Square Enix Loses Nearly $2 Billion in Value Since Final Fantasy 16

[Xlantaa]

FFXVI sold a lot more than SE predicted (which is weird, because it is never enough for them). The SE loss is because Forspoken and the amount of low buget games they released. The impact of FFXVI would be know on the next fiscal year. You get any excuse to bash CB3, I guess.

On the other hand, SE needs to aim for more big buget games well done, and no mid or low budget games. I hate they waste too much stuff on things like Haverstella or Octopath traveler, and then do not give enough attention to some of their sagas such Star Ocean or Valkyrie profile, making very basic games last year which are not that great.

In my opinion, they have way too much games in development to make quick cash. The big ones takes ages to release (who knows when Kh4 will be done). FFXIV seems to make enough money to sustain this, but they need big buget games and less filler games.

[Teno]

FFXVI sold a lot more than SE predicted (which is weird, because it is never enough for them). The SE loss is because Forspoken and the amount of low buget games they released. The impact of FFXVI would be know on the next fiscal year. You get any excuse to bash CB3, I guess.

On the other hand, SE needs to aim for more big buget games well done, and no mid or low budget games. I hate they waste too much stuff on things like Haverstella or Octopath traveler, and then do not give enough attention to some of their sagas such Star Ocean or Valkyrie profile, making very basic games last year which are not that great.

In my opinion, they have way too much games in development to make quick cash. The big ones takes ages to release (who knows when Kh4 will be done). FFXIV seems to make enough money to sustain this, but they need big buget games and less filler games.

Octopath is a fantastic game well worth what they invested in.

[AnotherPerson]

Imo, FF16 simply failed to deliver on actually making the combat system more interesting by introducing more RPG elements in a brand so heavily steeped in a RPG game... It's the same problem plaguing FF14 lately. More and more of the RPG elements that players can decide on are removed in favor for a more streamlined and long dance battle. There's no real variance in your gameplay other than "do more damage" and "dodge attacks". They literally had a good story, great cinematics, good music, and a decent design on making it easier in action combat for their players, but ... that was it. There wasn't much replay value. Not much to explore, gearing doesn't have real choice and feels nonexistent, etc. Basically, they played it too safe like FF14 (and most of the complaints I've seen on the forums are literally because they're removing meaningful gameplay choices). The game feeling incomplete to some and expecting DLC also doesn't do it too many favors. It's not a bad game, but it's non-innovative compared to the existing games out there because the formula has already been done by other games.

In other words, BG3 is looking real good right now compared to its competitors.

[Nebelheim]

I wouldn't put the 2 billion in loss on ff16. It most likely has to do with lots of flops and various other issues that have been building up for years. Selling various studios at a loss making horrible games like forspoken and continuing to invest in the failed nft market is what's causing there losses.

[Aldath]

I wouldn't put the 2 billion in loss on ff16. It most likely has to do with lots of flops and various other issues that have been building up for years. Selling various studios at a loss making horrible games like forspoken and continuing to invest in the failed nft market is what's causing there losses.

That's the issue, FFXVI didn't fail as a standalone title, it failed to compensate for SE's other failed projects.

Put this into perspective: FFXVI has sold less copies in Japan than Pikmin 4, a semi obscure title without the name power the FF brand had. Pikmin 4's numbers are considered surprisingly high for a niche title, and although XVI's numbers are still good in paper, they couldn't compete with a game that gave Nintendo the equivalent of cash for a nice meal for a company their size.

SE can't come out and outright say FF didn't live up to what they needed, I bet investors are already with a rises eyebrow when their supposed big contender lost to a bunch of funny plant dudes and failed to help the company recover from the game of the snarky New Yorker that caused the closure of a studio and the failed FF Battle Royale tie-in, and SE must be sweating cold because they're already spending big cash in VII-2 which if Nomura taught me something is that it might leave some players dissatisfied with the direction he's taking the franchise to, and remember they're gonna launch yet another tie in game that will either close next year or become a deserted whale farm like BE.

This spells nothing but bad news for us, as I really doubt the measures taken to recover players will be aimed towards improving, but attracting new blood and creating a base that can be farmed for profit on cash shop items, make players feel like you're in a second life, create attachment, and keep that smaller playerbase invested enough to cover for the rest.

[VerdeLuck]

Did no one read the article?
The "Losses" are from a dip in stock value. No, SE didn't lose any money, their stock is worth less for now because investors sold off.

Why? The article says 'The root of the problem, sources told Bloomberg, is that producers were given “full reign” over the scope and direction of projects, whose goals can shift “without warning”. The upshot of this is volatility in the quality of the final product.'
The investors think developers, and in particular Yoshi-p who falls under "Producers", have too much say in the direction of the product. They want more stable, highly monetized games that are the stable minimum viable product, which they think SE is less likely to give them now.
That's the opposite of what gamers want. Acting like this should be a lesson learned for SE you should be aware what they're would take from this, that they need to make more bland live service games with heavy microtransactions to keep investors happy.

[Nebelheim]

That's the issue, FFXVI didn't fail as a standalone title, it failed to compensate for SE's other failed projects.

Put this into perspective: FFXVI has sold less copies in Japan than Pikmin 4, a semi obscure title without the name power the FF brand had. Pikmin 4's numbers are considered surprisingly high for a niche title, and although XVI's numbers are still good in paper, they couldn't compete with a game that gave Nintendo the equivalent of cash for a nice meal for a company their size.

SE can't come out and outright say FF didn't live up to what they needed, I bet investors are already with a rises eyebrow when their supposed big contender lost to a bunch of funny plant dudes and failed to help the company recover from the game of the snarky New Yorker that caused the closure of a studio and the failed FF Battle Royale tie-in, and SE must be sweating cold because they're already spending big cash in VII-2 which if Nomura taught me something is that it might leave some players dissatisfied with the direction he's taking the franchise to, and remember they're gonna launch yet another tie in game that will either close next year or become a deserted whale farm like BE.

This spells nothing but bad news for us, as I really doubt the measures taken to recover players will be aimed towards improving, but attracting new blood and creating a base that can be farmed for profit on cash shop items, make players feel like you're in a second life, create attachment, and keep that smaller playerbase invested enough to cover for the rest.

That's one problem square enix has is they expect ff14 and the various final fantasy spin offs and mainline single player games to get high numbers to compensate for all there other failures. Then they set super high unobtainable sales figures for each game hoping they recover all there losses from games like forspoken. Then they get quiet when a game doesn't meet expectations or consider a game a failure when it doesn't meet there obscenely high expectations because they hope there next game will recoup losses from other failures.

[MonsutaMan]

They coping hard on X and reddit.....

....It was a dud, get over it.......

Picking out Forspoken, XVI and Avengers is like trying to figure out which deadweight caused a shelf to collapse....

[IkaraGreydancer]

You didn't even read the article.

The internal perception of FFXVI's success was reliant on its ability to make up for the losses incurred from other failed projects. FFXVI did not meet those expectations, and failed to abate the companies value from tumbling.



Are you upset? Do you feel a deep sense of injustice because someone said something negative about your favorite corporation?

Get a grip.

16 factually was a success though. SE was just stupid for assuming it'd cover the cost of many failed ventures before it. (Not new for SE to overshoot their estimations).
And ofc the "corporate shield" angle...
I'll never understand hating a corporation, crapping on anyone who says something remotely positive about said corp...but then lining up every month to pay said corp...

[DiaDeem]

I mean... I already knew we're pretty much keeping SE alive... but damn, we really are keeping SE alive. At this point, we're the real investors of this company.