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Final Fantasy XIII-2 Sells One-Third Of Final Fantasy XIII In Opening Week

By Ishaan . December 21, 2011 . 11:31am

Final Fantasy XIII 2 Sells One Third Of Final Fantasy XIII In Opening Week

Last week, Square Enix released Final Fantasy XIII-2 in Japan. A follow-up to the original Final Fantasy XIII, Square intended for XIII-2 to “right the wrongs” of its predecessor, so to speak. Less linear progression and more exploration were part of the new design.

 

Did the effort pay off? Maybe not. The original Final Fantasy XIII, released in Japan on December 17th, 2009, sold 1,501,964 copies (on PlayStation 3) in its first week on shelves. In comparison, XIII-2, released on December 15th, 2011, only sold 524,217 copies (also on PS3) in its first week. That’s about one-third of the original game’s sales.

 

To put things in perspective, the last major PlayStation 3 RPG released in Japan was Namco Bandai’s Tales of Xillia, released in September. That game sold 525,605 copies in its first week, beating out XIII-2 sales by a slight margin.

 

On the flip side, Final Fantasy XIII-2 also took far less time to develop than Final Fantasy XIII. Square Enix outsourced portions of the game to Tri-Ace, who helped with game design, art, and programming.

 

Data courtesy of Geimin.net.


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  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000301072427 Mark Shaver

    I think Tri-Ace may have had a hand in the music as well. I noticed while looking at the soundtrack (haven’t played or watched any of the game) that there are some songs that have an -Aggressive Mix-, similar to Resonance of fate’s [A] and [B] versions of their songs.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Utku-Savaş/571425196 Utku Savaş

    Well, it assures there will be no FFXIII-3.

    • godmars

      I wouldn’t be too sure of that. 500k isn’t exactly a bad number. Its just that 1.5 million is a better one.

      What really needs to happen to send a proper message is vsXIII comes out, honestly reviews and sell well while delivering on its claims weather its still PS3 only or multi. Though it will certainly have to deliver as a multi. With no vsXIII-2 follow up.

      • Nemesis_Dawn

        I really feel that if Versus XIII goes multiplatform, it’ll take a lot of the shine off it to a lot of its audience, especially in Japan. I think if it goes multi, we’ll see probably less than this in Japan. If it stays exclusive, I think the sales will be closer to XIII. 

        • SerendipityX

          I seriously doubt multiplat would hurt vsXIII sales. If anything I thought XIII going multiplat with excellent sales kind of showed FF had moved pass console exclusivity.

          • godmars

            Thing is, for XIII’s sales as a multiplatform it only sold as well as the game prior to it. vsXIII certainly wont sell as well in Japan, will probably sell less than XIII-2 on the 360 if it comes out there.

            Point is, if Square can make vsXIII honestly good, not just some trumped up Famicom review, it’ll sell better on one platform better than two. All of you 360-only owners may not like it, but its the truth. The Franchise just isn’t COD, will never sell at that level no matter what Wada’s been told by MS, and by all counts vsXIII is still under development as a PS3-only title. And we already have an example when that changes.

          • SerendipityX

            For the record, I own a PS3. I just prefer to use X360 for the trivial facts like that I like the GUI and the controller. lol But wasn’t FFXIII originally a PS3-only title too? *shrugs* I wouldn’t be surprised if vsXIII went multiplat simply for the extra sales even it they are mediocre.(In the US/Eur, not Japan)

            So I’m not the only who worried/skeptical about vsXIII quality? Thats good to know. I really hope Square knows what they’re doing this time.

          • godmars

            SerendipityX: At one time it was also promised as a more complete game. Then it went multplatform. I don’t think Sqaure has had any real clue about what they’ve been doing this gen.

          • http://www.facebook.com/people/Utku-Savaş/571425196 Utku Savaş

            But I think that the all engine they’re building for FFvXIII will not gonna handle by XBox360, we saw the same thing in FFXIII.

          • SerendipityX

            Okay, see I didn’t know that. So the vsXIII engine can’t be handled by the X360? I no idea it was kind of like that with XIII too, I was wondering why came out sorta strange with the three discs and all.

          • http://www.facebook.com/people/Farid-Belkacemi/1073052585 Farid Belkacemi

            FF XIII was a “PS3 only” in Japan… At least for one year. Then, SE published the international edition on 360. In the end, I’m not sure about your “kind of showed FF had moved pass console exclusivity”. Maybe in Europe/US, but not in Japan.

          • SerendipityX

            I was referring to US/Eur, not Japan.

          • Nemesis_Dawn

            We aren’t talking Western sales. We’re talking Japanese. They make Versus XII multiplatform, the Japanese PS3 sales will be lower than they would’ve been otherwise WITH THE 360 NOT MAKING UP THE LOST SALES. That last point is important. The original XIII sold less than 20,000 copies in Japan on 360. Keeping it exclusive gives the impression that it is something that can’t be done on 360, so you’d better check it out. Making it multiplatform makes it just like any other game.

          • SerendipityX

            You guys were kinda vague of whether not you were talking about Western or Japanese sales. *nods* That’s Japan for you.

        • http://www.facebook.com/santd Daniel Sant

          what if it went multiplat on Wii-U?

          personally I don’t think they should bother with 360. They already alienated people with XIII. Peoples whos first console was 360 and played XIII and hated it probably wont bother.

          • http://www.facebook.com/people/Utku-Savaş/571425196 Utku Savaş

            I’ll tell you what, the most critism for FFXIII that “it is linear and mashing the same button RPG” is actually the consumers that played a FF first time in their lives. What is it mean “mashin the same button” anyway? FF was like this to be begin with, hell all JRPGs are about that.

          • Nemesis_Dawn

            That is a wild card. I honestly can’t predict what that would do to sales, since the Wii U is supposed to be a little bit more powerful than a PS3. I can’t say what the perception of it would be.

    • SpecDotSign

      Not so fast… I’m not gonna spoil anything, BUT, one the endings of FF XIII-2 does leave room for a sequel. -__-
      If Squenix releases another FF XIII game before Versus XIII I’m seriously going to flip some tables.

      • http://www.facebook.com/people/Utku-Savaş/571425196 Utku Savaş

        Is it weird that I’m actually happy with the probability of FFXIII-3?

        • http://www.facebook.com/santd Daniel Sant

          I am, and I hated XIII, in fact I’ll be pretty disappointed if they don’t tie everything up.

      • Gatchaman1

        Or…….DLC ending if total sales are not good?

        O_o

  • AzureNova

    I hope it sells so Square can come out with other games soon.

    “cough cough” Final Fantasy Vs XIII

  • http://twitter.com/salarta salarta

    It’s Toriyama. Squeenix has handed everything to him on a silver platter despite repeatedly ruining good IPs with his crap. If he wants an FF13-3, they’re going to give it to him, even if it would only sell 10 copies.

    This was meant to be a reply to someone else. disqus is messing up.

  • http://twitter.com/salarta salarta

    Using this second message for what I intended separately from the one meant to be a reply to someone else.

