Tokyo RPG Factory Loses 224 Million Yen from I Am Setsuna

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According to financial statements released by Official Gazette, Square Enix's new studio Tokyo RPG Factory, the developers of I Am Setsuna have sees a 224 Million Yen loss this year which is roughly 2.4 million US dollars. Their first game, I Am Setsuna, released in Japan back in February of this year for PlayStation 4 and Vita. In Japan I Am Setsuna sold 33,629 copies on PlayStation 4 and 27,994 copies on PlayStation Vita in its first week. That is not awful for a new IP, but it wasn't good in regards to Square Enix and the deficit makes it clearly apparent.

Source: Gematsu

To be fair, the financial year ended in March, almost weeks after it's release so it stands to reason the sales wouldn't have covered the development cost.

It's also obvious that this game is most likely going to be a cult hit at best. The chances of it doing well were sunk the moment it became digital only, especially since Squenix has never really been great about promoting their online stuff. The forecast might look better once the worldwide release sales are factored in, but I'm sure they'll still be short of Squenix's goals. The best it could hope for is to pull a Xenogears/Lost Odyssey and become a cult favorite that word of mouth keeps it's sales going long afterwords.

My worry is that SE will use this as 'proof' that classic RPGs 'don't sell anymore'.

Nah, Bravely Default already convinced them otherwise

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Originally Posted by Fynn

Nah, Bravely Default already convinced them otherwise

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But they are still hesitant about it though!

It's hit or miss, really. I feel that they have to space out the "classic" style stuff because if you put them out on a regular basis then the novelty wears off.

I hope this game does well but in the end once I found out that there is no real variation other than "snow" for the world, I lost a lot of interest. I get really into exploring new worlds with lots of variety. World of FF and hopefully FFXV should help me out there, though.

I've accepted I might not have a lot of turn based RPGs to look forward to. I've also learnt as an explorer of all things PS1 and 2, that turn based RPG doesn't necessarily mean good. I've started to find action RPG/action adventure to be just as interesting and addictive. I am however worried for SE as a company, this company will do even more damage to its reputation if FFXV doesn't live up to expectations, particularly since they've had this one cooking for too long.

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Originally Posted by Shauna

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Originally Posted by Fynn

Nah, Bravely Default already convinced them otherwise

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But they are still hesitant about it though!

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Yeah, they hardly acted on this supposed confidence. The budget for Bravely Second was clearly even smaller than the first. And surprise surprise, it's sold significantly less.

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Originally Posted by Elpizo

My worry is that SE will use this as 'proof' that classic RPGs 'don't sell anymore'.

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Yeah same here. :ohdear:

actualy i'm not a bit surprised... it appears i'm not the only gamer sick of Wizards & Warriors Vs Dungeons & Dragons... and yeah this whole digital delivery of games is stupid, give me a box i can put on a shelf, why would i want to fill up my hard drive when a disc can do the same job without filling my HDD to bursting... 500GB is not a lot when you consider modern game sizes and they're only getting bigger...

well if it is proof that old school RPGs don't sell anymore, what's wrong with using it as proof that they don't sell anymore?

A single data point isn't proof of anything. The are lots of different potential explanations. It being a traditional JRPG is only one of them. Other explanations might be that it was overpriced, it didn't review that well, it didn't look especially interesting in the trailers (because pretty much every part of the game looks identical). etc

i'm not really worried in either case. A company in the business of making money from video games probably has more data on game sales than an end user could ever hope to get. selling a game isn't what matters. earning money from a game is.

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Originally Posted by Randy

A single data point isn't proof of anything. The are lots of different potential explanations. It being a traditional JRPG is only one of them. Other explanations might be that it was overpriced, it didn't review that well, it didn't look especially interesting in the trailers (because pretty much every part of the game looks identical). etc

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How about the fact that it wasn't well advertised? I mean, compared to even just Bravely Default, the marketing for I Am Setsuna was pretty terrible. I know people who were interested in the game who still didn't know that it actually released.

not so sure it was lack of marketing when i saw commercials for it and Bravely Second all over Cartoon Network/Nickelodeon and in various game magazines... honestly if it was presented as an homage to Chrono Trigger and had a physical copy i would have snapped it up in a heartbeat, but from screenshots and no real descriptions of the gameplay itself it looked like the same old orks and trolls high fantasy i'm sick to death of... i really don't think it's because it's a classic style RPG, people aren't sick of the old turn-based gameplay, look how well the HD Remaster of FFX did, i think the perceived setting is most likely putting people off, that and a lack of a physical copy... that's just my impression though...

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

How about the fact that it wasn't well advertised? I mean, compared to even just Bravely Default, the marketing for I Am Setsuna was pretty terrible. I know people who were interested in the game who still didn't know that it actually released.

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Probably had something to do with it.

It probably changes a lot company to company but from the little experience I've had of similar situations, they generally put their marketing budget behinds the things that gain the most hype organically.

So Bravely Default probably got more marketing because the initial reactions to it were far better. I know that was true in my case. I was pretty much sold on that game just by the environmental art.

I just hope this doesn't lead to the studio being closed. They deserve more chances, after playing I am Setsuna I think they have what it takes to make some great RPGs.

Mostly a rumor, but it looks like Setsuna may gain a spiritual sequel of some sorts.

When Square Enix reported a 244 million yen loss related to Tokyo RPG Factory, some gaming websites got a little ahead of themselves with the doom and gloom forecast: The financial data came before I Am Setsuna (the company's only game to date) had released outside of Japan, probably included the total cost of starting the company (not just development of I Am Setsuna), and many readers failed to realize the loss was in Yen, not USD (2.5 million), which is a pretty significant difference.

Oh happy days !!! :jess:

After I Am Setsuna let me down greatly, I am actually really happy to hear the team is still going. Despite the issues I ended up having with Setsuna, there was a lot of obvious talent and potential behind the game.

I look forward to their next outing.

Hopefully they branch out and take a few more risks and actually try some of their own ideas if they're interesting enough and capable of being implemented

The reasons I passed on purchasing the game are that it was digital only. I had planned on getting it physical, and for the Vita, not PS4, which if I remember correctly, that got scrapped entirely outside of Japan

Also it had the plot to FFX, which I guess could still work since some other games had similar plots. But I hadn't heard anything about memorable characters, or catchy writing, or anything that could bring it out of the realm of cliche rehash that sounded at all interesting to me. I've had a long history with Japan relying too much on tropes, cliches, and rehashes and then thinking that they're doing enough with just that, instead of using it as a base to build something more interesting off of and only use it as a jumping off point. I got the impression they didn't put any effort here

And lastly, I had heard that they only used a piano for their music. And while that is an interesting idea, after watching a video with a battle that was very haphazard loud random piano music, I can imagine after 20 hours it would really start to grate on my nerves and I'd hate to have to play through an RPG with the sound turned off...

I will give them credit. That was an interesting and brave choice, and if there were a physical copy for the Vita I would have found out about that the hard way and may have gotten used to it. Maybe it's not as bad as I'm thinking it is. But the other two factors just kill it for me. I guess I'll try to catch it on sale some day...

the all-piano soundtrack gets boring pretty quick. yes, sure, it's pretty, but it's not exciting.

physical copies can eat a dick though :p