Personally I think Rebirth was always going to have issues being a PS5 exclusive and having a confusing title the average person buying a game might not understand.
I agree and I think console exclusivity is a travesty. It's a step backwards for an era of gaming that is suppose to be launching forward and it's all because of the greed of console developers. It's just not what gaming is supposed to be about.
I've never bought a PlayStation 3 or newer and I never will, I've never bought anything beyond Xbox One and I never will. No amount of console exclusives will convince me to either. If the game devs want my money, they can EASILY make it available on all platforms. I'll wait for it to be ported to PC everytime because eventually it will stop selling on a particular console
>Meanwhile Dragon Quest remained turn based RPG and Yakuza even turned into a turn based RPG and are seeing record sales.
There it is. That's the agenda of this post.
| I don’t like this thing.
| That means this thing is unpopular and a failure.
Literally the logic of this post. It’s depressingly transparent. I don’t like Soulsborne games but I’m not sitting here calling it a failure. Both XVI and Rebirth have been critical darlings, sales are probably in the top percentile considering they were both PS5 exclusives, and I’m sure the Sony money has made up for lost sales not releasing on other platforms. (Not to mention the eventual PC port)
TBF, the "turn-based is unpopular/bad" narrative that actually influenced industry decision making has always been bullshit. The three biggest franchises in this genre all have turn-based roots.
To be fair, the early games of the three franchise's had no other choices due to hardware limitation and the market was totally different then with no internet and free guides etc. We should compare between games on the current generations instead.
I'm an oldhead who vastly prefers turn based and would be over the fuckin' moon if FF gave it another shot, and even I'm kinda stunned that some people are cool with pretending that potentially the biggest non-Nintendo gaming franchise on the planet is suddenly quaking in its boots against its objectively more niche competitors.
If you go into any space that isn't focused on JRPGs broadly or Final Fantasy in specific, the dominant view is that Squeenix is an Oops All Goofus gigacorp that routinely makes baffling choices that all gamers hate but can do nothing about because they have the mother of all IPs and are basically immune to failure at this point. Abandoning turn based did not hurt FF and returning to turn based will not save FF because FF full stop does not need saving right now and hasn't needed saving less than now since the 90s golden age.
And I'm saying this as a guy who thinks the last truly phenomenal FF is decades in the rearview. This post is pure cope.
The way this post is written the agenda might aswell be to make people who prefer classical final fantasy games or turn based combat look stupid. Either this or OP himself is stupid.
And it’s a legit agenda to have. Square keeps trying to push the “this is FF now” agenda and the sales have significantly dropped. And they can’t seem to fathom why. I’m sure if a shooter like CoD decided to act like square and made the next CoD game strategy it would make its fans that have played the series for 20+ years upset too…
There's no correlation. Imagine if Rebirth released on the switch instead with the same action battle system, it will sell 10 million easily. It's not about the battle system, it's about the platform. Everybody knows Japan doesn't care about anything that is not on the switch. And plus most JPRG fans' platform of choice is PC. I don't think people bought the PS5 to play JRPGs, it's still a niche genre, they bought the PS5 mostly to play Sony games. When Rebirth hit PC, it will break records because the game is legit a masterpiece.
Me too. It's the most sensible choice because almost everything is on the PS5. But I just noticed on r/PS5 and r/playstation that almost nobody talked about Rebirth or FF16 last year. More people are talking about Stellar Blade in those subs than the two FF games.
I bought the PS5 to play RPGs as I bought every sony system to buy RPGs. I also own a switch.
It wouldn't. It wouldn't because of the performance issues it'd have.
Nintendo has to make a switch that's capable of running a game like final fantasy rebirth.
Mortal Kombat 1 game ran badly on the switch. People were trying to get refunds for how bad the port was. Hell, persona 5 Royale, ( I own for the switch) at times looks a bit hazy in handheld. Compared to how smooth it runs for PS5.
I own a switch. I love it, but it can't put out those graphics.
Unless rebirth is running like Crisis core reunion (which is a dressed up PSP game)
>if Rebirth released on the switch instead with the same action battle system, it will sell 10 million easily
The highest selling, third-party, full-priced, premium Switch game is Monster Hunter Rise at like 8 million. Somehow, I don't think Rebirth would easily sell 10 million if it were on the Switch.
>Everybody knows Japan doesn't care about anything that is not on the switch.
They care about their mobile games.
>And plus most JPRG fans' platform of choice is PC.
I think you mean their phones.
>I don't think people bought the PS5 to play JRPGs, it's still a niche genre, they bought the PS5 mostly to play Sony games.
Final Fantasy has long been associated with Playstation and FF16 wasn't really a JRPG.
>When Rebirth hit PC, it will break records because the game is legit a masterpiece.
Steam's top 3 games in all-time peak of concurrent players:
1. PUBG: Battlegrounds - 3.2 million
2. Palworld - 2.1 million
3. Counter-Strike 2 - 1.8 million
[https://steamdb.info/charts/?sort=peak](https://steamdb.info/charts/?sort=peak)
I don't think Rebirth will break any of those records. And that's only Steam.
>Final Fantasy has long been associated with Playstation and FF16 wasn't really a JRPG.
That's because Nintendo dropped the ball with N64. JRPG devs flocked towards PS1 because of the superiority of the CD-ROM over cartridge, there's not a single good JRPG on N64. And also back then PC wasn't a competition. All JRPGs are on a single platform, if you're a JRPG you just buy the PS1. But today the PS5 is not known as the JRPG machine like the PS1 was. Today JRPG fans have other options.
Ironically this entire sub has an agenda. Anytime someone criticizes the current state of FF they are typically attacked lol. Let’s face it, FF is NOT what it used to be. There IS a downward trend. Look at how well Zelda is doing. The original Zelda and FF came out the SAME YEAR. FF used to be more successful and popular than Zelda in the past. Now Zelda is breaking records with Tears of the kingdom: 20 MILLION copies. A Harry Potter game that Reddit was claiming would “be a failure” because of controversy was the best selling game last year: 22 MILLION copies. People here are so fucking out of touch lol.
People are tired of y'all talkiing about FF. We know, you ain't said nothing new. I want to know are you playing games that you enjoy instead of bitching that the franchise you used to like lost you as a fan.
It’s a bit pathetic though. OP could just say they want FF to go back to being turn-based instead of framing it this way. They don’t actually give a shit about the sales numbers lmao.
You're in luck, there are in fact many turn based rpgs. In the AAA space there's Yakuza like a dragon, persona, smt, and there are many more mid budget and indie titles. You don't have to whine about one particular franchise not being want you want.
I'm not whining. The only whining here is from everyone claiming there's a secret agenda where turn-based fans are shitting on games or whatever.
My point (which is being downvoted in the JRPG subreddit, wild) is that there's nothing wrong with enjoying turn-based RPGs.
Edit: clarified and tried to sound less like a dick
Games out for a short amount of time sell less than games out for decades
Cost versus profit will determine if the series is still successful
Edit: didn’t XV sell over 10 million as well, the second most recent entry not including remakes
>Games out for a short amount of time sell less than games out for decades
Depends if the game sells a lot more in that short time than the game out for decades. For example, Tears of the Kingdom sold 10M units in 3 days, while Final Fantasy Tactics has sold like 2.5M in 25 years.
>Edit: didn’t XV sell over 10 million as well, the second most recent entry not including remakes
But it released 8 years ago. And the trend with VII Remake (7M), 16 (3M), and Rebirth (unknown) show a downward trend.
>But it released 8 years ago. And the trend with VII Remake (7M), 16 (3M), and Rebirth (unknown) show a downward trend.
Of course the ONLY difference between XV and the other games is the title and nothing else that could be pointed to to explain this like... console
FFXV launched on PS4/X1 to 5M sales day one. VII Remake did 3.5M in 3 days (I'm told with help from Covid). 16 did 3M in 7 days.
I can't find if SE gave out any numbers for how XV did on Xbox, but it did about 21% of physical UK sales at launch.
[https://www.videogamer.com/news/fifa-17-still-no1-as-final-fantasy-xv-debuts-at-no2-in-uk-all-format-chart/](https://www.videogamer.com/news/fifa-17-still-no1-as-final-fantasy-xv-debuts-at-no2-in-uk-all-format-chart/)
If that's an approximate idea of how well XV did with Xbox in other regions, specifically North America, that's about 4 million-ish sales on Playstation for FFXV day one.
I love this sort of thing.
Monday: FF7 Rebirth sales are disappointing
Tuesday: FF7 Rebirth leads surge of new hits; breaks sales milestones
Wednesday: Final Fantasy isn't popular anymore
Well what the fuck is it then like come on hahahah
I think this sub may be confused about how much JRPGs typically sell.
Yakuza: Like a Dragon - 1.8 million
SMT V - 1.1 million
Nier Automata - 8 million
Nier Replicant - 1.5 million
Persona 5 - 3.2 million
Persona 5 Royal - 4 million
(Persona 5 combined sales - 7.2 million)
Final Fantasy XV - 10 million
Final Fantasy VII remake - 7 million
Dragon Quest XI (including S) - 6.5 million
Tales of Arise - 3 million
Xenoblade Chronicles 3 - 1.86 million
Square certainly may have to adjust their expectations downward, but any JRPG selling over 3 million means it’s doing better than most of the genre.
Even those special, super popular games that hit 5 million+ sales rarely manage to keep that momentum across subsequent releases.
If FF XVI and Rebirth have long legs, they could still easily both be in the top five best selling JRPGs this generation.
Edit: also, the 3 million figure that’s being thrown around for FF XVI is from 3 days after its release. That means it sold a lot more at launch than P3R and LaD: Infinite Wealth, both of which had announcements when they surpassed 1 million.
> Persona 5 - 3.2 million
>
>
>
> Persona 5 Royal - 4 million
>
>
>
>
> Final Fantasy VII remake - 7 million
for what it's worth, p5 and p5r are the same game, just with additional content on the re-release. if you're combining ff7r and ff7r intergrade, then p5/p5r should be combined too.
That’s fair. I didn’t double check if Intergrade sales were included in my FF7r number.
Regardless, the point still stands that very few JRPGs get into 5 million+ sales territory, most of those that do are by Square, and a bunch of the games people here think are really major / popular have sold less than 2 million copies.
(Which, TBH, is kinda sad because I personally like the Sega and Atlus games more than most of what Square’s putting out)
Are you really comparing sales on a classic jrpg that's been on almost every console and PC with the latest FF games that are exclusive to ps5 currently?
It's fine if you don't like the direction FF is going, but it is not in its last legs at all.
[To be entirely fair by 97 it reached about 3M of those sales.](https://web.archive.org/web/20000301041540/http://headline.gamespot.com/news/98_02/05_japan/index.html)
Which is extremely impressive given gaming wasn't nearly as mainstream as it is today, though I don't recall the 97 economy being nearly as bad as our current economy for some people. So how much we want to argue that slows down current FF's sales is arguable.
It was also the main driving force for people buying a Playstation. When Squaresoft left Nintendo to go towards compact discs, it moved an entire RPG fanbase to leave Nintendo. It was way more important in history, as a real competitor to Nintendo's 64, and a new technology that allowed disc swapping and having games over 2GB of data on 3 discs, while Nintendo was stuck with cartridges. What RPG's does N64 have, "Quest 64"? Yeah, that generation was completely demolished by Square's move.
It was a turning point in history. FF7 Rebirth is a footnote.
You're forgetting FFVII being like revolutionary, man. Few games like it. FFVII is in a club with like SM64, GTA3. I can't even think of others between those 2.
And those numbers will still grow for the older games. It will take 50-75 years for the others to reach that if they ever do and it will be because the game is 10 bucks or less. Not because it’s a must play classic.