    Squeenix will probably do the stupid thing, as is typical of them, and think these poor sales are a sign that gamers prefer FF13′s approach. In reality, poor sales of FF13-2 mean lost consumer faith in the company from a combination of bad decisions they’ve made over the years, especially lately.

    I wouldn’t be surprised if some of it has to do with Toriyama specifically, too. He’s really the worst kind of “creative” person you could possibly have in a company that deals with creative IPs.

    • Gunbladeuser

      Yeah, totally agree here.

      If XIII-2 is good, though, I really hope that the sale numbers go as high as those of its predecessor and show Square Enix that they are heading towards the right direction.

      Anyway, I’ll wait for February to come and see for myself if this game’s better than XIII. I’m already putting effort into avoiding spoilers so that the game can surprise me.

    • http://twitter.com/Megawarrior345 Elle

      I’m sorry but I want Toriyama out of Square Enix.

  • vrakanox

    Kind of glad Xillia beat it.

  • SuigetsuHiramura

    It’s a sequel, not a mainstream title.  So it’s to be expected that it wouldn’t sell as much as the first.

    Did Final Fantasy X-2 sell as much as Final Fantasy X?  I think not.

    Did the entire Compilation of Final Fantasy VII even come close to the original Final Fantasy VII when it comes to sales?  Again, no dice.

    And the list goes on…

    Mainstream Final Fantasies will always sell better than spinoffs and sequels.  That’s just the way it is. 

    Edit: Unless you count Kingdom Hearts as a spinoff, but that’s pretty much a series on its own XP lol

    • http://twitter.com/salarta salarta

      Yes, and you’re absolutely correct no matter how we slice it that sales of a direct sequel would be lower than the first game in a case like this, where the first game was hyped out the ass and highly anticipated. There was really nowhere to go but down.

      Though I’d also say using FFX-2 as evidence doesn’t work well on account of how horrible that game was.

    • Gatchaman1
    • kroufonz

      FFX-2 sold lower than FF X but still close not omega bomba like FFXIII-2

      FF X first week  1.7m
      FF X-2 first week 1.4m

      http://www.abload.de/img/ffsaleszgo8d.png

  • OneOkami

    I’m kinda surprised the number isn’t more consistent with XIII.  I wonder if gamers were that turned off by XIII or perhaps anticipation of the Vita choked some of its fire.

    I’m interested in seeing the U.S. numbers as well.

  • SalomeHarras

    The most important thing to note is the very last paragraph:  ”On the flip side, Final Fantasy XIII-2 also took far less time to develop than Final Fantasy XIII. Square Enix outsourced portions of the game to Tri-Ace, who helped with game design, art, and programming.”

    Assuming (I personally don’t know this, I haven’t actually been following XIII-2 that closely) that they’re using the same game engine from XIII, and that they’re recycling assets, the cost of development for XIII-2 was probably significantly lower than the cost of XIII, thus, the amount of games they need to sell to hit their projected operating income is lower.  I’ve noticed that when games are released within a year of its previous release, there is a diminishing return in terms of revenue (with few exceptions), so this isn’t that surprising to me.  

    Generally speaking, 500,000+ copies sold in the first week for a console game is still really good for the Japanese market, it’s really just a matter of whether or not they were able to achieve their projected gross margin, which may or may not be released publicly.  

    That being said, I find the Tri-Ace bit to be particularly intriguing.  This signifies to me that either:

    -Cost of internal development exceeded cost of outsourcing.  This is a potentially big issue because it may force internal changes upon Square-Enix for the future.

    -They did not put as much of their resources into XIII-2 as I initially expected them to, thus using those resources for something else (Versus XIII?  Other title?  Fixing FF XIV?)

    -Lack of faith in the development team to produce the product they outlined to do.  

    • Gatchaman1

      Need to look back at X-2 sales then compare. They were much higher. 2 million in Japan alone. That’s 400,000 less than what FF XII sold in Japan (2.4). This isn’t something S-E should be proud of. They shipped a million copies probably expecting them to get sold out. Of course sales might pick up but this isn’t an impressive start by any means based on their past history. Crisis Core in Japan sold 800K units.

      • SalomeHarras

        I don’t think that’s a fair comparison to make.  

        The console market in Japan was different at the time FF X-2 was released, likewise, X-2 was the first time Squaresoft had ever released a direct sequel to a flagship title, curiosity alone may have abnormally spiked sales in that regard.  

        I sincerely doubt that Square-Enix (or anyone for that matter) realistically expects to sell through 100% of their shipment.  I’m going to be frank, any manager who honestly thinks that beyond a shadow of a doubt (unless he has undeniable evidence to support him) is naive and probably shouldn’t be in a position of power.  The only thing that matters to Square-Enix is whether or not they’ve met (or hopefully exceeded) their projected operating income on the project, nothing else, people tend to look too deeply into numbers with the wrong expectations of what they mean.  If Square-Enix announced a loss for their fiscal quarter, and explains that weaker than expected sales of FF XIII-2 as one of the causes, then there’s a problem.  

        I don’t think it’s fair to compare Crises Core with XIII-2 either.  The market has clearly shifted towards the portable realm over the years in Japan, and only the major console titles can generate numbers anywhere near 500k in terms of raw sales.  

        The gross margin, due to lowered development costs, is probably higher on XIII-2 per unit than XIII, and as long as it hits expected numbers, it could produce similar (or even superior) net operating income compared to XIII.  Even if Square-Enix doesn’t end up selling XIII numbers, this alone would make internal management, the board of directors, and their shareholders, very happy.  

        • Gatchaman1

          Yes but youre forgetting the sales of FF XIII and Call of Duty are still not that long ago in this era of gaming and our current economy. Fact is, people are steering clear of the sequel most likely due to bad feelings of XIII and word of mouth

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100002868112952 Blaine Frisbey

    It’s probably because people were hesitent to buy it if they didn’t like XIII.  Hopefully as they hear from friends or reviews that it’s changed, sales will pick up.

    EDIT: not to mention the fact that XIII had, like, 4 years of hype behind it, and they announced XIII-2 relativley recently.

    • http://www.facebook.com/santd Daniel Sant

      I think the word of mouth is better over there than the internet rabble rousers would have you believe, but whether people will even bother to give it a chance…I think the sour taste in peoples mouths after XIII and XIV is a bit too much.  They could win people over if they have some well-made dlc packs at a fair price, or even for free, but they should have just had certain features in the game to begin with if they wanted more sales.

  • http://tristsantithesis.tumblr.com/ Tsunayoshi Sawada

    Losing a two thirds of consumers is terrible, no wonder they are banking on selling DLC.  

    • Tatsu

      Seriously, I’m a little surprised how much DLC they’ve announced for this. I try to be open-minded about alternative forms of revenue, but it feels like they’ve crossed some kind of threshold.

      Am I the only one who’s dissuaded from buying a game because of these kinds of things?

      • http://twitter.com/ifarah12 Gren

        You’re definitely not, i’m not a big fan of DLC either.

      • http://tristsantithesis.tumblr.com/ Tsunayoshi Sawada

        I can see being dissuaded when its a western game since, usually, one just needs to wait for the inevitable ultimate or game of the year or complete edition that comes with all dlc in it. For jrpgs, I guess that never happens, at least in the US. 

