Square Enix held a financial briefing back on May 13, 2024 during which they flat out said they're disappointed in the sales of both Final Fantasy 16 and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. Though held in May, the financial briefing was not made public until September 18th.
President and director of Square Enix, Takashi Kiryu, said that profits for these two Final Fantasy titles "did not meet our expectations."
In the HD Games sub-segment, we released multiple new titles, including major titles such as Final Fantasy 16 and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, but profits unfortunately did not meet our expectations.(...)
We recognize that issues remain in the Digital Entertainment segment. The HD Games sub-segment failed to better its profitability, posting operating losses in every year of our previous medium-term plan. In addition to this, we did not manage our title portfolio across the company as well as we could have, which I believe resulted in opportunity losses due to cannibalization between our own titles.
We recognize that issues remain in the Digital Entertainment segment. The HD Games sub-segment failed to better its profitability, posting operating losses in every year of our previous medium-term plan. In addition to this, we did not manage our title portfolio across the company as well as we could have, which I believe resulted in opportunity losses due to cannibalization between our own titles.
Hard sales figures for Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth were not shared. Square Enix did announce that Final Fantasy 16 managed to sell over three million copies in its initial launch week on PlayStation 5. At the time of that announcement, Square Enix said that the three million copies sold was a figure they were "delighted to announce."
In the time since May when this financial briefing was held, Square Enix already announced that they planed to make significant changes to their business practices. Part of this new plan will focus on more multiplatform releases. Whether this means same day releases of future titles on Xbox, Switch, and/or PC in addition to PlayStation 5 really remains to be seen. These plans also involved cancelling a number of undisclosed titles.
In the near future, Square Enix has titles such as Kingdom Hearts 4 and Dragon Quest 12 coming. They are also making Foamstars free-to-play on October 3rd.
