• Light/Dark

Terra Wars, Mistwalker's latest mobile game, to shut down 6 months after its JP-only release

Reader mode
Byvar

Byvar

Member
Oct 26, 2017
535
After Terra Battle 2's failure, it looks like Terra Wars will be even faster to shut down: https://www.terra-wars.com/jp/news/20191122_000535.html
This game was announced for the West alongside Terra Battle 2. However, it was released exclusively in Japan on July 1st, and is now shutting down less than 6 months after its release on December 24th.
Terra Battle 2's story was to be continued in this game, so basically it got cancelled for the second time now.

With Terra Battle having shut down in multiple regions, Terra Battle 2 everywhere and Terra Wars before it got a chance to release in English, I think it's safe to assume that Sakaguchi's 9-game plan for this franchise is dead.
The question is, will Fantasian meet the same fate?

Gooch, if you need money, I'll give it to you if you make a console game again!
 
Kouriozan

Kouriozan

Member
Oct 25, 2017
21,331
Guess it's finally time to make The Last Story 2, huh.
But to be honest, it's kinda sad that his mobile ventures have to finish this bad.
 
Brazil

Brazil

Actual Brazilian
Member
Oct 24, 2017
18,548
São Paulo, Brazil
That's some depressing shit. My relationship with Terra Battle 2 was the closest I've ever gotten to reliving the Spore launch. I wanted to like that game so much, and yet it just sucked. Such great presentation and music, though :/

Here's hoping their Apple Arcade game turns out good. It kinda already looks like a second shot at Terra Wars, at least on the visual department.
 
The Pet of the Month

The Pet of the Month

Avenger
Oct 26, 2017
3,116
Amalthea
Ah man, that's two cancelled games in such a short timeframe. Were they doing that poorly? I have no idea the business behind mobile games, but it really sucks to see Mistwalker's works this decade fade out like this :(
 
Dreamboum

Dreamboum

Banned
Oct 28, 2017
23,031
Sakaguchi's strategy was stupid. Who makes a "2" of a gacha game anyway in the first place? He wanted to make it a Final Fantasy franchise, when it only needed to be one game. Sad
 

KoolAid

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,698
It was dead from the beginning, really. It was delayed too much, too many times. Sakaguchi is probably too busy doing that rotoscoped game for Apple Arcade right now.
 
Hero of Legend

Hero of Legend

Member
Oct 26, 2017
13,669
I'm glad at least since this will free Arzest up to resume their work with Nintendo. They've been quiet on that end. Hey Pikmin was their last major collab, but Arzest also did the 3D Battles in Bowser's Inside Story 3DS just earlier this year. They do have one Switch game and that's Boost Beast which was a port of their long shutdown mobile game. It's alright.

Hope Mistwalker is also in talks with Nintendo about future works as well. I said in another thread that they need to convince MS to allow them to remaster Blue Dragon on Switch which Arzest can do as they are the new Artoon (the dev of BD). HUGE potential there. It'd be a decent hit in Japan I'd bet.
 
Toth

Toth

Member
Oct 26, 2017
4,149
IIRC The Last Story does not offer much for a sequel since the main issue affecting the world was resolved, wasn't it?
 
Delaney

Delaney

Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,262
I'm not worried, because I'm sure that Terra Battle World console game they used to lure people into downloading the first mobile game during the Kickstarter craze will eventually come out and save this franchise.
 
Aexact

Aexact

Member
Oct 30, 2017
3,311
Brazil said:
That's some depressing shit. My relationship with Terra Battle 2 was the closest I've ever gotten to reliving the Spore launch. I wanted to like that game so much, and yet it just sucked. Such great presentation and music, though :/
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Man, TB2 took so many bad lessons from other gacha games that Terra Battle hadn't delved into yet, I was pretty sour on it to start. The bugs and NA shutdown certainly didn't help though yeah.
Toth said:
IIRC The Last Story does not offer much for a sequel since the main issue affecting the world was resolved, wasn't it?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Whatever loose ends there were were wrapped up in the Terra Battle Last Story collaboration event yeah.

