TL;DR: SquareSoft used to have reasonably short gaps between game's reveal and release. Starting from merge to Square-Enix, this gap has turned into way too long +2 year gaps. This is problematic for multiple reasons.
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This thread was inspired by the thread earlier today in gaf about FF7 Remake possibly still not being in full production. The thread was not really based on anything, but it started to make me wonder about Square, and their problems with overly long hype cycles.
In this context, the term ”Video Game Hype Cycle" would mean the time gap between a company revealing a game for the first time for the general audiences, and the point when the game is released. The length of this cycle is longer in those territories where the game is released last. So for example, Persona 5 (another game suffering from a long hype cycle) has it's hype cycle running around half a year longer for western audiences compared to Japan. Also, a reveal of a tech demo is not counted towards the hype cycle, only if a real game is officially revealed. So for example, FF7 Remake hype cycle does not start from 2005, when a tech demo about it was revealed.
The problems on having a hype cycle last too long for a game are numerous in my opinion. Here are some of the most glaring ones come to mind:
1. The expectations for the game become impossibly large, so that no game is going to be able to actually succeed them. Only posting vague trailers about the game, so that people will start to fill up the blanks left by these trailers with their imagination, instead of waiting what the finished product will look like.
2. On the other hand, people can simply get bored of waiting for the game to be actually released. When the hype cycle gets too long, the general consensus might turn into ”meh, who cared anymore" on a game.
3. Having an overtly long hype cycle is not sustainable in the long run. For the hype cycle to not face the problems mentioned above, it has to deliver quite consistently on trailers and information about the game, while not seeming like it's not going anywhere. You can't show the first few hours forever. But this can lead into the game being completely spoiled by the last trailers, leaving no element of surprise when it actually does release.
In order for the problems mentioned above not to arise, the hype cycle of the game has to be considerably short. In general I personally believe, that a game should be released in around a year from it being revealed. However this might be too strict nowadays, with all gaming companies revealing their games very early. So for now, my golden rule is that a game should be released 18 months (1.5 years) from it's release. So if a game is revealed in an E3, it should be released at the very least during the holidays of the next year.
How does Square-Enix fit into all of this? I'd argue that the company is falling a victim into having overtly long hype cycles for too many of their games, mostly released by their japanese side. I'm not going to discuss Eidos games this time. Let's first look at the bigger games Square released in late 1990's and early 2000's. I'm mostly trying to use their more well known games (So mostly mainline Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts) as examples. I'll also use examples that I can find sources on, or wikipedia mentions that are sourced. I'll also use japanese dates as release dates, mentioning western release dates if the gap between the two are considerably long (more than 2-3 months).
Hype Cycle lengths from Squaresoft: (All of the western releases were considerably later than the japanese ones)
Final Fantasy VI - Entered production in December 1992, released in April 1994 (announcement happened somewhere in-between this timeframe)
Final Fantasy VII - Announced in February 1996, released in January 1997 in Japan, September in North America
Final Fantasy IX - Announced roughly in May 1999, not confirmed to be FF9 until January 2000. Was released in July 2000
Final Fantasy X - Announced in January 2000, released in July 2001
Kingdom Hearts - Announced at E3 2001, released in March 2002 (note: North American Release only at September that year)
Final Fantasy X-2 - No concrete information on the announcement date, but since the gap between the two games was 2 years, we can assume the hype cycle was perhaps a year or so. Released in March 2003 in Japan, november elsewhere.
These hype cycles seem mostly reasonable. Most of them are bit over a year at most. The game development itself lasted less time as well though, for example FF6 took only 1.5 years to develop. Also with internet becoming more prominent, so has general audiences ability to get more trailers and information about future games easier. Still, let's compare this to Square-Enix era of games. I'm mostly not counting HD remasters, except for few games with notedly long hype cycles.
Hype Cycle Lengths for Square-Enix (Some IMO noteworthy examples bolded)
Kingdom Hearts 2 - Announced in Tokyo Game Show 2003, released in December 2005. However, was released in North America in March 2006, and in Europe in September 2006.
Final Fantasy XII - Announced in early 2001 (January?), released in March 2006 in japan, over 6 months later in the NA, 11 months later in Europe.
The World Ends With You - Announced in September 2006, released in July 2007 in Japan, April 2008 in the other markets.
