Square Enix: Final Fantasy Versus XIII not on hold

by Ludwig Kietzmann { Jun 19th 2008 at 11:30AM }

In a statement issued to Eurogamer, Square Enix has denied a recent report which stated that Final Fantasy Versus XIII had been put on hold in order to prioritize completion of regular ol' Final Fantasy XIII. According to a translated Famitsu interview with Versus director, Tetsuya Nomura, work on the spin-off title had been temporarily suspended while staffers helped out on the next highly anticipated, and not even remotely final, Final Fantasy installment.

"Reports that development for Final Fantasy Versus XIII is on hold are false," countered Square Enix. "The truth of the situation is that when free, some staff from the Versus team have been helping with the XIII team on development of Final Fantasy XIII. Development for both titles is continuing as originally scheduled."

That almost sounds like good news, until you realize that the "originally scheduled" release date for either title is likely quite far off. And that makes us so very, very sad.

Tags: Famitsu, Final-Fantasy, Final-Fantasy-Versus-XIII, Final-Fantasy-XIII, Square-Enix, Tetsuya-Nomura, Versus-XIII

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

NATO_Duke @ Jun 19th 2008 11:33AM

Thats the Square misinformation machine we all know and love.

bigsofty @ Jun 19th 2008 7:18PM

God 13! how much of this 99% CGI CRAP they gonna pump out?!?!

Maverick Saturn @ Jun 19th 2008 11:43AM

I hope this is true, for some reason I'm looking more forward to versus then original FF13

Sir Fidlious Wong (Justin T. McElroy Memorial Burn of the Day Award) @ Jun 19th 2008 12:11PM

Oh I know why....

Because this is Nomura who stated FFXIII Versus is essentially going to be a very dark adventure in the gameplay style of Kingdom Hearts.

Sora267 @ Jun 19th 2008 12:28PM

Did somebody say Kingdom Hearts?

Purple Haze @ Jun 19th 2008 10:22PM

Speaking of dark Kingdom Hearts, why the fuck have Square decided to screw with the style of Final Fantasy so much? I'm more interested in any game by Mystwalker than the Final Fantasy games because of Final Fantasy XII.

Gerrick @ Jun 19th 2008 11:55AM

For some reason I have it in my head that the original release dates were December of this year? I assume those must just be Gamestop numbers.

FOXHOUND @ Jun 19th 2008 12:04PM

Squ'enix might as well hire "Bill Lumbergh" to be a supervisor there at this rate. Lucky mug and all.

Bill Lumbergh> "And I almost forgot. Ahh, I'm also gonna need you to go ahead and come in on Sunday, too.. Yeaaaaahh...."

Brodie-san @ Jun 19th 2008 12:13PM

Tetsuya-san obviously didn't get the memo about the coversheet required for all FFXIII reports.

Superstar90 @ Jun 19th 2008 12:06PM

Even if this comes out in Japan in 2009, US won't see it until 2010. Square won't be able to do their 3 FF's per system this generation.

browntown @ Jun 19th 2008 12:30PM

They could easily do it. The engine is already done, and the ps3 is aiming for a 10 year life cycle, its very doable. Expect ff 14 1 or 2 years after versus

Vegeta (aka Ska Oreo) @ Jun 19th 2008 1:08PM

"and the ps3 is aiming for a 10 year life cycle"

Oh lol.

4MyFriends @ Jun 19th 2008 3:39PM

The whole "10 year lifespan" bullshit is just propaganda, used to justify the system's initial price. I don't understand why people still continue to believe in this kind of mess, especially when the PS3 is so full of bottlenecks that it wouldn't be able to compete with the next generation of consoles(10 year plan meant 10 years of PS3 before the PS4 is rolled out).

Vidikron (FU) @ Jun 19th 2008 4:46PM

The PS2 is still alive and kicking. I don't think it out of the question at all that the system could have a life span of 10 years. Everyone still buying PS2s now may well be buying PS3 years from now. But, OTOH, I don't think we'd see a big name game like FF show up during the last few years. By that time Square will have moved on to the next gen.

Dyranios @ Jun 19th 2008 12:14PM

Would have been nice of you to actually include the original release date in your entry, especially as you refer to it.

Zsavior @ Jun 19th 2008 12:25PM

How can a Project be on hold that never had a release date? I mean wouldn't it just be in continuous production till date and arrival happens? Seriously if they said nothing about the game most people would forget it wouldn't they till they just gave a date of when it was going to debut maybe.

I don't get square, would there really be such an uproar if they just didn't say anything and released the game when ready, rather than constant updates only showing the game is not out or going to come out anytime soon. Then again maybe they are keep the name out there to keep the title hot, who knows?

Brodie-san @ Jun 19th 2008 12:34PM

The way the market now works it seems is that the second you decide to make a game, you announce it. The moment you have a logo, you publish it. You then pretty much mention the game as much as possible through its development cycle right up to its release date - which will never be the date you originally thought you'd hit. Apparently this drives "buzz" for your game and more people will pick it up when it is finally available.

