The single for Final Fantasy XIII's main theme is being released on the 2nd of December and as well as containing the song Kimi ga aru kara, a second insert song announced at the Premiere Party will also be included.

The company Sugawara is contracted to, For Life Music Entertainment, has uploaded a preview of the song Eternal Love. Below, I have it ripped to an mp3 and uploaded onto Megaupload for you to enjoy all 45 seconds of it.

Eternal Love preview
Source

We already knew thanks to Square Enix's puzzle a few days ago that we'd be receiving some kind of announcement this Friday. Now Square have confirmed this and promoted the announcement to "Special" and "Huge".

The games European website has been updated with a countdown ending Friday at 3:30PM GMT. Larry Sparks from Square Enix Europe says "We wanted to share the news with as many people as possible, so we have created a special video that will be unveiled on Friday. We hope you enjoy the announcement." We still don't know what the announcement could be but the general consensus is that it's something to do with the games release date.

Final Fantasy XIII Official European Site

Source: MCV

Square Enix updated Final Fantasy XIII's official website today with a new Field tab. All that's there at the moment is a little thing on Palumpolum and some images that - as far as I can tell - have all been seen before, mostly recently, and there's not a thing interesting among them, but it's a given that each major location of the game will be added over time.

Thanks to forum member Squirrel Emperor for notifying us.

Official Final Fantasy XIII website (Japanese)

Well that didn't take long. Forum members hintonmj and Squirrel Emperor have already worked out the anagram posted by Square Enix about an hour ago. The anagram says "Announcement Nov Thirteenth" so we're obviously going to find out something then.

It could be plenty of things ranging from the announcement of an English demo or the confirmation of a Western release date but it looks like we'll have to wait a week to find out what they're holding from us.

Source: A puzzle for FINAL FANTASY XIII fans! - Forum thread

Square Enix North America has posted a puzzle on the Square Enix Members blog for fans of Final Fantasy XIII to solve. The puzzle is an anagram which they'll reveal the answer to on Monday. Here's the message:

Solve this anagram to find out what lies ahead: A Henchmen Inventor Tent Unto

If you have any idea what the solution is or would like to see how members of our community are getting along with the puzzle, visit this thread.

Thanks to our forum member lightning.versus.xiii for finding this.

Source: Square Enix Members Blog

Shonen Jump has two new pages full of brand new screenshots including a preview of the first full size Chocobo and also Hope's now confirmed summon, Alexander. Shonen Jump also says that Final Fantasy XIII will come with Final Fantasy XIV beta codes when it's released in Japan.

If you look closely at the screenshots, you can see Vanille riding the Chocobo. Thanks to this, you can judge just how huge the Chocobo's are in the game.



Update: Here's the full high quality scan.



Thanks to our forum member NeoLightning for finding them.

Square-Enix announced their third quarter earnings for this year earlier today in Tokyo. At the conference, Square-Enix's President Yoichi Wada revealed that sales had increased 39.3% this quarter and they're set to increase a lot more next quarter with the release of Final Fantasy XIII in Japan on December 17th.

Wada was also pressed about the release of Final Fantasy XIII outside Japan at the conference. He said that progress was good and that it's possible Final Fantasy XIII could be released internationally in this fiscal year. We aren't sure if he means both America and Europe but at least it confirms they're aiming for a pre-April 2010 release.

Source: Game Watch

Square Enix has rather subtly begun promoting Final Fantasy XIII in the West. Some English screenshots were released last week but there are still more to be had. This time around, Fang looks about ready to have words with Sazh over his perceptions of Pulse and also having to delay a "talk" with Vanille.



Source: scrawlfx.com

The theme song for Final Fantasy XIII has already been ripped (from the radio apparently) and thanks to a livejournal member, you can hear it below in full. Kimi ga Iru Kara performed by J-pop artist Sugawara Sayuri is set to be released as a single on December 2nd in Japan and the Final Fantasy XIII OST is coming out January 27th 2010.

Sugawara Sayuri - Kimi ga Iru Kara MP3 (13.4mb)

Source: 7music - livejournal

The Japanese Square-Enix store have updated their site to reveal the Final Fantasy XIII box art which confirms that the other one floating around recently is indeed fake. It's basically just the logo, it could just be a place holder but it's the same style we get every time here in Europe. Nevertheless, enjoy.



Source: Square-Enix Store [Japanese]

(Thanks, Astro.)