• Final Fantasy XV aiming to be the most profitable Final Fantasy to date... sometime



    Square Enix released their Annual Report around 24 hours ago and within it was a section titled the "Creator's Voice" where several of the company's key developers, movers and shakers shared their views on the future of Square Enix and games in general.

    One noteworthy point was raised by Hajime Tabara, the current co-director of FINAL FANTASY XV who also worked on titles such as the ever elusive TYPE-0 and Crisis Core: FINAL FANTASY VIII. He expressed a desire to elevate FINAL FANTASY XV beyond levels that shareholders might be hoping for.

    It’s a pleasure to introduce myself to our shareholders. My name is Hajime Tabata and I’m Co-Director of “FINAL FANTASY XV.”

    My aim for the projects centering on “FINAL FANTASY XV” is to achieve the highest-acclaimed, highest-profitable installment in the “FINAL FANTASY” series. With this goal in mind, I would appreciate your continuous support.


    Going forward, as a creator I would like to develop new IPs for seniors. I will create games that would thoroughly satisfy myself as I get older. Also, as a leader, I want to establish a strong production studio with an open, flexible atmosphere that constantly delivers excitement to shareholders, employees, the game industry and users—a studio with the capacity to consolidate the Group’s capabilities and play the best match at the forefront of the industry.


    On this journey, the support of shareholders would be very much appreciated.

    This is no small feat with FINAL FANTASY XI currently holding that position - a game that's been out for over a decade and has enjoyed a loyal, allbeit small, following of dedicated MMO fans.

    Other developers also chimed in on their goals and aspirations and we'll feature these in another article.

    So, is this good news for FINAL FANTASY XV? If the co-director wants to make it the highest acclaimed and most profitable then they're certainly aiming big. A lot os riding on this title which we've known about for several years now. Unfortunately though, the wait might still go on... for some time.

    Speaking to IGN, FINAL FANTASY & KINGDOM HEARTS series producer Shinji Hashimoto has suggested that fans may be in for even more of a wait.

    So at E3 this year we announced Kingdom Hearts III and Final Fantasy XV. Both have Tetsuya Nomura as their director, so we can’t create these two big games at the same time. It’s a difficult job, as we want each game to be perfect in terms of quality.

    A lot of people have wondered for the last couple of years if Square Enix has actually been working on Kingdom Hearts III; that’s why we announced it at E3 this year,” said Hashimoto. “But please, we need you all to understand that there’s a lot to do.

    KINGDOM HEARTS III was obviously in it's early stages of development from what little we saw at E3 this year. Nomura himself even went to lengths to mention during interviews that the video was pre-rendered showing what they were aiming for as they get to grip with their new tools.

    FINAL FANTASY XV is a lot further along in development with fans being treated to two trailers at E3. The likelihood is that FINAL FANTASY XV will be the first of the two to be released but it is worrying that there's the potential for both of these titles to get marred by managerial bureaucracy and delays with the same person at the helm.

    Both franchises have loyal and passionate fans and we've been waiting for both titles for quite some time now. What are you thoughts? Do you think Nomura should focus his efforts on one title? Do you think he can pull off helming both at the same time?
    This article was originally published in forum thread: Final Fantasy XV Aiming to be the most profitable Final Fantasy to date... sometime started by Aulayna View original post
    Comments 12 Comments
    1. Del Murder's Avatar
      Del Murder -
      I really hate when they do this over-hyping stuff because I feel like it's only setting themselves up to fail. It's quite a long-shot for FFXV to be the most profitable game especially considering the amount of time it's been in development. I really hope they don't split the game into a bunch of DLC or do some other crazy thing to micro-transation it in the name of 'profitability' because I think that will just backfire.

      But it is great to hear how much attention they are putting into it and what their aspirations are. In the end I just want a fun game and I don't doubt this will be the case with FFXV.

