[Bloomberg] Sales of FFXVI, VII Rebirth, and Foamstars failed to meet expectations

[PshycoNinja]

The shrinking between FF15 and REMAKE is negligible since 7R has no xbox version. In fact the first month sales of REMAKE is better than FF15 in USA.

As long as REBIRTH and FF16, it may be their products are not appealing. REBIRTH is part 2 of a trilogy which often sells least in a trilogy. FF16 is almost like an ACT game which is not expected by fans.

REBIRTH is more interesting because of its very good word of mouth, and in JAPAN it already shows better legs than FF16. Even in worst case REBIRTH won't sell less than Nier of SQUARE ENIX which sold 8 million.

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This is...a lot lol.

First off you insinuate that Remake was at a disadvantage compared to XV cause of no Xbox version when... PS4 was at like ~48M when XV released compared to ~110M when Remake was released. I would hope Rebirth would have outsold XVs first month but it didn't.

Sure maybe in the US region it did, but I think people were talking worldwide. Which it didn't. As a matter of fact we got confirmation recently that in the US in terms of dollar (and unit?) sales, XV is thr best selling for the franchise in the US. So if what you're saying is true, XVs legs still maintained ahead of Remake in spite of that first month.

You're second point may be true with Rebirth and XVI but it's hard to guage appeal. If we went by purely the numbers that would make XII and IX and direct sequels some of the least appealing games in the franchise, and I am not all convinced on that point. I know for me personally XVI wasn't super appealing but I hesitate to apply that as a fact.

As for the sales prediction, I would personally love that outcome for Rebirth but I think that is hugely optimistic. History tends to show JRPGs tend to be very frontloaded, though there are a few that break that mold.

But yeah the first and last points really stuck out to me. I hope I am not coming across contrarian or argumentative but I did want to give a bit of pushback.

 

[MZZ]

It's final fantasy so the expectations are pretty high. I just hope they can manage to break even and then some to not see it as a total loss.

No one really thought the brand does not really pull in the younguns like it did before.

And I bet its not because not being turnbased is pulling it down lol

I can see them still get the younger audience in their next entry. They just really have to play their cards right.

People are gonna hate this but you know what is a fantasy game which character designs have been the rage with its young players. Genshin and HSR. Coupled with the action gameplay and the open world they have finally been making. For sure, this is what they need.

Not being 100% serious of course

LOL Would be hilarious if they pivot to that type of artstyle and double down on action (which I think they will) and how even more mad the final fantasy diehards would be.

I do wonder, what would make the younguns play final fantasy. I guess the production values and the legacy does not appeal to them at all. Please don't say f2p and gacha and battle passes.

 

[vio55555]

Nobody on this forum wants to hear it, myself probably included, but Square should use the Switch 2 as the lead development platform moving forward.

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Honestly I think many of us are actually with you on this topic. The generational leaps on consoles are much smaller now than ever before to the point of becoming a lot harder to notice. Future generations are only going to be smaller jumps still.

The cutting edge maximum graphical fidelity situation is damaging the series; trying to compete on graphics and ignoring that gameplay/story/characters are really the main experience of the game is a mistake. It also creates this problem of ports because you don't get the full benefit of a global multi-platform release with the strongest possible launch momentum. Instead large parts of an already fractured fanbase are left to wait. FF fans are split up everywhere, the games need to be getting to fans as soon as possible after launch.

PC should not be delayed by years, and neither should Switch 2/Xbox.

Switch 2 will be on par with PS4 Pro, that is absolutely good enough to make phenomenal games for the next 8 years that won't look that much different from PS5. If Nintendo could deliver Odyssey, BotW, TotK and many others that are considered great games (that look fine as well) with the Switch, then there's no reason why SE can't maximize the potential of the Switch 2 and make FF games that look great on it.

Now realistically they may still stick with PS as the main platform going forward, but at the very least they need to also be developing Switch 2 ports during the development process. It's a huge mistake to ignore that so many JRPG fans (and FF fans) use the Switch as their primary console.

And also the mainline games need to come out at a quicker pace, it's tough to go 1 mainline game per generation, that's just not going to help build/keep the fanbase engaged. So simplifying the development process would be welcome.