Crisis Core - Announced at the E3 2004, released in September 2007 in Japan, March/June 2008 in NA/EU
The Last Remnant - Announced in May 2007, released in November 2008
Dissidia - Announced in May 2007, released in December 2008 for Japan,
Star Ocean IV - Announced in May 2007, released in February 2009 for Japan, June elsewhere
Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days - Revealed in E3 2007, released in May 2009 in Japan, September in North America
Final Fantasy XIII - Revealed in E3 2006, releasen in December 2009 in Japan, March 2010 elsewhere
Kingdom Hearts Birth By Sleep - Announced in E3 2007, released in January 2010 in Japan, September elsewhere
Nier - Announced in E3 2009, released in April 2010 worldwide
Final Fantasy XIV - Announced in E3 2009, released in September 2010
A Realm Reborn - ‘Version 2.0' was announced in October 2011, released in August 2013
3rd Birthday - Announced in May 2007, released in December 2010 in Japan, 2011 elsewhere.
Final Fantasy Type-0 - Announced in E3 2006, released in October 2011 in Japan, 2015 elsewhere as part of the HD Remaster
Final Fantasy XIII-2 - Announced in January 2011, released in December 2011 in Japan
Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance - Hinted at E3 2010, officially announced in January 2011. Released in March 2012 in Japan, July elsewhere
Bravely Default - Revealed in September 2011, released in October 2012 in Japan, December 2013 elsewhere.
Lightning Returns - Revealed in August 2012, released in November 2013 in Japan, early 2014 elsewhere
Final Fantasy X|X-2 HD - Revealed in September 2011, released in December 2013 in Japan, March 2014 elsewhere
I am Setsuna - Revealed in E3 2015, released February 2016 in Japan, July elsewhere
World of Final Fantasy - Revealed in E3 2015, released in October 2016
Final Fantasy XV - Revealed in E3 2006 as Versus XIII. Reannounced as XV in E3 2013, released in November 2016
Kingdom Hearts 2.8 - Revealed in August 2015, released in January 2017
Some noteworthy games still not released:
Kingdom Hearts 3 - Revealed in E3 2013, Released 2018 earliest, seems somewhat likely for now.
Final Fantasy VII Remake - Revealed in E3 2015, Part 1 is released 2018 earliest, likely later.
Dragon Quest XI - Revealed in July 2015, aiming for 2017 release
So looking at Square-Enix era of games, we can see that the hype cycles have got considerably longer compared to Squaresoft era of released games. This is most apparent with mainline Final Fantasy games, with 12 having a hype cycle for over 5 years, 13 over 3 years, and 15 over 10 years if we count Versus, but still over 3 years even if we only count XV.
The problem is not exclusive to their flagship console titles, though. A multitude of their PSP game titles have hype cycles either closer to 3 years, or over 3 years. Crisis Core hype cycle lasted over four years for Europe. 3rd Birthday and Birth By Sleep cycles lasted around three years as well. Even a HD Remaster for FFX took over two years from reveal to actual release.
Not all Games have this overtly long hype cycles, though. Examples of games with shorter hype cycles are The Last Remnant, Dissidia, Nier, FF13-2, LR, Bravely Default and I am Setuna. However, these games can be put to few distinct categories:
1. Games that heavily recycle assets, and had shorther Development Cycles due to it. 13-2 and LR, for example
2. Games developed by an external studio, with Square having less input on it. For example, Nier, The Last Remnant.
3. Games with smaller scope. Dissidia and Setsuna
This still leaves few games made by Square-Enix with short hype cycles, such as Kingdom Hearts 3D, Final Fantasy XIV and World of Final Fantasy. The first two were criticised from being rushed, especially original Final Fantasy XIV (which was in development from 2005).
So, what has resulted in Square-Enix games in general having so long hype cycles? Obviously I don't know any details, but I can speculate:
The Development of Square games take far longer than back in Squaresoft days. A general development cycle for bigger Square-Enix games seem to now take around four years.
However, Square still reveals their games to the public when they are still very early in production. FF Versus 13 is one of the most visible examples of this: The Game hadn't been developed almost at all outside of the CGI trailer it was revealed with.
Game development cycles can end up facing unexpected problems that set back projects, or even lead into their cancellation. However, with games already revealed, the projects end up taking far much longer than what Square actually was expecting.
Points 1 and 3 are not exclusive to Square-Enix. However, with Square revealing games so early, the hype-cycles become victims to points 1 and 3.
Here is my proposition for Square's revealing policy for the further.
1. Do not reveal games early in the production
2. Reveal a game only when you feel confident that you can release it within a year of releasing it. So even if you end up delaying it, it can still hit the 18 month mark I mentioned earlier in this post.
