My rant on what I believe to be the current internal situation with SQEX.

[GalvanizA]

IMO it's not the developers, they haven't changed; it's Yoichi Wada and also Shinji Hashimoto. Shinji Hashimoto is a key culprit that people ignore and forget about. He jumped over to Square from Atlus when he saw that company was no match in the J-RPG field. Since coming over and getting an influential position at the company Hashimoto has been allowing Tetsuya Nomura to do ANYTHING and EVERYTHING at the company which is why Nomura is all over the majority of their products. Hashimoto is in charge of Sales & Marketing and is the main guy deluded in thinking Nomura's work sells like sex with the hottest woman on the planet.

I remember at the FFVII: AC Premiere at Venice Film Festival back in 2004 and Nomura said on a blog entry on the official Japanese AC site (translated by AdventChildren.net) that Hashimoto asked him after the premiere, "You've come this far, what's next for you?" And Nomura rebuked his question by saying, "How would I know? I haven't even finished this movie or Kingdom Hearts II yet!"

Nomura seems to be given free creativity but he also seems to not really like it but accepts it anyway.

This is why Toshiyuki Itahana got so worked up back at around E3 2006 and said the main series was dead and that staff members that care about the traditional style of FF are moving to the FFCC series, which still, funny enough, isn't even traditional. Thankfully, Akitoshi Kawazu is an Executive at the company so they're safely under his protection from Wada and Hashimoto. In fact, Kawazu seems to realize this problem with the series being all Kitase and Nomura and that's why he supports FFCC and also Ivalice Alliance.

All I want now is the FFXII team, which is now lead by Hiroyuki Itou, to be able to make main series games more often. I trust Itou will put elements from VI, T, IX and XII into his future main series games. The bad thing is who acknowledges Itou at modern day SQEX? Yoshinori Kitase who worked with Itou on FFVI has an even bigger role at SQEX than he does despite Itou doing more work on FFVI than he did! It was FFVII that put Kitase on the map. Itou has no chance of being given the same freedom as Nomura who has Hashimoto wrapped around his finger and also because he does not have the "one promotion away from Exectuve" position that Kitase has. Remember DoC: FFVII? The only reason that got made was because Kitase likes FPS games and has a powerful enough position in the company to get it made. I mean think about it, how else would Nomura be able to direct FF Versus XIII without Hashimoto letting him? Do you think Hironobu Sakaguchi would allow something like that to happen? Allowing Nomura to direct a main series console FF game? Hell no! Sakaguchi telling Yasumi Matsuno to direct FFXII is one thing as he's got a track record of making good games. Hashimoto don't give a **** about the game being good, he just let Nomura direct an FF as Kingdom Hearts sells **** loads and he expects similar sales from FF Versus XIII.

Wada and Hashimoto are just about money and only the actual developers care about creativity which is why current SQEX keeps making spin-offs and remakes.

Just my view on what's going on in that Tokyo HQ of theirs. Oh, and I'm a Nomura fan btw incase this thread made me come off as a hater.

[Neal]

Most companies are "about money". Get used to it.

[Wandering Hands]

The best way for you to stop this would be to stop purchasing their products.

Lemme know how that goes for ya.

You might wanna rally up 20 million people to make more of an impact.

[Moklin]

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

[GalvanizA]

Originally Posted by [teehee

Most companies are "about money". Get used to it.

Yeah, well when Sakaguchi was still there this whole spin-off and remake thing didn't happen as much as it has with Wada.

I have nothing against what they're doing under Wada as it means more games for me to play but I feel if Sakaguchi was there:

1. FF Versus XIII would be called FFXIV.
2. There would have been much more non-FF games released.

[olorin818]

what suprised me is the fact that Nomura is actually involed in some many projects in Square, I dont see anything wrong about that, since he was one of the main guys who were in charge of FF7,8 FFAC, KH and now FNC, they were all successful projects and for sure they brought some cash to company, Maybe he will become soon a president of Square, becasue why not? you may not like him, but under his direction they earn quite a lot. But in that case what about Kitease, was it on this site, where I read an artice about Nomura and Kitease and their anit symapthy?
They both have strong postion in Square, so once Wanda will quite who will take his postion?
I dream Sagaguchi would come back, but he wont do it. so who else?
I hope I didnt get off topic GalvanizA but you actually made me think of this...

[Little Miss Scarlett]

Honestly, I just think you're complaining about nothing. If you don't like the spinoffs don't play them, and of course they're gonna want to make as much money out of something as possible. E.g FFVII may be milked dry, but it's still pulling in quite a bit of cash.

Originally Posted by GalvanizA

Yeah, well when Sakaguchi was still there this whole spin-off and remake thing didn't happen as much as it has with Wada.


I have nothing against what they're doing under Wada as it means more games for me to play but I feel if Sakaguchi was there:

1. FF Versus XIII would be called FFXIV.
2. There would have been much more non-FF games released.

1. Well, the way things are now really just means we're getting more games, Verses and XIV Besides, it's supposed to have the mythology/themes/something as XIII.