 

[LowParry]

I just briefly googled around for what you said here and I cannot find anything that supports this.

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Yeah I've been looking around for it to and not seeing anything. Probably just mis-read something then from this forum or elsewhere.

 

[Darmik]

I think overall they really need to figure out what the audience they're chasing for actually wants.

I enjoy Rebirth but I don't think there's anything to recommend to my casual gaming friends. FFXVI was okay but even if my issues with that game were fixed I don't think my casual friends and family would be interested.

But overall they have a pretty similar issue in that the combat and gameplay itself must look so overwhelming and visually noisy to the far majority of the gaming market of today. Compare it to something like Elden Ring or Monster Hunter which despite being rather hardcore are still easy to understand what is going on. Even Baldur's Gate 3 has simple concepts to understand even if it's wildly different to the rest. Expecting a new audience to understand all of these meters, breaking and figuring out what the player is doing at any given moment is a tall order. At the very least I think it's time to overhaul how basic attacking works and perhaps ditch the concept of staggering being crucial for dishing out damage if they want to stick with action based combat.

I don't think it's impossible for them to figure it out but it's going to take a lot of soul searching. They really need to go back to basics and figure out an easy to understand pitch that appeals to people. It has to be more than the brand name and high production values now.

 

[BBboy20]

I think XV being such a massive success when it was such an incomplete, empty, and janky game probably had a hand in people losing faith in the series. Massive amounts of people experienced XV and I'm betting a lot were like me. I couldn't even finish the game. It was a miserable experience for me.

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The Resident Evil 6 effect. Huh.

 

[werezompire]

If the Switch 2 has high-speed load times & graphic capabilities similar to a PS4 Pro (and that's what the rumors are saying), then I see no reason why it couldn't handle FF7 Rebirth fine at say 1080p.

 

[Mocha Joe]

If Switch has high-speed load times & graphic capabilities similar to a PS4 Pro (and that's what the rumors are saying), then I see no reason why it couldn't handle FF7 Rebirth fine at say 1080p.

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And if the rumors are true that it has DLSS, would make it even more feasible.

 

[duckroll]

If the Switch 2 has high-speed load times & graphic capabilities similar to a PS4 Pro (and that's what the rumors are saying), then I see no reason why it couldn't handle FF7 Rebirth fine at say 1080p.

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Depends on what we consider high-speed. UFS is a huge upgrade over the Switch, but it'll still be slower than the SSD speeds on the PS5 and Steam Deck/PCs.

I'm actually curious about Nintendo's storage plan in general though. That will have a much bigger impact on what games the Switch 2 can support rather than just technical specs. Will it still use cards? How much of a game will be feasible to be installed? Is the UFS upgradable? How big will it be? How many 100-150gb games can I store before I'm boned?

🤔🤔🤔

 

[DoctorPlayer MD]

I can see them doing a "Final Fantasy: Something title" and ditching the numbering system at this point.

The games have nothing to do with each other anyway, no point in clinging to all that baggage.

 

[PshycoNinja]

Yeah I've been looking around for it to and not seeing anything. Probably just mis-read something then from this forum or elsewhere.

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You good lol. This also happens to me from time to time. I was just so confused for a second.

 

[Rutger]

Yeah I've been looking around for it to and not seeing anything. Probably just mis-read something then from this forum or elsewhere.

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If something about it was directly said, I don't know, but SE did have a lot of errors when the Dawntrail preorder first went up, so assuming those were related then it does look like a good start for the game.

 

[vio55555]

I agree with you, yeah.

I still can't believe that Square, upon seeing the massive success that FF15 was, not only decided against giving that team the next mainline FF game, but decided to give them a new IP that ditched everything that people liked about FF15. Like what the actual fuck. Considering how expensive and long game dev is these days, you'd think that they would have seized this immediate opportunity.

I am praying that they don't make this mistake again. When Toriyama and Hamaguchi ship FF7 Part 3, they need to be given the keys to FF17. Load up Unreal 5 on every dev's workstation and get to fucking work on iterating upon everything that you've learned over the last decade of FF7 development, and ship a game as soon as humanly possible. On PS5, PC and Switch 2.

