“Final Fantasy” is one of the most popular gaming franchises to come out of Japan, and throughout its many installments, the game series has managed to establish its popularity outside of its home country as well. However, the game is still typically designed with a philosophy that caters more to its original Japanese audience, and not so much to people elsewhere around the world.
This hasn’t stopped its many fans from enjoying it, but it looks like its developers don’t see this as an ideal situation, and they want to make the game more appealing to a wider audience, particularly their fans in Western countries. This came straight from Hajime Tabata, the game’s director, cited by Phil Rogers, who oversees the operations of Square Enix in the Americas and Europe.
Apparently, Tabata realizes the importance of their Western fans and doesn’t want to leave them out of the loop – even though, as we said above, not many of them have been complaining about anything of that sort until now. Still, there has been some feedback from certain circles of the game’s fans who have been implying that the developers could maybe put a little more effort into making the game more accessible to those who’re not used to traditional “JRPG” – or Japenese RPG – mechanics.
And it’s quite noticeable that the latest “Final Fantasy” is making some drastic changes to the gameplay, which in some cases have been taken slightly negatively by the community. But of course, the game is still in development, and everything we’re seeing is subject to change, particularly when it comes to new gameplay features.
The company has apparently received a lot of feedback for the demo which they recently showed to the world, and they have been trying to incorporate as much of it as possible into the final game. We don’t know exactly how much we’re going to see that came from customer suggestions and similar areas, but it’s certainly encouraging to see that Square Enix are keeping an active eye on their community.
Rogers went on to say that the company sees a bright future for the “Final Fantasy” franchise and they care about it deeply, with everyone on the project having a strong determination to see the game succeed and evolve. He said that they want to see it surviving for another 10 years and managing to bring even more people to the franchise, something which can very realistically happen if the studio plays its cards properly when they’re developing this sequel.
So far though, we don’t know how much work they have left on it. There have been various rumors about the game’s release date, but it’s not clear if it will be ready in time for a 2015 release or not. Square Enix released a special demo of the game called “Episode Duscae” earlier this year, and they have been using it to gather feedback and improve on the main title before it’s ready. This was actually a pretty clever move of them, according to some, as it served two purposes – on one hand, it allowed their fans to get an actual preview of the game that satisfied their curiosity, and on the other, it works as an open beta test for the game for Square Enix, who now know exactly what’s wrong with it and what needs fixing. All they have to do at this point is fix all outstanding bugs and polish the gameplay to perfection, and they’re ready for an amazing release.