Did the West Save Square Enix

So I don't like Square Enix. I've never been a Final Fantasy fan (only played 30 hours of FFXII and enjoyed it, 25 hours of FFXIII and hated it.) I think the concept behind Kingdom Hearts is dumb. I don't like JRPGs and I grew up playing mostly PC games like StarCraft, Diablo, DOOM, Quake 3, and so on. I think Final Fantasy XV will bomb.

Then Square went and bought some of my favorite developers and published some of my favorite games.... huh.

EDIT: I wrote this post last night while tired, sorry for the under-cooked thoughts. So here's what I'm thinking, the western studios that square picked up will not save them in terms of sales. I don't think anything will really. But Eidos, IO Interactive, Avalanche and Crystal Dynamics have produced more quality content in that last 5 years than any of the rest of Square's subsidiaries. As a side, the only JRPG I ever truly got obsessed with was Persona 3 (Played 4 as well, thought it was good, but 3 is better imo.) But anyways, Square's western studios give them relevance in the triple A space while Final Fantasy struggles to emerge from 10+ years of development hell. I'm sure Square is doing well in the mobile space, so long as people want to pay 15 USD for FFVI. Add I think things like Bravely Default and I Am Setsuna look cool, I doubt these properties will sell well.

I really don't care about FF, i know I'm alone in this, but I think FFXV looks super lame. I'm just glad that they seem to have some respect for Deus Ex, Hitman, and Tomb Raider, and those games seem to be getting better and better.

Deus Ex and the new Hitman are very good but they're not runnaway successes. Neither are the new Tomb Raider games. SE pouring so much ressources into FF15 could still hurt the company real bad. I'm probably going to buy the game but I'm not sure they'll sell more than 5 million copies and I bet they're hoping for twice that at the very least.

Well it certainly didn't hurt at least. They'd still probably be alright without it, like every Japanese company they have income from a number of different things.

They've made some great games though

Yep, all those great thriving japanese AAA video game publishers like Konami, Capcom and Sega...

@pyrodactyl: Konami is doing just fine, it's just not a video game company. Sega's been dying since like 2000 when most other JP companies were doing fine.

Capcom is... meh

Is this question whether buying western developers "saved" Square Enix in terms of...quality? I definitely think that the western developers Square Enix owns have put out better games than the Japanese arm recently, at least in terms of their appeal to me, but it depends what you're into.

As for whether they saved Square Enix financially, I don't know the answer to that, though I will say that the western arm seems better at actually putting games out than Square Enix east, where games like Final Fantasy XV and Kingdom Hearts 3 have been in development since the dawn of man. If not for the western developers Square Enix would publish like one console game a year, and a bunch of final fantasy mobile stuff that couldn't be less appealing.

Square Enix makes far more from their very successful mobile division than Eidos.

Sega is moving towards PC development for the last decade. Anyone that thinks Sonic is their main bread and butter don't actually pay attention to business forecasts.

Capcom's the only iffy one, but still far from bankruptcy or whatever people imagine things.

Note: I'm pretty sure most people think japanese developers are bad no matter what actually is reality.

Final Fantasy XIII sold like gangbusters and XIV:ARR was one of the few profitable titles the company produced in 2014 and has continued to grow. The western titles have done well in the west, to no ones surprise, and they also publish CoD in Japan, which does okay for them. They're also doing quality things on the mobile end. I don't really think the company has been in need of saving for over a decade, but I think the Eidos acquisition has certainly been successful, but I don't think they're ever going to be the company they were in the late 90's, but they really don't have to be.

If that's all you've played of Square Enix then I'm not surprised you don't like them. But then you say you don't like JRPG's. I'm not about to preach to the unconverted. Square have done some great stuff (mainly before the Enix merge) but I don't think the West has saved anything in terms of Japanese development.

I get the impression that SE east and divisions are fairly separately operating entities.

SE Japan was doing really bad when FFXIV originally flopped it was the biggest blow the company had since the whole Spirits Withn fiasco.

But then they turned it around to make FFXIV:ARR which is probably right behind WoW in terms of successful subscription mmo. It prints money in the way all those publishers that hopped on the mmo wagon dreamed of.

So that would be what has 'saved' the company because it has probably pulled in as much if not more than the combined outputs of both SE east and west since it release.

