Squenix wants simultaneous global Last Remnant, FF dates

By Tom Bramwell Published 11 July, 2007

Feasibility being studied - CEO

Square Enix's John Yamamoto, president and CEO for North America and Europe, has said that the publisher is busily trying to work out if it can release Last Remnant and Final Fantasy XIII simultaneously worldwide, calling it "a goal".

"For one of our biggest upcoming titles, Last Remnant, we're working to simultaneously launch in the United States and Japan - and we're aiming for Europe. We're still assessing whether that's feasible, but it's a goal," Yamamoto told our sister site GamesIndustry.biz on the eve of the E3 Media & Business Summit in Santa Monica.

"We'll try our best," Yamamoto said when asked whether the same would be true for next-generation Final Fantasy. "Our ultimate purpose is to release titles in five languages at the same time. That is our ultimate goal and we are working on that," he added.

Square Enix has traditionally struggled to get Europe into line with launches in other territories, with translation thought responsible for a four-month gap between Final Fantasy XII's US and European releases, and the five extra months it took for Dragon Quest: The Journey of the Cursed King to materialise here following its North American launch.

Last Remnant was unveiled at the Square Enix Party 2007 last month with the promise of a simultaneous US/Japan release, while Final Fantasy XIII and Final Fantasy Versus XIII - both currently only for PS3 - first pitched up at E3 last year.

Yamamoto was less clear in clarifying recent confusion over whether Final Fantasy will ever appear on Xbox 360, but a spokesperson for the company indicated that doors definitely weren't closed. Watch out for the full interview on GamesIndustry.biz this week for more specifics.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (9) Latest comment 5 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • SeesThroughAll #1 5 years ago

    This should keep everybody happy, though. Apart from the obviously expected delay for Europe.

  • Rodster #2 5 years ago

    Another game that will wind up on the 360 sooner rather than later.

  • agparrot #3 5 years ago

    Isn't it just time for the UK to be wholly subsumed under the banner of America anyway?

    Purely so that we can have all their English-speaking-gaming-goodness at the same time as they do, obviously... they can keep their 'have a nice day' and president.

  • Steroyd #4 5 years ago

    About bloody time they looked into that.

  • Scimarad #5 5 years ago

    I'd prefer they didn't screw up the translation rather than rush it out the door...

  • The12thMonkey #6 5 years ago

    Square Enix are already capable of releasing products globally within a few days of each other.

    Chains of Promathia
    Treasures of Aht Urhgan
    Wings of the Goddess (this Winter).

    Yes, okay, they're all expansion packs for FF11, but they are all fully localised for their region. If Square put their minds to it, they certainly can do global launches.

  • Drakron #7 5 years ago

    They can because work is done simultaneous.

    The issue with their games is they first complete the game for JPN, release it and then start to work in the NA version that is released before they start working on the PAL version.

    And yes, its not going to happen ... expect a 4-6 months delay for europe.

  • Kryon #8 5 years ago

    Cool, so will the 360 versions have better graphics as usual then?

    /Runs

  • Sorb #9 5 years ago

    "Square Enix's John Yamamoto, president and CEO for North America and Europe"

    Finally somebody got that right! :)