CHAPTER VI Disaster and Reconciliation
Naoki Yoshida
When the merger between Square and Enix happened in 2002, there may have been a sort of awkward feeling, because a lot of external people came into the company, myself included. People who were on the Square side, making Final Fantasy in-house, may have felt a little strange having a lot of people coming in from the outside.
I’d worked with the Dragon Quest series for about five years, and joined the Final Fantasy XIV project after 1.0 had launched. Honestly speaking, when 1.0 was going through its testing phases, I heard from outside sources that the game was horrible. But I thought, at that time, because we had Final Fantasy XI, which was a very successful MMO for Square Enix, maybe it was just that the players were comparing it to that. Perhaps it was suffering by comparison. Besides, MMO launches are never smooth to begin with. That was the feeling that I had, not being part of the project yet.
But when 1.0 fully launched, there was so much negative backlash around the world that the company began to scramble to find out what had gone wrong. A team of developers were assigned to investigate the situation. For example, the company asked Hiroshi Minagawa, who was directing Final
Fantasy XII at the time, to look at user interface. Yoshihisa Hashimoto, who was CTO during that period, was asked to look at the battle system. We assigned Mr Hiroshi Takai, who was a VFX artist who worked on the
SaGa series and Final Fantasy V, to go in and investigate what was wrong with the launch of version 1.0.
That team would often consult with me, even though I wasn’t a part of the investigation at that stage. At night, they’d ask: “What should we check next?” It may have been that those people trusted me as a game developer, and a game director, to provide advice. But I was kind of working on the game on a volunteer basis at that point. Around midOctober in 2010, I consulted with our CEO at the time, Yoichi Wada, and I told him, “We’re in very bad shape. It’s an emergency. We can’t just install a couple of people to fix everything; we’re in a very grave situation.” I tried to bring it up with the upper management.
At that time, I was about to embark on a new project. The CEO thought, ‘Well, we can handle this with the current Final Fantasy XIV team; we don’t want you to go over there.’ The CEO made the decision that I wasn’t necessary. I wasn’t happy to hear that so I fought back. I said, “Okay then. Never talk to me about Final Fantasy XIV again. If you think the problem can be solved with a Band-Aid patched on top of it, don’t talk to me about it ever again.” He was not happy to hear me say that, but he didn’t get angry at me.
Of course, the development team continued to consult me. They were very hard-working about it. I loved the fact that those developers were still working very hard, and I wanted to support them. So I continued to assist for about a month, but the game’s condition continued to deteriorate. I remember it very clearly to this day. On November 26, 2010, at 4am, the CEO officially asked me: “Could you please handle matters on Final Fantasy XIV?” I said, “Well, if you insist, then I’m willing to help.”
At that time I had two objectives. Firstly I just wanted to think about what, starting from a blank slate, a
Final Fantasy MMO would look like. I also wanted to take the 1.0 version
“I said, ‘Okay. Never talk to me about Final Fantasy XIV again’” Naoki Yoshida
of the game and do a thorough investigation to determine where its issues lay. Was it technology, or game design? Was it our asset pipeline? Just to see what our ideal looked like, and what our current situation looked like.
In order to do those two things, I realised there was something else I needed to do: give the development team a break. There had been such a negative response to the first incarnation of the game that it had affected the developers. Not only were they tired physically, but they were also under such mental stress. So to find the motivation and the strength to revamp the game, they needed time off. The other reason was that if we were to just continue developing at this pace without a break, I anticipated the team would come back with a lot of questions. ‘What do we need to do next?’ So many questions that there wouldn’t be enough time to do our research on what was wrong. So by having them out of the way, so to speak, it gave me the time to do those two things I mentioned earlier.
We had about three weeks to do it. I would primarily handle the creation of my ideal Final Fantasy MMO, while my core team did the thorough investigation of 1.0. On December 28, I received the results of their work. It was night-time, and we were going through it, looking at the things they’d found.
It was very bad. So bad I ran a fever. I went into New Year’s break looking at the results of their investigation, comparing it to my ideal Final Fantasy MMO, and spent the break looking at what needed to be fixed or updated, and setting some goals.
When comparing the two, the conclusion that I reached was that there was no way to fix Final Fantasy
XIV unless we rebuilt the game from scratch. Even if we were to continue version 1.0 and try to fix it, adding content as we went along, the server structure itself was very poorly set up. I projected it would have had to shut down after three years, even if we tried to fix it. The server structure was just horribly messed up; it was not planned as a long-term operation.
Hajime Tabata
In 2012 I took a phone call from our previous CEO, Yoichi Wada. He told me that there was a great deal of trouble with Final Fantasy Versus XIII, a separate project to Final Fantasy XIII. He told me that he was considering whether or not to cancel the project. If he did, he said, then he’d want to really start it up from scratch again and take it off in a new direction, and maybe have me take on that project.
