True, but I doubt that they'll halt development just because the user base isn't strong enough. I still think they'll be working on it, they just may not release until they find the install base suitable.

Either way, I think TGS will be a good indicator of where they are in development, so lets hope they give us some fresh (Hopefully good) news by then.

Also, since FFXIII could very well be a huge game, 13% could be a decent amount of content. Think of 13% of Oblivion, what would that be?

Sort of off-topic, but did people see the news today that RE5 will be releasing in 2009 - not 2008? (calender year I think).

If its going to be exclusive to the ps3 Im willing to bet 13% of FFXIII is about 30% of Oblivion since they would most likely take advantage of blu-ray.

lol, I'm sure they just wanted to tell you that A) They are about 1/7 done with FFXIII, and they just barely started working on Versus, so they used those numbers (both 13? what are the odds? how do you even measure 1.3% done with a project? "Uhhh yeah we just started drawing the dudes")

Actually Quickdraw, I hate to say this but in general the last 10% of any software project takes much longer than you might expect.  Its sometimes called the "Last Mile Problem", though that was specifically coined for telecommunications, but for software it is a similar idea.

The reason the last 10% take so long is because you have to iron out all those bugs that everyone missed.  No matter how talented your development group and no matter how many procedures you try and implement to reduce bugs, all software has them.  In general, the longer a bug has been in the system, the longer it takes to debug and fix that problem, so if you have a software project that spans years, and there are bugs from the first months of development, you can imagine the pains it takes to fix them.

This is probably a bit of a geeky joke, but oh well...."Developers often say that the first 90% of the project takes the first 90% of the development time...and the last 10% takes the other 90%!"

Is creating the graphical engine part of the completion percentage? I always thought that was the most complicated part of development. Although if it's not included, that makes sense.

Either way, thanks for the info (The More You Know!). I guess I'll keep quiet next time when I don't know what I'm talking about, =P.

Firstly, I reckon the quotes of "13%" was partly tongue in cheek.

Even if the game is only 13% complete, there are various processes to go through before getting to the build stage of the game...from concept and full storyline and ideas to build of the in-game engine.  I think we will find that 13% of the actual game is a seriously decent amount of game even at this stage...although they will require a huge amount of time at the end to iron out bugs etc and this could easily take 6 months alone for a game of this size.

I also think that SE have shifted resources from this game onto other games to get them ready on time.  Also the quote of them not being entirely happy with the sales of the PS3 thus far will back the idea that they have shifted resources hence delaying the release of the game until there is a much bigger userbase.

It's pretty apparent that the game will not be out before the end of March 2008 and with today's information, I reckon it could easily be the very end of 2008 or even creep into 2009.

I honestly reckon that SE anticipated the game to be released in 2007 or early 2008 initially, but have shifted resources to allow for the development of the platform over another 12 months or so.  By this time they will have hoped that there will be a healthy userbase of the PS3 by then possibly to the extent of 10m plus. 

If they are seriously suggesting it at as low a percentage as 13% (anything lower than 25% really), don't expect to see this until halfway through 2009. SquareEnix teams spend on average about 4 years on their main-line games nowadays.