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Yeah, I really think just settling on an identity and iterating upon it is what's needed; tighten the definition of what it means for a game to represent FF (gameplay/battle system/concepts/ideas/etc.) and just move forward with several games that could be called similar to one another.

And now that we're post-pandemic hopefully they can find a way to getting new mainline iterations out on a 4-5 year timeline; that really is what's required to keep people paying attention. I think the 7 year gap was a huge issue for 16; there should never be gaps that big for mainline FF. Hard to grow a fanbase off games spaced out that far apart.

This isn't Mario Kart or GTA that people play for an entire generation. FF's have their moment in the sun when they release; that's when they get the vast majority of their playtime; if the game isn't getting released often enough, it just doesn't matter as much. Somebody young that started gaming in 2018 will only have seen 1 mainline FF release across their youth. Just hard to make an impact and hard for it to leave a big impact on that person like the games did in the 90s-00s. Of course nobody expects that pace of Square releases to return, but it needs to be way more often than this.

 

[Ahuitzotl]

I stopped posting about FF16 not having legs outside of USA because I felt like I was becoming anti-fan trying to combat people eating the PR speak in the face of the data, but *surprisingly* I was right, the game had no word of mouth, no one was talking about it on Tiktok and other social media compared to other AAA games.
I didn't expect Rebirth was going to sell as well as VII but I didn't expect for it to tank this hard. I'm not and haven't even been following the sales for it (Just that it had mediocre initial sales), I wonder what the pre-orders looked like before it came out 🤔.

 

[mlk1227]

Why does this have to happen to my favorite franchise? 🥲

 

[ScionN7]

I stopped posting about FF16 not having legs outside of USA because I felt like I was becoming anti-fan trying to combat people eating the PR speak in the face of the data, but *surprisingly* I was right, the game had no word of mouth, no one was talking about it on Tiktok and other social media compared to other AAA games.
I didn't expect Rebirth was going to sell as well as VII but I didn't expect for it to tank this hard. I'm not and haven't even been following the sales for it (Just that it had mediocre initial sales), I wonder what the pre-orders looked like before it came out 🤔.

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The hype was noticeably a lot more muted leading into Rebirth than it was for Remake, but I don't think anyone expected it to underperform this poorly. Personally I thought the high reviews and good wom would've given it a boost. Just looking at the trailers the game looked like a lot of fun and was packed with content.

It has to be frustrating for Square. Critically they just made their best game in 20 years, and this is the result.

 

[King Dodongo]

I love Splatoon but it might be Sui generis. Not sure there's room for another shooter like it

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Much like chocobo gp, the concept was good but the ideas alongside it made the games unsuccesful.

 

[Arithmetician]

I can see them doing a "Final Fantasy: Something title" and ditching the numbering system at this point.

The games have nothing to do with each other anyway, no point in clinging to all that baggage.

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I've had a non-trivial number of people tell me that they were intimidated by Final Fantasy because they wouldn't have the context if starting with the 16th entry… I think the numbering system is really cool but unfortunately it's toxic to the casuals that the series needs to reach.

 

[duckroll]

It has to be frustrating for Square. Critically they just made their best game in 20 years, and this is the result.

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18 years, not 20.

 

[BBboy20]

18 years, not 20.

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...huh. I could have sworn Dragon Quest 8 came out in 2008.

You know, I just realized Dragon Quest 11 is just ignored in these conversations even so, despite some problems people had, it still seemed to be one of the most praised games of 2018 anyways but...oh boy, the SquareSoft bias been showing, huh? >=D

 

[duckroll]

...huh. I could have sworn Dragon Quest 8 came out in 2008.

You know, I just realized Dragon Quest 11 is just ignored in these conversations even so, despite some problems people had, it still seemed to be one of the most praised games of 2018 anyways but...oh boy, the SquareSoft bias been showing, huh? >=D

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No Dragon Quest has a Metacritic of even 90. Also, Dragon Quest 8 is a dirty Level-5 game. Boo!

 

[cairngorm]

Also while a lot of JRPG fans are older...younger fans do play JRPG-like games still, except they're free. There are a lot of young Genshin and HSR fans.

