" A lot of what everyone is saying seems to be what I feel, with the exception of someone saying FF12 was good, because that is just plain asinine. Could they be taking a page from the Disney handbook on horrible business practices? "

No.

" Why the fuck am I reading about Libya oh my thread about Squaresoft?! What does Libya gave to do with jrpgs?! Stay in topic with this thrard "

" @Hailinel:  The part about FF12 being worse than being hit in the head with a bag of quarters or SE continually remaking versions of the same stuff and making half-attempts at getting back to the "Golden Age"? "

" A lot of what everyone is saying seems to be what I feel, with the exception of someone saying FF12 was good, because that is just plain asinine.

I doubt it.  The main reason being that the old squaresoft magic, to me, was that pretty much ANY title with their name on it was well done (I say pretty much because I'm sure I'm forgetting some horrible title or two that they made).  If Nomura can deliver on versus 13, all that does is mean that HE helped make a great game through his team and his ideas, not that Square Enix has gotten back in the groove of making sure every single title they put out is something people should, and want to, check out.  X-2 was poorly received, 12 was divisive, 13 was divisive, and 14 was, and still is, a horrible mess.  So even if Vs 13 makes an impressive showing, they still have a lot of work to do to prove themselves again as a company and Nomura can't do that alone, since when he succeeds and the rest of Square fails, all that's happened is Nomura has shown that he's good and the rest of the company is in big trouble.

" There's no shortage of talented developers out there. If Square isn't doing it for you anymore, find something else. "

" @shadowknight508: 
 The Last Remnant  and Nier both say hi "

" @Cornman89 said:

" There's no shortage of talented developers out there. If Square isn't doing it for you anymore, find something else. "

You wouldn't be upset that your favorite developer growing up isn't even the same company?  Wouldn't you want them to get back into the light? "

I can say that I really liked Final Fantasy 6 and 7 as well as kingdom hearts 
i did not like ff13 though

" @Sayishere said:

" i want   nobuo uematsu  do the soundtrack for the next final fantasy game :( "

Hamauzu's soundtrack for 13 was one of the best parts of that game so :P "

" @Faint: But Yoko Shimomura already out paced both of them with what she's been doing with Versus XIII, and she doesn't work for Square.  She's just freelance. "

" I say they never had any magic to begin with.

Now the Enix magic, that's something I want to see come back. Where's ActRaiser 3? Where's a Valkyrie Profile sequel that actually improves on the first one? Where's a modern Star Ocean game that can actually compete with the modern Tales games? "

nop

I'm not that bothered, Atlus are all the JRPGs I need. 
 
If I want to be bored to sleep, I'll put Final Fantasy XIII on. Thanks Square.

I cant remember if chrono trigger and the snes ff games are good or if i just thought they were because i was in 6th grade when I played them, i enjoyed ff9 that much i remember.

i hope Versus XIII turns out great.  i havent played Birth By Sleep yet.  considering what people have been saying about the game, i think ill get it when the price drops for it. 

Nope. I'm not a huge fan of what Square puts out to begin with (but I will easily concede Final Fantasy V and VI to be some of my favorite games), and nothing they have done in the past 10 years suggests anything other than the fact that they will continue down this dark path of rehashing old stuff while taking agonizingly long amounts of time to release the new. Oddly enough? I thought the Vs XIII trailer was kind of cool, right up until I discovered it was going to play like Kingdom Hearts.

I don't know why people think that  FInal Fantasy 7 is good but somehow the games after that aren't. Every terrible decision that is present in the later games in the series was just as present in Final Fantasy 7. 
 
Personally, I think that Square made a decision to become a different company and to turn FF into a different game. If you ask people what they love about FF1-6 it would be strategy, customization, exploration, music, etc. If you ask people what they love about Final Fantasy 7-13, it would be characters, costumes, graphics, story, music, etc. 
 