        Fortunately I waited for Dragon Age and got all the DLC in the Ultimate Edition. I cant see a FFXIII-2 ultimate edition ever.

      • http://www.facebook.com/people/Farid-Belkacemi/1073052585 Farid Belkacemi

        F*ck DLC lol (And I mean it).

      • SerendipityX

        No, but they are people like me who realize that DLC is completely optional and can be completely ignored while still enjoying the game.

  • Nemesis_Dawn

    Not surprising. In fact, I’m a bit surprised it did as well as it did. The first one was a big title. A major PS3 exclusive (at the time), the next numbered title in the series after the failure of XII, amazing graphics (for the time), with a demo that had people excited for it.

    This is one comes off as just another multiplatform RPG, quickly squeezed out cash-in, using so many of the same assets as the first one, and not really doing much new (in many people’s perception). I mean, I’m going to buy it, because I enjoyed the first one, but there’s nowhere near the excitement of the original.

    Versus XIII, however, as long as it stays exclusive, I will be VERY surprised if it doesn’t do better.

    • SpecDotSign

      XII was NOT a failure my friend. Next to Tactics, it has the most mature un-anime story in all of the series.

      • http://twitter.com/salarta salarta

        He’s probably referring to relative sales.

        Personally, I considered FF12 to be an okay game. Infinitely superior to what they tried to pull with FF13.

        • Nemesis_Dawn

          I wasn’t talking about sales, I was talking about series reputation. While there is a vocal minority who liked FFXII and want everybody to know it, the majority response was dislike. And if that wasn’t true, explain why SE tried to do so much purposely the opposite of XII in XIII. People are forgetting that while XIII-2 is supposed to be a reaction to XIII, XIII itself was a reaction to XII.

          • SerendipityX

            That last sentence actually puts things into perspective when you think about how FFXIII turned out. Kind of like a chain reaction @_@ Which IMO makes things even more convoluted with Square that I originally thought and I now I really hope they know what they’re doing with vsXIII. They’ve got it tough when it comes to pleasing the fans.

      • solbalmung

        Most un-anime story? Character interaction was close to none, the story was meh. It felt more like a MMORPG than a pure Final Fantasy with the focus on sidequests, gambits and such.
        Sure it was fun but I didn’t play FFXII for the story epicness or character depth…

        • SpecDotSign

          That’s what made it mature. It wasn’t “let’s save the world I’m the hero!”. It was “I’ll do anything for my kingdom, even seek the help of an ancient evil”. Vaan, as lame as he was, wasn’t obtrusive and annoying. The ladies were great strong female leads. And I’ll disagree, even if the story felt like it fell apart towards the end, it was still fantastic. But that’s just my opinion.

          • Nemesis_Dawn

            Are you kidding? Vaan wasn’t the most annoying character in FF history?!? Whatever short-skirt princess and bunny girl’s names were were strong female leads?!? You have to have a personality to be a strong lead. The only character with any personality was Balthier. Even the final boss might as well have been a cardboard cut-out.

          • SerendipityX

            IMO Vaan wasn’t annoying , actually he seemed to just be randomly caught with the mess and just went along with the ride for the most part. In fact I found most of the characters (besides Bathier) in FFXII to be inexplicably normal. There was nothing really quirky or obtrusive about them which I thought was strange and sort of endearing for a JRPG. Might have been incredibly boring for some but imo you don’t always have to flashy personality to have a strong lead. I admit to the ending falling flat on its face, it’s the only thing hated about the game.

          • solbalmung

            Couldn’t have said that better. Balthier by far was the character with most charisma even though lacking a bit of depth, as for the rest of the cast…..

          • http://twitter.com/Megawarrior345 Elle

            Balthier was the only interesting character for me. Fran was only good because of her fantastic character design. I thought her Viera friends were more interesting than her even though I still love her. As for Ashe….I don’t even know.

      • kroufonz

        story is XII weakest point

        • Gatchaman1

          I thought it was broken Gambits & useless Vaan

          • TheMysticalNinja

            When you had Balthier, Basch and Fran (and I guess Ashe), Vaan being useless wasn’t a concern. Hell it became somewhat enchanting how he was just tagging along.

            Story was…Eh it was better then IX, but that’s not saying much.

            Even if the gambits could be abused, I still liked the combat and the license board, as somewhat retarded as it could be (why do you need to learn how to use headgear…) was quite rewarding.

          • mirumu

             Six of one, half a dozen of the other.

          • http://twitter.com/Megawarrior345 Elle

            That’s part of it. lol

      • http://twitter.com/Megawarrior345 Elle

        XII was a huge disappointment for me to be quite honest. I grew to love some of it years later but it could have been so much more. It felt like it was trying to find its identity.

    • http://twitter.com/creid8 Pete

      XII, a failure? In Japan it sold just about as much as X, which was over 2 million copies.

  • TheMysticalNinja

    I’m just going to guess XIII lost a lot of goodwill and many of the consumers are being cautious for the sequel . Next week will be interesting for XIII-2

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Aaron-Cameron/100001055122940 Aaron Cameron

    im a huge FF fan and i not even buying this FF13 sucked to me so why will i get 13-2 il wait for Versus

  • http://myfigurecollection.net/collection/ashgail Ashgail

    If the game was met with positive reception, probably sales won’t lose momentum? Can’t say for sure at this point since I haven’t been following the general consensus towards the game. 

  • Ryan Baer

    When Tales beats you, you know its time to retire the series

    • http://twitter.com/salarta salarta

      It’s more accurate to say when Tales beats you, it’s time to stop and analyze exactly what is wrong with your company that resulted in so many fans and consumers not giving you their money.

      I’m actually pleased to see such low sales for FF13-2. It’s delayed, but it shows that consumers are actually putting thought into what they’re spending their money on, not just buying anything with a popular name. If there’s any hope for Squeenix at all, they will get the right message for the first time in about 8 years, and put real effort into reviving themselves as the excellent, highly respectable company they used to be.

      • TheMysticalNinja

        Or they will panic and make even more mistakes. Never look at lower sales as a good sign in a present and future sense.

        But yes Square Enix have lost a lot of goodwill (not just with XIII but with the cack handiling of XIV) and they need to make sure they will be more consistant

        • http://twitter.com/salarta salarta

          True. I want to believe Squeenix would try to actually fix themselves now, but based on their history for the past 8 years, it’s more likely they’ll just make even more mistakes. It’s how they got where they are today.

    • http://twitter.com/Megawarrior345 Elle

      LOL! Not retire, but re-evaluate themselves.

  • Crowlevel8

    That’s a surprise to me, I thought it would do about the same as Final Fantasy 13. SquareEnix has two strikes and as only one last hope Final Fantasy Versus XIII.  

        

    • http://twitter.com/adrian_staylor Adrian

      i completely agree with you, now lets see how much longer it’s gonna take for Versus to come out…

      • Crowlevel8

        I’m going to guess 2012 or 2013 :) 

        • http://twitter.com/Megawarrior345 Elle

          If this is any indication, IT HAS to be 2012/2013. No more delays.