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Yeah, SE needs to convince those younger people why they should choose FF over a free turn based or action rpg like those.

 

[vio55555]

I feel like the most important thing that hasn't been talked about in this conversation is why the games need to come out faster.

Every day somebody picks up their first JRPG, but with JRPGs, sales are all about the momentum/size of the initial release when the title makes its big splashy debut. If FF is only having that every 6 or 7 years for a mainline title, I feel like most young people are just not going to find it or will see it as a random once in a blue moon boomer title.

They might as well just pick up something like Persona with all sorts of releases all the time.

For so many fans of FF in particular, the first one you pick up is often your favorite or you'll have a special nostalgia for the title. For me that's FF4. I have a soft spot for that title (despite its flaws) because it was the first RPG I'd experienced, so the characters/world have a lot of meaning for me.

That's the problem with such a slow release timetable on mainline FFs, the series just doesn't have a chance if it's not releasing often enough because there's not enough people picking it up for the first time.

It's partially why I'm so in favor of making the Switch 2 the default platform (upscaling to better platforms/PC); you have to go where the kids are. Give kids a taste of a great FF and they'll be hooked. Get mainline FF coming out every 4-5 years with similar identities and I think you can build out a long-term fanbase among even younger people.

 

[BBboy20]

Yeah, SE needs to convince those younger people why they should choose FF over a free turn based or action rpg like those.

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You know, the whole industry gonna' have to figure how to win over those f2p gamers. Which the people who prepared the launch of Helldivers 2 probably had an idea of that.

 

[Brrandon]

Ill buy both of them when they release on pc... at a steep discount. Late ports should never be full price. Ill either just wait for a sale or someone in my steam family will buy them and ill play em for free.

 

[vio55555]

Ill buy both of them when they release on pc... at a steep discount. Late ports should never be full price. Ill either just wait for a sale or someone in my steam family will buy them and ill play em for free.

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And this is why FF needs to release multiplatform at the start (including Switch 2 for future mainline). They're always going to lose sales potential with delayed ports.

 

[Brrandon]

And this is why FF needs to release multiplatform at the start (including Switch 2 for future mainline). They're always going to lose sales potential with delayed ports.

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Yuuup. I love the franchise and have no problems giving them money for it (have had a ff14 sub for 3 years+many mog station purchases), but i just dont want to reward late ports.

 

[BlueManifest]

I think XV being such a massive success when it was such an incomplete, empty, and janky game probably had a hand in people losing faith in the series. Massive amounts of people experienced XV and I'm betting a lot were like me. I couldn't even finish the game. It was a miserable experience for me.

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It had been a long time since a main line FF had released and everyone had been so disappointed with FF13 that they were hoping 15 would finally be what they wanted, almost all FF fans bought it, more than half were disappointed in it again and dropped off from the series

Then fast forward to 16 sales to see the results

16's sales are a result of disappointment in ff13 and ff15, they keep losing more fans with every new release

 

[Zippedpinhead]

I really wonder if Dragon Quest Monsters met their expectations or not. I've yet to get to the game but finding a physical copy of that game was hard as fuck, barely any place had that. I had to actually go to the Nintendo NYC store to get it lol. I really wonder if it sold well enough digitally given that it was a Nintendo exclusive after all, it could only sell so much. And if it didn't sell well, I wonder if that's made Square not want to do anymore DQ Spinoff games. Hopefully, DQ12 slaps and looks hype as hell when we get to see it.

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IMO any game that sells out physically hit some sort of internal metric. Now whether that was enough? No clue.

Really disappointed to see SE struggling with the recent FF games. They were good, I truly do not understand why they haven't sold more.

Foamstars has always looked like worse Splatoon, whether it actually is or not. Which I am sure was not the intent, but it's how I have always seen it.

 

[ScionN7]

18 years, not 20.

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In my mind once you start measuring time by decades I'm not gonna bother getting too specific about the amount of years if you're close enough to round it up or down.

 

[DammitLloyd]

Please for the love of god, don't put 14 on the Switch 2! We'll be stuck with PS4 level graphics even longer! 😫

 

[Wolf Parade]

Legit question. What's wrong with lowering the budget of the next FF game and doubling down on appealing to the older fanbase? I realize it would be a shift in SE's approach, but smart firms pivot all the time when necessary. Stop trying to have FF compete on the same level as Genshin Impact, Elden Ring, and Monster Hunter. It's not at that level anymore and... maybe that's ok.