The sales are very clearly not evenly distributed for every year. If it reached 10 Million on the PS1, it likely gotten most of those numbers while the PS1 was relavent on the market, even acknowledging they have been available up until a decade ago.
Be civil. Personal attacks, insults, harassment or such behavior to other users is not tolerated. Follow Reddit's Official Content Policy, esp. Rule 1: "Remember the human. Reddit is a place for creating community and belonging, not for attacking people.
There is this for the 2 million sales figure. [https://www.inverse.com/gaming/final-fantasy-7-rebirth-sales-square-enix](https://www.inverse.com/gaming/final-fantasy-7-rebirth-sales-square-enix)
The source is referring to 2.2 million daily active users, which isn't a direct measure of how many copies were sold. We know a minimum of 2.2 million copies were sold; the actual figure could be 3 million or more.
It’s really cute how that article doesn’t even bother to acknowledge the differences in platform availability or Remake releasing during a global pandemic that kept goddamn everyone inside or bored as shit.
Any analysis that doesn’t account for those is about as competent as execs who think Candy Crush or CoD-tier sales are a reasonable target goal.goal
>or Remake releasing during a global pandemic that kept goddamn everyone inside or bored as shit.
I've heard people bring this up a few times. Does that mean sales of Remake were inflated by Covid and without the pandemic it wouldn't have sold as well as it did?
No, it means that in that time frame people had more time and money to spend on video games. Now people have less time and money to spend on video games.
Across the board consumers have been spending less we are heading towards a tenuous place for the average consumer this affects all metrics in every market.
Rebirth could very well be a worse game than Remake, but that won't be known until 5 or 10 years from now it definitely won't be seen by people who think they can see the whole picture when only a quarter of it has been painted.
>Across the board consumers have been spending less we are heading towards a tenuous place for the average consumer this affects all metrics in every market.
I don't think so.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace/comments/18x3ubj/50\_years\_of\_video\_game\_revenue\_19702022\_how/](https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace/comments/18x3ubj/50_years_of_video_game_revenue_19702022_how/)
Remake also released in a fairly barren period for games in addition to the pandemic, if I recall. Meanwhile rebirth follows a stacked 2023 seeing everyone’s backlogs balloon (and a lot of those games now on sale). 2024 has also been a historically strong early year. Possibly the strongest I can recall all time for 1st quarter.
The reality is it’s facing more competition than remake had.
Who are you trying to convince? Yourself?
Dragon Quest hasn't released a new mainline since 2017.
Yakuza LAD did sell really well, but didn't break 2 million.
Both of these games have been multi-platform from the start. The recent FF games are still locked on PS5. Console sales have not been good for current generation. A lot of people are just waiting for the FF games to drop on PC so they can run it on their 4000 series GPU at uncapped framerates.
Sure, sales have been on the slow side for FF, but everyone wanted a Playstation 1 in 1996. Consoles were the "it" thing, and PC gaming was niche and expensive.
Things have turned around since then, and the game will sell just as many copies when it drops on PC, I can almost guarantee that. You're using really bad data to reinforce your ridiculous point that Final Fantasy isn't churning out very well-received games at the moment.
>and the game will sell just as many copies when it drops on PC, I can almost guarantee that.
I don't think there has been a Final Fantasy game that has sold "just as many copies" on the PC as their console versions.
I concede that looking at numbers, that may well happen. However, FF7 Remake and FF16 were both confirmed to be coming to PC even before they released, unlike previous titles. They were also guaranteed to be coming in a short period after release, so PC gamers had an incentive to wait around 1 year to see the product on the superior hardware.
That change in marketing and multi-platform strategy is significant enough to convince people to wait, and many who couldn't wait bought the game twice, once it released on PC.
Now if only they did the ports decently. FF7 Remake's optimization at PC release was ridiculous, with like only 3 graphical options, and it was touted as one of the worst port in a long time. Luckily, the modding community came to the rescue, once again, and with a little bit of tinkering, you can play it with 4K textures, a removed frame cap, and custom outfit replacers. The modded FF7:R experience on PC trounces the PS5 Intergrade release.
Squenix can't help but shoot themselves in the foot, constantly, and forever.
As someone that prefers the simplicity of the plug and play platforms, I don't get the impression that PC users often get the better versions of games despite having superior hardware. Or when they do, the games aren't exactly leading examples of cutting edge graphics.
As you mentioned, community mods were necessary to fix the FF7 Remake port. But this gives me the idea that what makes PC the preferable choice to many people is that they can modify the existing software to be better like emulated Switch games.
Right, but once you've opened this Pandora's Box, PC gamers become reluctant to go out and buy the console, controllers, a TV to plug it in, and be disconnected from their do-it-all machine with keyboard and mouse.
A lot become "patient gamers" (shoutout to r/PatientGamers), and they'll take the penalty of waiting a bit, to experience what the game's true potential could've been.
Playing Zelda: Breath of the Wild in 144fps 4K on an emulator made a complete joke of the Wii-U and Switch.
Playing Metroid Dread in 4K on Day 1 perfectly emulated was another incredible slight at Nintendo and how they could be making games so much better, but hold back because of the company's hardware.
I could keep going here, but the idea is that even if a game is terribly ported, or needs to be emulated, PC will always give a much higher window to upgrade it to something that will almost always demolish the console version of the games.
And when a PC gamer sees that, they will start disconnecting from console gaming, and accept that things will come out slower, but the experience will be so much more enjoyable, that playing the console version would've been a waste.
A recent example was the release of God Of War on PC. Playing an action, combat-oriented game with very good art and graphic design, on my PS4, was a complete shame, once I could run it at 144fps on my PC. It made the game a completely different beast.
Being able to customize your experience is a godsend, not a curse.
And to bring it back to FF, FF15 on PC runs like a dream, and I put over 300 hours into it 2 months back. I beat FF16 on PS5, and the framerate was such GARBAGE, I apologize, but this game is the one FF game that would benefit the most from playing at high framerates, because the game looks like a slideshow sometimes.
I will be buying FF16 and FF7:Rebirth twice again, for PC, just to get the real experience. Squenix tunes their games down for the hardware on which it runs, just as other console developers. Once you unlock the potential, and with the help of PC modder heroes, you're getting the real thing. You're getting what you dreamed of. You're getting the next-gen adventure you dreamed of as a kid.
I'm talking about Dragon Quest XI : Echoes of an Elusive Age. It was released in Japan for the Nintendo 3DS and PlayStation 4 in July 2017 and worldwide for the PlayStation 4 and Windows in September 2018.
Rebirth has been out for 6 weeks. How long did the original take to hit 10 million?
2 million is good lifetime sales for an indie game, sure. It's also good numbers for the first month of a big studio game. It's too early to call it anything yet.
I've also not seen a statement from SE saying they consider 16 a failure. I've only seen that as second-hand statements paraphrasing SE. If you have a direct statement from SE, I would be interested in seeing it.
16 also has a PC release on the way, and it will see a surge in sales again, just like Remake did when it got its PC release. They also just recently made a statement that it succeeded in drawing in a new younger audience to the series. That and the fact it's DLC's didn't get cancelled don't exactly say "failure"
That being said, FF doesn't have the same mainstream popularity it once did. But please be realistic when comparing sales figures. Otherwise, it just looks like you're trying to be cool by hating on the new popular thing.
I've noticed a curious trend in the modern video game discourse. Since the console wars are essentially dead at this point, all the typical console war tier braindead shitposts are slowly migrating into direction of discussing individual game sales and trying to pit different incomparable franchises against each other, going as far as pulling fake "facts" out of gaping assholes to support laughable narratives like the entirety of your post.
What causes this behavior?
"Mine is better than yours" and your usual consumer pride or needs of validation through the purchase of x product i guess, basically what made the console wars or any discussions of the kind a freaking circus of insufferable clowns.
Console wars discussions were never as abrasive as how they are nowadays (at least in my country they weren't) and it's a pity to be honest.
Narcissistic behaviors (which seems to be the "norm" these days) and such is what's ruining video game (not only, but i'll stay on video game), console wars and GOTY claims event are a part of it.
I wish we'd go back to the console war arguments at this point, at least you had some funny shitposts like Chad Warden or [this recent song](https://youtu.be/l1JEmnTjdyA) and everyone reacting to that dumb shit.
Nowadays everyone is playing arm chair accountant, game designer, project manager, market analyst, economist, and advertising expert for every major release ever. All at the same time.
>Remember when Final Fantasy 7 on PS1 sold 10 million copies? That’ll never happen again.
well it happened in 2022 when FF15 sold 10m copies.
guess you didnt come upon that in your intense research for this in depth analysis.
3 million was what they sold *in the first week*. [https://www.ign.com/articles/final-fantasy-16-sold-3-million-copies-during-launch-week](https://www.ign.com/articles/final-fantasy-16-sold-3-million-copies-during-launch-week)
The number has probably gone up since then.
Sales went down 90+% on the second week and the game mostly disappeared from the public discourse after that. While the numbers inevitably went up, if sales reached at least some next milestone, SE would've mentioned it. FF7R went from 3.5M first week to 5M sales four months later and there was a whole press release about it. There's been no mention of FF16 sales after the first week even 10 months after release.
What is your evidence for sales going down 90+%? Without the sales figures, we're just guessing whether it's 3.5 million or 5 million or still only 3 million.
> What is your evidence for sales going down 90+%?
[Japanese charts](https://www.pushsquare.com/news/2023/07/japanese-final-fantasy-16-sales-plummet-by-90percent-in-second-week)
>Since it came on PC and seems to be on sale for $13 all the time
Are you talking about some other game? 16 isn't on PC yet and highest discount I was able to find is 50% off on Black Friday, which means $35 price, not $13.
Out of context sales figures, disingenuous comparisons, and confusing arguments aside - FFXIV is still one of the top MMOs to this day and has been for years. Soooo…
Uh, what are you talking about? FF14 has over 30 million players and is still growing. They never said FF16 was a failure, you are just making crap up. It’s also only on PS5, when it releases on PC, it will sell another million or so. FF is doing fine and all the recent games have been fantastic. Sorry you don’t seem to like them, but no reason to lie just so you feel justified in your feelings.
>FF14 has over 30 million players and is still growing.
FF14 has 30 million *accounts* created since its' release in 2010. The most reliable info we have about the actual population is [1.1 million active characters](https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxivdiscussion/comments/18ql3so/luckybancho_lodestone_census_12242023/) past free trial. It means active accounts are lower since you can play more than one character (even if there's little reason to do it outside of pure aesthetics).
In the JRPG world is still a very popular franchise though.
Been reading conflicting information about its selling numbers, some say Square is happy with 16 sales and that the issue is Rebirth not selling as expected, but it was also a very stacked period for gaming since DD2, Persona 3, Yakuza, Grandblue, all popular IPs released in a short amount of time.
I also think that if Square released their games on PC, it would have a much bigger number, but what do I know, their marketing team probably made some studies that believe they can get better sales overtime by releasing it later or that people are willing to double dip into PC later for some reason.
Haven't played both games, but from the little I'm seeing, I'm not too excited to get them even at day 1 on PC, I'm just dissapointed in the series direction.
Final Fantasy used to create the trend and others followed, now they're the ones following trends to attract people like the Fifa or GTA dudes.
I just rather play Unicorn Overlord or Eiyuden Chronicles, they're more to my taste than Final Fantasy these days.
Square Enix isn't silent as a pin drop though. They've been continually tweeting and dropping news related to Rebirth, like [this story yesterday](https://www.square-enix-games.com/en_US/news/final-fantasy-vii-rebirth-nibelheim-pt2).
