I like how some forum dwellers think they understand the JPN market better than anyone.

You may have a point overall, but the bolded is an unnecessary exaggeration. It's far from a disaster. It's good but not great for FF standards. If a more Western FF game helps it sell better in the West and equal overall, I see no problem with lower (yet in no way disastrous) sales in Japan.

PS4 is the market leader on Japan, handheld is a different market.

That isn't "benefit of doubt" It is that every single Final Fantasy game sold almost 10 millions on PS.

That should be fairy obvious; because Microsoft offer hardware that SE's AAA titles can be easily scaled onto, while Nintendo haven't. It's for that same reason that we've seen Final Fantasy progressively move further into the PC market too.

SE have been one of the 3DS's strongest 3rd party supporters. They clearly have no problem supporting a Nintendo system when they consider it worth their time. What they clearly aren't interested in though is either fundamentally re-engineering their games to serve a fraction of the market (the WiiU), or alienating the overwhelming majority of an existing fan-base (in this instance Final Fantasy's) in favour of the 3DS. If they were going down that rout, i'd expect them to skip straight to mobile. That at least is a growing market.

Enix has been a strong supporter of 3DS (bet the guy who pushed for DQXI on 3DS/Switch is feeling pretty damn vindicated today) ... but the Square side I'd say has been fairly dissapointing. 

Who's dick does Nintendo have to suck at Square to get some real Final Fantasy? World of Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy X couldn't have been on the 3DS but rather go to Vita (a system that has less than 1/4 the sales). 

20 million install base only gets you two music game spin-offs? Really Square? Really?  

IMO Square has had a bias towards Nintendo since the N64 days, it's time the executives at the company took charge of the situation and said "you're supporting Switch, period. Stop crying". I think some cold hard reality is going to be dawning on the Square side of the company given these sales. They've let the inmates (the developers) run the aslyum and it's taking the company right down the toilet. 

Nintendo has made some poor hardware choices, but Switch looks like an honest attempt to make a powerful system *given* the limitations of portability, which is the only type of game platform Japan will accept today. It's time Japanese developers instead of shunning Nintendo understand that Nintendo is trying to save the damn industry in Japan so that *they* themselves also have some kind of future to work with other than iOS. 

No one had to push for DQXI to be on the 3DS roflmao It's the other way around. Someone at Square Enix pushed for a PS4 version (most likely Horii). It was always going to be on the 3DS. And you seem to forget Final Fantasy Explorers.

Actually it would not surprise me in the least if Nintendo had to lobby a bit to get DQXI on 3DS/Switch. 

If DQ had any sort of decent sales potential in the West, Square-Enix foolishly probably would've made it a PS4/XB1 release and let that be that. 

Because they know 90% of DQ's sales would be in Japan they probably went "aw shit, I think we probably should throw Nintendo or two, just in case". 

3DS honestly is not supported by Japanese devs nearly as strongly as it should be. 

This is also terrible for Square-Enix's future. Final Fantasy is the cornerstone of the company, if its large decline like this (is it even one of the top 5 franchises in Japan any more? Splatoon at 1.5 million is likely going to have a higher LTD on the Wii U) .... yikes Square-Enix. 

Yeah, because spending millions of dollars to make a game for a tiny demographic (the PS4 in Japan) makes sense. I swear, some of these companies seem to be run by idiots lol. I wonder if the 3DS version and PS4 version will release at the same time. We all know that the PS4 version will get delayed (like every other Square game), but the 3DS is nearing the end of its life cycle. This could be another disaster waiting to happen. 

And people say that FF XV is a game catered to Western gamers. Really? Have you taken one look at the main characters? That's not catered to Western gamers. Fallout, The Witcher and The Elder Scrolls are catered to the West. I'm not sure who FF XV was catered at. Obviously it will sell in the West - on brand recognition alone. If this was marketed as a new IP I doubt it would do well in the West.

The PS4 version could still sell 1m in Japan which might be enough to cover the cost depending on what it is. But the PS4 version is Square Enix's attempt at making the franchise more popular outside of Japan. Also that's simply what Horii wanted and what Horii wants Horii gets lol

When you think about it, there's a pretty good chance Final Fantasy XV is the most expensive Japanese made game ever. 

These sales are a really bad omen for Japanese AAA development.

I think Japanese developers have miscalculated the success of the PS4 as well thinking it was basically PS2-all-over-again. It's not. It's very popular in the West with WESTERN games. Final Fantasy XV underperforming and Street Fighter V flopping should be sobering wake up calls. In Japan the PS4 is selling relatively poorly, it is no second coming of the PS2 in Japan. Traditional gaming is under serious threat.