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[Burbeting]

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?

 

[Elfstruck]

Personally, I don't really care. The game will eventually come out, and there are plenty of games coming up that will keep me busy for the time being. TLG and FFXV did come out, did they?

 

[Don.Abbade]

It's not Square. It's Nomura.

 

[Kazoo pls]

I just want them to stop revealing games so early. Imagine if Versus XIII was never revealed and we only heard of FFXV at E3 2013

 

[Dougieflesh]

While I would like them to announce their games when they're realistically gonna come out, it doesn't seem to impact their sales so they're probably still gonna do it.

 

[Linkura]

2 year gaps? It'd be nice if they were only 2 year gaps.

 

[pezzie]

It really doesn't bother me at all. My hype from a game typically comes right before release, when the media blitz starts, rather than the few teasers we get at e3. If they want to announce what they are working on earlier so I can think about it longer, that's fine with me.

 

[Hyrule Warrior]

I think it would also be nice if they revealed games after they've been in production for a considerable amount of time. Makes it less likely for games to be canceled. To hear that FF7R might still not be in full production just makes me think WTF. I honestly think other than Kingdom Hearts 3, this should just be their top priority now that FFXV is done. Especially if they're talking it being an episodic game, it makes it more and more likely to not even be a current gen game.

 

[jholmes]

OK but Sony "won" E3 by showing off a bunch of games, one of which was announced years before, the other two of which are nowhere near release. So as long as people say things like Sony "won" E3 by showing off games that are maybe five years away from release, companies will keep doing this.

 

[120v]

the whole industry has this problem right now, more or less

 

[mieumieu]

What I hate most is the drip feed of information. You only get a glimpse or two of games and then it is faded to darkness again.

This happens even in remasters like FFXII where they still havent answered a lot of questions like the camera controls. And the game is supposed to be very close to completion given the trophy leak.

 

[aerts1js]

I agree, they announce games a solid 1-2 years too early.

 

[Mihael Mello Keehl]

Personally, I don't really care. The game will eventually come out, and there are plenty of games coming up that will keep me busy for the time being. TLG and FFXV did come out, did they?

Yeah but it took a long time, lol. My goodness

 

[HeisenbergWW62]

It's not Square. It's Nomura.

Yep. I could honestly see FFXVI releasing before FFVIIR part 1

 

[HeelPower]

It's not Square. It's Nomura.

Yeah,no.

Both FFXII,FFXIII,FFXIV 1.0 were massive dev hells.

Nomura had little to nothing to do with them.

The company has major problems managing anything big.

 

[Elfstruck]

Yeah but it took a long time, lol. My goodness

Let's just pretend the game doesn't exist lol.

 

[Gentleman Jack]

It's not Square. It's Nomura.

I don't know that you can pin the catastrophic delay between announcement/release of the fabula nova crystallis debacle on one man. Things don't get that bad unless they're systemic.

 

[Burbeting]

It's not even only their dev hell games with this problem. So many psp games with 3 year hyping cycles.

 

[NinjaCoachZ]

Most of SE's games this gen have come out in a fairly reasonable timeframe. KH3 and FFVII remake are the most major examples and they stick out more so I don't think there's any need to make excuses about those since they were both announced as clear "how to win E3 / make people buy PS4" gambits. But a lot of their other games have actually been okay about not being announced too far off.

Announcements that are a year or a year and a half away honestly aren't ideal for me but at the end of the day they're not the worst either. It gets egregious when it's more than 2 years. Given how little we know about stuff past the first part of this year, I'm starting to hope the game industry is shifting away from that and take after the Fallout 4 model. Though of course there's exceptions like Sony's E3/PSX announcements which are probably 2018 at the earliest.

 

[Brix]

When they announce a game that interests me I say "Kool, I'll pick it up at release as long as it doesn't review horribly." I do realize it takes awhile to complete games so I don't get bothered if a game gets delayed. I would rather have a complete polished game than a rushed, broken, incomplete piece of garbage. I don't get bothered if a game gets released 4 years after it's first initial reveal because I know I'll have plenty of other games to play.