Not that franchises function as direct sequels anyway though.
 
PlanetSmasher

PlanetSmasher

The Abominable Showman
Member
Oct 25, 2017
117,613
Mistwalker is honestly just not equipped to survive in the current industry. They're never going to be the AAA RPG house people want them to be, but they're also not very good at making mobile games.

They're trapped between eras and they can't meaningfully survive in either one.
 
Bit_Reactor

Bit_Reactor

Banned
Apr 9, 2019
4,413
Woof the interview talking about retirement and putting "a nice bow" on his career was super depressing to see :(

That being said I don't know why he'd go to "mobile" for establishing the end of his legacy when he could instead make ONE good game or something on console or portable (which I guess is Switch now? I dunno).

I know there's a policy on this forum about decrying mobile gaming, but there's a specific TYPE of game that does well on mobile, and it's not games with sequels and individual sagas.

PlanetSmasher said:
Mistwalker is honestly just not equipped to survive in the current industry. They're never going to be the AAA RPG house people want them to be, but they're also not very good at making mobile games.

They're trapped between eras and they can't meaningfully survive in either one.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
This bums me out. Why can't they be a "middle tier" studio? I'm not saying this to you but genuinely curious what's stopping them from just trying to do "indie" level gaming but do it well with the veterans they have? There's a lack of JRPGs in the indie space that could possibly fill in the void that Chrono Trigger left of smaller but tightly paced rpgs. Wish they'd tap into that.
 
Pwnz

Pwnz

Member
Oct 28, 2017
14,279
Places
I hope they have contract work with Square, Nintendo, or others. Just imagine a new Final Fantasy with a Mistwalker lead, and or them collaborating with Monolith.
 
ILikeFeet

ILikeFeet

DF Deet Master
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
61,987
PlanetSmasher said:
Mistwalker is honestly just not equipped to survive in the current industry. They're never going to be the AAA RPG house people want them to be, but they're also not very good at making mobile games.

They're trapped between eras and they can't meaningfully survive in either one.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
a lot of their collab partners ended up getting absorbed into larger entities. maybe Gooch should do the same
 
bobbychalkers

bobbychalkers

Member
Oct 26, 2017
1,603
How are they operating nowadays? I know that for Lost Odyssey and Last Story they acted more like consultants and had other devs make the games.
Toth said:
IIRC The Last Story does not offer much for a sequel since the main issue affecting the world was resolved, wasn't it?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
If they ever continued with it, they should just take the Final Fantasy approach.
 
Pwnz

Pwnz

Member
Oct 28, 2017
14,279
Places
Bit_Reactor said:
Woof the interview talking about retirement and putting "a nice bow" on his career was super depressing to see :(

That being said I don't know why he'd go to "mobile" for establishing the end of his legacy when he could instead make ONE good game or something on console or portable (which I guess is Switch now? I dunno).

I know there's a policy on this forum about decrying mobile gaming, but there's a specific TYPE of game that does well on mobile, and it's not games with sequels and individual sagas.


This bums me out. Why can't they be a "middle tier" studio? I'm not saying this to you but genuinely curious what's stopping them from just trying to do "indie" level gaming but do it well with the veterans they have? There's a lack of JRPGs in the indie space that could possibly fill in the void that Chrono Trigger left of smaller but tightly paced rpgs. Wish they'd tap into that.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Ah shit. I was hoping for a couple new games from them, but well deserved.
 

Deleted member 35077

Self-requested ban
Banned
Dec 1, 2017
3,999
Oof, that's gonna hurt. The mobile landscape ain't like it was before, and at average the budget to make a gacha game is $4.5 million dollars.
 
Nano-Nandy

Nano-Nandy

Member
Mar 26, 2019
2,302
Wasn't one of their stretchgoals in their Kickstarter-like approach a console game? What happened to that?
 
