370°

Square Enix Declares $140m Loss Amid Game Pipeline Shakeup

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth publisher Square Enix has declared a $140m loss based on a shakeup of its internal development pipeline.

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techraptor.net
Furesis18d ago

What are they doing over there? Sounds like they canceled something big. I read a rumor a while back about ff9 remake . Here "Final Fantasy IX has gone through a very challenging development, the game is still in progress but may undergo changes drastic enough that we won't hear about it for a couple of years."
This could be one of the reasons if the rumor is true. That was Silknight i don't know how credible he is but it's something and it would make sense.

-Foxtrot17d ago

I hope IX is still on the cards

Just a straight up remake which they expand a little bit nothing over ambitious

If IX dosent happen then VI and VIII will never be thought of.

Kakashi Hatake17d ago

6 and 8 were way more p popular games despite today's cult following of 9.

blackbeld17d ago

I want my FF8 remake! Can't believe they cancelled it.

TiredGamer17d ago

What are they doing? Sales are falling and the costs are out of control. Big releases need to be absolute sales home runs now, and Final Fantasy sales have stagnated.

Now we know why Square didn’t fall over themselves to remake the original FF7 all these years ago. It certainly wasn’t a license to print money, at least not with what the expectations were. Each of these full on remakes drains an enormous amount of company resources for a razor thin profit margin.

TwoPicklesGood17d ago

Breaking the game up into multiple parts was a mistake IMO.

blackblades17d ago

The loses came from cancelling games nothing else.

Tapani17d ago

They lost the magic in the remakes. And the story is incomplete. The original FF7 is still way better. The Remake / Rebirth are just fan service. Like an Anime/Manga with "optional" filler content. FF7 had pretty much zero filler, it was paced extremely well, and still today flows much better than the grindy story and spongey enemy battles in the remakes.

babadivad17d ago

If they released it at once on all platforms, they would have made all of their money back. Could have been on to an FF8 or 9 remake. Ready to cash in again on nostalgia like Capcom. This is their fault for trying to milk the title.

Once I head they were breaking it up into parts, I lost all interest.

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 17d ago
neutralgamer199217d ago

I hope people understand usually when a loss is declared it means a game which had been in development got cancelled. For example Sony Santa Monica before GOW-PS4 had cancelled a project which Sony had spent 7 figures on

As far as square is concerned they release a bad game once a year. Forspoken anyone?

For those making comments on remake not selling well, I hope y’all realize that Sony is the only reason this remake is happening. If Sony didn’t fund it the remake wouldn’t be happening. Just like Konami didn’t want to remake SH2 because development costs of 100 plus million

shadowT17d ago

Do not miss Final Fantasy 16. Great game!

raWfodog17d ago

I'm waiting for them to release the complete edition bundle, but it's definitely on my list.

PhillyDonJawn17d ago

Wth is going on with the gaming industry?

mandf17d ago

Corporate investors taking everything

TiredGamer17d ago

Not rocket science. Compare sales numbers, development cycles, and budgets to the previous gens. We are all collectively burning up the industry from the inside out. Expectations are ludicrously high now for every release and sales are dropping for even the most prestigious of series.

We used to be satisfied paying $50-60 for a game that took 1/100th the budget and staff to make. Now gamers feel cheated if they have to pay the same for a game that took 100x the budget. We may be reaching the end of the line for this model of gaming.

wiz719117d ago

@tiredgamer I think your point is one that ppl don’t understand and you hit it on the nose .. some gamers don’t want to take accountability but it’s some of the gamers fault the industry is where it’s at .. we as gamers set the standards for the industry not the shareholders , ppl forget that the shareholders and the industry want and need OUR Money. Both the Xbox and PlayStation are seeing a drop in hardware , the industry is very stagnant right now.

Tacoboto17d ago

Speaking to Square:

Turns out their mismanagement wasn't related to the western studios they dumped to Embracer, but their own fault.

With regards to Xbox - a good way to kill your brand is to pull support on high quality titles and only dump B and C-tier titles to it

With regards to PC - Epic Games Story exclusivity for any duration and piss-poor optimization will hurt you.

With regards to FF Pixel Remasters - y'all messed up by barely releasing them on physical, like wtf that was free money!

And lastly, you don't help a franchise by releasing a mainline title that undermines every title that came before it. FFXVI was a DMC-like with bottom-of-the-barrel side quests and I can't imagine that helping Rebirth at all considering its marketing is directly tied to how big that game is.

Tacoboto17d ago

Sony is getting their best titles and with the most polish, so what about it? Nintendo gets their top properties too, for titles that can run on Switch hardware.

It's the other fanbases that get the second- and third-class treatment from Square. If that's due to agreements with Sony, that's not a Sony issue but a Square one for accepting those terms. Sony is doing its best to look out for Sony.

wesnytsfs17d ago

sales and stupid practices like exclusives.