However, what do you people think? Is the policy Square is using now fine (it does create some maximally great reveal moments in E3's, that's for sure)? What would you want to see changed?
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This thread was inspired by the thread earlier today in gaf about FF7 Remake possibly still not being in full production. The thread was not really based on anything, but it started to make me wonder about Square, and their problems with overly long hype cycles.
In this context, the term ”Video Game Hype Cycle" would mean the time gap between a company revealing a game for the first time for the general audiences, and the point when the game is released. The length of this cycle is longer in those territories where the game is released last. So for example, Persona 5 (another game suffering from a long hype cycle) has it's hype cycle running around half a year longer for western audiences compared to Japan. Also, a reveal of a tech demo is not counted towards the hype cycle, only if a real game is officially revealed. So for example, FF7 Remake hype cycle does not start from 2005, when a tech demo about it was revealed.
The problems on having a hype cycle last too long for a game are numerous in my opinion. Here are some of the most glaring ones come to mind:
1. The expectations for the game become impossibly large, so that no game is going to be able to actually succeed them. Only posting vague trailers about the game, so that people will start to fill up the blanks left by these trailers with their imagination, instead of waiting what the finished product will look like.
2. On the other hand, people can simply get bored of waiting for the game to be actually released. When the hype cycle gets too long, the general consensus might turn into ”meh, who cared anymore" on a game.
3. Having an overtly long hype cycle is not sustainable in the long run. For the hype cycle to not face the problems mentioned above, it has to deliver quite consistently on trailers and information about the game, while not seeming like it's not going anywhere. You can't show the first few hours forever. But this can lead into the game being completely spoiled by the last trailers, leaving no element of surprise when it actually does release.
In order for the problems mentioned above not to arise, the hype cycle of the game has to be considerably short. In general I personally believe, that a game should be released in around a year from it being revealed. However this might be too strict nowadays, with all gaming companies revealing their games very early. So for now, my golden rule is that a game should be released 18 months (1.5 years) from it's release. So if a game is revealed in an E3, it should be released at the very least during the holidays of the next year.
How does Square-Enix fit into all of this? I'd argue that the company is falling a victim into having overtly long hype cycles for too many of their games, mostly released by their japanese side. I'm not going to discuss Eidos games this time. Let's first look at the bigger games Square released in late 1990's and early 2000's. I'm mostly trying to use their more well known games (So mostly mainline Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts) as examples. I'll also use examples that I can find sources on, or wikipedia mentions that are sourced. I'll also use japanese dates as release dates, mentioning western release dates if the gap between the two are considerably long (more than 2-3 months).
Hype Cycle lengths from Squaresoft: (All of the western releases were considerably later than the japanese ones)
Final Fantasy VI - Entered production in December 1992, released in April 1994 (announcement happened somewhere in-between this timeframe)
Final Fantasy VII - Announced in February 1996, released in January 1997 in Japan, September in North America
Final Fantasy IX - Announced roughly in May 1999, not confirmed to be FF9 until January 2000. Was released in July 2000
Final Fantasy X - Announced in January 2000, released in July 2001
Kingdom Hearts - Announced at E3 2001, released in March 2002 (note: North American Release only at September that year)
Final Fantasy X-2 - No concrete information on the announcement date, but since the gap between the two games was 2 years, we can assume the hype cycle was perhaps a year or so. Released in March 2003 in Japan, november elsewhere.
These hype cycles seem mostly reasonable. Most of them are bit over a year at most. The game development itself lasted less time as well though, for example FF6 took only 1.5 years to develop. Also with internet becoming more prominent, so has general audiences ability to get more trailers and information about future games easier. Still, let's compare this to Square-Enix era of games. I'm mostly not counting HD remasters, except for few games with notedly long hype cycles.
Hype Cycle Lengths for Square-Enix (Some IMO noteworthy examples bolded)
Kingdom Hearts 2 - Announced in Tokyo Game Show 2003, released in December 2005. However, was released in North America in March 2006, and in Europe in September 2006.
Final Fantasy XII - Announced in early 2001 (January?), released in March 2006 in japan, over 6 months later in the NA, 11 months later in Europe.
The World Ends With You - Announced in September 2006, released in July 2007 in Japan, April 2008 in the other markets.
