Square Enix Explains Why Final Fantasy XVI is a PS5 Exclusive - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 02 June 2023 / 14,321 Views
Square Enix is set to launch the next entry in the Final Fantasy series, Final Fantasy XVI, next month as a PlayStation 5 exclusive.
Final Fantasy XVI producer Naoki Yoshida in an interview with Game Informer explained why the game is exclusive to the PS5.
"Final Fantasy, being one of Square Enix’s very important franchises up there with Dragon Quest and the Kingdom Hearts series – when we do begin development, we do approach multiple platforms, multiple companies, about releasing the game. And when you approach them, they’re going to come back to us with their offers," Yoshida said.
Square Enix ended up liking Sony's offer the most and decided to make it a PS5 exclusive. Yoshida added developing for one system is easier and the team has gotten help from PlayStation.
"That said, from a developer and programmer perspective, limiting development to one system makes it not only easier on us but allows us the ability to optimize it," he said. "And that allows us the ability to maximize performance for that one system because we’re only concentrating on that one system."
He added, "It allows us to create the game that we want to create [and] it makes it easier for us to do that."
Final Fantasy XVI will launch for the PlayStation 5 on June 22, 2023.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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Sony gave you money. Simple as that.
Good luck trying to push that narrative.
ThEy ArE HeLpInG DeVeLoPmEnT1!1
This goes pretty much hand in hand in most cases.
I don’t know why you act like money spent in that way isn’t actively helping funding those big budget games, and only look at it as the resulting games being excluded from other platforms instead of the logic for them to be exclusive when the platform holder is partially funding the projects and actively taking part in the development of the games. Which is the case for FFXVI, as per Yoshi P’s statement..
Only okay when one side does it.
I was fine with XBox doing it for Lost Odyssey, to give my favourite example from them.
And remember the flack with Tomb Raider?
In TR case both it was almost finished (with PS4 version well under development) and was a franchise with much stronger ties to PS than Xbox, so as always you make a bad job on your apples to oranges comparisons.
Excuses. Moneyhatting is moneyhatting. Doesnt matter how its done. If you dont own the IP its moneyhatting. Problem with your logic is you continue to make these excuses and complain when it works the other way.
Guess what, Street Fighter, FF, Castlevania were all made popular on Nintendo first yet its okay for Sony to take them away right because of closer ties???
You have no credibility in any of these discourses as it’s been more than established that you are allergic to give credit where credit is due unless it’s for the brands you jerk off to.
Yet you provided none in your response.
You’re the one trying to push a narrative.
This......is confusing. Multiple platforms? It's just Xbox and PlayStation SE would approach. Would they tried to have gotten FF16 exclusive to the Switch if Nintendo offered enough? This explanation really doesn't make that much sense. There's nothing wrong with flat out admitting Sony just dropped the bigger bag in their lap lol.
Does this also mean that SE actively shops around their games for exclusivity? If that's the case, I guess it makes sense why games like Triangle Strategy, Octopath Traveler, and Live A Live started out as Switch exclusives.
Also PC and it's pretty difficult these days to make a good pc port.
Developing games costs a lot of money these days, so having a platform owner throw in cash in front mitigates a lot of riscs. Also polishing costs a lot of time for every platform.
Hardware like PS5 and XSX might be a bit similar, but that's where it ends. The API etc. are still very different, which is why a good deal of games still run better on Inferior hardware as long as that's the main platform.
A game optimised for PS5 isn't magically going to run well on Xbox when ported and could run like absolute shit on pc. So skipping platforms also saves some costs and a lot of time.
Octopath traveller is on Xbox but not Playstation... But there's nothing confusing about his response, he literally states Sony made a better offer which likely goes beyond money (platform audience/ machine specs) and an additional benefit is development is easier with platform which is always true. Just look at any of the recent PC ports.
It’s amazing to see almost every single 3rd developer and publisher when They’re explaining why they’re exclusive, and not one of them will outright admit honestly that it’s about the most money.
At the least, Such an expensive game should be on PC same day. Sony likely paid for that not to happen.
Because it isn't. It was just about money paid MS could win every single time. They will consider total profit/revenue, so when asking for exclusivity which would you think would pay more (to account for lost sales)?
Some companies also want sales to help drive the IP forward, so the market leader has alot of power when it comes to contracts.