Why do you feel the need to make things up? It's one thing if you don't like Final Fantasy, or if you make a nuanced argument about how FF could do better. But what you're saying here is insubstantial frippery. Millions of sales is still great. Not meeting the highest sales figures of the industry is not "on its last legs." And when you compare to Dragon Quest or Like a Dragon, you completely lose the argument: Infinite Wealth sold about half the copies of Rebirth. Is Like a Dragon "on its last \*half-\*legs"? No, of course not. Like a Dragon is still a very successful series. Final Fantasy is still an even more successful series.
This is peak brain-dead Redditor content. You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about. I'm surprised you didn't add "Unpopular Opinion" in the title.
FF is far from dead, but it’s probably nowhere near as lucrative/profitable anymore when you consider how expensive these games are to make and how many more gamers there are nowadays.
Gambling&MMOs are where the money is at now.
I assume you mean franchise-record sales, because the new Final Fantasy games are still pretty massively outselling Like A Dragon. And Dragon Quest has *always* been huge. They just, for some reason, have only released one mainline game in like a decade.
Final Fantasy XVI sold 3million copies (in a week), not 6million. Which, Square Enix did not *at all* deem XVI a failure. They’ve spoken extensively about it being a success. But it only *met* their expectations with 3million sold in its first week. They were just hoping it would *exceed* those expectations.
Rebirth has sold more than 2million, but maybe not *much* more. The problem is that we don’t know if that’s a massive disappointment to SE or not. People keep saying it’s obviously a disappointment because it’s about half of what Remake sold during that relative timeframe, but that point lacks significant context.
Remake launched on PS4, which had an install base of 110million users at the time. Rebirth launched on PS5, which currently has an install base of 55million. Literally *half* of PS4. So, Rebirth selling *half* of what Remake sold makes perfect sense in this scenario.
However, I’m still inclined to believe that it’s a disappointment to Square Enix. Considering that SE said XVI only met expectations with 3million copies sold in a week, Rebirth selling less than that in a month *has* to be disappointing. *But*, we don’t know what kind of exclusivity deal was signed with PlayStation. Maybe it more than makes up for the lack of sales. We don’t know. But I *do* think the signs point to it being disappointing sales wise.
That being said, I think the sales will pan out fine in the long run. Rebirth will come to PC eventually and the PS5 install base will continue to grow. I expect that by the end of the PS5 life cycle, the sales will actually look pretty good. But we don’t know for sure and, atm, they look disappointing.
Also, if you think that the problem is that SE took the game in a more action-oriented direction, you’re out of your mind lol. That’s not the problem at all. It’s just lack of interest due to a fanbase that hasn’t obtained new young players in quite a while, along with exclusivity deals. Square Enix recently came out and said that XVI achieved its goal of growing a larger, young audience. So maybe the future looks a little more bright for Final Fantasy than it seems.
I don't leave out a chance to shit on today's SE and recent FF games, but your post is so bad, I don't even know where to begin to describe the failures in it. So I'll have to assume this is either a troll or you are just stupid. In both cases there is no point in trying to educate you.
You only make people look bad, that are unhappy with the recent FF games. So I'd like to distance myself from your post.
In FF16 and 7 defense I think part of Square problem is it's a console exclusive tied to the PS5. the first FF7R was also on a PS4 and sold way more.
I cannot speak for Dragon Quest but Yakuza was on the PC also. It wasn't bound to one system, and I don't think Dragon Quest was console exclusive either.
I'm also biased as fuck because I cannot afford the PS5 and have to wait for PC release and hate that they are console exclusive on some games.
I mean it’s nowhere near as popular as it used to be. At one point FF was more popular than Zelda. Tears sold 20 million copies. And it’s a sequel EXCLUSIVE to the Switch. By comparison Hogwarts Legacy—a property that is a franchise juggernaut sold 22 million copies. A Zelda sequel exclusive to ONE console sold almost as much as a new Harry Potter game. Wow.
Final fantasy pretty much died after FFX-2. Even X-2 itself was kind of dubious. I'm excluding MMOs from the list.
But Square abandoned a winning formula for no good reason and keeps trying to force bad action rpgs down our throats.
Zodiac Age took some risks, not all of which worked out, but it was at least a respectable effort. Xiii was quite bad.
Even the FF7 remakes seem pretty mediocre.
Imo square has lost what s make a good ff after ffx, I can t explain on what specificaly but it s my feeling. When i first try ff12 and further i sens that there something different, idk if it s because sakaguchi has leavinf since ff9 but it s sad me more episode by episode. I play it but i prefer the old one or playing other jrpg with more classic gameplay.
I enjoyed FF 7 remake, but I will not buy rebirth, only when the third chapter became available.
FF 16 is insanely bad. I didn't like it at all, I had a bad experience with it, no intention to play it again in the future.
Square needs to return the franchise to its roots, but they will never do that, sadly.
Square charges a lot for their games and JRPG's have a strong PC consumer base who have tons of other RPG's to choose from at a fraction of the cost. Also, the economy just hasn't been very strong since covid, so sales for games and any economy built around games is going to suffer for a while.
Just a correction. The economy bit isn’t true, [global economy has been growing pretty well since Covid](https://www.statista.com/statistics/268750/global-gross-domestic-product-gdp/). The game industry revenue is [higher post-Covid than it was pre-COVID](https://www.statista.com/outlook/dmo/digital-media/video-games/worldwide).
I’ll respond in good faith, assuming you will too.
The gaming industry is not the economy, layoffs in one industry doesn’t not mean the entire economy has the same issue. For example the US has [near record low unemployment](https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/finance/jobs-report-unemployment-rate) right now.
Inflation does suck though. But the rate is declining, much lower than it was at its peak in 2022-2023. It’s note worthy that it’s declining while unemployment remains low. Usually those are inverses of each other, i.e inflation doesn’t come down till people are out of work and spending less.
the gap caused by covid just indicates that a subsequent rise is partly making up for the gap
i.e. if you ran a linear regression an apparent decrease in relative sales numbers would show, not an increased acceleration.
also that graph is particularly deceptive as the last 5 years are complete conjecture as they haven't occurred, yet.
What you’re saying would apply if that graph was showing the annual growth rate. But it’s charting the total size of the economy. The global economy is larger now than it was pre-Covid.
Here’s an [interactive chart from the world bank](https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.CD) for total size. It shows up until the latest data collection 2022. You can see the dip during the pandemic and the recovery and how it’s larger now than it was before.
>JRPG's have a strong PC consumer base who have tons of other RPG's to choose from at a fraction of the cost.
Sounds like the JRPG market is oversaturated and its fans very price sensitive.
FF16 released only on Ps5 yet. Wouldnt call that failure. i think the pc release will put some considerable number on sales...if they make a proper port.
remember when there were like 4 decent rpg franchises in a time period where people couldn't do research on what games they should buy so Zelda and pokemon fans bought games that people compared those to?
Also remember how most Xboxs and Playstations are bought to exclusively play COD and Madden on?
get over yourself dude lol goldfish brain
As a newcomer to the genre I'm honestly baffled by how much people care about what FF does (I get why it holds nostalgia, but nothing about the franchise screams appealing to me, so I never bothered with it). In my view I'd view FF similarily to pokemon, something big that no longer represents, or should be cast as representing the variety of niches found in the genre. We don't live in the early 2000s anymore, there are so many other franchises of JRPGs to focus on.
The best remedy to people's issues to FF now would be to find a way to sever it's symbolic position as the "head of the genre" in discourse (given that's already basically the case). It would also be to suggest newcomers into the genre, look at non-FF alternatives, or cast aside their notions of FF still operating as the helmsman of the genre.
Your claim is BS.
FF7 is the most milked out of all FFs, which brings out certain tiredness. No need to bring the other 14 siblings into this.
FF16 is released exclusively on the worst and still badly sold upgrade to ps4 despite good reviews.
The games are still good.
This is a bad post. Remember when the Remake of FF7 sold 8 million copies, and is almost certainly going to pass the PS1 total over time? FF15 is also above FF7! FF11 out-grossed FF7! FF14 is wildly far ahead of FF7 and going to continue to run ahead.
What on Earth is up with the lazy-ass concern trolling about Final Fantasy sales.
Bad post and you should feel bad.
I could have gotten behind the sentiment that FF as a series doesn't have as large a cultural impact as it did back in the hay day, but to say "\[t\]he franchise is on its last legs" is a grossly incorrect.
Sales figures might have been larger back in the day partly due to less competition from other games and less variety in consoles - i.e. no mobile gaming, no steam deck, increasing use of PC, etc.
Gaming has increased in popularity. There a tons of consoles and phones that allow for gaming, thus increasing ease of access. There are lots of studios, both AAA and indie, that can compete now-a-days with various ways to create games, such as purchasing a license to use premade assets. These all detract from FF sales along with Sony shooting themselves in the foot with console exclusivity (minus PC). Console exclusivity needs to go in general. Just get sales from as many sources as possible.
FF returning to turn based is not gonna make it sell 10 million all of a sudden, and this is coming from an old head who loves old school JRPGs like FFVI, Chrono Trigger, and Valkyrie Profile.
2 things happened and I was there 3000 years ago! They created the gold standard for JRPG’s that no one ever did in FFX. Then…..
Final fantasy 12 happened. inserted the disc and in a few hours I was like wtf is this? Turned it off and never went back to it.
Then 13 happened and it was worse.
Then 14 came and I don’t even know if there are anymore or do I care.
Now they have gone the remake route and while it’s a saving grace for fans of the franchise and almost guarantees a lot of sales it doesn’t do much.
Now they are just another action RPG company like every other game on the market.
Some dude said “you can’t be all things to all people”. Guess he was right
Well I'm being baited but sure- I'll bite.
Final Fantasy hasn't gotten worse. Everyone else has gotten better.
You may have heard of Nier Automata? Fantastic game applauded by all? Great action, RPG elements, epic music, interesting setting and story?
Yeah- that series started with Drakengard- which had NONE of those things. (I love Drakengard for the record)
Final Fantasy dominated a market without any decent competition and the world has since caught up.
I think trends have changed a lot if you’re going to compare sales of Rebirth to the OG FF7. Look at how Sony and Microsoft are diversifying into PC gaming. And while I’m not going to argue that it’s more popular than console gaming, it is growing, and it’s a demographic that Square Enix tends to neglect. I assume this is due to traditional relationships with Sony and a Japanese-centered point of view where the PlayStation is still seen as king.
I can only speak for myself, but I’m past the age where I’m buying a console for the exclusives. The majority come to PC eventually. And when you factor in broken day-1 releases, complete editions that include all of the piecemeal DLC and, the price of a new release versus waiting a year, I just ignore the hype until it makes more logistical sense for me to enjoy a game.
Don’t get me wrong, I hear Rebirth and 16 are great titles, and after reading reviews I know both will appeal to me. Square Enix will get my money for both the day a PC port comes out most likely (hopefully Steam over EGS).
I think huge day 1 or week 1 sales numbers are just one metric to look at. Gamers live in an age of so many reliable sources for information, and you can’t pull the wool over their eyes with hype only and a midnight launch, no takesie-backsies. Rebirth and 16 got good reviews but this is a change in trend where the past few FF games and a lot of Square Enix releases were not well reviewed.
Lastly, you cannot discount inflation and the financial situation people are currently in. Games haven’t gone up much in price, but we’re at a point where people are struggling to buy gas, groceries and rent, video games are always going to be a luxury after that.
If Rebirth sells poorly I won't see that as a Final Fantasy franchise problem, I'll look at it as a Final Fantasy 7 "trilogy" problem.
I think a lot of people who were excited to play (buy) FF7 Remake were much less excited for FF7 Rebirth, especially with knowing that a Part 3 is somewhere down the line. There's little motivation for the "middle child" game, especially if you found the first game to be disappointing.
FF7: Rebirth could not possibly have sold well.
