Kresnik said:
I don't think it's possible for them to go more "all in" on mobile than they are already, and look what position they're in now. They've had a lot of problems with AAA development over the past generation but I feel like they're over the worst of it now. Mobile is a cash cow in certain situations, but not in the way they're currently approaching it. Case in point: DQ8 mobile vs. DQM2 3DS. The latter sold 800k full price copies; the former notably underperformed. They were on to a good thing with their handheld remakes of DQ titles, but rather stupidly decided to throw that all away to chase after the mobile audience. The money is there if the games are right - for example, Dragon Quest Monsters Super Lite or whatever it's called - is doing very well for them. But that's build-from-the-ground-up F2P not ported. I think we'll see the same amount of that, but less mobile development overall because less ports. In addition, I think a few games have opened their eyes to stuff lately. Namely Bravely Default performing well in both the east and west. For so long they ditched all their "mid tier" IP's, but for whatever reason they decided to gamble again on BD and it seems to have paid off for them. I think there's a lot riding on Bravely Default 2 performing well, but I think we could see a return to more mid-tier stuff from them, at least for handhelds. Mentioning FFX HD as being a good performer, too, may well have opened the door for more HD ports, too (starting with FF XII HD). And in addition, I have to wonder if they look at the financial results of other Japanaese companies and take notes. When you see Tecmo Koei performing well in being a mid-tier publisher with a load of mid-tier games; while Bamco perform best of all with a lot of small-to-mid-tier stuff geared at the Japanese market mixed in with their new focus on F2P for consoles, then I'd have thought that SE might take a lesson or two from that. |
Good post.Square was too disappointing throughout last gen compared to past generations, but maybe it´ll be better, at least a bit, going forward, if we´re to believe their CEO´s words about how 'they had lost focus, BD opening their eyes' and that they´re going to rectify that.We´ll see.
And Capcom...I wonder how things will go for them.