TiredGamer17d ago

The industry implosion is continuing. Sky high budgets, prolonged development windows, stagnant sales numbers, and falling currency values (inflation) are wreaking havoc on the legacy industry. AAA games will slowly become the rarity.

CS717d ago

Sad. Rebirth was one of my favorite games in a long time. Should have sold more.

CrimsonWing6917d ago

Oh I’m with you. What’s worse is they can say, “Well we tried to make this amazing game and spend all this money on, but not enough people showed an interest. So no more of these since we can’t take a hit like that.”

The industry is going to take a dramatic shift. Mark my words on this.

rpvenom17d ago (Edited 17d ago )

I think there is quite a large portion of individuals like myself who held out on buying it on PS5 because I can get it on PC eventually. To be able to mod the game and also have custom graphical settings to my liking

gold_drake17d ago

same

but im not sure if it matters at all. im sure they made sony pay a hefty sum for the 3parter to come on ps5 exclusively. so watever they made in sales, might have come bk in profits for square, but i dont know
and we dont know what "underperformed" even means for square.

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220°

New PlayStation Handheld Reported Again, Supposedly Runs PS4 Games

Another leaker has claimed that a PSP/PS Vita style PlayStation handheld is in the works, and it'll supposedly support PS4 games.

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playstationlifestyle.net
anast14h ago

If this is true, it will crush everything for the price.

VenomUK1h ago(Edited 1h ago)

Needs to be a PS5 portable.

Cacabunga1h ago

PS4 native with PS5 remote play capabilities. Would be sweet.

And let PS Portal support cloud streaming for all PS+ games.

anast6m ago

Going off all the pricing behavior of Sony to this point. I'm willing to bet it will be cheaper than the Steam Deck. And when the price is revealed and I am right, send me a message.

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crazyCoconuts1h ago

It would be a niche product like Portal. Not bad, but not mainstream. It's legacy PS4 right?

Kneetos58m ago

The switch 2 and next steam deck will be out by then and will likely be way more popular

anast4m ago

The switch 2 will be a handheld Series S for kids and the next steam deck will be ridiculously over priced for a bunch of aging CRPGS and F2P mobile style games.

-Foxtrot13h ago

If you had every PS1, PS2, PS3, PSP and PSV game then sure but I mean if it's just the PS4 why not just get a Steam Deck?

anast2h ago

You might be correct, but it depends on the price point. Also, most PC gamers wait years for Sony releases, so it might be better just to get the PS4 handheld.

crazyCoconuts1h ago

I'd be surprised if Sony reversed course and continued to put new releases on PS4. It would cannibalize their PS5 sales

MrBaskerville1h ago(Edited 1h ago)

If it supports your library, some people own more ps4 games than steam games. I know I do.

crazyCoconuts1h ago

I might buy something like this to play my old library but man those old games are cheap on steam. This console would have to be cheap to make sense. I don't see it happening

SegaSaturn66944m ago

Deck is very viable option given how good PS3 and switch emulation have become. Even new releases are chugging along at 30fps.

Lexreborn22m ago

To be fair, I have a lot of ps4 games I don’t have on steam that is can play on my ps5 but I choose to play ps5 games on my ps5.

I also haven’t rebought any of my PlayStation exclusives on PC because I own them on my ps4/5 and even the upgraded ways that rival the pc version. So, if I wanted to play them on my steam deck I would still have to buy them again which if I bought the 6 top games Spider-Man 1,2, mm, horizon, fw , GoW and ragnarok and GoT with LoU1,2. It would more then. Likely be the cost of this device.

So, instead of double dipping I would buy the handheld and if it has a playable sf6 that actually works online (steam deck is not functional) I think I would want it for myself

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 2m ago
MeteorPanda2h ago

I still play my vita. The oled screen was too good for it's time. I obviously had to home brew it but playing my old snes/ps1 games on it is so good.

Skuletor2h ago

How many people will buy this at launch? As a Vita owner, I'd definitely hold back after how Sony's support for that turned out.
Also, PSP played near PS2 quality games, PS Vita played near PS3 quality games, shouldn't the next Playstation handheld be aiming for near PS5 quality?

MeteorPanda1h ago

the sadest thing on vita support for me was the removal of Close? The app that let you see local players and what they were playing. i made friends back in the day for co op that way lol.

I think it was privacy breaching? such a shame.