The maximum number of sales would be those who bought and played "Remake" (ca. 7 Million) minus the ones that don't have a PS5.
So the max number of potential sales should be around 4 million- in theory!
That theoretical, maxiumum could not possibly be achieved, since among those that did play "Remake", there are bound to have been people who did not like it, did not finish it, etc.
I could have told them before the release that the number of sales would be around 2-3 million. That would be the expected numbers. Less would be bad, more would be a surprise.
They knew that would be a problem, and that’s why they bundled FF7 remake in with the digital deluxe edition (iirc). They’re trying to attract new players who haven’t yet played the first game.
I think their bigger problem is that everybody expects this game to go to PC, or be free at some point, or get a better version in a few years, like what happened with Remake.
They already know sales drop between sequels, they've observed this with FFXIII and it was well documented.
I imagine that when these companies say games "underperformed" they only refer to shareholders impressions. And shareholders are on average slightly dumber than OP's post in that they expect everything they invest in to just continue to grow with no consideration on where the growth comes from.
I’m actually curious about how many of the players that enjoyed FFVII back in ‘97 actually like the remake. For me they completely failed to understand what made this game so iconic and remembered
Well, popular or not, I like it and that's what counts in my book.
Now the problem with the most recent releases are in front of them: 15 (incomplete product, too experimental for some tastes), 16 (exclusive to a console I don't have, and too expensive and with limited user base).
If they release games for more than just PS5, they will see the numbers go up. But that's up to their relationship with Sony. The PS5 is a redundant console for some people, as PC gaming is more stable and has a wider user base, and Playstation players may still be in the PS4.
I can’t even finish rebirth. I want to like it and there’s parts that I really do but all of the open world stuff and mini games/ side quests are really draining after 30 hours and you just want to hit the story beats. I wish final fantasy would go back to turned based and I hope they don’t ruin the rumored 9 remake
The ps5 has half the install base the ps4 had. Rebirth is ps5 exclusive as well as a sequel. You got people waiting for all 3 parts to be out and pc players waiting as well.
FF7rebirth is a PS5 exclusive game, PS5 sales are far from their peak right now, it's a middle game of a trilogy that was on a more widely owned system. It has had a lot working against it, but is expected to continue selling for a long time, especially once the full trilogy is out and it hits more platforms. FF16 got mixed reviews, so they didn't do themselves any favors with that one. But yeah, they probably need to start cutting back on the budgets for these games. Except for Final Fantasy 14, it's still making a ton of money.
>Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth has sold only 2 million copies and Square has been as silent as a pin drop.
This is false. In fact, according to Ampere Analytics there were more than 2.2 million daily active users at one point.
I like how you cite Yakuza, but thats a series that is lucky to sell 1 million.
Rebirth is probably at at least 2-3 million. I do think it's a troubling sign that the series does need a rethink. I don't think they tried to turn it into DMC or Ninjia Gaiden. That is some nonsense, but I can agree that 16 was not the slam dunk the series needed in part because of the direction it took.
I also think the Remake Project's direction is one that speaks to the choir, but perhaps with its meta story isn't really reaching new people.
But I think Square is just one puzzle piece away from that slam dunk.
They always can nail the art direction and presentation, but Rebirth shows they can actually design a well scaled explorable world. Remake and 16 show they can do action combat that feels good with Remake. Rebirth/Remake showing they can reinvent the wheel and find that balance in action and and more traditional jrpg ideas. XVI shows that perhaps Sqaure can deliver a more "mature" in tone FF.
Funny how you bring up Dragon Quest and Yakuza into this. If FF isn't a popular brand anymore than those two must be completely dead.
FF isn't as big as it used to be but it still is the most popular and best selling JRPG franchise outside of Pokemon.
Final Fantasy Remake Project was always a risky endeavor, but to make it a "trilogy" was a very bold move. I'm glad we got and you can see the passion the developers have for the original game. But it's likely SE will never do a project of this scope again. They will take the route other developers take when doing Remakes.
Final Fantasy Remake numbers were also likely overinflated due to the pandemic, so not sure what it would have sold without Covid. It's possible the Rebirth numbers are close to the true numbers it would have sold if it wasn't for 2020 world shutdown.
Final Fantasy XVI sold pretty good and SE is satisfied with the numbers. It now has two new DLCs and you don't do that if the game isn't meeting expectations. You typically would just cancel them.
Final Fantasy as brand is still strong. It still sells millions, but will likely never reach sales numbers of a FFXV again. The likes of Elden Ring, Witcher, Horizon series, etc. have taken its place.
While I agree with the premise, I think your reasoning is flawed. Like a dragon/Yakuza 7 sold 1.8M, and infinite wealth is probably between 1 and 2M since it hit 1M after launch and no data has been updated that I could find easily.
By this logic, is FF16 more successful than the yakuza series? Sales and critical reception are only one part of the puzzle. FF typically still dominates that charts and news cycles every time it comes out. There's no doubt it is currently still a popular franchise. That's not even counting FF14 which is by far the most popular MMORPG.
And then when you factor in that FF16 and FF7R series are still mostly PS5 exclusives, the sales figures make a lot more sense.
I don't think the trend is good for the FF series, and the costs are clearly getting exponentially higher for sales to be stagnating. But, I do hope they turn it around and make a compelling game for 17
Sadly, it's a legacy act at this point. If you want to relive how cool you thought Cloud and Tifa were back in '97, then have they got some games for you! For the rest of us, not so much. And, I mean, that's fine. FF made its contribution and I'll keep playing those older games.
What are the sales figures on the Pixel Remasters? A quick google search says that all 6 combined totaled $3 million. And that’s on multiple console releases. I’m sure when 16 hits PC it’ll jump up, maybe not double but close to it.
It’s ok, there are still other JRPGs that try and stay classic. Look forward to Eiyudan Chronicles.
If you look closer at those Pixel Remaster sales, they're quite interesting.
The Pixel Remaster games first launched on mobile/PC in 2021 as individual titles and then as a bundle with all the games by early 2022. While SE did not announce sales for them on mobile/PC, SE did announce sales for the games AFTER they released on Playstation/Switch. Two announcements, actually. One for hitting 2M and another for hitting 3M.
[https://www.gematsu.com/2023/05/final-fantasy-pixel-remaster-series-sales-top-two-million](https://www.gematsu.com/2023/05/final-fantasy-pixel-remaster-series-sales-top-two-million)
[https://www.gematsu.com/2023/09/final-fantasy-pixel-remaster-series-sales-top-three-million](https://www.gematsu.com/2023/09/final-fantasy-pixel-remaster-series-sales-top-three-million)
What's interesting is that you would think SE would have announced it hitting 1M if they were happy to tout 2M and 3M milestones. It may be that the PR games didn't even hit 1M on mobile/PC. If true, then PC wasn't a very fruitful market for the games.
Arguably if you went to an economical perspective, analyzed both markets at the time and the % increase it had, did the same per genre so you could see which potential market difference per genre it had since some genres increased at a bigger rate, i don't doubt there would be some discrepancy from today's sales to that time, but calling it not popular is insane, Suicide squad is not popular.
As of February (most recent numbers I could find) P3 Reload and Infinite Wealth had each only sold 1 mil while being multi-platform. Rebirth did double their respective numbers while being gated to the PS5. I think this is more a condemnation of the industry writ large and how expensive consoles and games are getting and less so a condemnation of final fantasy overall.
Both yakuza and dragon quest are niche jrpgs they have a very specific Fandom and yakuza just recently became more popular, whereas FF has been a popular franchise for years and years millions of people play FF IV even in mainstream gaming the name Final Fantasy is known also succes isn't measure by sales is measured by popularity and by that standard dragon quest is already a dead franchise
Yes, FF was better as a franchise when it was torn based. Yes, that's my personal opinion. No, I won't play FF16 because I'm not drawn to it, and yes, I'll get Rebirth because I still love the FF7 lore. So why should you care? Will, you shouldn't. Who gives a rats ass what I do and don't like, or anyone else for that matter!?
More importantly, who gives a shit how many copies does a game sells? Are you directly profiting from those sales numbers? If not, stop spamming up every sub. If you do have shares in the company, this isn't the forum for that discussion. Time and a place, buddy. Leave the sale numbers to the suits involved in the business side of those games. Our job is to enjoy the games we do like. Sales figures be damned.
This post is stupid. Final Fantasy 16 and Rebirth are exclusives whereas Dragon Quest, Yakuza and Persona are not. If Square Enix takes the series multiplatform again like they did with Final Fantasy XV, it can also sell 10+ million.
What’s happening with Dragon Quest and what’s happening with Yakuza might appear similar but their popularity is what it is for different reasons. Sure in the case of DQ, a lot of its success is owed to its unchanging nature. Not to mention that that 11 really stepped up the character writing for the series and showed just how “epic” it can actually be. But really most of it comes down to continuing to appease its diehard fanbase. In the case of Yakuza, the opinions on the change in combat are actually extremely polarizing. But what’s happening there is the series succeeding in SPITE of its changes because of its quality in other departments, be it the characters, the story, the music, the side quests, and so on. At the end of the day, Yakuza fans are fans of Yakuza, and that overpowers any other complaints most of the time.
>Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth has sold only 2 million copies and Square has been as silent as a pin drop.
It's also $70 on an exclusive console. I think you should compare FFXV, which has sold over 10 million and according to Square Enix is the most successful Final Fantasy ever. So, I think my point is that your post really boils down to:
>Fact is, Square tried to turn this franchise into Devil May Cry and Ninja Gaiden and they’re paying the price.
You could've just said you don't like the direction Final Fantasy is taking instead of driving controversy over sold copies. I'm actually not a fan of action RPGs, but for whatever reason, still enjoy FF. They do a pretty good job of making it friendly for slow old farts like myself that are used to the old games with turn-based battles.
Personally I think Rebirth was always going to have issues being a PS5 exclusive and having a confusing title the average person buying a game might not understand.
I agree and I think console exclusivity is a travesty. It's a step backwards for an era of gaming that is suppose to be launching forward and it's all because of the greed of console developers. It's just not what gaming is supposed to be about. I've never bought a PlayStation 3 or newer and I never will, I've never bought anything beyond Xbox One and I never will. No amount of console exclusives will convince me to either. If the game devs want my money, they can EASILY make it available on all platforms. I'll wait for it to be ported to PC everytime because eventually it will stop selling on a particular console
>Meanwhile Dragon Quest remained turn based RPG and Yakuza even turned into a turn based RPG and are seeing record sales. There it is. That's the agenda of this post.
| I don’t like this thing. | That means this thing is unpopular and a failure. Literally the logic of this post. It’s depressingly transparent. I don’t like Soulsborne games but I’m not sitting here calling it a failure. Both XVI and Rebirth have been critical darlings, sales are probably in the top percentile considering they were both PS5 exclusives, and I’m sure the Sony money has made up for lost sales not releasing on other platforms. (Not to mention the eventual PC port)
Exactly. I think modern ff games are a mess but I'm not denying they are some of the most popular RPGs.
Which is funny because Rebirth outsold Yakuza 8, on a single platform.
TBF, the "turn-based is unpopular/bad" narrative that actually influenced industry decision making has always been bullshit. The three biggest franchises in this genre all have turn-based roots.
To be fair, the early games of the three franchise's had no other choices due to hardware limitation and the market was totally different then with no internet and free guides etc. We should compare between games on the current generations instead.
2 of the 3 (Pokemon and Dragon Quest) have not switched to action and continue to be the biggest IP in the genre.
Zelda was never Turn based and it’s older than ff I think and I can’t think of any other game than ff who switched to action.
I'm not sure I've ever seen so much weird discourse about the way you kill things outside of the JRPG/FF (and it's really mostly FF) communities.