Sure it have. The one claiming it is money paid is tslog not me.
Its no denying money was spent in making this exclusive aswell. Sony has power of money and sales so MS cant exactly compete on just money terms.
He could have explained it by this $$$$$$$
"Square Enix ended up liking Sony's offer the most and decided to make it a PS5 exclusive."
How I'm reading this is that this means that Microsoft also made an offer but Square liked it the least and so Sony's was better. Money talks and Square is a business after all.
(My following comment is based on the fact that MS also made an offer, unless someone can provide evidence that MS didn't make an offer?)
Nobody should be hating on Sony that they offered better. MS probably didn't want to offer higher because they were budgeting and eying trying to buy Activision instead. (I'm also not hating on MS buying Activision either) This is the business; Sony and MS both played the same game and Sony won this move.
So if anybody's mad that this is exclusive to PS5, just know that MS tried to make it exclusive to Xbox as well, and there was never going to be a multiplat version.
So bottom-line….would you prefer FF16 to be PS5 exclusive or Xbox exclusive? Those seemed to be the only option.
In essence Microsoft tried to Moneyhat this but couldn't because they were busy trying to Moneyhat an entire publisher.
Yeah sounds about right.
Probably more than just money though. "We are willing to help with development, advertising, and set aside X amount of people to test and debug" etc etc.
Octopath Traveler I, Live A Live comes to mind first because Nintendo localization teams are credited in the ending credits of each.
They also were responsible for the publishing of the games abroad.
Don't know if this is the same case for Triangle Strategy or Bravely Default II but mye thinks this is most likely too
The FF16 deal likely happened before the ABK deal. It doesn't make sense for MS to pay for a timed exclusive that likely won't see enough of a return to make it worth it. While Sony likely doesn't need to pay as much either.
MS paid SE 100M for Tomb Raider which is a fraction of the popularity of FF. Only
to see Tomb Raider be sold for 300M lol. Can you really blame then for saying, no thanks.
That's just sad though because why couldn't it be a multiplatform release? Capcom, Bandai Namco, Sega, are constantly releasing their biggest games multiplat, but SE just can't do that lol. This isn't some indie publisher we're talking about either. SE is bigger than the likes of Sega.
MS wouldn't be pulling that crap. The public backlash if MS tried to moneyhat the likes of FF16, Resident Evil 4, etc. would make the Tomb Raider backlash look like child's play. Which is why any third party exclusivity deals MS has made since has been indie or AA.
True but it took the PlayStation fanbase to turn Persona from a niche jrpg to one big enough to be a viable multiplatform title and lets not forget in Sega's case SMT is still exclusive, my point was to demonstrate that no ones above these type of business dealings.
Probably what separates FF from games like Persona and perpetuates it deals with Sony is the form the numbered FF's take at the moment that limits them to PS PC and Xbox and in Xboxes case the sales numbers and not seeing any real growth potential has stifled developing for Xbox , while a series like Persona can be put across all four platforms and while it also had factors held against it ,unlike FF with Xbox Persona off shoots like Strikers showed an audience was there and most importantly it had great potential to grow where as of this moment the numbered FF is games are pretty much stuck with being a PS/PC series and so prey to these kind of deals.
Well I'm only saying this based off the the fact that Square said they had offers and liked Sony's the most, so MS must've made an exclusive offer as well then. Ya it is unfortunate for Xbox owners that they couldn't just make it multiplatform like other big devs.
It'd be nice to know the full story but I can actually see Microsoft pulling this. When someone is put in a corner you never know what they might try and do. Like maybe MS wanted to tried one last shot at trying to gain some attention from the Japanese market and what bigger way to do that than to get exclusive to FF (and also maybe MS didn't like that Square made deal before with Sony with FF7R either). Then after MS lost the deal for FF16 they decided to forget buying exclusive games, and just buy an entire publisher lol
Anything is possible....except for MS buying Nintendo; they tried that already lol
sony gave them a big cheque
Pretty simple! If you want to play it on launch day-get a PS5. Nothing will change that!!!👍
Way to go Square, instead of trying to push your best IPs to new heights in popularity just sit on their past success and focus on short-term gains at consumer reach expense and which you'll use in NFT ventures. I'm sure this is all sane and sound as a business model.