        • http://twitter.com/adrian_staylor Adrian

          i really hope so, versus is the only game that can redeem their recent questionable decisions 

  • http://twitter.com/FaithlessMr Bruno Silva

    It’s not as bad when you consider that a new handheld was released at the same time. Sure, the Vita may not have had the overly sucessful launch everyone expected it to have, but it’s only natural that it’s release manage to drive some of the gamer’s attention from this to the new system, and some of the new games.

    Also, the Vita did cost over 250, so gamers in Japan did have to choose between this or the Vita and a memory card and one or two games. It’s only natural the first weekend sales figures are not as impressive.

    EDIT: We also should take on account that the Final Fantasy brand name did suffer after Final Fantasy XIII’s release, and Final Fantasy XIV. This most likely also had quite an impact on the game’s sales. Again, 500k copies sold domestically is far from bad, it’s bad when you compare it to the previous game’s sales.

  • kroufonz

    this should make SE think seriously.

    my feeling for XIII-2 is quite mixed, first i hear good things lots of improvement, then come this bunch of dlc crap, and now the comparison of x360 and PS3 is out pointing that while 360 version improved, the PS3 version performance and graphic quality turned worse than FFXIII.

  • http://twitter.com/charliesabers Carlos Escalante

    SE REALLY needs to learn how to manage their brands. The problem they are facing is a mix of confused product development, bad targeting and bad brand development. They thought they could slap the FF logo over everything and that it would sell, and it has, only that sales have been consistently lower and consumer trust has nose-dived during the last 6 or so years.

    Final Fantasy usted to mean “great stories”, “memorable characters”, “great music” and since the PSone era, “great graphics”. While the graphics and music have remained a staple of the series, I think they warped the meaning of “great stories” to “confusing plots” and “memorable characters” to “cosplay quotient”.

    I used to play FF as a kid because I got lost on those worlds and felt “mature” because the stories were so good. Maybe it has became more apparent because of technological advances and voice acting, but with the exception of XII, which had a good, if underdeveloped story and dialogues, dialogue is cheesy and ham-fisted, and exposition is generally pretty juvenile and needlessly melodramatic.

    FF is not a kid’s game. Teens, who I think factor into the way FF has been developing, want to be amazed by aspirational stories and characters, not banal and fake sentimentality. Adults, want to be entertained, not insulted intellectually by a game series which in the end lives and dies by it’s story.I think they need to turn this games, specially the main series, into aspirational material again.

    As brand, it’s all over the place and not in a good way. FFXI and XIV were wasted numbers and SE seems to have begun realizing so many numbers stop being appealing. The Fabula Nova Crystalis as a whole is also confusing and maybe they should just drop the “XIII” from Versus altogether.

    Gameplay wise I loved the battle system in XIII, and XIII-2 seems to address the restricted sense of freedom XIII had. I will buy the game, but I’m prepared to be appalled by the “directing” capabilities of Toriyama, whom I think is a talentless hack who should not be leading a team of creative individuals.

  • kroufonz

    FFXIII does bring lots of negativity toward FF and SE in general
    -FFXIII announced as PS3 exclusive
    -SE lie and FFXIII changed to PS3 exclusive on japan only
    -FFXIII get overall bad reception worldwide compared to past FF title
    -SE lie for the second time and make FFXIII budget release multiplat on japan

    even after all of those bad reputation they got from FF XIII, SE confidently say a lots of people wanted FFXIII sequel, and FFXIII-2 become WORST selling numbered single player FF since PSX era (FFVII),it can’t even reached 1000k on first week. also they are try to push x360 version a bit in japan and yet it turned out can’t even enter top20 sales rank.

    now that i think again it’s funny how PS3 still didn’t have any single exclusive SE JRPG and got one multiplat unreleased (last remnant), while wii got bunch, x360 even have some exclusive and timed exclusive.

    SE should finish FF Versus XIII and get Tri Ace to work on VP 3 (make it For PS3 and focus just on one platform) make sure to polish the game to ensure it is good.

    • pockystix

      well, at least the Tales franchise has been kewl on the PS3.

      Honestly, I have no idea what’s up with Square as of late. . . they are just. . . yeah.

      I even have to scratch my head at DQX. . . I mean, part of it feels like a natural evolution from DQIX. . . but most of it is. . . yeah.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Farid-Belkacemi/1073052585 Farid Belkacemi

    Japanese gamers, I honestly love u. Square Enix should now understand that u don’t f*ck your fans so to speak. It seems like 2/3 of FF XIII buyers just took Skyrim, Xillia or even Skyward Sword/MH 3G instead of XIII-2… And I’m glad they did. Hope XIII-2 drops critically next weeks, it deserves it in some way. *bloody eyes*

    • http://www.facebook.com/benjtan Benjamin Tan

      we should follow in their footsteps and boycott this game

  • Raidou

    I think from the moment I saw Noel I’ve had this sinking feeling about actually handing over money for this game. Then after every update about dlc, the nearly identical to 13 battle system and the lack of a third character for your party I’ve gotten more and more sure that I won’t enjoy this game.
    I can’t be the only one and I guess these sales reflect that.
    So sorry SE, but some of us just plain aren’t interested.

    • http://radiantloki.blogspot.com/ Mark Dinh

      That what I said about it being identical to XIII about the battle system (though I have learned that if you control all three it would be hectic chaos), and I still hate the fact about a monster being a replacement… DLC pisses me off cause I know I can’t get them… but I still pre-ordered it. I wish they add back the Def, Mag Def, Agility, or any other FF stats. I love FF and everything buy SE should have seen this coming… Can some one still me what they fixed? Like really? What’s the *right the wrong”? I know it’s more non-linear with multiple endings, towns you can finally explore, puzzles I guess.

  • Tom_Phoenix

    These initial sales are preety much the result of the damage XIII caused to the brand. A lot of people got burned when they bought XIII. As a result, it’s only logical that the reception to its sequel is cold and reserved.

    The upcoming weeks will clearly show whether or not this game actually is an improvement over the original. If it is, the positive word of mouth will spread and the game should be able to stick around on the sales charts for a while, slowly building up sales.

    However, if this game turns out to be the same sh*t as the original or not much of an improvement, then the game will drop from the sales charts fast and the sales will preety much remain what they are now. In that case, Square Enix will have to seriously reexamine what they have done wrong with this series. Otherwise, it will pull the entire company down along with it.

    EDIT: Also, the amount of DLC Square Enix is churning out for this game is also repelling customers, especially since so much of it was announced well before the game was even finished.

  • Lexaus_the_Alchemist

    It’s disturbing when we can think that 500k is a horrible number for any game. Yes, it is pretty bad for ‘Final Fantasy’, but for any other series that’s like a priority-mailed god-sent gift from the heavens. I just hope this now opens their eyes a bit and forces them to take a step back and look as to where the series has gone to.

    Still hyped for FFvsXIII and FF Type-0 (and future Final Fantasy games) now matter how badly FFXIII and its ilk try to damage the brand.

    • http://twitter.com/Megawarrior345 Elle

      Well Square Enix set the bar REALLY high for a long time.

