- Front Mission First release date anounced
\"Square Enix today confirmed that its PlayStation mecha strategy revival, Front Mission First, will be released in Japan on October 23.\" Still no word on a North American or European release, however. Gamers.com
- Rejoice! Bakusou! Yankee Tamashii demo now available
Square has probably released a demo of Bakusou! Yankee Tamashii for the PC, I think. The biker gang MMORPG may be available at the official Bakusou! website, located at yantama.com. I dunno, I can\'t read Japanese.
- Final Fantasy XII approaches
Square Enix's Yasumi Matsuno has confirmed that Final Fantasy XII will be on display at the Tokyo Game Show next month in preparation of its spring 2004 launch in Japan.
- Sword of Mana to get Deluxe Pack with cute battery-powered Li'l Cactus and other useless stuff
Out of nowhere, some random Japanese company "Meikyosha" announced the Shinyaku Seiken Densetsu Deluxe Pack, which will be released alongside Sword of Mana and contain a battery-powered figure of Li'l Cactus which can, get this, rock back and forth. It also comes with a sock puppet Rabite and a calendar. For those of you insane enough to waste money on importing this, it'll come at ?7800 (?57/US$66). Gamefront
- Dengeki slams Crystal Chronicles in first Japanese review
Mr. Joshua Yadron may have been right in his predictions that Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles isn't as great as it seems, because Dengeki certainly agrees with him, scoring it a 6 out of 10 average from three reviewers. Find out why inside!
- Crystal Chronicles '03 release bites the bucket
Nintendo announced the release dates for several of its upcoming games today, and Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles was listed with February 9th, indicating that it had been pushed back from its previous November 11 due date. As it turns out, Europe will now be getting the game before North America, as its December release date over there (here) still holds true. Squenix's return to Nintendo will be out on August 29th in Japan, so you'll just have to wait, or invite your 3 Japanese chums over to play your leet imported copy. Nintendo
- Hot Final Fantasy X-2 voice actors pose for free to keep the hype machine running
Recent release of Final Fantasy X-2 Vocal Collection, a single containing tracks spoken by Yuna, Rikku and Paine's voice actresses (Mayuko Aoki, Marika Matsumoto und Megumi Toyoguchi respectively) has garnered enough attention to be accompanied by an actual launch party at Akihabara involving the three maidens. The single comes with a DVD containing an interview, trailer, and song. Gamefront
- Hopes for Chrono Break broken as Masato Kato surfaces outside of Squenix
If you've been paying attention to the industry this last week, you'll have noticed the announcements regarding Xenosaga II and Baten Kaitos from Namco. Now it would seem that Masato Kato, the scenario designer and story planner for Chono Cross and Chrono Trigger respectively, and therefore the actual mastermind behind the story, is doing the scenario for Baten Kaitos, indicating that he presumably wouldn't be involved too closely with any major projects at Square Enix. So much for that one, then? Gamefront
- Dengeki GC gets hands on Crystal Chronicles; Nintendo reveals first shipment details
Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles received 7 / 8 / 9 / 9 (33/40) from japanese Gamecube specialist mag Dengeki GC, indicating that it should be pretty good as we expected, but not exactly perfect (as expected). At least it's better than Joshua Yadron thought it would be, that blasted naysayer. Nintendo mentioned that the first shipment of the title in Japan would consist of 100.000 units, which seems on the low side - so perhaps they don't expect the game to do really that well, or is the Gamecube market really that tiny? Gamefront
- New Dragon Quest VIII imagery surfaces
The not-yet-released weekend edition of Japanese gaming magazine V-Jump will have a new page of information on Squenix's Dragon Quest VIII which, if not particularly interesting to your average Final Fantasy fanatic, is at the very least different in its attempt to bring the archaic series into 3d finally. The screens portray some basic activity in the game, such as battling, which looks a lot like Chrono Cross for some reason. The celshaded, cartoony look appears to bring Toriyama's designs to life quite nicely, too. UPDATE: more here and here (07/17) Gamefront
- Crystal Chronicles music downloads and PAL release dates
With the utter lack of interesting information pertaining to anything currently flowing from Japan, it would seem Nintendo of Europe had to clean the bottleneck, confirming Crystal Chronicles for a December release, and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance for October in PAL territories. Additionally, acompanying the upcoming launch of Crystal Chronicles in Japan, a preview of the gameplay and the maxi single by Yae have been released at PonyCanyon (what a name). Gamefront
- Drakengard interview sheds new light on upcoming title
An exclusive interview held by Gamebunker with two members of the Drakengard development team, Takamasa Shiba and Yasuhito Watanabe, added a little depth to the fairly meagre impressions seen so far of the game that tells of the pact between a Knight and a Dragon. The official website also includes a look at some of the game's battle scenes with some interesting classical music and a promotional movie. Gamebunker
- Business conference sees Square Enix among biggest publishers within 3 years; this year's games confirmed; other details
"My penis is very large," Wada proudly brought up during the conference, "Very much larger than Mr. Miyamoto's; in fact, I believe I may have the longest, most durable penis in the gamesindustry." Full Article
- Squenix confirmed for TGS 2003; "beating" Nintendo at sales
The CESA recently released a list of developers that will be at the TGS in September; among those is Square Enix (obviously). Sales numbers for the first half year in Japan have also been released, putting Square Enix at 4.28 million sales in software (mostly due to the 2 million they clocked up from Final Fantasy X-2) vs runner-up Nintendo, who sold 3.15 million units (but that doesn't include 1.44M of Pokemon sales).
- Final Fantasy III Game Boy port apparently still under consideration
According to The Magic Box, Square is still considering a Game Boy Advance port of the Wonderswan version of Final Fantasy III, despite ten months of consideration.
- Square Enix to promote violent behaviour with sword for controller
Screw button-pressing gameplay, says Squenix, we're stripping off the extras and showing you what gaming is really about! Or are we?
- Squenix to reveal new game!
At an upcoming media conference, Square Enix will be announcing a new, previously unannounced title, that is sure to "make fans very pleased". So... Front Mission History? Dragon Quest Pocket Monsters GBA 7? Or... Chrono Break?
- New SP color to commemorate Sword of Mana
Nintendo will release yet another Game Boy Advance SP variant color in Japan, this time to commemorate the release of Square's Sword of Mana. The color is named "Mana Blue" and will go on sale packaged with the game. The cost: a cool ?18,300, or about $152. Media
- Front Mission History under development?
What appears to be a new Front Mission title may be coming up from Square Enix as it was revealed by Gamefront that the company registered the trademark "Front Mission History" at the Japanese Patent Office. What the title could mean in terms of a game is open to anything, of course, but thusfar rumors seem to point towards a strategy-based MMORPG. Gamefront
- New Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles artwork and screens released
Square Enix continued its remarkable techniques in capturing screens of Gamecube gameplay, as new screens of the Japanese version of the game, along with some character art portraying the main playable characters in their various get-ups and art/renders of the world map were made available today. It appears environmental effects like mist or rain dynamically change around the sphere you and your Bucket are encapsulated in, too. Cool. Gamekult.com
|
|