Just a few months ago, Final Fantasy XV director Hajime Tabata mentioned that FFXV was the franchise’s "last chance" in the sense that if it didn’t move units, the franchise would be put on ice. Well, here we are a few months after, and Final Fantasy XV is not only a success critically, but financially, too.
Just how much? Try over 6.5 million units sold! This sales figure was revealed by none other than Tabata himself during an interview. Speaking to GameSpot, Tabata mentioned the Final Fantasy XV sales number casually while also mentioning the upcoming Windows edition of FFXV, and even the "pcket" edition.
Hajime Tabata: From a business standpoint, we’ve achieved over 6.5 million units, and the fact that we’re still going to be putting out content till the launch of the Windows Edition–and then we have the Pocket Edition–this project has been very successful for us. But from a personal level, and from a dev team standpoint, what really resonates with us is the fan feedback we got from the day one release. A lot of the major criticisms was that they felt the story was lacking in certain aspects. So for us, we did our best to give back and supplement those areas where people felt it was lacking.
When those fans who were complaining about the story from the early days are now completely satisfied with the overall experience, that’s the moment when we can say as a team that we’re pleased with what we did for Final Fantasy XV. And obviously, we don’t plan to draw this out forever. At some point we’re going to have to mark the end of the journey for Final Fantasy XV. With that said, we’re still listening to what the fans want and expect for this game.
With that level of success, it’s now wonder why other game franchises and studios are collaborating with Square Enix on FFXV. As for Tabata-san and his team, they’re already targeting their new project but not for this generation of consoles, but for the PS5.