Square Enix looking for foreign publisher
- Posted September 25th, 2007 at 07:17 EDT by
- 2,277 views
- 21 Comments
Purveyors of rear-end kicking RPG games, Square Enix, are looking a foreign publisher to, well, publish its games outside of the land of the rising sun.
In a conversation with the Financial Times, Michihiro Sasaki, Senior VP, said how the company would like to have a bigger presence in North America, as only about 20% of it’s revenue comes from outside of Japan.
Everyman and his dog in Japan knows who and what Square Enix is, and probably have an extensive collection of Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy games. This means there is little room for growth in their homeland, while the Western video game market is forever expanding, only having just recovering from the video game crash of 1983 a few years ago.
Sasaki-san added: “We need to seek co-operation with a US publisher - we need local content…our strength is in role-playing games and fantasy titles, so it is a bit difficult to appeal to the US market”. He would like to be having half his sales coming from overseas in a few years time.
As long as we still get Square’s epic fantasy quests, there shouldn’t be any lynch mobs outside of the publisher’s office.
Stay tuned.
Source: Financial Times
Comments
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Solid_Squirrel |
ZeroTheSquirrel- 7:33am BST - September 25th, 2007
- 1
Sony should defitnetly jump at this oppurtunity
they'll reap many rewards for this :D
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swanky2167 |
Sanguinary- 8:47am BST - September 25th, 2007
- 3
I'm more worried about Microsoft deciding to publish Square-Enix games
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Kojiro000 |
ShinKojiro- 11:32am BST - September 25th, 2007
- 6
Id publish all of square-enix's games.... if I could. and yeahm Sony should jusp to be squares publisher in the US. oh, and im sure if Square put more blood, violence and needless death in their games, us Westerners would jump all over that right? :) Look at Fable. you can go Slaughter a whole village for no aparent reason, us westerners love that (I Hate that game) @swanky2167, i doubt square would ever accept Microsofts offer, since that would mean they wouldnt be able to put FFXIII on ps3 anymore. theyve made every game except 1 for the PS1/2/3
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Dragon-slayer87 |
Dragon-Slayer87- 12:12pm BST - September 25th, 2007
- 8
Always the US market... What about the EU market... :@
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Nosferatu
- 12:31pm BST - September 25th, 2007
- 9
If this is the case will the final fantasy franchises in the future and other square enix titles such as dragon quests hit united states ever again. If this is the case then maybe american publishers and developers and studios dont wanna take in such a a genre because how united states seems highly fascinated by First person shooters 100% the other genres are medium state though.
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mystik4l06 |
mystikal06- 2:58pm BST - September 25th, 2007
- 11
@swanky....well i doubt it...i dont think they would go to microsoft...although in a business perspective that might be the best way to go....but they have been the most loyal to sony despite the fact they brought FF11 to x-box and that was a good idea actually cuz it was online only but yea u get my point..
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swanky2167 |
Sanguinary- 3:10pm BST - September 25th, 2007
- 12
@kojiro and mystik
I don't think SE would mind bringing their products to 360, since they are in obvious, and very public, disagreement with how Sony is handling the marketing of the PS3. If they don't think the PS3 will sell, why wouldn't they start adopting a new lead console for their games? And if I were Microsoft, I would look at SE's doubts towards the PS3 and try to get them to change allegiances.
**edit** and that doesn't mean that FF13 would be ported to the 360, it could be exempt from any deal made. Only future titles could be made 360 exclusive.
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JouninGarrett
- 3:29pm BST - September 25th, 2007
- 13
What? Video game crash recent? That was 25 years ago...Square wasn't nearly what they are now. You make it sound as though they had already taken over the Japanese market in 1983...that crash was worldwide. This site is the worst for news. Oh, and Square was going under in 1987 and they released Final Fantasy, intending for it to be their FINAL game, hence the name. It went on to sell as well as Dragon Quest and kept Squaresoft afloat. Your article makes no sense...
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FrostyCass |
Eyedentify- 9:08pm BST - September 25th, 2007
- 15
@ jouninGarrett
Yea that line "only having just recovering from the video game crash of 1983 a few years ago." made me laugh. I had to read that twice just to make sure thats what it said.
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JouninGarrett
- 12:04am BST - September 26th, 2007
- 16
@frosty cass
Yeah, I made several comments on their recent "FF7 re-make announcement @ TGS" topic and several users agreed with me. Guess what? The article is completely missing off the site now. The idiots who run this site had someone call them out, got scared, and took it down. And I 'loled' at the 1983 recent thing too.
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rossinator_99
- 12:16am BST - September 26th, 2007
- 17
for those of you wondering about 1983, they mean that s.e. just recovered afew years ago. 1983 afew years ago? c'mon and think a little.
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PS3-The Ultimate Machine
- 5:44am BST - September 26th, 2007
- 18
This will be the biggest kick in the nuts for either MS or SCEA,I just hope SCEA can fork out the cash for this one.
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bluesuedeshoes
- 7:18am BST - September 26th, 2007
- 19
I might be mistaken but I thought SCEA and SCEE have both published Square games in the past in America and Europe respectively. I think what Square is after is a partner who can help push them in the West who has experience of marketing to westerners someone like Ubisoft or EA would be the comapanies that spring to mind. Also given Sony's continued weak sales of the PS3 I'm sorry but Square-Enix would have to look at publishing games for the Wii and the Xbox 360 if they ever wished to get 50% of their sales from Overseas. The PS3 is too expensive and its selling slowly because of it and Sony need to wake up because I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of Japanese Devs started to follow Capcoms lead and do more for the 360. Its not about throwing money at Square-Enix for exclusivity deals, this is about publishing their games in Western markets in a way that would appeal to us Westerner. Decisions on exlcusivity etc. are completely separate and as such I'd expect them to go for niether Microsoft or Sony as a publishing partner given their obviously limited focus.
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JouninGarrett
- 8:51am BST - September 26th, 2007
- 20
@rossinator
No, they are definitely talking about the Western Market...Square recovered nicely in '87 when the first FF was released and Enix has always been doing well thanks in part to their Dragon Quest series. Seriously, this site is littered with morons.
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