 

[Famassu]

Don't really understand why people get their panties in a bunch when it comes to games like Kingdom Hearts III being announced early. We know it's a long time coming and the implications were really clear that it was the project Osaka Team started working on after Dream Drop Distance.

FFVII Remake could be argued to have been revealed too early but even then it is a bit different than something like FFVsXIII because we know they are actively working on it. It's not something that will take second place to other games and there is no FFXIV1.0 fiasco in the horizon that will require the attention of most of SQEX.

That said, what's the harm in knowing about the existence of games? Seems like the bigger problem is some you obsessing about them more than stuff just being announced. So long as publishers aren't too flimsy with the announced games and too trigger-happy cancelling many announced games (see: MS and all the cancelled XB1 games), there's really no harm in announcing games, especially if they are actively being worked on.

 

[Baleoce]

OK but Sony "won" E3 by showing off a bunch of games, one of which was announced years before, the other two of which are nowhere near release. So as long as people say things like Sony "won" E3 by showing off games that are maybe five years away from release, companies will keep doing this.

Yeah this is a big part of the problem. We lap this stuff up.

 

[random25]

It's all about the hype, baby!

Let's be honest, if SE didn't show that FFVII:R trailer, a lot of people here will be whining and complaining and posting that Hashimoto gif every single time.

 

[Trey]

It would annoy me considerably if games I strongly anticipated did this. As it stands now, what Square Enix is doing perplexes me. Why not announce when you need have a clear target release date in mind?

Most publishers can accomplish as much.

 

[Gentleman Jack]

It also feels weird calling these things Hype Cycle.

It's just bad project management that lengthened development times beyond what anybody should have to endure.

 

[Zarth]

Not so sure its as intentional so much as massive delays on the most recent FF titles...

 

[raven777]

It's not Square. It's Nomura.

lmao no

 

[Famassu]

It also feels weird calling these things Hype Cycle.

It's just bad project management that lengthened development times beyond what anybody should have to endure.

It's not bad management. It's big current gen games taking a long time to be developed because no one develops games like KHIII and FFVII Remake in 2-3 years. Games like KHIII are comparable to games like Horizon and Horizon hasn't been made with any better management or faster than KHIII.

 

[Wagram]

I don't really mind it as long as the product comes out okay. Final Fantasy XV was not worth the wait. While decent and with some good ideas, I don't want another unfinished product.

 

[Via Purifico]

It's not Square. It's Nomura.

It must be a meme at this point.

This is Square as an entire company and their management. AAA development is expensive and takes time I get that but it feels like with each passing gen less games are coming out for them.

I wouldn't mind it if they scaled back the big AAA productions.

 

[Balb]

It's not bad management. It's big current gen games taking a long time to be developed because no one develops games like KHIII and FFVII Remake in 2-3 years. Games like KHIII are comparable to games like Horizon and Horizon hasn't been made with any better management or faster than KHIII.

How long was Horizon in development? KH3 will likely be released at least 5 years after it was announced (E3 2013).

 

[ArkhamFantasy]

How long was Horizon in development?.

Since 2011, same with Dreams.

 

[Cipherr]

Personally, I don't really care.

This is part of the problem IMO. I was in the FF7 thread saying the same thing. You mean not only is the game split into 3 parts, but only part 1 makes it this gen and the other two pieces are TBA? The hell kind of shit is that?

Yet right after I post folks are like "What's wrong with that"?

Umm everything? How about the 3 part shit is terrible to begin with, and now it cannot even come out this goddamn generation? The days of 7 8 9, Tactics, Xenogears, Chrono Cross and more out in a single generation almost seems like a dream at this point. But gamers just don't seem to give a fuck anymore. Everything is met with this... apathy.

Christ if the development is going to take 2 generations then at LEAST people should be all for cutting the damn hype announcements for this crap short. There's really nothing good about announcing some project that won't really be completed for another ~6 years dude, I mean come on... But apparently you can't even get a consensus on that.

 

[Burbeting]

Since 2011, same with Dreams.

Still, it was officially revealed at E32015, targeting a 2016 release which would have hit the 18 month deadline. It got delayed only later.

