG titles. DQ XI was an excellent traditional turn based JRPG.

Yossarian22 said:
I wish Square and Enix would unmerge.
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I'm not too bothered by the merger, while Square seems to be a bit hit or miss with their titles, at least they seem to not push Enix to make any drastic changes to their series. With that said, a Sega/Enix merger would be pretty sweet (though I imagine somebody would promptly purchase SegaEnix at that point.)
 
harmattan said:
While they've had a few bangers over the past years e.g. Deus Ex(es), Tomb Raiders (I loved these games), I just can't get past the maga/boy band ascetics and bad localization in most of their games. I'm sure it's just my inflexible Western sensibilities, but just can't get past the cringe.
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Well those games were developed by western developers not SE themselves.
SeymourGore said:
The Enix side is still producing some excellent JRPG titles. DQ XI was an excellent traditional turn based JRPG.



I'm not too bothered by the merger, while Square seems to be a bit hit or miss with their titles, at least they seem to not push Enix to make any drastic changes to their series. With that said, a Sega/Enix merger would be pretty sweet (though I imagine somebody would promptly purchase SegaEnix at that point.)
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DQ11 and Octopath Traveler were the last two games that I actually enjoyed from SE. I won't even be getting Octopath 2 later this month because I refuse to give any money to SE at this point.
 
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vegeta535 said:
I won't even be getting Octopath 2 later this because I refuse to give any money to SE at this point.
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I'm hoping the game sells well enough for them to greenlight 'HD-2D' style remakes of their classic titles. One of the reasons I've been holding off on playing through the Pixel Remasters is the hope for this announcement.
 
I'm a harsh critic of Square-Enix in general. I think that it's owing to the fact that Squaresoft was my favorite game developer as a kid. FF2 (Final Fantasy IV) and FF3 (Final Fantasy VI) and even Final Fantasy V (I spent many summers in Japan, and I bought SF games from used stores) were all titles that were life changing for me. This is ignoring Chrono Trigger and Secret of Mana (Seiken Densetsu 3). I listed to all of the soundtracks: original OVA's, orchestral versions, remixes. Squaresoft was responsible in general for my love of RPG's.
Since then, they have just repeatedly made the worst possible decisions over and over again. Their writing has gone downhill. They have prioritized graphics and "being cool" over simply developing good games. They've gone and prioritized NFT's and aesthetics over literally game studios.

They had Eidos Montreal printing them money and they sold them off to make NFT's. I more or less can only hope the SE craters and that a better company (like perhaps Sony) does better things with the IP.
 
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NightReaver said:
That was NCSoft, and it's existing as a shell of it's former shelf...if even that's still around. Still lives on in private servers.
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ah, that's right. that was my first mmo. I joined in on one castle siege and that was one of the best gaming experiences I've had.
 
UnknownSouljer said:
I'm a harsh critic of Square-Enix in general. I think that it's owing to the fact that Squaresoft was my favorite game developer as a kid. FF2 (Final Fantasy IV) and FF3 (Final Fantasy VI) and even Final Fantasy V (I spent many summer in Japan, and I bought SF games from used stores) were all titles that were life changing for me. This is ignoring Chrono Trigger and Secret of Mana (Seiken Densetsu 3). I listed to all of the soundtracks: original OVA's, orchestral versions, remixes. Squaresoft was responsible in general for my love of RPG's.
Since then, they have just repeatedly made the worst possible decisions over and over again. Their writing has gone downhill. They have prioritized graphics and "being cool" over simply developing good games. They've gone and prioritized NFT's and aesthetics over literally game studios.

They had Eidos Montreal printing them money and they sold them off to make NFT's. I more or less can only hope the SE craters and that a better company (like perhaps Sony) does better things with the IP.
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I read they were disappointed in the western studios sales performance. You are a lost company if you believe 10+ million sales is disappointing for single player games. They want so hard to have the next Fortnight.
 
UnknownSouljer said:
I'm a harsh critic of Square-Enix in general. I think that it's owing to the fact that Squaresoft was my favorite game developer as a kid. FF2 (Final Fantasy IV) and FF3 (Final Fantasy VI) and even Final Fantasy V (I spent many summer in Japan, and I bought SF games from used stores) were all titles that were life changing for me. This is ignoring Chrono Trigger and Secret of Mana (Seiken Densetsu 3). I listed to all of the soundtracks: original OVA's, orchestral versions, remixes. Squaresoft was responsible in general for my love of RPG's.
Since then, they have just repeatedly made the worst possible decisions over and over again. Their writing has gone downhill. They have prioritized graphics and "being cool" over simply developing good games. They've gone and prioritized NFT's and aesthetics over literally game studios.

They had Eidos Montreal printing them money and they sold them off to make NFT's. I more or less can only hope the SE craters and that a better company (like perhaps Sony) does better things with the IP.
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Secret of Mana is Seiken Densetsu 2, not 3. 3 was just released in the west as Trials of Mana a few years ago.
 