      Also, 'games for seniors'? What the smurf? Tabata sounds like he's kind of nutty.
    1. Karifean's Avatar
      Karifean -
      If they're not lacking enthusiasm that's certainly a good point. A game made with heart always turn out better than one no one cared for. It had me a bit worried for a second how he said "highest-profitable", but I'm gonna be hopeful that doesn't mean anything terrible.
    1. Jinx's Avatar
      Jinx -
      I think you have to remove FFXI as a comparison. It's a completely different type of game, so its title as "most successful Final Fantasy" is sort of misleading. As an MMO, one can expect for it to have earned the most money over the years. Even if it only has 50k subscribers now (I have no idea what the actual number is) and they're paying $15/mo subscription fees...that would add up incredibly fast.

      I think you have to look at the console games and compare whichever one did best of those. I'm assuming it'd be FFVII.
    1. Mirage's Avatar
      Mirage -
      Most profitable? That's going to be quite the feat when the game has been in development for like 7 years already.

      Also, FF11 subs are probably in the ball-park of 100-200k.
    1. Jiro's Avatar
      Jiro -
      They've set themselves up for disappointment already. It's sad. I cannot see a single player game making more money than a long running MMO. It's just simply not going to happen.
    1. Jinx's Avatar
      Jinx -
      Quote Originally Posted by Mirage View Post

      Also, FF11 subs are probably in the ball-park of 100-200k.
      This just further aids my point. I was just throwing out a lower number since I didn't know actual numbers.
    1. Aulayna's Avatar
      Aulayna -
      FFXI didn't become the most profitable until around 9 years after it's launch (2012 if Wikipedia is to be believed). It's not like they're just making pure profit off of subscriptions. That still has to go back into covering all the overheads like servers, continued content development/patching, the support teams etc MMOs aren't particularly cheap to run. Which does make me curious what the most profitable FF was before FFXI claimed that mantle actually as whichever FF it was must've made some serious money.
    1. Laddy's Avatar
      Laddy -
      FFXV certainly has potential to be a critical and commercial success, especially with Nomura as the director, but to so quickly display these kinds of ambitions is unwise, especially with no clear release date in sight.
    1. Mirage's Avatar
      Mirage -
      Quote Originally Posted by Aulayna View Post
      FFXI didn't become the most profitable until around 9 years after it's launch (2012 if Wikipedia is to be believed). It's not like they're just making pure profit off of subscriptions. That still has to go back into covering all the overheads like servers, continued content development/patching, the support teams etc MMOs aren't particularly cheap to run. Which does make me curious what the most profitable FF was before FFXI claimed that mantle actually as whichever FF it was must've made some serious money.
      Well, let's see...

      Servers: Probably not a lot, considering there's not all that many worlds and players left, the hardware they servers ran on around the turn of the millenium is also greatly outmatched by today's hardware so they could probably virtualize a lot of them into a few actual hardware servers, if they felt like they needed to cut costs anyway. Continued content development and patching, bug fixes aren't exactly done very often, unless it is game-breaking. Content updates aren't more than a few times a year nowadays. A bit more often in wake of the new expansion pack, though. Customer support is practically non-existent, so I can't imagine them spending a lot on that!

      If I had to take a guess for most profitable except XI, I'd put my money on FF10.
    1. Del Murder's Avatar
      Del Murder -
      I'd say VII or VIII.
    1. Super Christ's Avatar
      Super Christ -
      Whether this game is successful or not, they are only setting themselves up for failure by expecting it to be the most profitable game in the series. The development time (so far) does not bode well for their assessment. At 7 years since they announced it - and it was almost certainly in development before that - they're already at or even past half of the development time for Duke Nukem Forever, which was already the butt of everyone's jokes this far into it's development.
    1. Jiro's Avatar
      Jiro -
      Final Fantasy Fifteen? More like Final Fantasy Forever (NEVER!)

      lolol

      no I am sorry I will excuse myself
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