 

[Primethius]

Is 2 really an issue for them given the fairly impressive sales of FFXV?

In fact, I don't even agree with 1 as an issue. And so, I'm not convinced by either 1 through 3 as actual issues they have to tackle.

 

[GuitarAtomik]

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?

Personally, I think all games should adhere to this. As a recent example, I was pretty hyped for The Last Guardian when it was announced, but by the time it released I couldn't care less. Still haven't played it and I'm not in any rush to either. It's pretty obvious I wasn't alone in that. Announcing in the same year as release worked for Fallout 4. It will probably work or other big brands.

I agree though that S-E is especially egregious with this. I'm curious if it's them not adjusting their marketing strategies to longer dev times, or maybe they feel like they need to keep people hyped about the company with new teases, or maybe they think it's working for them, or what.

 

[quesalupa]

I kind of love it tbh. There's always some ridiculous dream game on hold and it's a magical experience when it's finally shown off.

 

[LordRaptor]

I don't think its fair to portray it as a West versus East thing, because the Enix side of things seem to be able to project manage effectively.

 

[Elfstruck]

Christ if the development is going to take 2 generations then at LEAST people should be all for cutting the damn hype announcements for this crap short. There's really nothing good about announcing some project that won't really be completed for another ~6 years dude, I mean come on... But apparently you can't even get a consensus on that.

LOL. I'm glad that the game exists, that's all I care about. I don't sit around doing nothing and wait for the game to come out. What's wrong with that?

 

[Mik317]

eh as long as it does come out who cares? Games are becoming more and more difficult to make...so things like time and budget rises (often unexpectedly). It bein announced early doesn't really change much in the long run.

sometimes having things to look forward to makes life worth it. And on the company side of things, it gives you something to point to as coming. Living project to project isn't the best way to go about things IMO.

A game will come out when its ready to. Its up to you to fill the time with other things until then...because if ONE game is all you have to look forward to then perhaps you need a new hobby.

 

[Vital Tundra]

Its pretty ridiculous. SE really needs to change their management structure.

 

[RangerBAD]

They don't take that long for hype. It's because of bad management. Sakaguchi was the only one to keep it tight. Putting Nomura on so many project wasn't a good idea either.

 

[Toth]

I don't know that you can pin the catastrophic delay between announcement/release of the fabula nova crystallis debacle on one man. Things don't get that bad unless they're systemic.

Aside from the longer expected development time on 13, the FNC would not have been a mess if Versus came out when it was expected. FF13-2 and LR were largely created because there were no games close to being ready to come out during the FFXIV fiasco and rebuilding phase. So Nomura was indeed part of the problem. Toriyama, ironically, probably saved their bacon by releasing XIII and creating two sequels as quickly as he did.

 

[Gentleman Jack]

Toriyama, ironically, probably saved their bacon by releasing XIII and creating two sequels as quickly as he did.

Which is precisely what you would expect someone with the ability to scope, delegate and finish a task with a deadline to do. I wonder what that job title is. Nomura was a shitty manager working for even shittier managers. I feel like laying the blame all one one guy kind of ignores the problems Square had getting games out that Nomura barely worked on or didn't work on at all.

 

[Kastrioti]

I remember when they announced FF9, FFX and FF11 on the same day with the subsequent articles in game magazines like EGM.

I seriously can't believe that FF7R was announced at E3 2015 and may not make 2018. I understand game development is different but Square is by far the worst when it comes to release schedules for their big franchises.

 

[StoveOven]

More developers and publishers should follow the Cyberpunk 2077 route. Announce when development starts and then disappear until you have something substantial to show. The secrecy and reliance on "hype cycles" that the videogame industry is super weird and unhealthy. I don't think Square is necessarily handling this perfectly, but it's honestly nice to know that these games exist.

 

[Pachinko]

They lost their way around the same time their lead producer (Hironobu Sakaguchi) quit the studio. Read that giant FF7 feature over at Polygon , the people who were left at Square after the gooch resigned (along with the president of the company) were the type to follow directions well but had never really been left in charge of a team. Suddenly they had to take on new roles and their egos got the better of them all.

