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[iQuasarLV]

If anything it's the exact opposite. SE has discovered that their remakes and remasters do pretty well while their new IPs underperformed.

Net sales declined YoY in the HD Games sub-segment, partly because the release of major titles a year earlier had created a challenging YoY hurdle, but also because many of the new small and mid-sized titles we launched this year did not perform as well as we had expected.

What games might you think they are referring to here, hmm?

 

[Woopah]

What games might you think they are referring to here, hmm?

Primarily Harvestella, Diofeld Chronicle, Star Ocean: The Divine Force and Valkyrie Elysium. Possibly Dragon Quest Treasures as well.

Whereas Tactics Orge: Reborn, Crisis Core Reunion and Dragon Quest X Offline seem to have sold pretty well.

 

[Doom85]

Primarily Harvestella, Diofeld Chronicle, Star Ocean: The Divine Force and Valkyrie Elysium. Possibly Dragon Quest Treasures as well.

Whereas Tactics Orge: Reborn, Crisis Core Reunion and Dragon Quest X Offline seem to have sold pretty well.

It’s been reported Tri-Ace is hiring sometime after Star Ocean 6 released so clearly the game did well enough.

 

[Woopah]

It’s been reported Tri-Ace is hiring sometime after Star Ocean 6 released so clearly the game did well enough.

I don't think we can say that a game met SE's expectations, just because the stuido that made it still exists.

For example, we know Marvel's Midnight Suns did not meet the publisher's expectations, but that hasn't stopped Firaxis from hiring people.

 

[March Climber]

It’s been reported Tri-Ace is hiring sometime after Star Ocean 6 released so clearly the game did well enough.

Tri-Ace is that one comic relief character in a serious movie that somehow manages to keep avoiding death, but they're oblivious to it.

 

[Roni]

I keep hearing how Forspoken flopped yet I’ve seen no movement on the price. Square needs to swallow their pride and send this to the clearance rack ASAP.

One of the clearest signs their leadership is old and needs replacement: this was widespread practice in the industry around 2010, everyone has moved on from locking a game no one wants at full price until it recoups its investment.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

It’s kind of a series of self-fulfilling prophecies for SE at this point.
They do a lot of RPGs still. BUT, people only really want FF and KH from them, so that’s where the big money goes. The rest of their games have to do with limited tech and budgets and virtually zero marketing, of course nobody knows about them. Plus, the smaller games aren’t what people expect from SE, so they review poorly and people are all too eager to call them trash even without having played them.

I hope SE keep diversifying their portfolio. Otherwise we wouldn’t even have the good smaller stuff like Octopath or Teatrhythm and we’d be stuck with FF (far from its highs at this point), the joke that KH has become, and their west-pandering shit. The industry needs a big publisher doing smaller stuff. The quality you get from a B-tier SE game is still netter than what you get from indies on average.

As for marketing, I think that holds true for some games (even though they turned out hugely criticized by critics Balan and BF so it wouldnt matter anyway). But some of their games got TONS of marketing, in particular Forspoken and Marvel Avengers. I dont remember if GOTG got a lot.

I think their best bet is just focus on JRPGs big or small. Forget about all the quick cash in indie card games, and forget about their attempt at GAAS and open world action games like Forspoken.

Their best selling and rated games are probably all their JRPGs. Just stick to that.

It would be like Bethesda trying to make an NBA game or Konami making an F1 racing game. Forget it.

 

[DenchDeckard]

I wonder if final fantasy xvI will meet squares lofty expectations.

 

[Killer8]

It's a misallocation of resources. Many mid games like Harvestella, Diofield Chronicles, Various Daylife (and the list goes on and on) simply shouldn't have been made. They could've rolled the budgets of all these shitty games into something with AAA production values with more widespread appeal. There is only so far that pretty Amano-style box art depicting watercolor people standing on cliff sides can take you, when the Metacritic score averages 70.

I don't particularly mind their remasters since they are preserving their series' legacy. Tactics Ogre also sold relatively well and they did a solid job with it (for a change). It was more like a Let Us Cling Together+ with all the gameplay and balance changes. Live A Live was also fantastic and i'm sure the upcoming Dragon Quest 3 HD remake will be too. I think a case could be made that SE should actually invest more into their remasters, since nostalgia is such a big component of their popularity.

We've not seen anything from Parasite Eve for a long time, and having a remaster to refresh a series' relevance in people's minds can open the way for sequel development. I think this is probably why Valkyria Elysium flopped (in addition to it being low budget shite) - they should've dropped a remaster of Valkyrie Profile Lenneth and 2 first, and then released the new entry. That's a little something called marketing that SE need to get re-acquainted with.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

It's a misallocation of resources. Many mid games like Harvestella, Diofield Chronicles, Various Daylife (and the list goes on and on) simply shouldn't have been made. They could've rolled the budgets of all these shitty games into something with AAA production values with more widespread appeal. There is only so far that pretty Amano-style box art depicting watercolor people standing on cliff sides can take you, when the Metacritic score averages 70.

I don't particularly mind their remasters since they are preserving their series' legacy. Tactics Ogre also sold relatively well and they did a solid job with it (for a change). It was more like a Let Us Cling Together+ with all the gameplay and balance changes. Live A Live was also fantastic and i'm sure the upcoming Dragon Quest 3 HD remake will be too. I think a case could be made that SE should actually invest more into their remasters, since nostalgia is such a big component of their popularity.

We've not seen anything from Parasite Eve for a long time, and having a remaster to refresh a series' relevance in people's minds can open the way for sequel development. I think this is probably why Valkyria Elysium flopped (in addition to it being low budget shite) - they should've dropped a remaster of Valkyrie Profile Lenneth and 2 first, and then released the new entry. That's a little something called marketing that SE need to get re-acquainted with.

I agree with this post.

But good luck thinking they'll change. Square has already stated Blockchain games are coming. So if anything, they'll be making more games for quick cash ins and western style games which seem more attune to GAAS.

It seems like they got the overall resources (as you said about pooling resources), but they seem to prefer doing a combo of their big JRPG games, sandwiched between tons of smaller scale and western style games, hoping it all comes together.

 

[Trogdor1123]

It looked awesome to start and then they showed more and it was… it was not appealing