  • ShinGundam

    Probably, people just want an actual powerhouse FF, i don’t know…
    Nomura really needs a lot of luck, potions and 7777, that will likely put only more weight on him considering no one make a full 3D FF that received as good as PS1 era.

     

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Danny-Lee/100001803906692 Danny Lee

    IMO. FF13 probably lost to other games the moment it went to 360. If it didn’t, there wouldn’t any content cut from FF13 which would probably lead to a more positive feeback if it were to be a PS3 exclusive. Maybe then the sequel would probably sell just as well.

    • TheDarkEmpress

      I agree partially, but it still cannot be denied that FFXIII was just a very crappy title to begin with…for all of the hype it received it was just a major flop…I couldn’t even believe how lazy the devs got with the mechanics of the game…it doesn’t have as much to do with content being cut for porting as much as it has to do with simply being a mediocre game in general….and FF fans are not partial to corner-cutting.

  • pockystix

    I’d say “good”, but that’s way too much for this kind of thing.

  • http://radiantloki.blogspot.com/ Mark Dinh

    Final Fantasy XIII was a disappointment to many old fashion FF players. No matter what, I love all the Final Fantasy games that come out. I’ve been with it for a long time, so I won’t quit on it. I loved FFXIII. It really brought a new battle system, and it was enjoyable. The paradigm system is similar to the job system, so I didn’t really mind. The only character I had a problem with XIII was Snow, I hated his guts like no tomorrow. I LOVE HOPE, but SE you took that away from me. What the hell? You never really changed anything, you just add more to it. Having a bunch of DLC for an FF, especially this was the most stupidest idea you guys have ever thought of. What is wrong with you? FFXIII brought down the Final Fantasy named a lot, tell from these sells, but this is for XIII’s related story. Final Fantasy versus XIII would mostly likely sell better then XIII because it not this cheesy ass story XIII gave us. (Though ever game is cliched by now… nothing really unique IF you think about it carefully) Versus story is similar I guess to VII, or VIII, (Just saying) but the system is a mix of KH, Crisis Core, and FF which is something new. Plus you can move around like in Type-0 or KH. I think everyone likes dark stories for some reason lol. Everyone is bashing on you SE, take a hint. I still love you, but please for buddha’s sake… If Tales games is going to outsell you in NA and JP, then you might want to think things through. FFXIV was probably the only MMO I played the most. 500K is a really bad number..

  • http://radiantloki.blogspot.com/ Mark Dinh

    I read good reviews so far, so I hope the sells go up. Final Fantasy was the one of the games that got me into RPGs, and if it stopped, I would be very disappointed.

  • TheDarkEmpress

    Only Square could take one of their flagship franchises, an absolute staple when it comes to quality and creativity in the RPG world; and mangle it into such a twisted and unrecognizable mess as FFXIII was, only you, Square…FF fans are not partial to cutting corners, who’s to say you wouldn’t do it again?

    Hopefully Square is finally getting the hint that you can’t go slighting your fans….even if you promise to right the wrongs the damage has already been done…Sure, you may be a massive money empire that can afford to screw your customers over and take millions in losses each fiscal year with only so much as a snicker from the top execs…but you can’t go on doing that forever, because without customers companies cease to exist…Take care of your customers and they’ll take care of you.

    TL;DR STOP MAKING SHITTY GAMES

    (I will be buying FFXIII-2, and if this one sucks I can definitely tell you Square: Fool me twice…I won’t ever be back again)

  • Go2hell66

    I blame noel

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Daniel-Morandi/100000837836996 Daniel Morandi

      That and…

      I blame having to recruit monsters instead of real characters in a consistent plot. I blame
      having one of their most important characters as DLC. I blame being 30
      hours of gameplay when plotwise the FF were more than 50 hours plus
      the secrets. I blame having multiple ending and inconsistent plot with time travels when It was something very off in the main FFXIII. I
      blame the “-2″ number because that reminds people of FFX-2.

      • http://twitter.com/Megawarrior345 Elle

        I wish it was like Chrono Cross or Star Ocean where you could recruit actual people with their own dialogue (even if it doesn’t have any voices)

  • http://www.facebook.com/santd Daniel Sant

    wall of text crits you for 2 damage. Some other things that I think contributed to the low sales

    Type-0 was almost directly competing with XIII-2.  I am pretty sure the suits were very reluctant to push the Type-0 delay back even 2 weeks like they did.  But since they did, I think thats a decent sign that maybe they are listening to their devs when they say “yo, this isn’t ready.”  Anyway, people only have so much money, and for an FF fan I bet people were already thinking about picking between one or the other, Type-0 or XIII-2. For other people, the perception is probably “wtf? didn’t we just get an FF two months ago?!”  Though the brand is damaged and lowered sales overall, the two games were pretty equally spread, even though Type-0 cost just as much as a ps3 game.  I hope they realize which is the superior product and which people in the company actually know what the eff they’re doing.

    Then of course the competition.  The follow up to one of the most poorly received FF, going up against new Monster Hunter, a strong nintendo lineup, and a new handheld?  SE releasing this game against them took balls and I gotta give them credit for that.  This is REAL competition, not some “I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine” perfectly spaced out release schedule.

    What I think they should do —
    1) Get Toriyama out of there.  Not necessarily fire him, but get him working on is own damn projects and stop pooping on my FF.  I think this is a good compromise for everyone. Though I do think XIII-2 is quite a bit better than XIII. If you DO make a XIII-3, give him less freedom. More checks and balances.

    2) I feel bad for all the pressure being placed on Nomura, but its pretty much up to him, and personally I think he can deliver an awesome game.  People might hate on Kingdom Hearts for the story and whatnot but iirc Versus story is being handled by Nojima.  I do think that they need to do something out of the box if they want people to give a crap at this point and generate some extra buzz.  Consider Vita compatibility of some kind, PC release, Wii-U release, SOMETHING.

    3) They seem to be on the right track with FFXIV, this is essential in repairing the brand.  Do not screw this up or thats a wrap. They have the chance to make it a success, but there is also the possibility of a double flop. Holy cow what a disaster that would be.

    4) STOP trying to pull the veil over customers eyes, give them what they WANT. Or..at least do a better job of convincing them what they want.

    5) Build up more presence and understanding with your customers. Seriously, Squeenix, get with the times.  While other companies are talking up their games with social networking and all this, we have Squeenix over here just quietly chugging along doing everything the old fashioned way.  People actually like to hear about nerdy things like development and coding these days.

    6) All that other jazz about getting more talent.  Tabata and Yoshi-P are a nice start but it would be great to see even more players.

    post getting too long so thats it

    • Aoshi00

      Very insightful comments, I think everyone has alrdy said what’s needed to be said… but a deciding factor.  Toriyama has to go, I guess calling him a hack might be a bit harsh, but I don’t know what else to call him for constantly delivering poor work.  He didn’t just ruin the FF brand (PE 3rd B-day?), he kinda ruined the good name of Toriyama Akira in my opinion.. now I can’t not think of Toriyama Motomu when I hear the name..