Think about Tetsuya Nomura in particular - he's a notorious perfectionist but like most artists can't stand to actually finish something so after getting his feet wet with the first Kingdom Hearts he was tasked with co-directing a feature length film , producing a couple KH spinoff games AND making a sequel.

I should add that the FFXII announcement OP has listed as 2001 is incorrect. I don't recall seeing anything signifying the games development was actually started until at least 2003. Still, it was clearly intended for release in late 2004 and got delayed twice, the second delay leading to the nervous breakdown and departure of it's director.

There's also the fact that games just take longer to make than they did 20 years ago unless you want them built like an automobile. (and even activision has strayed from that method , given the call of duty teams 36 months each to build a new title with this generation of games)

Consider , if you will, the amount of work it took to make a snes final fantasy title versus a PS1 entry versus a PS2 entry. Just for starters. So yeah, those 16 bit games took 12 months or so to build. You had 30-40 people working on them the entire time. Probably 1 or 2 engineers and a bunch of sprite artists, a single writer , etc. The complexity of what they were making mostly involved drawing tile sheets and having a level designer place them on a grid. Sprites were drawn too obviously , counting each frame as it's own sprite there may have been as many as 500 character sprites. 100+ high detailed (but static) monster sprites for battles and then other graphics like a menu , character portraits ,etc. A few people then had to use the game engine to make it function as an actual game, placing events and switches to make sure the whole thing runs properly and finally testing it out. It's still a big undertaking of course but , now lets look at what it took to make a PSone entry -

Instead of building maps with tiles, everything was pre-rendered. Battle scenes and character models were all built with triangles , every single thing you see had to be sculpted by a 3D artist based on a 2D sketch , all hand animated. From FF7 onward it wasn't unusual to see 60 minutes or so of high quality CG being used to help tell the story, someone had to make that stuff, the exact same way as a film like Toy Story. The core game design mechanic still followed a mostly linear fashion but you know, 200 people worked on the game instead of 30-40. That's how ff7,8,9 got finished in 12 months.

Once you make it to the PS2 era though , well now the CG has to be twice as detailed so you need a bigger team on that. Every single object that was modeled with triangles in the PS1 entries STILL has to be modeled with triangles but now there are 10-20 times as many of them which means more artists and more time. Instead of basic textures , higher quality ones are needed - more people, more time, more money. Not to mention that with FFX onward, every entry had voice over work so now you needed to deal with the memory limits of that, recording voices , locking in story elements sooner to make sure they get recorded properly, etc etc. The biggest change though, instead of static pre-rendered 2d bitmaps, a very large portion of FFX,X-2,XI,XII used fully 3D environments, every single object within those rooms, hallways, roads and such all had to be modeled by someone in 3D. The increase in detail means flat out that everything takes more time and in FFX's case I don't think the team got much bigger they just had to work 'better" and it still took them 50% longer to make FFX than it did FFIX because of the extra work load ... for what is arguably a more linear game.

So, you come along to the PS3/360 era and the same shit's happening as before but now the detail level is a 100 fold increase in complexity instead of just a 10 fold increase and with budgets already being on the high side well, team sizes didn't get much larger. It also didn't help that Square and many other developers were mislead about the actual power of the new consoles in 2005/2006. So they made game designs that needed something closer to a regular PS4 and tried to cram them onto a PS3. It didn't go well. It took 3 years to build an engine that fully utilized the PS3 how square wanted for FFXIII , FFXIV was kind of doing it's own thing engine wise and it took 5 years to polish that up. FFXIII as a game was built in closer to 2 years but look at it - beautiful highly detailed art but it's very shallow as a game because they still couldn't get their engine to handle properly large areas. VersusXIII was probably intended for release a year after XIII to keep things padded out but then the engine got delayed and by the time they started really working on Versus (2010) it was quickly determined that the game didn't really work with XIII's engine. So after 2 years of trying they gave up , Nomura was removed and voluntold to work on KH3 instead. A producer that actually managed to ship finished games was told to do the same with this one and here we are , roughly 4 years of full production later , enjoying FFXV.

And that's what it comes down to - even when things go well , big games take a while to make now.

