New details from Square Enix’ May financial results have emerged, confirming that Final Fantasy 16 and Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth did not meet expectations from their initial, PlayStation 5 exclusive, releases.
These results were spotted by Eurogamer, confirming that these comments in May coincided with new strategies to “aggressively” pursue multiplatform releases instead of concentrating on exclusives. Another underperformer was Foamstars, which the company recently announced would be going free to play soon. There are not specific figures, but profits were under what they were expecting, even after months, or in Final Fantasy 16's case, a year after initial launch.
While the company talks underperforming, it doesn't list specific metrics that it was aiming for, so it is hard to get an accurate, specific view to compare with. Still, they did have to deal with lower profits, and significant drops overall with their full portfolio, so their decision to redirect to a multiplatform strategy, as well as some layoffs and a refocus on in-house production, are all the results of these financial disappointments.
That new multiplatform strategy gets its first test as Final Fantasy 16 released on PC this week. Additionally, Final Fantasy XIV’s Dawntrail expansion also came out in between the initial announcement of overhauls, and This comes along with the MMORPG itself finally landing on Xbox.With the multiplatform strategy, it wouldn't be surprising to see more Xbox releases, and this too was something Naoki Yoshida hinted at recently.
As for Foamstars, that PlayStation ? exclusive isn’t getting any platform expansion announcements, but it will be going free to play on October 4th, less than a year after launch.