Crisis Core - Announced at the E3 2004, released in September 2007 in Japan, March/June 2008 in NA/EU
The Last Remnant - Announced in May 2007, released in November 2008
Dissidia - Announced in May 2007, released in December 2008 for Japan,
Star Ocean IV - Announced in May 2007, released in February 2009 for Japan, June elsewhere
Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days - Revealed in E3 2007, released in May 2009 in Japan, September in North America
Final Fantasy XIII - Revealed in E3 2006, releasen in December 2009 in Japan, March 2010 elsewhere
Kingdom Hearts Birth By Sleep - Announced in E3 2007, released in January 2010 in Japan, September elsewhere
Nier - Announced in E3 2009, released in April 2010 worldwide
Final Fantasy XIV - Announced in E3 2009, released in September 2010
A Realm Reborn - ‘Version 2.0' was announced in October 2011, released in August 2013
3rd Birthday - Announced in May 2007, released in December 2010 in Japan, 2011 elsewhere.
Final Fantasy Type-0 - Announced in E3 2006, released in October 2011 in Japan, 2015 elsewhere as part of the HD Remaster
Final Fantasy XIII-2 - Announced in January 2011, released in December 2011 in Japan
Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance - Hinted at E3 2010, officially announced in January 2011. Released in March 2012 in Japan, July elsewhere
Bravely Default - Revealed in September 2011, released in October 2012 in Japan, December 2013 elsewhere.
Lightning Returns - Revealed in August 2012, released in November 2013 in Japan, early 2014 elsewhere
Final Fantasy X|X-2 HD - Revealed in September 2011, released in December 2013 in Japan, March 2014 elsewhere
I am Setsuna - Revealed in E3 2015, released February 2016 in Japan, July elsewhere
World of Final Fantasy - Revealed in E3 2015, released in October 2016
Final Fantasy XV - Revealed in E3 2006 as Versus XIII. Reannounced as XV in E3 2013, released in November 2016
Kingdom Hearts 2.8 - Revealed in August 2015, released in January 2017
Some noteworthy games still not released:
Kingdom Hearts 3 - Revealed in E3 2013, Released 2018 earliest, seems somewhat likely for now.
Final Fantasy VII Remake - Revealed in E3 2015, Part 1 is released 2018 earliest, likely later.
Dragon Quest XI - Revealed in July 2015, aiming for 2017 release
So looking at Square-Enix era of games, we can see that the hype cycles have got considerably longer compared to Squaresoft era of released games. This is most apparent with mainline Final Fantasy games, with 12 having a hype cycle for over 5 years, 13 over 3 years, and 15 over 10 years if we count Versus, but still over 3 years even if we only count XV.
The problem is not exclusive to their flagship console titles, though. A multitude of their PSP game titles have hype cycles either closer to 3 years, or over 3 years. Crisis Core hype cycle lasted over four years for Europe. 3rd Birthday and Birth By Sleep cycles lasted around three years as well. Even a HD Remaster for FFX took over two years from reveal to actual release.
Not all Games have this overtly long hype cycles, though. Examples of games with shorter hype cycles are The Last Remnant, Dissidia, Nier, FF13-2, LR, Bravely Default and I am Setuna. However, these games can be put to few distinct categories:
1. Games that heavily recycle assets, and had shorther Development Cycles due to it. 13-2 and LR, for example
2. Games developed by an external studio, with Square having less input on it. For example, Nier, The Last Remnant.
3. Games with smaller scope. Dissidia and Setsuna
This still leaves few games made by Square-Enix with short hype cycles, such as Kingdom Hearts 3D, Final Fantasy XIV and World of Final Fantasy. The first two were criticised from being rushed, especially original Final Fantasy XIV (which was in development from 2005).
So, what has resulted in Square-Enix games in general having so long hype cycles? Obviously I don't know any details, but I can speculate:
The Development of Square games take far longer than back in Squaresoft days. A general development cycle for bigger Square-Enix games seem to now take around four years.
However, Square still reveals their games to the public when they are still very early in production. FF Versus 13 is one of the most visible examples of this: The Game hadn't been developed almost at all outside of the CGI trailer it was revealed with.
Game development cycles can end up facing unexpected problems that set back projects, or even lead into their cancellation. However, with games already revealed, the projects end up taking far much longer than what Square actually was expecting.
Points 1 and 3 are not exclusive to Square-Enix. However, with Square revealing games so early, the hype-cycles become victims to points 1 and 3.
Here is my proposition for Square's revealing policy for the further.
1. Do not reveal games early in the production
2. Reveal a game only when you feel confident that you can release it within a year of releasing it. So even if you end up delaying it, it can still hit the 18 month mark I mentioned earlier in this post.
However, what do you people think? Is the policy Square is using now fine (it does create some maximally great reveal moments in E3's, that's for sure)? What would you want to see changed?