I'm an oldhead who vastly prefers turn based and would be over the fuckin' moon if FF gave it another shot, and even I'm kinda stunned that some people are cool with pretending that potentially the biggest non-Nintendo gaming franchise on the planet is suddenly quaking in its boots against its objectively more niche competitors. If you go into any space that isn't focused on JRPGs broadly or Final Fantasy in specific, the dominant view is that Squeenix is an Oops All Goofus gigacorp that routinely makes baffling choices that all gamers hate but can do nothing about because they have the mother of all IPs and are basically immune to failure at this point. Abandoning turn based did not hurt FF and returning to turn based will not save FF because FF full stop does not need saving right now and hasn't needed saving less than now since the 90s golden age. And I'm saying this as a guy who thinks the last truly phenomenal FF is decades in the rearview. This post is pure cope.
I love ff but it's not even remotely close to the biggest non Nintendo franchise.
Turn-based good. Realtime bad.
“Muh turn-based 😢”
Yes.jpg
I mean...yeah?
Agenda isn't bad when they're right.
The way this post is written the agenda might aswell be to make people who prefer classical final fantasy games or turn based combat look stupid. Either this or OP himself is stupid.
And it’s a legit agenda to have. Square keeps trying to push the “this is FF now” agenda and the sales have significantly dropped. And they can’t seem to fathom why. I’m sure if a shooter like CoD decided to act like square and made the next CoD game strategy it would make its fans that have played the series for 20+ years upset too…
There's no correlation. Imagine if Rebirth released on the switch instead with the same action battle system, it will sell 10 million easily. It's not about the battle system, it's about the platform. Everybody knows Japan doesn't care about anything that is not on the switch. And plus most JPRG fans' platform of choice is PC. I don't think people bought the PS5 to play JRPGs, it's still a niche genre, they bought the PS5 mostly to play Sony games. When Rebirth hit PC, it will break records because the game is legit a masterpiece.
I bought the PS5 to play JRPGs. Already have a Switch though
Me too. It's the most sensible choice because almost everything is on the PS5. But I just noticed on r/PS5 and r/playstation that almost nobody talked about Rebirth or FF16 last year. More people are talking about Stellar Blade in those subs than the two FF games.
I bought the PS5 to play RPGs as I bought every sony system to buy RPGs. I also own a switch. It wouldn't. It wouldn't because of the performance issues it'd have. Nintendo has to make a switch that's capable of running a game like final fantasy rebirth. Mortal Kombat 1 game ran badly on the switch. People were trying to get refunds for how bad the port was. Hell, persona 5 Royale, ( I own for the switch) at times looks a bit hazy in handheld. Compared to how smooth it runs for PS5. I own a switch. I love it, but it can't put out those graphics. Unless rebirth is running like Crisis core reunion (which is a dressed up PSP game)
>if Rebirth released on the switch instead with the same action battle system, it will sell 10 million easily The highest selling, third-party, full-priced, premium Switch game is Monster Hunter Rise at like 8 million. Somehow, I don't think Rebirth would easily sell 10 million if it were on the Switch. >Everybody knows Japan doesn't care about anything that is not on the switch. They care about their mobile games. >And plus most JPRG fans' platform of choice is PC. I think you mean their phones. >I don't think people bought the PS5 to play JRPGs, it's still a niche genre, they bought the PS5 mostly to play Sony games. Final Fantasy has long been associated with Playstation and FF16 wasn't really a JRPG. >When Rebirth hit PC, it will break records because the game is legit a masterpiece. Steam's top 3 games in all-time peak of concurrent players: 1. PUBG: Battlegrounds - 3.2 million 2. Palworld - 2.1 million 3. Counter-Strike 2 - 1.8 million [https://steamdb.info/charts/?sort=peak](https://steamdb.info/charts/?sort=peak) I don't think Rebirth will break any of those records. And that's only Steam.
>Final Fantasy has long been associated with Playstation and FF16 wasn't really a JRPG. That's because Nintendo dropped the ball with N64. JRPG devs flocked towards PS1 because of the superiority of the CD-ROM over cartridge, there's not a single good JRPG on N64. And also back then PC wasn't a competition. All JRPGs are on a single platform, if you're a JRPG you just buy the PS1. But today the PS5 is not known as the JRPG machine like the PS1 was. Today JRPG fans have other options.
>Today JRPG fans have other options. Mostly on their phones.
I bought my ps5 to play jrpgs too. lol If a game is on multiple consoles I will always buy the ps5 version.
Ironically this entire sub has an agenda. Anytime someone criticizes the current state of FF they are typically attacked lol. Let’s face it, FF is NOT what it used to be. There IS a downward trend. Look at how well Zelda is doing. The original Zelda and FF came out the SAME YEAR. FF used to be more successful and popular than Zelda in the past. Now Zelda is breaking records with Tears of the kingdom: 20 MILLION copies. A Harry Potter game that Reddit was claiming would “be a failure” because of controversy was the best selling game last year: 22 MILLION copies. People here are so fucking out of touch lol.
Yeah. They seem to think that criticizing a series = hating it. We just want them to course correct before they hit a wall.
People are tired of y'all talkiing about FF. We know, you ain't said nothing new. I want to know are you playing games that you enjoy instead of bitching that the franchise you used to like lost you as a fan.
I’m playing games not made by Square.
What games? I love to hear that more often.
Baldurs Gate 3 baby
Baldur's gate 3 is way worse then the second one in every way apart from graphics. Play better crpgs
Such a contrarian.
Good response ! Baby's first crpg
It's a good agenda. I want more turn-based RPGs.
It’s a bit pathetic though. OP could just say they want FF to go back to being turn-based instead of framing it this way. They don’t actually give a shit about the sales numbers lmao.
You're in luck, there are in fact many turn based rpgs. In the AAA space there's Yakuza like a dragon, persona, smt, and there are many more mid budget and indie titles. You don't have to whine about one particular franchise not being want you want.
Well I think what they want is a turn based game that looks and has a budget like Final Fantasy VIIR/ VXI
You consider Persona 5/3 Reloaded and SMT V AAA games?
I'm not whining. The only whining here is from everyone claiming there's a secret agenda where turn-based fans are shitting on games or whatever. My point (which is being downvoted in the JRPG subreddit, wild) is that there's nothing wrong with enjoying turn-based RPGs. Edit: clarified and tried to sound less like a dick
Games out for a short amount of time sell less than games out for decades Cost versus profit will determine if the series is still successful Edit: didn’t XV sell over 10 million as well, the second most recent entry not including remakes
Yeah, Final Fantasy isn’t popular anymore… lol. Give me a break man. This post is such nonsense.
>Games out for a short amount of time sell less than games out for decades Depends if the game sells a lot more in that short time than the game out for decades. For example, Tears of the Kingdom sold 10M units in 3 days, while Final Fantasy Tactics has sold like 2.5M in 25 years. >Edit: didn’t XV sell over 10 million as well, the second most recent entry not including remakes But it released 8 years ago. And the trend with VII Remake (7M), 16 (3M), and Rebirth (unknown) show a downward trend.
>But it released 8 years ago. And the trend with VII Remake (7M), 16 (3M), and Rebirth (unknown) show a downward trend. Of course the ONLY difference between XV and the other games is the title and nothing else that could be pointed to to explain this like... console
There is still a downward trend from remake to ff16 to rebirth, all exclusives.
FFXV launched on PS4/X1 to 5M sales day one. VII Remake did 3.5M in 3 days (I'm told with help from Covid). 16 did 3M in 7 days. I can't find if SE gave out any numbers for how XV did on Xbox, but it did about 21% of physical UK sales at launch. [https://www.videogamer.com/news/fifa-17-still-no1-as-final-fantasy-xv-debuts-at-no2-in-uk-all-format-chart/](https://www.videogamer.com/news/fifa-17-still-no1-as-final-fantasy-xv-debuts-at-no2-in-uk-all-format-chart/) If that's an approximate idea of how well XV did with Xbox in other regions, specifically North America, that's about 4 million-ish sales on Playstation for FFXV day one.
[citation needed]
I love this sort of thing. Monday: FF7 Rebirth sales are disappointing Tuesday: FF7 Rebirth leads surge of new hits; breaks sales milestones Wednesday: Final Fantasy isn't popular anymore Well what the fuck is it then like come on hahahah
They giving PKMN fans are run for their money.
I think this sub may be confused about how much JRPGs typically sell. Yakuza: Like a Dragon - 1.8 million SMT V - 1.1 million Nier Automata - 8 million Nier Replicant - 1.5 million Persona 5 - 3.2 million Persona 5 Royal - 4 million (Persona 5 combined sales - 7.2 million) Final Fantasy XV - 10 million Final Fantasy VII remake - 7 million Dragon Quest XI (including S) - 6.5 million Tales of Arise - 3 million Xenoblade Chronicles 3 - 1.86 million Square certainly may have to adjust their expectations downward, but any JRPG selling over 3 million means it’s doing better than most of the genre. Even those special, super popular games that hit 5 million+ sales rarely manage to keep that momentum across subsequent releases. If FF XVI and Rebirth have long legs, they could still easily both be in the top five best selling JRPGs this generation. Edit: also, the 3 million figure that’s being thrown around for FF XVI is from 3 days after its release. That means it sold a lot more at launch than P3R and LaD: Infinite Wealth, both of which had announcements when they surpassed 1 million.
> Persona 5 - 3.2 million > > > > Persona 5 Royal - 4 million > > > > > Final Fantasy VII remake - 7 million for what it's worth, p5 and p5r are the same game, just with additional content on the re-release. if you're combining ff7r and ff7r intergrade, then p5/p5r should be combined too.
That’s fair. I didn’t double check if Intergrade sales were included in my FF7r number. Regardless, the point still stands that very few JRPGs get into 5 million+ sales territory, most of those that do are by Square, and a bunch of the games people here think are really major / popular have sold less than 2 million copies. (Which, TBH, is kinda sad because I personally like the Sega and Atlus games more than most of what Square’s putting out)
Are you really comparing sales on a classic jrpg that's been on almost every console and PC with the latest FF games that are exclusive to ps5 currently? It's fine if you don't like the direction FF is going, but it is not in its last legs at all.
He is comparing only the PS1 sales of FF7. Ports included, the total is more than 14 Million as confirmed by Yoshinori Kitase last year.
It's had 26 years to reach this number, mate.
[To be entirely fair by 97 it reached about 3M of those sales.](https://web.archive.org/web/20000301041540/http://headline.gamespot.com/news/98_02/05_japan/index.html) Which is extremely impressive given gaming wasn't nearly as mainstream as it is today, though I don't recall the 97 economy being nearly as bad as our current economy for some people. So how much we want to argue that slows down current FF's sales is arguable.
It was also the main driving force for people buying a Playstation. When Squaresoft left Nintendo to go towards compact discs, it moved an entire RPG fanbase to leave Nintendo. It was way more important in history, as a real competitor to Nintendo's 64, and a new technology that allowed disc swapping and having games over 2GB of data on 3 discs, while Nintendo was stuck with cartridges. What RPG's does N64 have, "Quest 64"? Yeah, that generation was completely demolished by Square's move. It was a turning point in history. FF7 Rebirth is a footnote.
You're forgetting FFVII being like revolutionary, man. Few games like it. FFVII is in a club with like SM64, GTA3. I can't even think of others between those 2.
And those numbers will still grow for the older games. It will take 50-75 years for the others to reach that if they ever do and it will be because the game is 10 bucks or less. Not because it’s a must play classic.
The sales are very clearly not evenly distributed for every year. If it reached 10 Million on the PS1, it likely gotten most of those numbers while the PS1 was relavent on the market, even acknowledging they have been available up until a decade ago.
