lord_of_flood on 12 August 2014
This sucks for consumers, but it's a logical business decision for Square Enix after how Tomb Raider did initially. Remember that the first game in the reboot series only made a profit 9 months after its release despite it ending up selling over 6 million units, and even then its profit margin wasn't particularly large. I imagine MS funded a very significant portion of this game's budget (in particular the marketing/advertising/distribution budget) to get this game as an exclusive, so having a huge portion of the budget being paid up front allows Square Enix to have a higher chance of turning a bigger profit sooner rather than risking a much smaller profit or even a potential loss.
But who knows?
NNID: TheCCluc