Skuletor1h ago

Vita had so much promise, I wonder what it would have taken for Sony to have been more supportive. GTA: San Andreas Stories would have probably brought more sales alone, if they could have gotten that. I was disappointed we never really got anything on the same level as Killzone: Mercenary after that game, which looked amazing running on the Killzone 3 engine. Would have loved to see new entries of PS IP like Infamous, God of War etc, Sony really dropped the ball and using proprietary memory cards that were ridiculously priced didn't help, if they were smart, they'd have sold them cheaper since they were mainly being used to store stuff people were paying for in their store anyway, lol.

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220°

Microsoft targets late 2026 Xbox Next launch with new COD game

Rumour has it that Microsoft has a new Xbox in the works, and its launch will coincide with Infinity Ward's next COD game.

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overclock3d.net
purple10117h ago

So that’ll be £1000 with a zen 5 cpu and god know what graphics card

Good one

Also now they have promised cod on nintendos systems, the switch 2 might become VERY popular as a cod console with the kids, tethering it to their 5g phones, or the schools WiFi hehehe

chicken_in_the_corn14h ago

Don't believe it. The documents from the FTC case say 2028 and that holds more weight than this.

ThinkThink13h ago

I think they are going to drop a handheld next year and a next gen console the year after. I think it'll be one sku though at launch

crazyCoconuts1h ago

Why would they expand the Xbox hardware footprint when their foundation is crumbling?
Creating a handheld would take a great deal of focus during a time where MS is struggling under the weight of their new game company acquisitions. Those handheld comments were just more Phil diarrhea of the mouth- nothing serious behind it, certainly not within a year

Zeref2h ago

A lot of things in that document turned out to be cancelled plans though. We should have seen the digital series X by now and the new controller.

crazyCoconuts1h ago

I'd put money on no Xbox console. It's over. 1:5 compared to competition and if the exclusives come to PlayStation it's only gonna get worse. Come this holiday PS Pro will be wooing all the power fiends that aren't in the PC camp just in time for GTA6.
By the time the next Xbox would be ready, they'd practically be starting over and the Xbox name will be trash. No exec will approve that risk and Satya will want to put this embarrassing L behind him.

Sonic18814h ago(Edited 4h ago)

Microsoft has a long ways to go when it comes to the gaming industry

ravens524h ago

This is another thing MS is doing that I don't like. Like chill, foster your teams and try to make the beginning of some good series on the already powerful series x. They are trying to rush this gen. It's coming up on four years. So this gens life will be 5 years and on the 6th the next gen will be released? Stupid. Makes no sense especially seeing how long everyone has supported the Ps4 and Xbox 1. Annoying.

OtterX3h ago

Yea, they have had terrible 1st party support for 2 gens now. Why would anyone rush out to get this new XBox, especially when they plan to bring the games they do have to Playstation? I love PS5 + Switch + PC. I don't see the point of an XBox console at all.

Reaper22_3h ago

Perhaps some people like playing games on xbox.

Sonic18812h ago(Edited 2h ago)

"I don't see the point of an XBox console at all."

You can play Xbox games on a smart TV in 1080p now lol as long it has the game pass app. No need for an Xbox

jznrpg19m ago

@Reaper22 but it’s less people as time goes on. That’s not sustainable. They clearly will get out of the console business it’s just a matter of when

Einhander19723h ago

So, Microsoft has sold less consoles than the previous gen the past two generations with this most recent generation falling off the most. And in this current generation the most popular console by far is the least expensive one. But they are going to try to push out another console that is supposedly powerful not the thing that actually worked for them a cheap game pass console...

And they are going to come out with this thing when the PS5 Pro will be on the market so it's unlikely that they will be able to make any significant power gains. Certainly not to the point that PlayStation 5 won't be able to play the games. Heck we see how long the PS4 has stayed relevant, PS4 games will still be getting released in 2026. And given their console sales track record no publisher under the sun is going to skip PlayStation to make games for xbox. And with the way Microsoft is positioning themselves as such a rival publisher I can't imagine many publishers really looking to prop xbox up. Heck we hear rumors of publishers skipping xbox for releases.

If this is actually true, this thing is DOA.

crazyCoconuts1h ago

Exactly. This will never make it out of the gate.
The proof will be if these rumors about more exclusives coming to PS. If they were planning to keep the hardware alive, they'd be hoarding those exclusives, because everyone knows you need exclusives to secure a platform

Show all comments (19)
80°

PlayStation Store Being Investigated for Anti-Competitive Practices in Poland

Polish headquarters of Sony Interactive Entertainment were raided by government authorities as part of an investigation into their anti-competitive practices.

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playstationlifestyle.net
PapaBop20m ago(Edited 17m ago)

This is precisely why discless consoles are a terrible idea. I made my money back on my disc based ps5 within the first two months when comparing the cost on the PS Store to what I paid for my physical disc versions. The last game I bought was Armoured Core 6 for £43.85 on ShopTo, still costs £59.99 on PS Store. Those savings soon add up.