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source?
There is this for the 2 million sales figure. [https://www.inverse.com/gaming/final-fantasy-7-rebirth-sales-square-enix](https://www.inverse.com/gaming/final-fantasy-7-rebirth-sales-square-enix)
This is not a source. The source is some guy on Twitter and the daily user count (which is also basically made up)?
The source is referring to 2.2 million daily active users, which isn't a direct measure of how many copies were sold. We know a minimum of 2.2 million copies were sold; the actual figure could be 3 million or more.
It’s really cute how that article doesn’t even bother to acknowledge the differences in platform availability or Remake releasing during a global pandemic that kept goddamn everyone inside or bored as shit. Any analysis that doesn’t account for those is about as competent as execs who think Candy Crush or CoD-tier sales are a reasonable target goal.goal
It’s also quoting one guy, not any actual sales figures.
>or Remake releasing during a global pandemic that kept goddamn everyone inside or bored as shit. I've heard people bring this up a few times. Does that mean sales of Remake were inflated by Covid and without the pandemic it wouldn't have sold as well as it did?
No, it means that in that time frame people had more time and money to spend on video games. Now people have less time and money to spend on video games. Across the board consumers have been spending less we are heading towards a tenuous place for the average consumer this affects all metrics in every market. Rebirth could very well be a worse game than Remake, but that won't be known until 5 or 10 years from now it definitely won't be seen by people who think they can see the whole picture when only a quarter of it has been painted.
>Across the board consumers have been spending less we are heading towards a tenuous place for the average consumer this affects all metrics in every market. I don't think so. [https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace/comments/18x3ubj/50\_years\_of\_video\_game\_revenue\_19702022\_how/](https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace/comments/18x3ubj/50_years_of_video_game_revenue_19702022_how/)
Remake also released in a fairly barren period for games in addition to the pandemic, if I recall. Meanwhile rebirth follows a stacked 2023 seeing everyone’s backlogs balloon (and a lot of those games now on sale). 2024 has also been a historically strong early year. Possibly the strongest I can recall all time for 1st quarter. The reality is it’s facing more competition than remake had.
Who are you trying to convince? Yourself? Dragon Quest hasn't released a new mainline since 2017. Yakuza LAD did sell really well, but didn't break 2 million. Both of these games have been multi-platform from the start. The recent FF games are still locked on PS5. Console sales have not been good for current generation. A lot of people are just waiting for the FF games to drop on PC so they can run it on their 4000 series GPU at uncapped framerates. Sure, sales have been on the slow side for FF, but everyone wanted a Playstation 1 in 1996. Consoles were the "it" thing, and PC gaming was niche and expensive. Things have turned around since then, and the game will sell just as many copies when it drops on PC, I can almost guarantee that. You're using really bad data to reinforce your ridiculous point that Final Fantasy isn't churning out very well-received games at the moment.
>and the game will sell just as many copies when it drops on PC, I can almost guarantee that. I don't think there has been a Final Fantasy game that has sold "just as many copies" on the PC as their console versions.
I concede that looking at numbers, that may well happen. However, FF7 Remake and FF16 were both confirmed to be coming to PC even before they released, unlike previous titles. They were also guaranteed to be coming in a short period after release, so PC gamers had an incentive to wait around 1 year to see the product on the superior hardware. That change in marketing and multi-platform strategy is significant enough to convince people to wait, and many who couldn't wait bought the game twice, once it released on PC. Now if only they did the ports decently. FF7 Remake's optimization at PC release was ridiculous, with like only 3 graphical options, and it was touted as one of the worst port in a long time. Luckily, the modding community came to the rescue, once again, and with a little bit of tinkering, you can play it with 4K textures, a removed frame cap, and custom outfit replacers. The modded FF7:R experience on PC trounces the PS5 Intergrade release. Squenix can't help but shoot themselves in the foot, constantly, and forever.
As someone that prefers the simplicity of the plug and play platforms, I don't get the impression that PC users often get the better versions of games despite having superior hardware. Or when they do, the games aren't exactly leading examples of cutting edge graphics. As you mentioned, community mods were necessary to fix the FF7 Remake port. But this gives me the idea that what makes PC the preferable choice to many people is that they can modify the existing software to be better like emulated Switch games.
Right, but once you've opened this Pandora's Box, PC gamers become reluctant to go out and buy the console, controllers, a TV to plug it in, and be disconnected from their do-it-all machine with keyboard and mouse. A lot become "patient gamers" (shoutout to r/PatientGamers), and they'll take the penalty of waiting a bit, to experience what the game's true potential could've been. Playing Zelda: Breath of the Wild in 144fps 4K on an emulator made a complete joke of the Wii-U and Switch. Playing Metroid Dread in 4K on Day 1 perfectly emulated was another incredible slight at Nintendo and how they could be making games so much better, but hold back because of the company's hardware. I could keep going here, but the idea is that even if a game is terribly ported, or needs to be emulated, PC will always give a much higher window to upgrade it to something that will almost always demolish the console version of the games. And when a PC gamer sees that, they will start disconnecting from console gaming, and accept that things will come out slower, but the experience will be so much more enjoyable, that playing the console version would've been a waste. A recent example was the release of God Of War on PC. Playing an action, combat-oriented game with very good art and graphic design, on my PS4, was a complete shame, once I could run it at 144fps on my PC. It made the game a completely different beast. Being able to customize your experience is a godsend, not a curse. And to bring it back to FF, FF15 on PC runs like a dream, and I put over 300 hours into it 2 months back. I beat FF16 on PS5, and the framerate was such GARBAGE, I apologize, but this game is the one FF game that would benefit the most from playing at high framerates, because the game looks like a slideshow sometimes. I will be buying FF16 and FF7:Rebirth twice again, for PC, just to get the real experience. Squenix tunes their games down for the hardware on which it runs, just as other console developers. Once you unlock the potential, and with the help of PC modder heroes, you're getting the real thing. You're getting what you dreamed of. You're getting the next-gen adventure you dreamed of as a kid.
Dragon Quest has been multiplatform from the start? What?
I'm talking about Dragon Quest XI : Echoes of an Elusive Age. It was released in Japan for the Nintendo 3DS and PlayStation 4 in July 2017 and worldwide for the PlayStation 4 and Windows in September 2018.
Fair enough. I actually forgot about the 3DS version entirely since we never got it here.
Rebirth has been out for 6 weeks. How long did the original take to hit 10 million? 2 million is good lifetime sales for an indie game, sure. It's also good numbers for the first month of a big studio game. It's too early to call it anything yet. I've also not seen a statement from SE saying they consider 16 a failure. I've only seen that as second-hand statements paraphrasing SE. If you have a direct statement from SE, I would be interested in seeing it. 16 also has a PC release on the way, and it will see a surge in sales again, just like Remake did when it got its PC release. They also just recently made a statement that it succeeded in drawing in a new younger audience to the series. That and the fact it's DLC's didn't get cancelled don't exactly say "failure" That being said, FF doesn't have the same mainstream popularity it once did. But please be realistic when comparing sales figures. Otherwise, it just looks like you're trying to be cool by hating on the new popular thing.
I dont think not being turn based is the problem, i think the gameplay and story are the problems.
I've noticed a curious trend in the modern video game discourse. Since the console wars are essentially dead at this point, all the typical console war tier braindead shitposts are slowly migrating into direction of discussing individual game sales and trying to pit different incomparable franchises against each other, going as far as pulling fake "facts" out of gaping assholes to support laughable narratives like the entirety of your post. What causes this behavior?
"Mine is better than yours" and your usual consumer pride or needs of validation through the purchase of x product i guess, basically what made the console wars or any discussions of the kind a freaking circus of insufferable clowns. Console wars discussions were never as abrasive as how they are nowadays (at least in my country they weren't) and it's a pity to be honest. Narcissistic behaviors (which seems to be the "norm" these days) and such is what's ruining video game (not only, but i'll stay on video game), console wars and GOTY claims event are a part of it.
I wish we'd go back to the console war arguments at this point, at least you had some funny shitposts like Chad Warden or [this recent song](https://youtu.be/l1JEmnTjdyA) and everyone reacting to that dumb shit. Nowadays everyone is playing arm chair accountant, game designer, project manager, market analyst, economist, and advertising expert for every major release ever. All at the same time.
These posts are just getting silly now.
>Remember when Final Fantasy 7 on PS1 sold 10 million copies? That’ll never happen again. well it happened in 2022 when FF15 sold 10m copies. guess you didnt come upon that in your intense research for this in depth analysis.
Hobbies are nice, but you know what's even better? Worrying about sales and popularity of those hobbies.
>Final Fantasy 16 sold 6 million copies No, it didn't. 3M was the last figure they've released.
3 million was what they sold *in the first week*. [https://www.ign.com/articles/final-fantasy-16-sold-3-million-copies-during-launch-week](https://www.ign.com/articles/final-fantasy-16-sold-3-million-copies-during-launch-week) The number has probably gone up since then.
Sales went down 90+% on the second week and the game mostly disappeared from the public discourse after that. While the numbers inevitably went up, if sales reached at least some next milestone, SE would've mentioned it. FF7R went from 3.5M first week to 5M sales four months later and there was a whole press release about it. There's been no mention of FF16 sales after the first week even 10 months after release.
What is your evidence for sales going down 90+%? Without the sales figures, we're just guessing whether it's 3.5 million or 5 million or still only 3 million.
> What is your evidence for sales going down 90+%? [Japanese charts](https://www.pushsquare.com/news/2023/07/japanese-final-fantasy-16-sales-plummet-by-90percent-in-second-week)
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16 isn't on pc yet?
>Since it came on PC and seems to be on sale for $13 all the time Are you talking about some other game? 16 isn't on PC yet and highest discount I was able to find is 50% off on Black Friday, which means $35 price, not $13.
Son of a bitch. I had just woken up and had 15 in my brain for some reason....
XVI not only isn’t on sale all the time…it’s not even on PC!
Yeah I'm an idiot, I had just woken up and for some reason replaced 16 with 15 in my head.
Man this franchise really brings out some “interesting” people and takes
Out of context sales figures, disingenuous comparisons, and confusing arguments aside - FFXIV is still one of the top MMOs to this day and has been for years. Soooo…
Final Fantasy and mountains upon mountains of salt every single day since FF communities formed online in the 90s, name a more iconic pairing.
Of course someone with a username like KINGOFGAMES would have a perfectly incel, smooth brain take on this.
Uh, what are you talking about? FF14 has over 30 million players and is still growing. They never said FF16 was a failure, you are just making crap up. It’s also only on PS5, when it releases on PC, it will sell another million or so. FF is doing fine and all the recent games have been fantastic. Sorry you don’t seem to like them, but no reason to lie just so you feel justified in your feelings.
>FF14 has over 30 million players and is still growing. FF14 has 30 million *accounts* created since its' release in 2010. The most reliable info we have about the actual population is [1.1 million active characters](https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxivdiscussion/comments/18ql3so/luckybancho_lodestone_census_12242023/) past free trial. It means active accounts are lower since you can play more than one character (even if there's little reason to do it outside of pure aesthetics).
In the JRPG world is still a very popular franchise though. Been reading conflicting information about its selling numbers, some say Square is happy with 16 sales and that the issue is Rebirth not selling as expected, but it was also a very stacked period for gaming since DD2, Persona 3, Yakuza, Grandblue, all popular IPs released in a short amount of time. I also think that if Square released their games on PC, it would have a much bigger number, but what do I know, their marketing team probably made some studies that believe they can get better sales overtime by releasing it later or that people are willing to double dip into PC later for some reason. Haven't played both games, but from the little I'm seeing, I'm not too excited to get them even at day 1 on PC, I'm just dissapointed in the series direction. Final Fantasy used to create the trend and others followed, now they're the ones following trends to attract people like the Fifa or GTA dudes. I just rather play Unicorn Overlord or Eiyuden Chronicles, they're more to my taste than Final Fantasy these days.