All other media has products that cater specifically to an older demographic and they manage to find a fan base. Even if the sales potential of the 35+ game consumer is not as profitable as the youth market, there is money to be made.

 

[demosthenes]

Damiani gonna be in shambles.

 

[Roronoa_Zoro]

It had been a long time since a main line FF had released and everyone had been so disappointed with FF13 that they were hoping 15 would finally be what they wanted, almost all FF fans bought it, more than half were disappointed in it again and dropped off from the series

Then fast forward to 16 sales to see the results

16's sales are a result of disappointment in ff13 and ff15, they keep losing more fans with every new release

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This 100% it was released, not liked, and it festered

How 13 got a whole freaking trilogy is beyond me. Wasn't even a ff fan at the time but everyone seemed to complain it had gone off the deep end with 30 hour tutorials and I remember Xbox fans being so hyped to get ff then everyone just stopped talking about it lol

 

[duckroll]

Legit question. What's wrong with lowering the budget of the next FF game and doubling down on appealing to the older fanbase? I realize it would be a shift in SE's approach, but smart firms pivot all the time when necessary. Stop trying to have FF compete on the same level as Genshin Impact, Elden Ring, and Monster Hunter. It's not at that level anymore and... maybe that's ok.

All other media has products that cater specifically to an older demographic and they manage to find a fan base. Even if the sales potential of the 35+ game consumer is not as profitable as the youth market, there is money to be made.

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I guess it depends on what you are actually asking here. Square Enix doesn't necessarily need FF in particular to compete on a big scale if they have other things to. But do they? FF is their biggest brand, so that's the safest choice for them if they want to compete for that.

As to why S-E has to compete at all, it is because that is the size the company is at, and hence the expectation of their investors, their board of directors, and the mandate for the CEO appointed to run the company. If your company is at a certain size, you have to compete with that market. Lowering budgets and being more economical would mean downsizing. That means layoffs. The bulk of S-E's development staff are in Japan, it would be challenging to have drastic layoffs to downsize quickly. In lieu of that, if you are employing all these people anyway, they have to make something.

If the choice is between making many AA games versus making a couple of AAA games, no matter how we look at it, the reality of the market is that the latter is more likely to be more successful than the former. This isn't even theory. S-E has tried both strategies before, and making more AA games just lost them money.

 

[Gamer @ Heart]

This 100% it was released, not liked, and it festered

How 13 got a whole freaking trilogy is beyond me. Wasn't even a ff fan at the time but everyone seemed to complain it had gone off the deep end with 30 hour tutorials and I remember Xbox fans being so hyped to get ff then everyone just stopped talking about it lol

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It got a trilogy because square was desperate to recoup the ridiculous investment. Regardless of the reception, the game still sold well.

They turned around 2 very interesting and creative sequels and ultimately profitable sequel in under 3 years which now feels like an achievement and some ubisoft shit with concurrent development.

The square enix capable of that would be flourishing these days. Instead they went right back into 5+ year long turnarounds

 

[benzy]

It had been a long time since a main line FF had released and everyone had been so disappointed with FF13 that they were hoping 15 would finally be what they wanted, almost all FF fans bought it, more than half were disappointed in it again and dropped off from the series

Then fast forward to 16 sales to see the results

16's sales are a result of disappointment in ff13 and ff15, they keep losing more fans with every new release

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The fans were so disappointed with 13 and 15 that they came back to VII Remake during covid and gave it positive sales and reception and then left again because.... Maybe XVI is just mid

 

[Kirbivore]

I can see them doing a "Final Fantasy: Something title" and ditching the numbering system at this point.

The games have nothing to do with each other anyway, no point in clinging to all that baggage.

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I can see them doing that... which would be a bad idea in the current state of the franchise. It would be easier to do if the mainline games actually had a consistent throughline gameplay wise but they don't.

