"The seismic effects of market shifts and economic gloom in combination with a rather short release list have made a significant impact for Square Enix. In 2007, twenty-two releases spread across five systems (DS, PSP, PS2, Wii, 360) added up to a shockingly huge 6.4 million units sold.

In contrast, Square Enix's 2008 effort of ten releases across four systems (DS, PSP, Wii, 360) resulted in a far lesser 1.7 million units sold.* This is a 4.5 million unit difference and is a eye-popping 73.81% decline from 2007."

http://chartget.blogspot.com/2008/11/japan-square-enix-2008-unit-sales-down.html

2007
[NDS] Dragon Quest IV - (1,201,771)
[PSP] Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII - (753,939)
[NDS] Final Fantasy IV - (612,044)
[NDS] Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings - (524,009)
[Wii] Dragon Quest Swords: The Masked Queen and the Tower of Mirrors - (486,222)
[NDS] Itadaki Street DS - (413,537)
[NDS] Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fate - (389,845)
[PS2] Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix+ - (337,091)
[PSP] Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions - (301,796)
[NDS] Final Fantasy Tactics A2: The Sealed Grimoire - (287,871)
[PSP] Star Ocean 1 First Departure - (204,996)
[NDS] Subarashiki Kono Sekai: It's a Wonderful World - (192,955)
[PS2] Final Fantasy XII International Zodiac Job System - (137,040)
[PSP] Final Fantasy Anniversary Edition - (124,839)
[NDS] Heroes of Mana - (98,566)
[PS2] Final Fantasy XI: Wings of the Goddess expansion data disk - (95,576)
[PSP] Final Fantasy II Anniversary Edition - (78,057)
[Wii] Chocobo's Mystery Dungeon: The Labyrinth of Lost Time - (72,710)
[NDS] Front Mission - (57,153)
[PS2] Final Fantasy X International (ULTIMATE) - (47,676)
[360] Final Fantasy XI: Wings of the Goddess expansion data disk - (15,379)
[360] Final Fantasy XI: Vana'diel Collection - (3,212)
TOTAL - (6,436,284)



2008*
[NDS] Dragon Quest V - (1,152,229)
[PSP] Star Ocean: Second Evolution - (141,218)
[NDS] Valkyrie Profile: The Accused One - (118,374)
[360] Infinite Undiscovery - (96,197)
[NDS] Cid and Chocobo's Mystery Dungeon: The Labyrinth of Lost Time DS+ - (46,362)
[NDS] Sigma Harmonics - (42,552)
[NDS] Nanashi no Game (The Game with no Name) - (41,481)
[NDS] Front Mission 2089: Border of Madness - (32,917)
[Wii] Soul Eater: Monotone Princess - (8,198)
[NDS] DS Bookkeeping, Level 3 - (6,044)
TOTAL - (1,685,572)

0 PS3 games and 1 Wii game

btw infinitie undiscovery for 360 is over tracked or are these figures Japan only?(the game has shipped  96K we have 345K sold to customers.)

Serves them right.

I dunno why, but it probably has something to do with there being a lot less games released this year compared to last...
If these lists have shown anything though, it's that SE sucks hard nowadays. Nothing but remakes, Re-releases, spin offs and mediocrity.

P.S. - IU is not overtracked, these are Japan numbers only.

Several Fairly simple reasons add up to a huge effect

2008 is not over
The entire Japanese Market is down this year
Less releases means less sales - if alot of their teams released games in 2007, then they're just starting games in 2008
You missed a game - Chrono Trigger, which could hit 500k by the end of 08
Less Final Fantasy spin offs/remakes

Sigh they could have easily added at least 100 or more probably 200k more if they released IU on PS3.

Well, take a look at all the Final Fantasy stuff on the 2007 list.

Maybe some people should click and read the original article in the link before posting their questions :

There's 'Japan' written directly in the link. You make your own deduction with that...

And quoted from the article :

"* It should be noted that Chrono Trigger DS and The Last Remnant have both just released and may change the scope of these results slightly, but not enough to significantly alter the analysis.

Source = Famitsu Historical Data"

the world ends with you sold that little? i am playing it and its an awesome game :D one of the best square game in years

uhmm.. I think it's not all that telling to just look at games in the year they released and dismiss all sales they have in the following year etc. ... SE just released far less games and far less franchise games in 2008 and that's all there is to it from what I see in this "analysis"