Bigkrev

Bigkrev

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,391
I really enjoyed Terra Battle 1 for a month after launch before I fell off, but what was it that led Terra Battle 2 to be such a disaster? Was it simply that making a sequel to a Gacha game never works cause your hardcores who lose everything in the transition either quit or just stay with the first game?
 
Bit_Reactor

Bit_Reactor

Banned
Apr 9, 2019
4,413
NoKisum said:
Was this game the source of that otherworldly crossover event in FFXV?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
The first one I think, yeah. where Noctis had more chemistry with her than his actual love interest? :P

It was a good event. My friend who is pretty obsessed with gacha (bless his soul) shit on the TB games though. Even for a gacha fan they just weren't great to him.
 
jacks81x

jacks81x

Self-requested ban
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
2,460
NYC
Can Microsoft just buy them already and let them work on AAA JRPGs for XBox and PC?
 
Mansa Mufasa

Mansa Mufasa

Member
Jun 17, 2019
1,403
Toronto
The selfish side of me wants Gooch to either go back to SE and lead his own team with their resources or get picked up by Sony and become their JRPG Studio going forward. Would love that so much.
 
Sumio Mondo

Sumio Mondo

Member
Oct 25, 2017
10,009
United Kingdom
Filipus

Filipus

Prophet of Regret
Avenger
Dec 7, 2017
5,160
jacks81x said:
Can Microsoft just buy them already and let them work on AAA JRPGs for XBox and PC?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

if they were going to do that it would have happened when Microsoft basically funded them into existence. Right now they are crashing down and all the developers that helped them make their great games have been bought out.
I love Mistwalker but there are better investments to make in the Japanese market.
 
theMrCravens

theMrCravens

Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,347
Bigkrev said:
I really enjoyed Terra Battle 1 for a month after launch before I fell off, but what was it that led Terra Battle 2 to be such a disaster? Was it simply that making a sequel to a Gacha game never works cause your hardcores who lose everything in the transition either quit or just stay with the first game?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Nah, a sequel was a great idea, and TB1 fans were pretty hyped for it.

Unfortunately the game itself turned out worse than TB1.
Silicon Studios made a total mess of it.
Awful mix of Character and Weapon gachas, multiple bugs and maintenance, barebone story content (3 stages?) compared to TB1 Launch, etc.
 
Transistor

Transistor

Outer Wilds Ventures Test Pilot
Administrator
Oct 25, 2017
37,432
Washington, D.C.
Brazil said:
That's some depressing shit. My relationship with Terra Battle 2 was the closest I've ever gotten to reliving the Spore launch. I wanted to like that game so much, and yet it just sucked. Such great presentation and music, though :/

Here's hoping their Apple Arcade game turns out good. It kinda already looks like a second shot at Terra Wars, at least on the visual department.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
TB2 wouldn't have been near as bad if it weren't for the awful overworld mechanic.
 
John Harker

John Harker

Knows things...
Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,432
Santa Destroy
Lots of The Last Story love in here is a very pleasant surprise!
I was there a few years ago when he said he wanted to do it, but ball was entirely in Nintendo's court
 
Aexact

Aexact

Member
Oct 30, 2017
3,311
Bigkrev said:
I really enjoyed Terra Battle 1 for a month after launch before I fell off, but what was it that led Terra Battle 2 to be such a disaster? Was it simply that making a sequel to a Gacha game never works cause your hardcores who lose everything in the transition either quit or just stay with the first game?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I dunno if it's sequel-itis was the reason but Terra Battle has finite gacha pulls, which means with enough grinding, you could pull every character in the game which isn't conductive for a gacha game.

TB2 made drops infinite but they also relied on energy pulls for boring equipment. Every week there was a new bug to fix. Battles were less interesting because of random encounters and traversing the world map was sluggish and unfun. It was a pain to play and the gameplay loop of gachas was lacking too. Not many ways to earn energy besides login bonuses and diluting resources to pull equipment meant you were spending on stuff that isn't as fun as flashy characters.

It was lackluster.
 
Reader mode
You must log in or register to reply here.