2. Not sure I agree things'd be different, why bother making loads of games where there's a chance they'll flop when calling it Final Fantasy guarantees a best seller?

[GalvanizA]

Originally Posted by Darling Heartilly

1. Well, the way things are now really just means we're getting more games, Verses and XIV

You type the truth.

[Pixel]

Originally Posted by GalvanizA

IMO it's not the developers, they haven't changed; it's Yoichi Wada and also Shinji Hashimoto. Shinji Hashimoto is a key culprit that people ignore and forget about. He jumped over to Square from Atlus when he saw that company was no match in the J-RPG field. Since coming over and getting an influential position at the company Hashimoto has been allowing Tetsuya Nomura to do ANYTHING and EVERYTHING at the company which is why Nomura is all over the majority of their products. Hashimoto is in charge of Sales & Marketing and is the main guy deluded in thinking Nomura's work sells like sex with the hottest woman on the planet.

I remember at the FFVII: AC Premiere at Venice Film Festival back in 2004 and Nomura said on a blog entry on the official Japanese AC site (translated by AdventChildren.net) that Hashimoto asked him after the premiere, "You've come this far, what's next for you?" And Nomura rebuked his question by saying, "How would I know? I haven't even finished this movie or Kingdom Hearts II yet!"

Nomura seems to be given free creativity but he also seems to not really like it but accepts it anyway.

This is why Toshiyuki Itahana got so worked up back at around E3 2006 and said the main series was dead and that staff members that care about the traditional style of FF are moving to the FFCC series, which still, funny enough, isn't even traditional. Thankfully, Akitoshi Kawazu is an Executive at the company so they're safely under his protection from Wada and Hashimoto. In fact, Kawazu seems to realize this problem with the series being all Kitase and Nomura and that's why he supports FFCC and also Ivalice Alliance.

All I want now is the FFXII team, which is now lead by Hiroyuki Itou, to be able to make main series games more often. I trust Itou will put elements from VI, T, IX and XII into his future main series games. The bad thing is who acknowledges Itou at modern day SQEX? Yoshinori Kitase who worked with Itou on FFVI has an even bigger role at SQEX than he does despite Itou doing more work on FFVI than he did! It was FFVII that put Kitase on the map. Itou has no chance of being given the same freedom as Nomura who has Hashimoto wrapped around his finger and also because he does not have the "one promotion away from Exectuve" position that Kitase has. Remember DoC: FFVII? The only reason that got made was because Kitase likes FPS games and has a powerful enough position in the company to get it made. I mean think about it, how else would Nomura be able to direct FF Versus XIII without Hashimoto letting him? Do you think Hironobu Sakaguchi would allow something like that to happen? Allowing Nomura to direct a main series console FF game? Hell no! Sakaguchi telling Yasumi Matsuno to direct FFXII is one thing as he's got a track record of making good games. Hashimoto don't give a **** about the game being good, he just let Nomura direct an FF as Kingdom Hearts sells **** loads and he expects similar sales from FF Versus XIII.

Wada and Hashimoto are just about money and only the actual developers care about creativity which is why current SQEX keeps making spin-offs and remakes.

Just my view on what's going on in that Tokyo HQ of theirs. Oh, and I'm a Nomura fan btw incase this thread made me come off as a hater.

LOL. You think Atlus makes shitty games? Wow.

[ArxTheHero]

I don't really see a problem here. I think the spin-offs are cool.

[Desi]

Nothing Suceeds like Success (N.S.L.S)

Since Square-enix is in a way having a ton of success with the current Nomura fiasco they have any reason to change.

[Stella Nox Fleuret]

Originally Posted by GalvanizA

Yeah, well when Sakaguchi was still there this whole spin-off and remake thing didn't happen as much as it has with Wada.

I have nothing against what they're doing under Wada as it means more games for me to play but I feel if Sakaguchi was there:

1. FF Versus XIII would be called FFXIV.
2. There would have been much more non-FF games released.

I agree with that... I mean 3 FFXIII games? They ruined the old style.
FFversusXIII could be a FFXIV and Agito a random FF for PSP...

But money, money, money.

[The Lightning]

It's a company, and companies are in it for money. Heck, who isn't in it for money when it comes down to things like that?

[Sundance Kid]

Originally Posted by GalvanizA

IMO it's not the developers, they haven't changed; it's Yoichi Wada and also Shinji Hashimoto. Shinji Hashimoto is a key culprit that people ignore and forget about. He jumped over to Square from Atlus when he saw that company was no match in the J-RPG field.

Aside from this topic

ALTUS RPGs are better then FF games in my opinion you can go for over hundreds of hours with Atlus RPGs and enjoy it with worthier plot.

Dare I say better then FF on a Final Fantasy website?

[Wandering Hands]

I think at the moment, everything is better than, not just FF, but a fair bit of what SE has been putting out lately.

Really, they haven't been doing much lately besides remakes, spin-offs and other methods to beat franchises to bloody, money-making death. But while they're doing that, other companies are making innovations and leaving SE coughing in the wake of the proverbial dust trail.

[Sundance Kid]

EDIT: ATLUS IS better then SE