Not sure if they saved Square Enix financially but the Western studios definitely help kept it on the map as a major video game publisher. In that case, buying Eidos was certainly a smart move on their part.

It's more a case of the things they do that are relevant to western gamers are (unsurprisingly) coming from their western studios. As others have said many Japenese game developers have major revenue streams coming from things that are never seen in the west.

Not sure if they've saved SE but their western side has been the most interesting to me the last few years. They've put out some good games while the Japanese side hasn't put out anything worthwhile.

The 'West' didn't save square Square Enix. Unless you use the UK based publisher Eidos to be 'The West' and are suggesting that Square Enix wouldn't have survived without their games and audience.

Square Enix from a position of power bought Eidos. Maybe it was 'The East' saving Eidos?

Your points doesn't really seem to involve saving anyone. It seems to be 'I didn't like older Square Enix games. Now there are games I like with Square Enix on the box.'

They have a good catalog of games, but on the other hand...

Jim also mentions an older video he made about SqueEnix and I suggest you watch that one too.

Depends what save means? SE West make more games I like but there not exaclty world beaters just solid 8/10's which never really sell. SE East however has mobile which sell's a ton in Japan and Final Fatasy which still sell's considerably more than all it's other franchises, but I've not liked any of SE East output in a long time.

@mak_wikus: Nothing Jim said was surprising but SE gave Eidos Montreal alot of time and money given that Human Revloution didn't pull up any tree's I can understand why SE did what they did.

edit: Mobile / MMO East crushes West where it counts unfortunately

I don't know, but i remember that even though Tomb raider 2013 sold well it was still well short of what they needed to be. Final fantasy has been bad since 13 (haven't played much of the mmo tough) and even though deus ex is pretty mediocre people seem to like it a good deal.

You should switch your app store location to Japan, and then go to square enix, all those apps with all those microtransations. The none western side of them are doing all right for themselves. Lets not forget that they own Taito and that means that they own the Space Invaders licence (as well as arkanoid etc), so they could probably just become a merchandise company if they wanted to and still be okay.

They also have a big MMO title that rakes in money for them too - I wouldn't be surprised if their mmo subscriptions and in app purchases could sustain the company alone.

I think, as you say in you original post they brought the western companies. The western companies didn't buy them, and what's more they brought Edios after their deal with Temco didn't go through. It wasn't out of desperation, it was to expand, so among the amount of money they were already making from JRPGs that sold millions of copies (at an premium because their brand was on it) they could also make money off people who didn't like that sort of thing.

Final Fantasy XIV is doing incredibly well, and is one of the most profitable MMOs out there. As for if the west saved Square Enix? I think Square Enix saved Square Enix. They've been pretty smart in their approach the last couple of years, and although they've had some misses, they've mostly returned profits on their outings. They were smart in looking to the west and broadening their appeal, it wasn't a fluke.

@mak_wikus: I can tell just by that guy's outfit that his video is not for me. Psst... It's the hat it's 100% the hat.

I would like to see Square Enix do a spin-off Final Fantasy game made completely by one of their Western developers.

No, as others have pointed out it's the reverse. Eidos was crashing and burning when Squeenix saved it and these days their MMORPGs and Mobile games drive the Bus profit wise. It isn't the ports of FFVi that does it, it's their f2p games like Record Keeper and Mobius Final Fantasy. (btw Bravely Default sold incredibly well and was very profitable for them, don't know about Bravely Second).

You are letting your personal tastes/biases blind you to financial reality and the tastes of other gamers.

fwiw I don't think FFXV is going to bomb. The fall AAA lineup outside of shooters (CoD, Battlefield, Titanfall) is unusually weak this year (Dishonored 2, Paper Mario:Color Splash & Mafia 3 and really nothing else afaik). So if nothing else it could meet demand that isn't being satisfied elsewhere. It will pretty much be the only RPG/Action RPG out there. That certainly worked for Dragon Age: Inquisition in 2014, a game that ppl loved briefly at the time but have since soured on.

I do think it will under perform but that's mainly because the Japanese market in gene has more or less quit buying console games entirely. But it will probably do ok-ish in the West.

i think it's the gloves. Like why have on leather gloves indoors? I'm not sure but is he hitman cosplaying?

Pretty much this.

I'm just glad that in 2016 we're still essentially treated to Eidos games. And arguably better Eidos games then we've ever gotten before!