Just like selling 3 studios and the Tomb Raider franchise for 300m to someone that reportedly instantly licenses just the Tomb Raider for 600m to Amazon can certainly be considered a master move.
I see no reason to doubt this explanation, it's perfectly logical. If you go out fishing for offers, you're going to take the best one and run with that. Fair and square. Microsoft could surely have outbid Sony if they had wanted to, but they didn't.
Unfortunate but most JRPG gamers play on Playstation anyways, especially FF fans. I don't think anyone is going to care that much.
That is very obvious
"when they approach us, they offer us money and we take it every single time", is what should have been said, instead of skirting around "we took the money hat".
I know Valve doesn't pay out it's arse for exclusivity the way Epic does, so I can easily imagine SE took a bag from Sony, and has yet to mention taking a bag from Epic (it's going to happen, they've accepted multiple bags from EG over the past few years for multiple games, this will be no exception, unless SE is asking for a stupid amount).
Not like I'd care for the game at this point anyway, since I have that 3 exclusivity contract rule I go by when it comes to EGS exclusivity, and seeing as how SE went over that by 5 times already, I've no reason to buy from them anymore. They just don't want my money, nor respect my time, so I've no need for their products anymore (there are indies out there that are far more deserving anyway).
I think ultimately this exclusivity deal was a result of SE not having full faith in the success of the game and FF as a brand. Having an exclusive deal helps guarantee a base level of profitability (most likely) as well as much needed resource assistance from Sony and single console focus to actually help get a quality game out the door in a decent time frame (something that SE has become really really bad with). And what's lost is most likely mediocre sales on a platform that isn't really doing that great anyways...and even then its only limited to 6 months. Its a win-win situation for SE imo, and the right time to do a deal like this. If this game turns out well, they can have a quick turn around time to get the Xbox and PC version out, and maybe regain a lot of lost FF fans by producing a quality game. When the next FF hits, it can be a proper multiplatform release with a revitalised fan base.
To say they don't believe FF would have a good enough sales is quite odd.
I think you have misunderstood my post. Mediocre sales is specifically in reference to potential sales on the Xbox platform. And in my opening sentence 'success' can be measured in any number of ways not just raw sales. I believe SE have struggled in recent years to get their games out the gate and at the expected quality for the brand. Partnering up with Sony is a win-win for them and I believe has helped them get FF16 looking the way it does and with a reasonable release date since reveal.
Woah, you mean Sony offered the most money? Who knew that’s how moneyhats work.
Yet if it was that easy - wouldn't MS do it?
Imagine Xbox getting FF16 exclusively. Same with Harvestella, Dragon Quest Treasure, Dragon Quest, Octopath 1 AND 2.
Why worry about Japan if you can just buy all the best games?
Wtf is Harvestella or DQ Treasure?
Also MS has said repeatedly that they don’t buy games anymore. The best they’ll do is a small timed exclusive window.
Why should MS waste money on these titles?
Why would MS spend money on popular JP titles? To get better access to Japan.
Harvestella and DQ treasures are games exclusive to the Switch. Were they moneyhatted?
Also is "they don't buy games anymore' a good argument when they are buying multiple studios/publishers?
Also if MS isn't "buying games anymore" then is it really moneyhatting? If MS isn't bidding against Sony - then where is the money? If you offer nothing, and I offer $1 - did I just money hat something for $1?
If MS cared about money whipping publishers to make small gains in Japan, then they’d have been doing it for years.
I’m working under the assumption that the FF16 deal will be the same as the FF7 deal, timed exclusive for PC, not coming to Xbox on console. MS doesn’t do those types of deals anymore and haven’t for a very long time.
You seem awfully confused about all of this and are reaching for excuses when the producer literally said Sony offered them the best deal. That means the most money.
They done during X360 and it didn't work.
It didn’t work? They sold 80M units and virtually tied the PS3.
You were talking about Japan did you flip to another point without any reason?
What money whipping of publishers did they do during 360 to make gains in Japan?
Sony did the exact same thing with Nintendo. Offered Square a deal Nintendo couldnt match.
This is Sonys nature. I cant believe those trying to pretend Square do these things for the good of their hearts.
Before there was an article that and it says square enix blames Microsoft for not releasing ff16 on Xbox ..