Derangel said:
That's the worst part about all of this. They do release good games! They just also turn around and release some of the worst games at the same time. Their HD-2D titles have all been great, FFVII Remake was excellent, the Crisis Core remaster/remake was solid, and a few others. They are fully capable of releasing great stuff, and a lot of it even sells reasonably well. But then they throw money at stupid projects like their terrible mobile games, Avengers, Babylon's Fall, Balan, and so on. Not to mention their NFT bullshit and desire to sell high-priced collectables instead of better capitalizing on their successful products. SE genuinely does not seem to have any clue what they're doing and are just throwing shit at every wall in sight to see if any will stick.
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I've bought a lot of the HD-2D titles and bought every single TRPG they release since I love the genre and they have been great.
M76 said:
None of those are proper AAA games. There was no decent AAA game published by them since Shadow of the Tomb raider.
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While true I think their HD-2D titles make more profit per sale than their AAA games. The development costs are probably no where near something like the Avengers. They price it pretty close to AAA or AAA prices on a lot of them anways.
 
vegeta535 said:
I read they were disappointed in the western studios sales performance. You are a lost company if you believe 10+ million sales is disappointing for single player games. They want so hard to have the next Fortnight.
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There is a very irrational desire for every game that gets released to be a multi-100 million dollar seller. And it's not based anywhere in reality. These were good games that were profitable. And when you produce titles like this in your portfolio, even if they don't make that huge stack of cash in a single year, they continue to sell for many years afterwards. (Steam sales, as a 3 pack, etc).

It's not as though the Tomb Raider series or DX series were poor sellers.

Here is an example of ridiculous expectations from Square as quoted from Wikipedia:

The game sold more than 1 million copies less than 48 hours after its release.[105] In the United Kingdom, Tomb Raider debuted at number one on the charts, and became the biggest UK title launch in 2013,...
Furthermore, the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions of Tomb Raider set new week one records as the fastest-selling individual formats of any Tomb Raider title so far, a record which was previously held by Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness.[106] Tomb Raider topped the charts in France, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, and the United States.[108][109][110][111][112] In the United States, Tomb Raider was the second best-selling title of March, excluding download sales, behind BioShock Infinite.[113] In Japan, Tomb Raider debuted at number four with 35,250 units sold.[114]

Three weeks after its release on March 26, Square Enix announced that the game sold 3.4 million copies worldwide at retail, but has failed to reach predicted sales targets.

Basically the first Tomb Raider title sold better than any other Tomb Raider game ever in its first week, and SE was still upset.
Here is DX:MD:

Although Mankind Divided topped gaming sales charts during its week of release in the United Kingdom, the game had a weaker debut than Human Revolution because of a lower install base on consoles than its predecessor.[104] Mankind Divided was the third-bestselling game of August in North America, with console-game sales increases for the period partially attributed to its release.[105] In Square Enix's 2016 fiscal report, Mankind Divided and other 2016 titles including Final Fantasy XV were cited as factors in their net-profit increase.[106] By May 2022, Human Revolution (including the Director's cut) and Mankind Divided had sold a combined 12 million units.[107]

12 million units was not good enough nor that the title was responsible for their net-profit increase. (And again, I'm sure that these titles have continued to sell in the 6 years since launch).

I don't know how to describe this is any other better words: that selling off a game dev for NFT's is dumb. Especially when they're profitable. They may not be stratospherically profitable, but it's that expectation in the first place that is the problem. Want to sell a lot? The core of the business is to make a good game. Everything else sorts itself out.

I played most of these games. Both of the DX games were "fine". They could've been better from a story standpoint (we don't need to hash that out here), the point is with proper guidance the only place for these studios to go was up. The diversity was a good thing in SE's lineup considering that from a first party perspective they've been rehashing the same properties over and over. Which could've ultimately become a problem with Eidos Montreal, however it didn't have to be that way.
Armenius said:
Secret of Mana is Seiken Densetsu 2, not 3. 3 was just released in the west as Trials of Mana a few years ago.
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True. But not the point.
 
From the article: "It plans to bolster its MMO operations by focusing on retaining users through a "variety of operational initiatives" rather than rolling out new expansion packs, and intends to release new smart device and PC browser titles in Q4 to shore up that sub-segment."

I don't play Final Fantasy XIV, but Square Enix is way out of touch if it thinks that it can retain MMO players through anything other than actual content releases. MMO's thrive on new content. Sure, event rewards and things like that will get players to login for a time, but without new content they'll lose interest in the game no matter what you try and offer them.
 
Dan_D said:
From the article: "It plans to bolster its MMO operations by focusing on retaining users through a "variety of operational initiatives" rather than rolling out new expansion packs, and intends to release new smart device and PC browser titles in Q4 to shore up that sub-segment."

I don't play Final Fantasy XIV, but Square Enix is way out of touch if it thinks that it can retain MMO players through anything other than actual content releases. MMO's thrive on new content. Sure, event rewards and things like that will get players to login for a time, but without new content they'll lose interest in the game no matter what you try and offer them.
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They tried that with FFXI and the player numbers dipped until only a few thousand hardcore players remained.
 
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