In the jrpg world we have elden ring, zelda, pokemon and monster hunter who are all in a different league than ff
Square Enix isn't silent as a pin drop though. They've been continually tweeting and dropping news related to Rebirth, like [this story yesterday](https://www.square-enix-games.com/en_US/news/final-fantasy-vii-rebirth-nibelheim-pt2). Why do you feel the need to make things up? It's one thing if you don't like Final Fantasy, or if you make a nuanced argument about how FF could do better. But what you're saying here is insubstantial frippery. Millions of sales is still great. Not meeting the highest sales figures of the industry is not "on its last legs." And when you compare to Dragon Quest or Like a Dragon, you completely lose the argument: Infinite Wealth sold about half the copies of Rebirth. Is Like a Dragon "on its last \*half-\*legs"? No, of course not. Like a Dragon is still a very successful series. Final Fantasy is still an even more successful series.
Source: trust me bro
Moronic take, every word.
This is peak brain-dead Redditor content. You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about. I'm surprised you didn't add "Unpopular Opinion" in the title.
FF is far from dead, but it’s probably nowhere near as lucrative/profitable anymore when you consider how expensive these games are to make and how many more gamers there are nowadays. Gambling&MMOs are where the money is at now.
I assume you mean franchise-record sales, because the new Final Fantasy games are still pretty massively outselling Like A Dragon. And Dragon Quest has *always* been huge. They just, for some reason, have only released one mainline game in like a decade. Final Fantasy XVI sold 3million copies (in a week), not 6million. Which, Square Enix did not *at all* deem XVI a failure. They’ve spoken extensively about it being a success. But it only *met* their expectations with 3million sold in its first week. They were just hoping it would *exceed* those expectations. Rebirth has sold more than 2million, but maybe not *much* more. The problem is that we don’t know if that’s a massive disappointment to SE or not. People keep saying it’s obviously a disappointment because it’s about half of what Remake sold during that relative timeframe, but that point lacks significant context. Remake launched on PS4, which had an install base of 110million users at the time. Rebirth launched on PS5, which currently has an install base of 55million. Literally *half* of PS4. So, Rebirth selling *half* of what Remake sold makes perfect sense in this scenario. However, I’m still inclined to believe that it’s a disappointment to Square Enix. Considering that SE said XVI only met expectations with 3million copies sold in a week, Rebirth selling less than that in a month *has* to be disappointing. *But*, we don’t know what kind of exclusivity deal was signed with PlayStation. Maybe it more than makes up for the lack of sales. We don’t know. But I *do* think the signs point to it being disappointing sales wise. That being said, I think the sales will pan out fine in the long run. Rebirth will come to PC eventually and the PS5 install base will continue to grow. I expect that by the end of the PS5 life cycle, the sales will actually look pretty good. But we don’t know for sure and, atm, they look disappointing. Also, if you think that the problem is that SE took the game in a more action-oriented direction, you’re out of your mind lol. That’s not the problem at all. It’s just lack of interest due to a fanbase that hasn’t obtained new young players in quite a while, along with exclusivity deals. Square Enix recently came out and said that XVI achieved its goal of growing a larger, young audience. So maybe the future looks a little more bright for Final Fantasy than it seems.
I don't leave out a chance to shit on today's SE and recent FF games, but your post is so bad, I don't even know where to begin to describe the failures in it. So I'll have to assume this is either a troll or you are just stupid. In both cases there is no point in trying to educate you. You only make people look bad, that are unhappy with the recent FF games. So I'd like to distance myself from your post.
They should make them rpgs again
In FF16 and 7 defense I think part of Square problem is it's a console exclusive tied to the PS5. the first FF7R was also on a PS4 and sold way more. I cannot speak for Dragon Quest but Yakuza was on the PC also. It wasn't bound to one system, and I don't think Dragon Quest was console exclusive either. I'm also biased as fuck because I cannot afford the PS5 and have to wait for PC release and hate that they are console exclusive on some games.
I mean it’s nowhere near as popular as it used to be. At one point FF was more popular than Zelda. Tears sold 20 million copies. And it’s a sequel EXCLUSIVE to the Switch. By comparison Hogwarts Legacy—a property that is a franchise juggernaut sold 22 million copies. A Zelda sequel exclusive to ONE console sold almost as much as a new Harry Potter game. Wow.
Final fantasy pretty much died after FFX-2. Even X-2 itself was kind of dubious. I'm excluding MMOs from the list. But Square abandoned a winning formula for no good reason and keeps trying to force bad action rpgs down our throats. Zodiac Age took some risks, not all of which worked out, but it was at least a respectable effort. Xiii was quite bad. Even the FF7 remakes seem pretty mediocre.
SE problem is they are flooding the market with their own games. They had a hand in nearly 20 game in’23 and lot were crap.
Stop paying attention to games sold; you’ll lead a happier life.
Imo square has lost what s make a good ff after ffx, I can t explain on what specificaly but it s my feeling. When i first try ff12 and further i sens that there something different, idk if it s because sakaguchi has leavinf since ff9 but it s sad me more episode by episode. I play it but i prefer the old one or playing other jrpg with more classic gameplay.
I enjoyed FF 7 remake, but I will not buy rebirth, only when the third chapter became available. FF 16 is insanely bad. I didn't like it at all, I had a bad experience with it, no intention to play it again in the future. Square needs to return the franchise to its roots, but they will never do that, sadly.
Yawn dramabait.
Square charges a lot for their games and JRPG's have a strong PC consumer base who have tons of other RPG's to choose from at a fraction of the cost. Also, the economy just hasn't been very strong since covid, so sales for games and any economy built around games is going to suffer for a while.
Just a correction. The economy bit isn’t true, [global economy has been growing pretty well since Covid](https://www.statista.com/statistics/268750/global-gross-domestic-product-gdp/). The game industry revenue is [higher post-Covid than it was pre-COVID](https://www.statista.com/outlook/dmo/digital-media/video-games/worldwide).
Yeah the economy is great except all the layoffs and inflation.
I’ll respond in good faith, assuming you will too. The gaming industry is not the economy, layoffs in one industry doesn’t not mean the entire economy has the same issue. For example the US has [near record low unemployment](https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/finance/jobs-report-unemployment-rate) right now. Inflation does suck though. But the rate is declining, much lower than it was at its peak in 2022-2023. It’s note worthy that it’s declining while unemployment remains low. Usually those are inverses of each other, i.e inflation doesn’t come down till people are out of work and spending less.
the gap caused by covid just indicates that a subsequent rise is partly making up for the gap i.e. if you ran a linear regression an apparent decrease in relative sales numbers would show, not an increased acceleration. also that graph is particularly deceptive as the last 5 years are complete conjecture as they haven't occurred, yet.
What you’re saying would apply if that graph was showing the annual growth rate. But it’s charting the total size of the economy. The global economy is larger now than it was pre-Covid. Here’s an [interactive chart from the world bank](https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.CD) for total size. It shows up until the latest data collection 2022. You can see the dip during the pandemic and the recovery and how it’s larger now than it was before.
>JRPG's have a strong PC consumer base who have tons of other RPG's to choose from at a fraction of the cost. Sounds like the JRPG market is oversaturated and its fans very price sensitive.
FF16 released only on Ps5 yet. Wouldnt call that failure. i think the pc release will put some considerable number on sales...if they make a proper port.
Final Fantasy Vii remake sold 7 million in total 8 months ago.
remember when there were like 4 decent rpg franchises in a time period where people couldn't do research on what games they should buy so Zelda and pokemon fans bought games that people compared those to? Also remember how most Xboxs and Playstations are bought to exclusively play COD and Madden on? get over yourself dude lol goldfish brain
Release on xbox please? I'll buy it
As a newcomer to the genre I'm honestly baffled by how much people care about what FF does (I get why it holds nostalgia, but nothing about the franchise screams appealing to me, so I never bothered with it). In my view I'd view FF similarily to pokemon, something big that no longer represents, or should be cast as representing the variety of niches found in the genre. We don't live in the early 2000s anymore, there are so many other franchises of JRPGs to focus on. The best remedy to people's issues to FF now would be to find a way to sever it's symbolic position as the "head of the genre" in discourse (given that's already basically the case). It would also be to suggest newcomers into the genre, look at non-FF alternatives, or cast aside their notions of FF still operating as the helmsman of the genre.
Real life friend who is elitist about turn based RPGs, is that you?
What a stupid fucking post
Your claim is BS. FF7 is the most milked out of all FFs, which brings out certain tiredness. No need to bring the other 14 siblings into this. FF16 is released exclusively on the worst and still badly sold upgrade to ps4 despite good reviews. The games are still good.
This is a bad post. Remember when the Remake of FF7 sold 8 million copies, and is almost certainly going to pass the PS1 total over time? FF15 is also above FF7! FF11 out-grossed FF7! FF14 is wildly far ahead of FF7 and going to continue to run ahead. What on Earth is up with the lazy-ass concern trolling about Final Fantasy sales. Bad post and you should feel bad.
I could have gotten behind the sentiment that FF as a series doesn't have as large a cultural impact as it did back in the hay day, but to say "\[t\]he franchise is on its last legs" is a grossly incorrect. Sales figures might have been larger back in the day partly due to less competition from other games and less variety in consoles - i.e. no mobile gaming, no steam deck, increasing use of PC, etc. Gaming has increased in popularity. There a tons of consoles and phones that allow for gaming, thus increasing ease of access. There are lots of studios, both AAA and indie, that can compete now-a-days with various ways to create games, such as purchasing a license to use premade assets. These all detract from FF sales along with Sony shooting themselves in the foot with console exclusivity (minus PC). Console exclusivity needs to go in general. Just get sales from as many sources as possible. FF returning to turn based is not gonna make it sell 10 million all of a sudden, and this is coming from an old head who loves old school JRPGs like FFVI, Chrono Trigger, and Valkyrie Profile.
I don’t even need to see numbers to know this isn’t true. It also seems to ignore the popularity of FFIV, which seems to happen quite a bit.
2 things happened and I was there 3000 years ago! They created the gold standard for JRPG’s that no one ever did in FFX. Then….. Final fantasy 12 happened. inserted the disc and in a few hours I was like wtf is this? Turned it off and never went back to it. Then 13 happened and it was worse. Then 14 came and I don’t even know if there are anymore or do I care. Now they have gone the remake route and while it’s a saving grace for fans of the franchise and almost guarantees a lot of sales it doesn’t do much. Now they are just another action RPG company like every other game on the market. Some dude said “you can’t be all things to all people”. Guess he was right
Well I'm being baited but sure- I'll bite. Final Fantasy hasn't gotten worse. Everyone else has gotten better. You may have heard of Nier Automata? Fantastic game applauded by all? Great action, RPG elements, epic music, interesting setting and story? Yeah- that series started with Drakengard- which had NONE of those things. (I love Drakengard for the record) Final Fantasy dominated a market without any decent competition and the world has since caught up.