I don't even know the truth now haha
I just realized this was PS5 only. That's great to see. I was positive this would be PS4 as well.
Did they ? the last I remember was the same as Method 114 , 6months then PC 12months then Xbox, I figured that somewhere down the line they decided that with how long production was taking even now we have no episode 2 let alone 3, they decided that those delays along with the year long exclusivity especially if that included a further 12 months for each future episode. so selling FF7R to what had become since FF7R was announced a much more Game Pass focused Xbox ecosystem with a much smaller FF fanbase and then having to repeat that across all episodes wasn't worth it in the end.
It started with 12 months then they extended it and then it never came. Sony must have extended it again or made it permanent. If they released it to gamepass then it would have access to close to 30 million users which is it small. Even if 1/3 tried it then it's Still big and worth it.
Mostly likely they didn't saw a good ROI on doing the port to Xbox 1 year later.
Does developing for multiple platforms cost extra time and money? Yes. But in the case of a game like Final Fantasy, the money earned on the additional platform would certainly exceed those costs. The only reason not to do it is if you are making more money by not doing it - and that suggests Sony is doing something to make the equation work out that way. It likely wouldn't be the most cost effective path, but Square Enix could even have a completely separate team working simultaneously on the adaptation for XBox, thus not holding back the PS5 version. We've certainly seen companies take games that were originally optimized for a single platform and later adapt them for less capable platforms. There's nothing that says Square Enix would be forced to take a lowest common denominator approach. If they do something on the first platform that can't be done on the second, that's fine - they change strategies on the second. That costs some time and money, but nothing comparable to the original cost of development, and easily coverable by the revenue the new platform would pull in.
Yes there is. MS demands that a version for Series S is made so that would already make a restriction. If you look for most SE games they are having issue on PC versions, their engine is not working fine over there. Also when looking for sales of FF on X360 and X1 it is visible that the biggest part of the sales are on PS, and calling it exclusive gives more marketing power and sales on the PS platform plus Sony supporting it more. So in the end it is likely that Sony isn't having to put as much money as we think they would need.
So basically they are not enough to optimise the game on multiple consoles and Sony paid them more money lol
Well we all remember ff15 optimisation.. I have bother Xbox and PS version and PS version of he game has that frame pacing issue which was very annoying.
Stranger of paradise performance on all consoles is very bad and the visual make-up made it look like a PS3 and 360 game.square Enix are not as bad as bethesda in terms of optimisation but they are not great either. Forgot to do add forpsoken which was only on PS5 and the performance for it wasn't great either
I do remember it. There was an article that stuck with me talking about how the frame rate and optimization would have been better if they didn't have to concentrate on releasing it on the xbox at the same time.
And here we are. It only releasing on one console so they can better optimize it.
Shame I can't find the article. I even imagine one of the pictures in my head.
If you were a product manager, and you wanted to ensure that adding an additional platform didn't hurt the quality of the product on the first platform, what would you ask your company head for?
Phil Spencer doesn't believe exclusives sell systems.
Lol
So you are in favor of moneyhatting?
They purchased Bethesda and 20 other companies for exclusives. What is this weird narrative where we act like Microsoft hasn't spent way more for exclusivity.
Whilte true, not that I find the term insulting (having been an self proclaimed X-men fanboy for the best part of a decade and a half) but it is the reason why many are ignoring basic facts about things to make out like paying off a single studio for timed exclusivity ("moneyhat") = bad while buying a publisher to get all their games forever ("ultimate moneyhat") = good. They are the same thing just different sums of money.
I'm glad the regulators are not aware of those 20 companies they acquired for exclusivities then :) Would not help their case for sure!
They Purchased, not money hatted.
Also more Xbox games release on PS than PS games release on Xbox.
Try again.
And Sony and SquEnix, no doubt, agreed on a mutual beneficial deal and signed a contract, just part of business.
Thats called money hatting.
Indeed and MS can and have done the same, at the moment their policy is agreeing on a mutual beneficial deal with studios and publisers and signing contracts to add their games to day 1 on GamePass or in the case recently, buying entire publishers. In the end, all the same thing. Massive corporations throwing money around and not actually making any games.
How are they not making any games? That have released two 1st party games this year..
Also being Market Leader has more power than money.
They still get some timed exclusivity games, but they aren't hitting the charts.