3 years to make a single AAAA title with multiplayer with a team of 400 people. That's insane, 1200 man years of development.

Rebuilding FFXV from the ashes of Versus XIII took almost 4 years but as anyone that has played it knows, it shipped about 6 months sooner than it probably should have. Realistically it could have taken closer to 5 full years (as a PS4 project). So in a way it was actually finished ahead of schedule.

An example that's more similar to SQX japan titles - Bioware. After finishing Dragon Age 2, that team started work on Inquisition. That would have been sometime in 2011. DA:I ended up shipping in late 2014. So roughly 4 years. Likewise - Mass Effect Andromeda is due out in a couple of months. Roughly 5 years almost to the day since ME3 shipped.

So , I mean in a way I agree with the ops comments - games in general are hyped to early but , they are frigging expensive to build and take a long ass time now. Publishers feel they have to announce things too early in order to make sure they get their money back , especially on uncertain IP's.

I mean, this thread is mostly a response to all the bad press on FF7R's current release date of "never" and how frustrating it is to maintain any kind of excitement for a thing you badly want that might be years off but let's lay down the facts on that quick shall we -

FF7R announced at E3 2015, a little over 18 months ago. Word later came out through interviews that the project was only given a green light earlier that same year. Fast forward to PSX 2015 only 6 months later and suddenly it looks like they've got a super far along playable build of the game. You know, like, maybe it will make it out in time for it's 20th anniversary after all ? Then, all of 2016 goes by with nary a peep about the game. Now, it's early 2017 still and over the course of 2 interviews, the fans begin panicking - Nomura states "it's still a ways off" , Kitase mentions " they've got a real time version of what they demoed in 2015 working at the level they want to hit with the whole product". So , sadly , as it turns out the "gameplay demo" shown at PSX in 2015 was equivalent to the KH3 announcement teaser , the same type of trailer FFXV got at E3 in 2013 (of which 90% of that stuff didn't make it into the game at all). It was little more than a target render of what they hoped to achieve. Well, here we are a year later and it seems they've only just got that visual quality in realtime with unreal engine 4 working properly.

So what does that mean ? well, at the very least they intend to have a playable build up and running this year at a tradeshow at some point(and honestly I wouldn't be surprised if the PS4 version of DQXI included a demo for it's western release) so that tells me they've got the engine where they want it, they can start building the game properly. An act which, if you read my ramblings above - takes anywhere from 12 months to 36 months. Should we all give up hope on playing this game anytime soon ? well, I guess that depends how soon you wanted to play it exactly. I know I was really hoping for a late 2017 release but I had to admit that even if they started development early in 2015 (which it's pretty clear they did not) you'd be looking at at least 36 months of dev time, that puts us at late 2018. We also know that Nomura is juggling the final pieces of KH3's development and that it probably WILL hit a 2018 release date (5 years for a brand new game is pretty standard as I mention above, and 2013-2018 is 5 years). Once it's done, I imagine his full attention will be directed at helping finish FF7R part 1.

All this ranting done now , FF7 isn't really "late" unless it manages to get delayed until 2019 or later. The real question for me was always "how long will it be between each entry". The only other game that did something like this was Starcraft 2 which , while intended for a 2009 release ended up coming out in 2010 instead... and then it was 2012 for part 2 and 2015 for part 3. So breaking into 3 games , each one still took 2 years or so to make.

The best advice I can give is to not get excited for buying a new game until it has a real honest to gosh release date AND you can deal with the inevitable 6 month delay.

This is why I have to applaud Horizon, I thought for sure that was going to get bumped another month or 2 just like Uncharted 4 last year but here we are and it's gone gold !

 

[potatohead]

They have a shit load of problems. This is one of them.

 

[Lingitiz]

As ridiculous as it is, the mere announcements of FFXV and Kingdom Hearts 3 probably sold a lot of consoles, which I'm sure the entire industry is happy about.

 

[MatrixMan.EXE]

I still think that there aren't that many cases of them doing this. The problem is that when they have announce games too early, it's been very high profile titles (FFXII, FFXIII, Versus XIII/XV, KH3). Either way, they should definitely stop doing that.