I don't know. I remember when you found out about new games by walking into the store. That doesn't happen any more. Maybe someone with some psychology and/or marketing degree can explain this to us.

I wouldn't be surprised if there was some data to support the fact that this new model of harping on about a game that isn't ready for months has a positive release on sales.

Zsavior @ Jun 19th 2008 1:26PM

Same here Brodie-san I would like somebody to explain this to, because it seems like it just goes to infuriate more gamers when they hear the title they were looking forward to get pushed back and see nothing else come out about it. I don't know enough about marketing to get this strategy either.

You announced games X,Y, and Z 1-2 years ago. Y, and Z never got a date but I still purchased my console on them because hell you had video and what seemed to be game play. Ever since then the only people that get to see Y,Z is media, and pretentious industry personal while you are actually selling Y, and Z to me and showing me nada. Then I get to the point were I am like F', Y, aNd Z also you can go to hell and you blame slow or lagging sales on some other new trend. This makes no sense to me.

Sir Fidlious Wong (Justin T. McElroy Memorial Burn of the Day Award) @ Jun 19th 2008 2:09PM

It may not have a release date, but it does have milestones. Set amount of work needed to be done by a set date, etc.

Titanium_Orchid @ Jun 19th 2008 2:37PM

@Brodie-san

We will make video games analogous to the check engine light in your car.

We will make checking your engine analogous to reading about the game.

If the check engine light appears once, you will check the engine to see what the problem is. Once that is done, you will most likely never check your engine again because the light hasn't appeared again and there is no reason for you to check the engine.

If the check engine light is on permanently, you assume there is something wrong with the light and eventually stop caring about whatever the light wants you to check out.

If the light appears at regular intervals, you will probably check your engine once in a while but not on a routine basis.

The light appears at random intervals. This situation is probably closest to what most game developers do. If the light appears at random intervals, you will be more likely to check your engine every time the light appears because you cannot attribute the activation of the light to anything specific.

To summarize: The release of information at random times almost guarantees that a game developer/publisher will generate interest in a game. News is not interesting if the similar stories are broadcast over and over and over again. Random information ensures that every time news is released, people will know, and care about said news.

If a company only released one statement about a game, and then said nothing, only people who were paying attention to the initial release will know of the game's existence. Its hard to keep enthusiasm for a game going over the span of two or three years if nothing new is said about it. Random news releases generates a large "knowledge base" about a game.

If a company released every minute detail about a game in development, people would probably start to ignore the information. Much like someone tune out a yapping dog if it made noise for hours and hours without end.

Hope this clears things up: Car, engine, light, random, yappity dog, videogame.

Mr Khan @ Jun 19th 2008 2:55PM

That was very good, Titanium Orchid [+]

Brodie-san, your complaints are probably one of the reasons Nintendo has adopted their new strategy of "announce when we have a playable build that exists," which creates windows of discouraging uncertainty (like right now when we have no idea what they're going to talk about next, and leads some to assume that there's nothing on the horizon)

What Titanium Orchid describes can sometimes frustrate users, but ultimately helps keep enthusiasm up for long-term projects

wyrdtoo @ Jun 19th 2008 12:26PM

I've had FF XIII pre-ordered on Amazon for quite a while now, and they've changed the release date at least twice. It was originally scheduled to ship in November of this year, then it was changed to January of 2009, then recently it was changed to December 15 of this year. I was a little surprised by that last update, but according to the messages I get from Amazon, the dates are based on information provided to them by the publisher/manufacturer, so it's the best guess for now. No matter what, it looks like a new FF sometime during the winter months, and I'll be happy with that.

browntown @ Jun 19th 2008 12:29PM

They better get this badboy out in 09 then, cuz i want some ff, i really wanna know what the battle system is like.

ThePerfectCompanion @ Jun 19th 2008 12:58PM

In a weird sorta way I kinda respect Square Enix's approach to games like this. They know people want it as soon as possible but they have also made it very clear that they won't be rushed at all. People are basically used to Final Fantasy's taking a long ass time to come out. A delay isn't a huge deal one way or another when compared to the huge amount of time they put into each game.

Personally both seem really interesting. While Versus does seem to be the more "darker" of the two I still think the main FFXIII is gonna have its own edge to it.

I'd like to see some actual gameplay though. My problem with RPG's is that sometimes they look so bland and boring. Lost Odyssey with its ring system although kinda gimmicky still kept you involved and made it that much more fun for me. Hopefully SE adds an element to the game that makes it stand out. Or at least have a new, cool, semi innovative battle screen.

juju187 @ Jun 19th 2008 1:06PM

next year its gonna be released dont hold your breath

Titanium_Orchid @ Jun 19th 2008 2:46PM

A delay in a game's release is probably a bigger deal to the developer/producers of a game than the consumer. More time, tallant and money spent and less time/money/tallant that could be used to produce something else.

I a way, we should be happy when a game takes a long time to release because that means the developers/producers care about producing a highly polished product more than they care about making a quick buck... There are obviously exceptions to this rule though: Daikatana, I'm looking at you.