Seriously that opening for FFXV is ... a disaster. Once one of the top franchises in Japan now can't even hit 700k its opening week? There's no spinning how devastating this is. This one proud franchise used to clear 2 million in its first week without breaking a sweat there.
"Eurogamer also notes that the game was the most downloaded game on launch day for any title released in Japan" I don't know what that amounts to, and perhaps they meant only PS4, but it sounds like it may very well be closer to 1 million than 700k. Keep in mind that Final Fantasy XIII and older games never offered a digital version on Day 1. Additionally, Square Enix said they've shipped 5 million units worldwide (and shipments are also based on pre-order numbers, etc), which is a record for the series. So I think it's very premature to call doom and gloom. Definitely not fair to compare it to the golden days of PS1. A lot of franchises, besides Pokemon, are selling significantly lower in Japan these days.
I think Square-Enix hitching their wagon to Sony has caught up to them. Why has Nintendo never been given a main line Final Fantasy game despite having the best selling system in Japan for each of the last two generations by a large margin? Bet they are counting their lucky stars Dragon Quest XI will be on 3DS and Switch too, otherwise they would be in big, big trouble with Dragon Quest as well.
You mean why has a Nintendo home console never (or barely ever) been given a mainline Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Street Fighter, Guilty Gear, Devil May Cry, Resident Evil, Tekken, Soul Calibur, Megaman X, Dynasty Warriors, Tales of, Dragon Quest, Yakuza, Castlevania, Metal Gear Solid, etc, and the list goes on.
Basically every single major Japanese developer avoids Nintendo's home consoles with their mainline titles, and either put none of them on Nintendo's home console, or very few of them. Instead they shift their focus on Nintendo's portable systems.
They need to get over their biases or whatever the reason is of the last 20 years and get over it. It's not 1998 anymore. This is 2016 now and things have changed big time.
There's no bias. If there ever was a wedge between Nintendo and Square, it's obviously long gone. Because they've put out a lot of great titles on Nintendo's handheld. Like I said, it's pretty much every single major Japanese developer.
How many traditional Resident Evil games have appeared on a Nintendo home console since N64? - 4/10 Mainline Street Fighter? - 0/7 Metal Gear Solid? 1/5 (1/6 if you consider Peace Walker mainline) Devil May Cry? - 0/5 Dynasty Warriors? - 0/8. (They got a few spinoffs though) Megaman X? - 0/5 Tales of? - 3/15 Tekken? 1/8 Yakuza? 0/7 Persona? 0/5 Shin Megami Tensei? 0/2
So this is not something unique to Square Enix by any stretch of the imagination. It's everyone.
Some times some of them put a some of their mainline games on Nintendo consoles. But that's the very rare exception rather than the rule. And usually it's for the hyper successful Wii, unless its a paid exclusive like Resident Evil 4 and Tales of Symphonia. It's not an issue of bias, because many of these franchises either started on Nintendo's home consoles, and/or still appear on Nintendo's handhelds. The issue is that since N64, Nintendo keep making hardware that no one other than Nintendo want to put most of their big titles on. And the Switch seems to be no different so far.
Capcom just showed Marvel vs Capcom Infinite. It was not announced for Switch. Surprise? It's not a coincidence that this has happened for decades among all developers. So don't single out Square, who at least have put more quality titles on Gameboy/DS/3DS than many of the other companies I mentioned.
It's time for the Japanese community to support Nintendo again unless they want to gauruntee their own destruction. Street Fighter V bombing on PS4 was bad enough, this needs to be a huge wake up call. The traditional home only console in Japan is dead, it's time to rally around the portable/home Switch.
If you've paid any attention to Street Fighter V, you'll see that it has little to do with PS4, as it sold way worse on PC, and more to do with them releasing the game in an unfinished state, and getting hammered for it by critics and gamers alike. Their reason for doing so was to get it out in time for their Capcom Pro Tour. The hardcore Street Fighter fans didn't seem to mind much, because they had what they needed the most. Training mode and Online play. But the casual audiance did mind. Street Fighter 4 had a long life cycle though, and Capcom plan on updating SFV with content until at least 2020.
Japanese developers better hope Switch does well in Japan, because it's curtains to the traditional Japanese game industry if it does not take off. It's going to go smartphone only and you're going to see Dragon Quest XII and Final Fantasy games launching on mobile if Switch does not succeed.
I don't think Switch is the answer. Wii was extremely successful, and yet the same happened there. Most developers avoided putting their main big tittles on the Wii, with few exceptions, and instead made some "specialized" titles suiting the Wii. Now if you look at interviews with Japanese developers, you'll see a very familiar pattern. They say they want to make "different" games for the Switch.
Don't expect Final Fantasy VII Remake on Switch unless it's at least as powerful as PS4. (Or if the game gets announced for Xbox One, then as powerful as Xbox will probably do.) They want to make that game the best they can, without compromise. Downgrading the game to suit a console that may not even have Gen 8 capability may not be the way they want to do it.
This is exactly the type of thinking that's going to kill the Japanese market. Japanese gamers don't give a crap about 4K or any that stuff any way. I don't even think Japanese gamers give two shits really about 720p versus 1080p.
If DQXI can run on Switch, if Dark Souls III can run on Switch, then Final Fantasy VII damn well should be able to run on Switch. And Final Fantasy XVI even beyond that.
No one gives a shit (in Japan anyway) if some assets are compromised a bit. Hell back in the day we played Street Fighter II for hours on end on Super NES/SFC ... and that was like what? 1/4 the power of the arcade cabinet?
Every Japanese developer needs to wake the fuck up or they their precious creative fancies and fetishes are going to be working on nothing but shitty ass mobile games in a 3-4 years because that's all their bosses are going to pay them to do. Or they can go grovelling to Kickstarter to get their ideas greenlight on a shoe string budget with a team of 10 people.