      Nonetheless I’m still interested in this game, and hope to be good as my copy is on the way lol..  S-E has really taken the once quality FF brand to many places in the last decade (Toriyama directed X-2, FF12 & 13 were two extreme opposites, MMO-like and totally straight line, thus making half of the people hate each game, and despite improvement over 13, this is a sequel and not a main game)..  why number the two online games.. etc etc..  Drop Toriyama, and at least get Uematsu, it might do some good.. 

      Maybe 13 was just a lost cause to begin w/…  and yeah, VS13 deserves its own name, just drop the 13 like Type-0 did Agito 13, since it takes forever, it might as well be called 15..  incidentally this seems to be an unlucky number as well.. but then so was 14 :(…

      It’s really a pity though.. I was hoping people would give S-E a chance to redeem themselves. other than not being thrilled by the monsters, I’m pretty pleased w/ all the improvements I heard.. I even ordered the Before Fragment novel for 13-2 as I enjoyed Episode 0 a lot.. but w/ so much competition and the Vita just released, like others said, people don’t have unlimited money to buy everything at once..

      • ShinGundam

         I think they tried to appease to fans too much than they should,
        they made an MMO-lite or anti-JRPG/FF with XII, then XIII comes out as critical reaction to what people hate about XII then we have XIII-2 which is another critical reaction for the original.

         Truth is no one is making an FF game and the transition to 3D just made things worse. It doesn’t help that the old self of the series is an archaic, for example i doubt many like to talk to A,B,C NPCs to windup the story and get some gameplay here and there.  

         What SQEX need now is luck and nothing more than luck and wish for game that is perfect storm of gameplay, music , art ,etc that win hearts and minds.

  • http://nocturneadagio.blogspot.com/ LainaLain

    Well….this is a recession.

  • Elemiel

    So XIII-2 righted the wrongs of the first game but it seemed to create more wrongs. So let’s hope XIII-3 rights the wrongs of this game.

    • Mr_SP

      Well, there’s probably a significant number of players waiting to see if FFXIII-2 *does* redeem it’s predecessor, so it should expect more sales. In any case, 500,000 is nothing to sneeze at.

      • Elemiel

        True true.

  • idofgrahf

    So Square is now feeling the stings of FFXIII when only a third are interested in XIII-2, after XIII square is going to have to convince alot of people to buy another FF and XIII-2′s sales so far seem to be an indication of this. As for myself, I’ll wait until XIII-2 is in the bargain bin here in US before thinking of buying it. I felt like an idiot for going to XIII’s midnight release and the game ended up to be craptacular, not making the same mistake twice.

  • http://twitter.com/py0npy0njump eiji

    So, Squeenix? Time to make good games for once? This is what you get for alienating talented developers away from the company and being calculated as hell. I couldn’t care less if you alienate fans because new fans will always resurface. Talented developers are hard to come by and being by the books will get you no place.

    I think the last real Final Fantasy was Final Fantasy XII. You could’ve just billed XIII as “Fate of the Two Worlds” for all I care so that everyone will see how big of a disappointment it is. Yes, a disappointment. It’s not bad per se, just disappointing. Taking three years to develop a shiny engine and a bit over a year for a game, then churning out beta for a very anticipated title is just overbearing.

    I don’t think vXIII can clean up this mess. Just release the damn thing so we can get this over with and move on to XIV or an inevitable XV, and make the latter as powerful and memorable as certain FFs. 

    Fans destroyed this franchise. Really. Along with the incompetency of the producers. Make Final Fantasy interesting again, please? Or suck it up and forever pander to Cloud and Sephiroth fanatics.

    • godmars

      Funny, I’d call FFX the last “true” titles in the series. XII though it had good game mechanics it suffered by not having a central character, any kind of notable villain or even a real plot. Being too heavily influenced by FFXI as well as Tactics, which were all based on the same world.

      I think where they really went wrong was trying to distance themselves from mini-games. Probably haven’t complained about it here, but if FFXIII needed anything – ANYTHING – it was flying segments. Snow and Serah flying through the fireworks and that first manic escape and chase. All the times Sazh took to the air. Especially when Fang wrangled a monster. The cutscenes *BEGGED* to be made into Panzer Dragoon on-rail shooter segments. Begged I tell you!

      So no, if Square can’t think past what’s become their standard of MMO-like game play, they can’t put better than what they’ve managed with Type-0 on the PS3, then vsXIII is likely doomed.

      • Solomon_Kano

        I wouldn’t condemn Versus so soon based on XIII’s failings. At this point one can pretty much determine if they’ll like VS or not by a simple question: do you like KH’s gameplay?

        Versus looks to be more standard Nomura fare and, despite my liking of Nomura’s games, that’s honestly a take it or leave it thing. Regardless of anything else that’s happened in SE before or during its development, that doesn’t seem to have changed, so I don’t think it can be damned by what’s happened around it.

        • godmars

          And the reason I’m concerned is that:
               1) Square has shown no kind of ability on HD consoles this gen.
               2) They’ve shown an active unwillingness to do anything “only” on the PS3.
               3) vsXIII was literally conceived and announced at the same time as XIII and XIV, both of which are strong examples of Square being lazy, disorganized and largely riding their name.
               4) Just like XIII and XIII-2, XIV for that matter, Sqaure has made ambitious promises, and disastrously failed to deliver on them.      

          I haven’t written off vsXIII entirely, but at this point, as I keep saying Namura or no, by past/current example the odds aren’t looking too good.

          • Solomon_Kano

            Yes, looking at all that I can understand being skeptical of how Versus will turn out but, personally, I just can’t put it down even with all of SE’s failings this gen. It’s a minor thing, but none of the games you mention had Nomura’s involvement (beyond some character designs) so I can’t just automatically lump it in with their other works even if it’s not illogical to do so by looking at their recent slate.

            That’s likely just me hoping for the best but, from what we -have- seen of it, it looks like Nomura’s pulling through where the rest of SE hasn’t. To me, at least. Time will tell, of course.

            Also: while it’s not an HD Square game (and thus not in the same area), Type-0 was conceived in the midst of Square’s other recent messes and yet turned out to be the closest thing to the core of Final Fantasy in years even while being of a completely different genre. So not everything from this XIII time period has gone wrong.

            It can’t be ignored that Tabata is a better director than Toriyama or XIV’s past director though, so that’s probably why that didn’t go sour. Even if these games were planned in the same timespan, it’s clear that the director had a lot to do with the final product’s reception (I don’t recall people receiving any of Toriyama’s games well). Again though, time will tell.

    • http://twitter.com/salarta salarta

      I’d say fanboys and fangirls ruined this franchise, and just about any good Squeenix franchise. In my definitions of things, fanboys and fangirls are people so blindly, stupidly devoted to a name or a company that they will buy and support absolutely anything they churn out.

      The REAL fans won’t just buy any garbage put out there for sale. Real fans want to see the company treat their IPs with respect, and put genuine effort into making good products beyond surface appearances to hype those products.

      I think the greatest red flag for Squeenix should have come when prominent people like Toriyama and Tabata started openly lying about their products to try and trick people into buying them. Any respectable company does not have employees that engage in that kind of behavior. It’s disrespectful to consumers, the equivalent of a real estate agent telling you the house you plan to buy was built on open plains when it was actually built on top of radically altered wetlands.