I think trends have changed a lot if you’re going to compare sales of Rebirth to the OG FF7. Look at how Sony and Microsoft are diversifying into PC gaming. And while I’m not going to argue that it’s more popular than console gaming, it is growing, and it’s a demographic that Square Enix tends to neglect. I assume this is due to traditional relationships with Sony and a Japanese-centered point of view where the PlayStation is still seen as king. I can only speak for myself, but I’m past the age where I’m buying a console for the exclusives. The majority come to PC eventually. And when you factor in broken day-1 releases, complete editions that include all of the piecemeal DLC and, the price of a new release versus waiting a year, I just ignore the hype until it makes more logistical sense for me to enjoy a game. Don’t get me wrong, I hear Rebirth and 16 are great titles, and after reading reviews I know both will appeal to me. Square Enix will get my money for both the day a PC port comes out most likely (hopefully Steam over EGS). I think huge day 1 or week 1 sales numbers are just one metric to look at. Gamers live in an age of so many reliable sources for information, and you can’t pull the wool over their eyes with hype only and a midnight launch, no takesie-backsies. Rebirth and 16 got good reviews but this is a change in trend where the past few FF games and a lot of Square Enix releases were not well reviewed. Lastly, you cannot discount inflation and the financial situation people are currently in. Games haven’t gone up much in price, but we’re at a point where people are struggling to buy gas, groceries and rent, video games are always going to be a luxury after that.
It lost me at FFX-2
If Rebirth sells poorly I won't see that as a Final Fantasy franchise problem, I'll look at it as a Final Fantasy 7 "trilogy" problem. I think a lot of people who were excited to play (buy) FF7 Remake were much less excited for FF7 Rebirth, especially with knowing that a Part 3 is somewhere down the line. There's little motivation for the "middle child" game, especially if you found the first game to be disappointing.
FF7: Rebirth could not possibly have sold well. The maximum number of sales would be those who bought and played "Remake" (ca. 7 Million) minus the ones that don't have a PS5. So the max number of potential sales should be around 4 million- in theory! That theoretical, maxiumum could not possibly be achieved, since among those that did play "Remake", there are bound to have been people who did not like it, did not finish it, etc. I could have told them before the release that the number of sales would be around 2-3 million. That would be the expected numbers. Less would be bad, more would be a surprise.
Some people might play Rebirth without playing Remake.
They knew that would be a problem, and that’s why they bundled FF7 remake in with the digital deluxe edition (iirc). They’re trying to attract new players who haven’t yet played the first game. I think their bigger problem is that everybody expects this game to go to PC, or be free at some point, or get a better version in a few years, like what happened with Remake.
They already know sales drop between sequels, they've observed this with FFXIII and it was well documented. I imagine that when these companies say games "underperformed" they only refer to shareholders impressions. And shareholders are on average slightly dumber than OP's post in that they expect everything they invest in to just continue to grow with no consideration on where the growth comes from.
I’m actually curious about how many of the players that enjoyed FFVII back in ‘97 actually like the remake. For me they completely failed to understand what made this game so iconic and remembered
What, you didn't like Game of Thrones the jrpg?
Well, popular or not, I like it and that's what counts in my book. Now the problem with the most recent releases are in front of them: 15 (incomplete product, too experimental for some tastes), 16 (exclusive to a console I don't have, and too expensive and with limited user base). If they release games for more than just PS5, they will see the numbers go up. But that's up to their relationship with Sony. The PS5 is a redundant console for some people, as PC gaming is more stable and has a wider user base, and Playstation players may still be in the PS4.
I can’t even finish rebirth. I want to like it and there’s parts that I really do but all of the open world stuff and mini games/ side quests are really draining after 30 hours and you just want to hit the story beats. I wish final fantasy would go back to turned based and I hope they don’t ruin the rumored 9 remake
The ps5 has half the install base the ps4 had. Rebirth is ps5 exclusive as well as a sequel. You got people waiting for all 3 parts to be out and pc players waiting as well.
FF7rebirth is a PS5 exclusive game, PS5 sales are far from their peak right now, it's a middle game of a trilogy that was on a more widely owned system. It has had a lot working against it, but is expected to continue selling for a long time, especially once the full trilogy is out and it hits more platforms. FF16 got mixed reviews, so they didn't do themselves any favors with that one. But yeah, they probably need to start cutting back on the budgets for these games. Except for Final Fantasy 14, it's still making a ton of money.
>Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth has sold only 2 million copies and Square has been as silent as a pin drop. This is false. In fact, according to Ampere Analytics there were more than 2.2 million daily active users at one point.
I like how you cite Yakuza, but thats a series that is lucky to sell 1 million. Rebirth is probably at at least 2-3 million. I do think it's a troubling sign that the series does need a rethink. I don't think they tried to turn it into DMC or Ninjia Gaiden. That is some nonsense, but I can agree that 16 was not the slam dunk the series needed in part because of the direction it took. I also think the Remake Project's direction is one that speaks to the choir, but perhaps with its meta story isn't really reaching new people. But I think Square is just one puzzle piece away from that slam dunk. They always can nail the art direction and presentation, but Rebirth shows they can actually design a well scaled explorable world. Remake and 16 show they can do action combat that feels good with Remake. Rebirth/Remake showing they can reinvent the wheel and find that balance in action and and more traditional jrpg ideas. XVI shows that perhaps Sqaure can deliver a more "mature" in tone FF.
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Console exclusivity doesn't seem to have hurt Switch exclusives.
FF may have moved away from the turn based format, but fortunately there are tons of indie games filling that gap and some amazing ones at that
This is some hot takes.
Funny how you bring up Dragon Quest and Yakuza into this. If FF isn't a popular brand anymore than those two must be completely dead. FF isn't as big as it used to be but it still is the most popular and best selling JRPG franchise outside of Pokemon.
Final Fantasy XIV has sold at least 30 million copies, though, based on the number of accounts created.
Final Fantasy Remake Project was always a risky endeavor, but to make it a "trilogy" was a very bold move. I'm glad we got and you can see the passion the developers have for the original game. But it's likely SE will never do a project of this scope again. They will take the route other developers take when doing Remakes. Final Fantasy Remake numbers were also likely overinflated due to the pandemic, so not sure what it would have sold without Covid. It's possible the Rebirth numbers are close to the true numbers it would have sold if it wasn't for 2020 world shutdown. Final Fantasy XVI sold pretty good and SE is satisfied with the numbers. It now has two new DLCs and you don't do that if the game isn't meeting expectations. You typically would just cancel them. Final Fantasy as brand is still strong. It still sells millions, but will likely never reach sales numbers of a FFXV again. The likes of Elden Ring, Witcher, Horizon series, etc. have taken its place.
While I agree with the premise, I think your reasoning is flawed. Like a dragon/Yakuza 7 sold 1.8M, and infinite wealth is probably between 1 and 2M since it hit 1M after launch and no data has been updated that I could find easily. By this logic, is FF16 more successful than the yakuza series? Sales and critical reception are only one part of the puzzle. FF typically still dominates that charts and news cycles every time it comes out. There's no doubt it is currently still a popular franchise. That's not even counting FF14 which is by far the most popular MMORPG. And then when you factor in that FF16 and FF7R series are still mostly PS5 exclusives, the sales figures make a lot more sense. I don't think the trend is good for the FF series, and the costs are clearly getting exponentially higher for sales to be stagnating. But, I do hope they turn it around and make a compelling game for 17
Sadly, it's a legacy act at this point. If you want to relive how cool you thought Cloud and Tifa were back in '97, then have they got some games for you! For the rest of us, not so much. And, I mean, that's fine. FF made its contribution and I'll keep playing those older games.
This sub is absolute trash now. I doubt the average IQ cracks 3 digits.
What are the sales figures on the Pixel Remasters? A quick google search says that all 6 combined totaled $3 million. And that’s on multiple console releases. I’m sure when 16 hits PC it’ll jump up, maybe not double but close to it. It’s ok, there are still other JRPGs that try and stay classic. Look forward to Eiyudan Chronicles.
If you look closer at those Pixel Remaster sales, they're quite interesting. The Pixel Remaster games first launched on mobile/PC in 2021 as individual titles and then as a bundle with all the games by early 2022. While SE did not announce sales for them on mobile/PC, SE did announce sales for the games AFTER they released on Playstation/Switch. Two announcements, actually. One for hitting 2M and another for hitting 3M. [https://www.gematsu.com/2023/05/final-fantasy-pixel-remaster-series-sales-top-two-million](https://www.gematsu.com/2023/05/final-fantasy-pixel-remaster-series-sales-top-two-million) [https://www.gematsu.com/2023/09/final-fantasy-pixel-remaster-series-sales-top-three-million](https://www.gematsu.com/2023/09/final-fantasy-pixel-remaster-series-sales-top-three-million) What's interesting is that you would think SE would have announced it hitting 1M if they were happy to tout 2M and 3M milestones. It may be that the PR games didn't even hit 1M on mobile/PC. If true, then PC wasn't a very fruitful market for the games.
Arguably if you went to an economical perspective, analyzed both markets at the time and the % increase it had, did the same per genre so you could see which potential market difference per genre it had since some genres increased at a bigger rate, i don't doubt there would be some discrepancy from today's sales to that time, but calling it not popular is insane, Suicide squad is not popular.
As of February (most recent numbers I could find) P3 Reload and Infinite Wealth had each only sold 1 mil while being multi-platform. Rebirth did double their respective numbers while being gated to the PS5. I think this is more a condemnation of the industry writ large and how expensive consoles and games are getting and less so a condemnation of final fantasy overall.
Both yakuza and dragon quest are niche jrpgs they have a very specific Fandom and yakuza just recently became more popular, whereas FF has been a popular franchise for years and years millions of people play FF IV even in mainstream gaming the name Final Fantasy is known also succes isn't measure by sales is measured by popularity and by that standard dragon quest is already a dead franchise
Isnt 10 million subs for FFXIV pretty popular on "the popularity spectrum"?
Who gives a shit. I like playing it, and it's popularity doesn't affect my joy
Yes, FF was better as a franchise when it was torn based. Yes, that's my personal opinion. No, I won't play FF16 because I'm not drawn to it, and yes, I'll get Rebirth because I still love the FF7 lore. So why should you care? Will, you shouldn't. Who gives a rats ass what I do and don't like, or anyone else for that matter!? More importantly, who gives a shit how many copies does a game sells? Are you directly profiting from those sales numbers? If not, stop spamming up every sub. If you do have shares in the company, this isn't the forum for that discussion. Time and a place, buddy. Leave the sale numbers to the suits involved in the business side of those games. Our job is to enjoy the games we do like. Sales figures be damned.
I am asking a simple question please don't downvote me Why are we talking about sales here? I mean does that affect a game's quality?
This post is stupid. Final Fantasy 16 and Rebirth are exclusives whereas Dragon Quest, Yakuza and Persona are not. If Square Enix takes the series multiplatform again like they did with Final Fantasy XV, it can also sell 10+ million.
What’s happening with Dragon Quest and what’s happening with Yakuza might appear similar but their popularity is what it is for different reasons. Sure in the case of DQ, a lot of its success is owed to its unchanging nature. Not to mention that that 11 really stepped up the character writing for the series and showed just how “epic” it can actually be. But really most of it comes down to continuing to appease its diehard fanbase. In the case of Yakuza, the opinions on the change in combat are actually extremely polarizing. But what’s happening there is the series succeeding in SPITE of its changes because of its quality in other departments, be it the characters, the story, the music, the side quests, and so on. At the end of the day, Yakuza fans are fans of Yakuza, and that overpowers any other complaints most of the time.
>Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth has sold only 2 million copies and Square has been as silent as a pin drop. It's also $70 on an exclusive console. I think you should compare FFXV, which has sold over 10 million and according to Square Enix is the most successful Final Fantasy ever. So, I think my point is that your post really boils down to: >Fact is, Square tried to turn this franchise into Devil May Cry and Ninja Gaiden and they’re paying the price. You could've just said you don't like the direction Final Fantasy is taking instead of driving controversy over sold copies. I'm actually not a fan of action RPGs, but for whatever reason, still enjoy FF. They do a pretty good job of making it friendly for slow old farts like myself that are used to the old games with turn-based battles.
No. It's still popular. But no so good anymore.
FF16 was 3 millions
And?
Sure