What in the Hell is Square doing?

[z121231211]

Is it just me or did they bring androgyny to a whole new level?

Seriously, it's never been this hard to tell the gender of a character by their face.

 

[daveman247]

Well, maybe as a dev they aren't doing too well. Never like final fantasy so can't say much here.
But as a publisher they are getting a hell of a collection going. So i like them for that

 

[OrpheusTelos]

*Company releases tech demo for new graphics engine*

"OMG y arent dey makin da gaem I want!!1!"

Square Enix has some of the neediest fans...

In a nutshell, this.

Pretty kickass TECH DEMO though.

Again, herein lies the problem. When was the last time we saw a trailer of gameplay footage from this company?

Umm... The other day at E3, Kingdom Hearts 3D?

I don;t understand your point.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFTqYH9e-pI

I exagerate, but this company has fallen into a really depressing trend of announcing a game, and, whilst taking half a decade to develop/release it, announcing a fuck ton of other games that'll take another 5 years.

Also I find that example especially noteworthy of the problem: that game comes out in fucking July. It took a year to develop it and we're just now seeing a substantial amount of gameplay footage.

I agree that it is somwhat strange, but I also think that they were being overly optimistic when they announced their 'Fabula Nova' series in the first place. XIII had such a problematic development and mixed reception, it's no wonder that they took the time to rethink things.

And, looking on the positive side; Square has really tried hard to fix FFXIV after it's disastrous launch (the game has significantly improved), the development times for their more recent games (KH3D, XIII-2, etc.) have been normal, and a lot of the games people complain about not being out yet (FF7 remake, KH3) don't even exist yet. I'm sure we'll see games like Versus when they are ready, if they still exist, and I'm hoping that this apparently cheaper, gorgeous graphics engine means that they're getting their shit together. I remember hearing that Versus was being reworked with this engine?

Also, I'm not sure I agree with that last bit. There's been a lot of KH3D gameplay going around for the past few months.

There hasn't been any new footage. All of it was recut from the original Japanese trailers, re-tooled with the English instead of Japanese Voices and Subtitles.

Anyways, if Versus XIII is being "re-tooled" with this Graphics engine... jeesus. We won't see Nomura finish the Kingdom Hearts Xehanort Saga until the PlayStation V will we?

I remember hearing that Lumonous can be used for current-gen hardware (the tech demo seems to be for next-gen), and that it is apparently cheaper. Taking that into account, retooling Versus with Luminous could perhaps explain why it is taking so long. After XIII's bloated development and the extra resources they needed to finish what still ended up being a very limited experience, they probably didn't want to end up repeating the same situation after the one-two punch of XIII and XIV. So, a cheaper engine that could perhaps allow them to put only the necessary resources into Versus XIII could be a good thing, especially if it enables them to fufill the game's promise, rather than the half-baked concepts of XIII and XIV.