      • RupanIII

        Aside from them simply not making great games anymore, for me they really rub salt in the wound when they bring back old characters and other elements from the classic FFs. Of course, they’ve abandoned nearly everything that made them great, but they’ll still bring stuff back in a totally superficial way. ‘You like [insert location/character name/magic system/etc. here] from your favorite FF? Guess what! They’re back! We stuck them in our latest random spin-off! I dunno, it’s a music game or something! Who cares! You’ll buy anything fanboy! Just ignore the fact that we don’t make games in the same league as your favorite FF anymore!’

        The funny thing is I used to think references to past titles were awesome. It felt respectful, like paying homage to the history of the series while still creating something original. Now it seems more like cynical lip-service than homage :

      • http://twitter.com/py0npy0njump eiji

        >In my definitions of things, fanboys and fangirls are people so blindly, stupidly devoted to a name or a company that they will buy and support absolutely anything they churn out.
        Fans didn’t see how XIII will come. With just a vague demo, players are blinded by the shine of XIII. Even I gave the game a chance after reading all the feedback about the game. It’s an ‘okay’ game, but I was expecting a blockbuster title whose world is much more immersive given the power of current-gen consoles. And it was a disappointment. I can’t think you can blame the fans for buying something they have no idea of. Besides, Squeenix didn’t release a demo for this game. That alone raised eyebrows.

        What are ‘fanboys and fangirls’ then? They’re the fans who’re crazy for certain entries in the series. And yes, they’re the ones who keep Final Fantasy uninteresting, because they want every game to be like their favorite. Well, bad news: The classic ATB won’t work as an exciting way to play anymore. Designing an overworld is just a pain and will take up a lot of resources and dev time. If you look at XII and XIII, Squeenix is trying to reinvent the brand because well, the series is becoming a fan-exclusive franchise and they know have have to hit it big by reaching out to a wider-audience. They succeeded in XII — it was a whole new approach to Final Fantasy. I’m going to be honest — the PS1 FFs are boring mechanics-wise because nothing new was presented to the table, and the game’s are just modified relics of IV. Play VII, you’ll probably be able to play IX. And yeah, looking at it now, Final Fantasy’s stories are not even near BioShock’s.

        Anyone who wants a remake of say VII are the ones holding back Squeenix. Sure, a VII remake will bring in the big bucks because fans are willing to pay for it. But at a creative standpoint, it is dumbing down Squeenix. At this point, either they keep FF as a children’s franchise or create a new IP just for the ol’school FF fans.

  • Syltique

    It still sold 10x more than Ni No Kuni did in its first week.

    • godmars

      Meh, I’m still buying it.

      Ni No Kuni that is :3

    • http://twitter.com/Megawarrior345 Elle

      I’ll be buying Ni No Kuni instead next year.

  • Gaara D.Dragon

    All in all, it did very well !

    It didn’t do the crazy numbers of XIII but it was on par with a great rpg and one of the highest sellers anyway. 

    I think people are just looking for an excuse to bitch about Square. They are trying to right the wrongs in a very conceptual game and i appreciate that.

    • kroufonz

      if you compare to other rpg ofcourse it is good,
      but please remember that this is FF and considered as canon sequel of mainline numbered entry. which make FFXIII-2 sales number pathetic. this is first non MMO FF sold below 1m First week since FFVII.

      for comparison see this picture and you will understand why people think FFXIII-2 a bomba.

      http://www.abload.de/img/ffsaleszgo8d.png

      • Nemesis_Dawn

        Read the rest of the comments for an explanation for why XIII-2 was always going to do worse than XIII, just like X_2 did worse than X and all the other VII titles did worse than VII.

        • kroufonz

          my point is that FFXIII-2 do much worse than previous FF, (also FFVIII sales>FFVIIsales so not all FF sales worse than VII)

          while FFX-2 first week number do worse than FFX it isn’t only sold 1/3 of FFX numbers. so FFXIII-2 numbers couldn’t be considered as normal as another “sequel usually did worse”

          first week JPN number comparison:

          FFX 1.7m while FFX-2 1.4m

          FFXIII 1.5m while FFXIII-2 only 0.5m

      • Gaara D.Dragon

        Your comparisons are definitely not apt.

        It’s not even a new numbered FF and on top of that it’s a release trying to recover from a lot of unprecedented negativity. Even that was not totally unexpected for a conceptual and radically different game that was XIII.

        You cannot call the sales of a game that topped the sales charts, pathetic.

        Don’t forget that XIII ended up doing more than 6 million in the course of time, through all the negativity.

        • http://twitter.com/salarta salarta

          It’s not uncommon for shitty products to sell well due to marketing and a big name. If it’s well-known enough, and advertised enough, people will buy it. Some because they will assume it’s like other past games they played with the name, and others just because it’s the new big thing.

          The sales for this game are much more accurate to how most consumers would have responded to FF13 if they knew what they were getting into before they put their money down on it.

          You can say consumers should research what they’re buying before they buy it, but that’s not realistic. Many people don’t want to spend their time reading tons of articles to gauge if they would like it when they can spend that time bettering themselves, or playing other games.

          • Gaara D.Dragon

            TO AN EXTENT !

            Silent Hill had a big name and marketing, Homecoming came and it went straight downhill.

            I cannot understand why you people enjoy so much bitching about FFXIII, yeah it had drawbacks, move on.

        • kroufonz

          how come itis not apt? it is an FF game and it should be compared with FF sales standard not “other game” standard.

          what i am saying is the sales is good, but not good enough for a console mainline FF game and when compared to other FF sales number it is a FACT that FFXIII-2 number is very low.

          in general it is true that FFXIII-2 number not a pathetic sales number, but for playstation console FF sales standard it is certainly pathetic.

          at the past lowest playstation FF first week number is around 1.4m  now FFXIII-2 can only reach around 0.52m

          and i am not forgetting FFXIII numbers, you should remember that FFXIII first week number is 1.5m (ltd almost 1.9m in japan) it is not started at 0.5m like FFXIII-2 did.

          and all of this has nothing to do “with just a reason to bash SE/FFXIII, fyi i never hate FFXIII”

  • darkraiders

    After how disapointed so many peoples have been with XIII i was expecting sales to be low compared to normal for launch game of FF and considering the last 3 FF game released on console X-2,XII and XIII wasn’t super well received by peoples it was only a matter of time before it would become to this.
    I think if S-E didn’t do a good enough job with FFXIII-2 we can expect next FF to sell even lower.

    (Before someone say it yes they sold a lot of copies of X-2,XII and XIII but selling a lot of copies don’t mean the game was well received.)

