New Rumour Hints At Exciting Future For Square Enix Games On Xbox

Instead of acquiring studios I would roll into these companies and cut them a fat check to simply have their catalog on Gamepass

@ZuneTattooGuy But that is extremely pricey to the point it just vastly cheaper to just buy outright buy the company.

Final Fantasy 1-6 Pixel Remasters on Game Pass please.

You are absolutely right, @AverageGamer. The problem Xbox has, @ZuneTattooGuy, is that the current split for Xbox versus PlayStation is roughly 30/70. That means that for Microsoft to put something on the Xbox as an exclusive, or even Game Pass, they have to compensate the Developer for the other 70% that they do not get to sell to due to it not being on the PlayStation. Even for a game that is already on the PlayStation, such as FF7, Square Enix would still expect to lose some sales were it to appear on the Game Pass, and would expect a level of compensation as a consequence. It's far more cost effective to buy the company and then do as you please with the games, including having them as fully exclusive...

I thought Sony was going to buy these guys?

@ZuneTattooGuy If you look at Xbox's leaked internal emails it's clear they don't like that approach.
A studio acquisition is an asset.
It's something that gives back for the long run.
A big game on Gamepass, while great for us and Gamepass in the short term, is money thrown down the drain to sustain something just for a little while longer.

To be honest if you are a hardcore Final Fantasy fan you probably have a PS4/5 or a PC/Steam Deck etc. FF16 is currently the only true PS5 exclusive !! (or will be until 2024, Spiderman 2 will take its place)

I really hope this is true.

As a massive JRPG and Final Fantasy fan, this would be a dream come true.

I also wish they’d release some other PlayStation/Nintendo JRPGs from Square Enix like the Secret of Mana series on Xbox.

I hope so. My wife has a ps5 but I would love these to be on my xbox. And maybe SE will actually release Pixel Remaster on disc at a reasonable price or actually be sold in shops like any other game.

I do hope that this rekindled relationship between Microsoft and Square Enix leads to some release parity - at least for those games that aren't [timed] exclusive to other platforms - kind of a shame to continue to see Xbox getting skipped.

Sonys money not cutting it anymore? SE are not in a great position, they’re struggling. Maybe they’ve realised cutting themselves off from other markets and taking money isn’t the most profitable anymore. I think they’re kind of being forced to open up due to their poor performance.

Nah.... I won't expect anything from Square. As long as Sony is there they will do everything they can to stop japanese developers from coming to Xbox. But they should reconsider this though.

@Belkan

It’s not that simple anymore. Square is not doing well and when you aren’t doing well in business, you make changes. Square continuing to make games as exclusives for Sony when they wind up underperforming just doesn’t make sense so at least for me, this rumor isn’t shocking at all. It’s just pure common sense in my book and was inevitable at this rate.

Square effectively cut themselves off from a decent sized portion of the market and it’s becoming clear that they need to switch things up if they want to see levels of success that they want to see.

They may have wanted to save FF7R, FF16 and others for a Nintendo Direct event, and then have a simultaneous release on Xbox - rather than announce everything at the Xbox Tokyo Game Show.

@AlwaysPlaying Announcing a major acquisition focused on exclusivity while fighting a major acquisition by a competitor likely wouldn't go down well with regulators and Jim Ryan did say nothing is more important than CoD. So if Sony were to announce a Square Enix acquisition, it would be after the Activision acquisition had either gone through or been blocked to the point that Microsoft walks away.

Hopefully they stay independent, their Switch support has been amazing so far and there's so much potential for Switch 2 to fill in gaps like FFVII Remake trilogy, FFXVI, native versions of KH, etc.

Basically SE is the only thing that made me get a PS5. Take them out the equation and Playstation really doesn’t interest me much unfortunately. Insomniac is the only other reason but not sure they are enough by themselves.

Hopefully Xbox can get all the SE goodies!

@Moonglow I was talking about Square struggling and maybe realising Sonys money isn’t the best option for them anymore financially.

PlayStations business model is a whole different discussion but I think they’re learning the hard way that top end multimillion $ games isn’t sustainable in the long term.

@RIghteousNixon at least square knows, Sony alone isn't enough for them. Sony exclusive looks to be back firing now. This is a massive blow to them. This isn't the PS4 era now, where Sony was too carried away and get cocky over the success of ps4.

@Belkan

Yeah, even for some of Sony’s big 1st party exclusives, you are seeing relatively low sales when compared to their overall installed base. People can run around spouting Sony’s impressive hardware sales figures all day long, but the money is made through selling games and services, not hardware.

Square sees the writing on the wall. They need to sell to the entire market and cease walling themselves off into a corner of the console market by focusing mostly on Sony.

Any rumor about Ms and falcom?

I have really fond memories of square from the ff 7-9 days but the truth is I haven’t really like a final fantasy since 9. Including 16 (and especially, especially 13)

Sony acquiring SE would hurt Nintendo a lot more than it would do Xbox.

I just want to see release date parity going forward, especially with games that are revealed for other than PS

Square Enix announced a new title Little Goody Two Shoes for the end of October yesterday also for Xbox.

Just tell me where/when/how to preorder 🤙