 

[vio55555]

This 100% it was released, not liked, and it festered

How 13 got a whole freaking trilogy is beyond me. Wasn't even a ff fan at the time but everyone seemed to complain it had gone off the deep end with 30 hour tutorials and I remember Xbox fans being so hyped to get ff then everyone just stopped talking about it lol

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13 sequels was a definite case of "well we spent a ton of money to develop all of this, we'd better get some extra money out of this with more games", but of course that showed how quickly sequel sales can diminish.

Legit question. What's wrong with lowering the budget of the next FF game and doubling down on appealing to the older fanbase? I realize it would be a shift in SE's approach, but smart firms pivot all the time when necessary. Stop trying to have FF compete on the same level as Genshin Impact, Elden Ring, and Monster Hunter. It's not at that level anymore and... maybe that's ok.

All other media has products that cater specifically to an older demographic and they manage to find a fan base. Even if the sales potential of the 35+ game consumer is not as profitable as the youth market, there is money to be made.

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I don't think it's a big problem as long as the narrowing is just on the graphics fidelity part of the game, i.e. making the game fully compatible with Switch 2 on release.

These should still feel like big AAA event games, but if they can save development time (i.e. money) by being less aggressive on the graphics front it might make sense. Of course making a game that can release on every platform is a different added cost.

They can also save money if they're not trying to fully reinvent the wheel in every game. There's an added design cost to recreating everything fresh every single time when gameplay shouldn't require that, the series needs a core identity that carries through and that should start with modern gameplay that doesn't get fully remade in every game.

 

[Roronoa_Zoro]

It got a trilogy because square was desperate to recoup the ridiculous investment. Regardless of the reception, the game still sold well.

They turned around 2 very interesting and creative sequels and ultimately profitable sequel in under 3 years which now feels like an achievement and some ubisoft shit with concurrent development.

The square enix capable of that would be flourishing these days. Instead they went right back into 5+ year long turnarounds

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Well I WOULD love 16-2...

 

[BrickArts295]

Graphic wise, I don't think Square needs to reach higher. XV still looks pretty darn good in 2024, just still with that as a base line and you can support Switch 2 going forward.

 

[BlueManifest]

The fans were so disappointed with 13 and 15 that they came back to VII Remake during covid and gave it positive sales and reception and then left again because.... Maybe XVI is just mid

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7 was a remake of their most popular game of course the first one would sell well but still not as much as 15

 

[duckroll]

Well I WOULD love 16-2...

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In terms of cost I would be really curious as to how quickly they can make a FFXVI-2. So I just finished the Echoes of the Fallen DLC last night and really enjoyed it. It's not a big DLC but it is a substantial dungeon with great art, quite a few fights, excellent music, and a bit of story here and there. This was presumably a small project led by a team that was also working on The Rising Tide. It was shadowdropped in Dec 2023, which means at most it took maybe 6 months to make, probably much less, given how they had to make Rising Tide as well which was more substantial.

If they put 4 teams of this size together, give them each 20 months to make modular content like this. We would have enough to ship a FFXVI-2 within 2 years.

 

[vio55555]

I can see them doing that... which would be a bad idea in the current state of the franchise. It would be easier to do if the mainline games actually had a consistent throughline gameplay wise but they don't.

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Ultimately this is the real issue here; the biggest problem with the FF franchise. Nobody knows what the franchise represents. Yeah there's shared elements like Chocobos and Bahamut..., but what is the core identity of FF? Can anybody answer that?

It's not gameplay because that hasn't been consistent since the 00s...

It's graphical fidelity? That's not really a selling point other than that the games look good. A lot of AAA titles on PC or PS5 or Xbox X look good.

I feel like they almost have to stick with numbers because the series is so hard to define that it's tied to them. This isn't like Pokemon where they can just choose a pair of colors or letters for new iterations because the gameplay is similar across generations.

But it also gets back to the issue that FF needs to start following a direction where the gameplay is similar across mainline games with minor adjustments, not a full overhaul in every new game, and it needs to start showing an identity that carries across games. People should feel like 17 and 18 and 19 and 20 are similar games. If you liked one, you should like the rest sort of like 7 through 10 were. Most people that liked any of those liked them all.