    • Aoshi00

      What’s slightly ironic is there were many fans who defended 13 being a great game, refused to believe there were actually people who disliked it, and those who disliked it were automatically branded  “internet vocal minority”.  The truth is a lot of people were disappointed by it despite selling millions.  12 and 13 were simply two extremes that were both so different than the FFs that came before them.. and other than X-2, you got 11 & 14 being MMOs w/ monthly subscription (wasted two perfectly good numbers, which is why Lost Odyssey and Last Story were FF11 & 14 in my mind :).. X was really the last one I felt great playing and evoked memorable feelings.. which is no coincidence, w/ Kitase and Toriyama taking things to a complete different direction, compared to say the Sakaguchi/Uematsu combo..

      On one hand, I wish this sequel is a better game and would sell more as I was really looking forward to it (I prefer console RPGs to handheld), but on the other hand, I would be glad if this serves as a wake up call to S-E that people won’t continue to swallow any garbage forever if you just slap on the FF logo on it.. fans are fed up. Still, it’s sad though, they did realize their mistake w/ 13 and that was a wake-up call which is why we got 13-2 (again, die hard fans insist there was nothing wrong w/ 13)..  Of course like many have said alrdy, there are other factors at play as well.. this is a -2 and can’t be compared to X-2 since that was the first direct sequel and people were curious.. and now you have people just blew $250 on a Vita or a Monster Hunter 3DS, so that’s major competition..

      • http://twitter.com/py0npy0njump eiji

        Uematsu isn’t even involved in game development.

        • Aoshi00

          His style of music created a rich and unique atmosphere for the first 10 FFs, making those games very memorable and made us remember a lot of moments.  I was making a point that Sakaguchi and Uematsu worked well together, just like they continued to do in Lost Odyssey and Last Story, they were a staple to the once famous franchise, now neither of them is involved, instead you have Kitase and Toriyama.  Even though it’s not technical, you know the soundtrack is also a huge part of the game, other than gameplay, story, and visuals right?  Sakimoto and Hamauzu are great composers too, but they lack a certain charm that Uematsu brought to the past FFs, Lost Odyssey, & Last Story, which ironically felt more FF-ish than 11-14. W/o Uematsu, FFs wouldn’t be the games they were. Just like Dragon Quest would not be DQ if not for Sugiyama’s music and Toriyama’s art design.

          • http://twitter.com/py0npy0njump eiji

            Shouldn’t you be bashing Hamauzu instead of Kitase or Toriyama? Sure, both suck as producers but why leave out Hamauzu or Sakimoto? They’re the composer’s for the last two main games. And I think they’re better composers than Uematsu. Uematsu’s music is empty without the story in them. Uematsu’s music also strive in ‘being catchy’, not in being beautiful and emotional which Hamauzu and Sakimoto can certainly do.

            Soundtrack, huge part of a game? I’m sorry but you can slap in the best music with the worst mechanic and still make the game awful. No amount of good music can ever make an awful game better.The Last Story isn’t that good. It’s just Sakaguchi banking on the ‘Final Fantasy’ name. He better come up with something better.

          • Aoshi00

            I didn’t say I disliked FF11-14 because they didn’t have good music, they did, I didn’t dislike 12 because of Sakimoto or 13 because of Hamauzu’s music.  I said the the newer FFs in the last decade which are so different than the first 10 have this similarity, both Sakaguchi and Uematsu were absent.  Just like if S-E decides to make a new DQ, and throws away the signature Toriyama art, Sugiyama music, would it still feel like a DQ to the fans or a different RPG entirely?  This is what S-E is doing w/ the FF brand right now, draggin it thru the mud, doing whatever they want to do w/ it while forgetting its roots, thinking fans would continue to flock to it because of the nostalgia for the older titles.  Right now it’s anything goes even being MMOs.  And you’re right, no amount of good music could salvage bad or greatly flawed games, could be said for FF 12 & 13, which just drove away fans of the series. W/ so many elements of the former games gone, maybe if they have Uematsu music, they would’ve at least “felt” more like a Final Fantasy?

            I don’t think Uematsu only makes “catchy” music, but his tunes are very memorable and timeless, to me he’s very versatile, the first 10 FFs, Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, Sakura Note on the DS, Anata wo Yurusanai for the PSP, Last Story, none of them are alike, and I find his music evoke a lot of emotion.  Like 20 years from now I would still remember the music from say FF 6-10 (you truly feel the music for those games were empty?).  Sakimoto’s music was more thematic overall but not as memorable, you don’t really remember what the music from 12 sounds like, perhaps other than the rearranged title crystal theme (I loved his Muramasa and Archaic Sealed Heat soundtrack though).  Hamauzu I do like (Sigma Harmonics, great music, terrible game), that’s why I loved the X soundtrack as well which was a collaboration of Hamauzu, Uematsu, and a 3rd composer. 

            Personally I liked Last Story a lot, it was a mixed of action and turn-based. It was not perfect, but I feel a lot of love went into it. I liked the chars, story, pacing, presentation, and the soundtrack, spent many hours on single and multiplayer and loved it, enjoyed it more throughly than FF 11-14 anyway.  Sakaguchi was also sticking it to S-E in a way w/ the similar title.  It might not generate huge sales since it was an RPG on the Nintendo (that’s not Pokemon), but that was to be expected as a new IP and also it did not have FF in the title.  But now fans seem to be cautious when it comes to FF as well.  Imagine if Sakaguchi were to helm a main numbered FF again w/ Uematsu back to compose the score, and Toriyama staying far away, I wonder what the interest of fans would be. Remember how fondly remembered Chrono Trigger was because of the Dream Team, Sakaguchi/Toriyama/Horii/Mitsuda, each contributed a lot to making such a timeless classic.

  • Gaara D.Dragon

    People have lost perspective completely comparing this game and XIII to past ones.

    JRPGs for a big part are going downhill in popularity. Thats a fact.

    Considering that FF is one of the last big ones along with Tales of

  • http://twitter.com/Megawarrior345 Elle

    Tales of Xillia outselling a FF game first week!? OH MY GOD.

  • http://www.facebook.com/wahyudilestadi Wahyudi Lestadi

    wow … its so easy to destory a brand …

  • Roses4Aria

    Sadly, this doesn’t surprise me.  After all, there were people bashing on it months before we even saw any gameplay.  :( 

    I personally liked XIII, but I know there were a lot of people who didn’t and I think they were all waiting to see what others thought of XIII-2 before spending their money on it.  Between the streams and negative online comments in its first few days of release, it’s pretty clear that many fans were disappointed and I’m sure that discouraged others from purchasing it.  As the old saying goes, “Once bitten, twice shy” and there are some fans out there that feel like they’ve been “bitten” more than once by SE.  Not to mention that the ending sounds horrendous.  I have to admit even I’m a little wary of buying it now…

  • PrinceHeir

    i just hope after all of these.

    all the criticism, feedback from every gamer.

    let’s just hope they learned their lesson and improve it on Versus XIII.

    im pretty sure 100% Versus XIII will surpass FFXIII week sales.

    i mean the game is probably the closest thing you want from a FFVII Remake(not saying they are related to each other, is just that the anticipation of the game is overwhelming to alot of people)

    all that aside, i can’t wait for this game.

    i just love the mythology and places in the game so there’s that :P

  • http://www.facebook.com/prince.almarzouqi1 Prince Al-Marzouqi

    Too bad those ppl didn’t play the game cuz it’s amazing!

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