Matsuda stepping down as Sqenix President and CEO

[Thaciscokidd]

Under the rapid change of business environment surrounding the entertainment industry, the proposed change is intended to reshape the management team with the goal of adopting ever-evolving technological innovations and maximizing the creativity of the company’s group in order to deliver even greater entertainment to its customers around the world

Press Release

I wonder if this means they are changing course from the NFT message at the beginning of this year or will Takashi Kiryu stay in line with that.

[Wanzzo]

well, we need to wait and see for what road the new boss will travel, if it's the crappy one full of NFT and pay to win shit or the nice one that respects our money, our relationship with the company and their products and how this will impact FFXIV productions and services. But, such situations are always suspicious... '-'

[Amenara]

Hopefully the new CEO sees the bad ideas pushed by Matsuda and sees the bad games released under him and does something to change course.

[Midareyukki]

The new guy, Kiryu, worked at an advertising and public relations company and has only been in Square Enix since 2020. Kind of a weird choice, I expected Kitase or Miyake. I wonder if this will be a change for the better or if it's gonna be more of the same...

[LianaThorne]

The new guy, Kiryu, worked at an advertising and public relations company and has only been in Square Enix since 2020. Kind of a weird choice, I expected Kitase or Miyake. I wonder if this will be a change for the better or if it's gonna be more of the same...

That worries me tbh. I wonder if it's because it's he's amazing at his job or if because his ideals fall more in line with his predecessor/NFTs than others.

[DiaDeem]

I wonder if it's because it's he's amazing at his job or if because his ideals fall more in line with his predecessor/NFTs than others.

I wanna hope that more than one executive in SE realized that NFTs aren't really that interesting to people (like Ubisoft eventually did), so they're specifically changing leadership to not deal with that anymore. If they wanted to stick with the same, Matsuda was doing just fine. So I wanna remain hopeful, but we'll just have to wait and see.

[ReynTime]

The new guy, Kiryu, worked at an advertising and public relations company and has only been in Square Enix since 2020. Kind of a weird choice, I expected Kitase or Miyake. I wonder if this will be a change for the better or if it's gonna be more of the same...

In most large japanese game companies it's not a developer or game director who ends up being a CEO. This is why Nintendo didn't pick Miyamoto or Takahashi to be the CEO after Iwata. It'd be a waste of their skillset that is more valuable if they can supervise or be directly involved with teams.

[Midareyukki]

In most large japanese game companies it's not a developer or game director who ends up being a CEO. This is why Nintendo didn't pick Miyamoto or Takahashi to be the CEO after Iwata. It'd be a waste of their skillset that is more valuable if they can supervise or be directly involved with teams.

Maybe. I don't think Kitase's doing anything lately xD

But either way. I'm not saying that they should go for the other devs. I didn't mention Saito and Yoshida for a reason. I know very, very well that just because you're good at being a dev, it doesn't mean you can run a company, even if you're on the board. That was never my intention.

What concerned me is his experience with the company. The others don't have as much experience in the corporate side of things, but they know the company the longest. Meanwhile from what I see, Kiryu's experience has been the complete opposite: lots of corporate-side experience but few years with the company.

I just don't want to have the same as early last decade where Square Enix had almost zero idea how to approach their series and made really dumb questionable choices. But it's too early to tell, and it's not fair on Kiryu to judge him by his cover. Just expressing concern about how well he knows the company he's in and how much he knows about the videogame industry. Especially when more and more we've seen the industry care far too much about making a quick buck than its employees or having a product worth buying.

Or you know... the NFT plot.

Edit: nevermind, Kitase stopped being "Special Thanks" on the credits and is the Producer of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth xD

[ReynTime]

Maybe. I don't think Kitase's doing anything lately xD

But either way. I'm not saying that they should go for the other devs. I didn't mention Saito and Yoshida for a reason. I know very, very well that just because you're good at being a dev, it doesn't mean you can run a company, even if you're on the board. That was never my intention.

What concerned me is his experience with the company. The others don't have as much experience in the corporate side of things, but they know the company the longest. Meanwhile from what I see, Kiryu's experience has been the complete opposite: lots of corporate-side experience but few years with the company.

I just don't want to have the same as early last decade where Square Enix had almost zero idea how to approach their series and made really dumb questionable choices. But it's too early to tell, and it's not fair on Kiryu to judge him by his cover. Just expressing concern about how well he knows the company he's in and how much he knows about the videogame industry. Especially when more and more we've seen the industry care far too much about making a quick buck than its employees or having a product worth buying.

Or you know... the NFT plot.

Edit: nevermind, Kitase stopped being "Special Thanks" on the credits and is the Producer of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth xD

It could have something to do with his experience at Dentsu, which is one of the biggest companies in Japan.

[Saraide]

Getting rid of matsuda isnt bad. Unfortunately this new guy always has the option to be worse. CEOs usually just fail up and away to other companies where they will again cause more harm. Truly the masterclass of snake oil salesmen.