 

[iksenpets]

Please for the love of god, don't put 14 on the Switch 2! We'll be stuck with PS4 level graphics even longer! 😫

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PS4 graphics are here for everything forever. Switch 2 is here to usher in the perma-cross gen.

Also lol they're not doing a second upgrade to the graphics for another decade, and even then that would require a miraculous level of player base retention over that time

 

[Roronoa_Zoro]

In terms of cost I would be really curious as to how quickly they can make a FFXVI-2. So I just finished the Echoes of the Fallen DLC last night and really enjoyed it. It's not a big DLC but it is a substantial dungeon with great art, quite a few fights, excellent music, and a bit of story here and there. This was presumably a small project led by a team that was also working on The Rising Tide. It was shadowdropped in Dec 2023, which means at most it took maybe 6 months to make, probably much less, given how they had to make Rising Tide as well which was more substantial.

If they put 4 teams of this size together, give them each 20 months to make modular content like this. We would have enough to ship a FFXVI-2 within 2 years.

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It would take a lot of coordination to get the writing cohesive between 4 parts and flow with good pacing but with that efficiency surely 5m in sales would be profit

 

[oty]

So yes, I'll say that even with its 10 million sales XV was a failure at growing the series and fostering new fans that would stick around. There WAS a chance to shift the series open world in 2016 while the iron was hot, they took it with XV and got good enough sales, but the quality of the game simply wasn't there for it to be a healthy starting point for a new era of the series. Again, BotW's sales, reception, legacy, longevity is right there as an example of what that actually could've looked like.

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im gonna be honest, that makes zero sense. so if a game sells 30million units but it isnt reviewed amazingly, that means the next game has to completely shift itself because 30m units just simply dont matter if the review scores arent high enough

the game was appealing to major audiences, and even without reception at its favor, still clinched that spot in FF history. how does that translate to completely abandon everything it did lol. it's an incentive to look even further into what it did right, or atleast, it was 8 years ago

I edited my post because the brand being "healthy" was a poor choice of words. I agree that it wasn't a surprise - as you say it released at a time when open worlds were as hype as ever. That combined with the desperation of FF fans to move on from the XIII trilogy + XIV 1.0 and the excitement to finally be playing the end result of the 10 years saga of Versus XIII development drama was a perfect storm that they won't be able to replicate.

I'm not saying FF can't be successful as open world, but I think people sometimes ignore context with XV's sales. I think it would be a mistake for SE to compare XV's sales to Rebirth and conclude that they should go back to a more XV direction. I actually haven't played Rebirth since I have to wait for PC, but from how much everyone seems to love it, it might be a good idea to take lessons from Rebirth for XVII and onwards.

Click to shrink...

why though? XV didnt review well because it was a rushed frankestein project made in 3ish years with one of the worst major game engines of the last few years, and it still reached where it reached. it's substantially more impressive what it accomplished compared to other recent FFs, by far

like seriously, I know y'all dont like XV, but this idea that it somehow negatively affected the rest of the franchise....it's copium. not saying you exactly said that, but it's this opinion thats going around that is just blatantly a rebuttal of XVI/Rebirth simply not being appealling to audiences in the slightest compared to XV rofl

 

[Primeau31]

Someone in here said earlier that Remake trilogy started 10 years too late and I'm inclined to agree; all anecdotal of course but I know of at least 3 people that went out to buy a PS5 for Rebirth that had no idea there was a Remake project happening (They all moved on from gaming). The catch 22 is, of course, it's hard to say that Rebirth would have been the massive game it is had development started an entire generation earlier. It's sad to see tbh, these Remake games are so important to me and I'd love to see them succeed commercially but it looks like the ship has sailed.

 

[duckroll]

It would take a lot of coordination to get the writing cohesive between 4 parts and flow with good pacing but with that efficiency surely 5m in sales would be profit

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They can forget about the writing and just stick to the action. The story in FF16 is trash-tier garbage anyway. Lol.

 

[mlk1227]

Everyone here genuinely has amazing ideas but my concern is whether or not SE ALSO has these amazing ideas (going back to turn based, slightly scaling back graphics in favor of gameplay, story, characters etc.) or are they only looking at the problem as not being on multiple platforms because if it's the latter then…………….. 🙃