I think square made a decision to make Final Fantasy a style over substance franchise, and that's why it is failing now. People are sick of the style. Especially since, as graphics get better and better designers are forced to make more detail-based decisions that alienate more and more people. NObody was going to get turned off by Locke's clothes, or voice but legions of people are turned off by Tidus clothes and voice. 
 
I think the only way square could make a comeback is to start over wtih games that focus on gameplay instead of graphics. You could fight several battles in FF1 in the time it takes to fight one battle in FF7. They need to find what about the game is supposed to be fun, and double down on THAT, eliminating everything that is not.

Sup bitches,  

"

Sup bitches,  

Always the best way to start a conversation.  As a distant observer of Square/Square Enix and all that they've done, I'd say they've definitely lost a lot of good rep. I honestly don't see any Japanese developers doing anything mindblowing any time soon. It'll be a while at the least before they make a return to form. Or maybe they'll never get back to their prior status. "

@Animasta said:

FF12 was the best final fantasy, by the way. FFX was terrible and FFX-2 was superior. Just so you know... and I would disagree, I think FF8 and FF9 are pretty bad, for different reasons (FF9's battles take WAY TOO FUCKING LONG and FF8's story and dialogue is just groan worthy oh and FF8's battle system was broken as all hell)

I can't go through the rest of the comments without addressing this. XII is horrible, even worse than XIII. VIII is great though among the weaker of the first ten. And IX and X are up there with the likes of VI competing for the title of "Best Final Fantasy fucking ever"

I don't think this is simply about Final Fantasy, though that's obviously something they've thoroughly driven into the ground and we all used to adore. But they made so many great games otherwise. The Chrono series, Xenogears, Super Mario RPG, Rad Racer, Romancing SaGa, Mana, Breath of Fire, Bahamut Lagoon (great Japan-only release), Tobal, Bushido Blade, Parasite Eve, Vagrant Story, The Bouncer (yes, I thought it was great), Kingdom Hearts (obviously), among others.

They created so many amazing games spanning so many genres. All of that, is just gone now. And in its place, we get Michael Bay animes.

I doubt it, they won't please long time fans modernizing and they won't please newcomers with the old style of jrpgs. I still enjoyed 13 but yeah I don't think it will ever be as big as it was, but I hope it will get great again.

Square Soft was fantastic at making games for the their times, but things change and I wouldn't expect a company to just revolutionize the way it does things. Eventually someone will come along that will please both crowds, and 10-20 years later we'll be sad they aren't keeping up.

I guess we're bringing this thread back to life?

Anyway, Monolith Soft took a chunk of the Square magic but then they decided Xenosaga was a good idea and in the process ended up loosing a good portion of the magic they had. The lost magic was picked up by people like Level-5 along the way, Monolith had to mix their remaining Square Magic with magic Nintendo gave them.

I doubt it most people are pretty much over JRPGs at this point. I guess the souls games are JRPGs? Besides those I can't think of any I've enjoyed since FF9.

Their new stuff may not be very good, but they do have a massive back catalogue that is widely available on multiple platforms for relatively low prices. Say what you will about FFIV's multiple releases, but anyone who wants to play that game pretty much can.

Well, I guess this thread lives to discuss another day...

I'll just be blunt: the old Square magic is dead and should stay dead. The writing was new and epic then; now it's grown stale and long-winded. Random encounters were necessary to work around the platforms' limitations; now they feel antiquated and jarring.
Square (and Japanese developers in general) need to let go of the past and try redefine the JRPG, and not try to perpetuate the cliche that a JRPG has become: an obtuse, plodding juggernaut with a mishmash of acronym laden battle systems, cliche ridden plots and terrible stereotypes.

And fire Nomura. Seriously fire him. Get some fresh blood in. Fire him.

It's easy to say 'yes' or 'no' but I'm not even sure anymore what made the old square games so special. They really need to sit down and think about why the market reacted the way they did to the games that they used to make and see why they reacted that way. I think they thought it had to do with the way it looked or staying to older Japanese game design and story conventions but, as we have seen, that isn't really the case. So what was it? I don't know myself but they people there need to figure that out before they make more games.

...that probably won't happen though.