Square Enix has released a steady stream of high-quality titles over the past year, though not all of them have been commercial successes. Speaking to investors, the company’s chief executive Takashi Kiryu said it would scale back its future offerings to ensure they were all of very high quality. This news will come as a blow to those who are fans of the more experimental RPGs the company has released in the past.
Q: Has the way your development function has spread across so many bases made it difficult to control your development efforts?
A: It has less to do with our development function and more to do with the many additions to our lineup. I want to structure our development function so that we are able to deliver higher quality from each title by reducing our lineup.
Q: Why haven’t you been able to downsize your lineup so far?
A: As the needs of our customers and the types of devices available have diversified, we have tried to produce hits by developing a wide range of titles rather than focusing on only certain ones. I believe this has resulted in splitting our resource pool. Meanwhile, there were clear winners and losers among the major titles recently released on the gaming market, and it became possible for even indie titles to make themselves felt. The market is increasingly polarized between blockbuster and indie titles, but I feel we’ve developed many titles that fall somewhere in the middle. I want to make clearer distinctions in the future.