There are problems with every videogame project, of course. But with
Final Fantasy Versus XIII the period of trying to fix the issues just went on way too long. It had already been in development for six years by that point. It couldn’t carry on in the same way. That was when I became involved and started to change the project towards becoming Final Fantasy XV.
Yoko Shimomura
Final Fantasy Versus XIII was the first Final Fantasy game that I composed music for. Because it was a spin-off game there wasn’t the pressure I might have felt with a numbered [mainline] game. It was a gentle way in, although of course the game then morphed into a mainline title. When the game changed to Final Fantasy XV it was a big moment for me. Some of the pressure was mitigated by the fact some of the music I had written for Versus XIII had already been accepted. Had I been asked to start again from scratch it may have been far more intimidating. About a third of the music I wrote for
Versus XIII made it into XV.
Hashimoto Everyone was doing what they thought was right with these projects. Nobody was deliberately trying to grind the company into the dirt. But there are some things where the problem only becomes clear once the games take shape. Sometimes you only realise where you’ve gone wrong after the work is finished.
Tabata I didn’t actually say “Yes” straightaway to the offer. I took it to my team and we discussed it all. In actual fact, about 90 per cent of the team were opposed to taking it on.
There was a lot of antipathy, because my team didn’t want to merge with Tetsuya Nomura’s, and they knew about the snags the project had encountered.
It took about six months to reduce resentments and take control. Creating a team where we could all work together and be on the same page when we entered the pre-production stage for Final Fantasy XV was crucial, so I paid a lot of attention to making sure the team integrated well and worked together. I even gave a motivational speech.
We pulled a number of different ideas for the final form the game might take, and we split the department up into several teams, and they all came up with ideas that we put together and then presented to each other. The two core concepts that came out of that were the idea of comrades, and the idea of a journey. That helped us work out the systems and structures of the game. Then we split into different teams and worked on different mock-ups. It was a very useful period actually, because not only was it a team-building exercise in itself, but it also helped focus the direction of the project.
At the start, I had quite a topdown style of management to get things back on track. Someone had to make firm decisions, otherwise
“The period of trying to fix the game’s issues went on way too long” Hajime Tabata
people would have this very fuzzy understanding of where we were headed. But as the project started getting on track and gaining momentum, we moved into a secondary phase where individual sub-teams could have their own vision and work a bit more autonomously. There was a definite shift in style there.
Shimomura There were some clear differences between the two directors. With Nomura it took much longer to get the okay on a new piece of music. He would think very deeply about the piece, and often request changes. But once he told me that he was happy with a piece there would be almost no changes thereafter. Tabata, by contrast, often gave the green light very quickly, but would then require more and more changes at a later date. They have different ways of working that reflect their personalities; both present their distinctive challenges.
Sakaguchi After moving away from Square Enix there was a need to remove my influence from the Final
Fantasy series for various reasons. I’d started a new studio with Mistwalker, and there was a risk people would want to follow me from Square. As such, the CEO at the time wanted to remove any influence I had from the series. There was a long period where I stayed away. That changed with the arrival of the new CEO, Yosuke Matsuda. His thinking is different. He acknowledges that I am the creator and the originator of Final
Fantasy and could see that, from a promotional point of view, it would be good to have me on board again to send a positive message. That was about the time Final Fantasy XV was in development. Masuda introduced me to the director, Tabata, and we had dinner together. It was the first time we’d met.
Tabata We spoke at length and Sakaguchi had some critical points to bring up, which he shared. He always has a lot more to say when he’s drunk. I have to take him out properly if I really want to get some information out of him.
Sakaguchi He said to me that night: “In my team we believe that a Final
Fantasy game is a place to try new things.” This guy, I thought to myself, he says some good things. Maybe I can get on board with him?
Tabata At that first meeting Sakaguchi told me that I could ask him anything I wanted. So I said: “How much money do you have?” And he replied: “You can ask me anything but that.” Sakaguchi So you see, while there was a long dark period, I am now allowed to talk pretty freely to Final Fantasy people. When I set off on my own path, Final Fantasy seemed to follow me around; it almost felt like a burden. But I’ve been making games away from Square for about 15 years and it’s better now. It’s a little like if your daughter gets married to a man you really can’t stand. And then they have a grandson together and he’s cute and it brings you back together. That’s kind of how I feel about Final
Fantasy now.
Tabata One of the big things in doing a project like this – a numbered Final
Fantasy game, such a big part of the overall business strategy for the company – is that you really do come to realise how all the different departments in the company are supporting a project. People who aren’t involved at all in the actual development of the game, how they’re involved was something that really struck me.
Also, the way that the difficulty level of developing a project just expands so rapidly when it becomes a project of that level. To meet the needs of the fans, and give them what they want, is always going to be a hard thing, whatever level you’re working at. But when you’re moving onto the higher technical level, the scope of the project becomes so much more difficult. It’s as if you’re making a toy rocket, for example, and then moving on to make a much more professional, proper rocket – the technology, the level of detail and design that is involved in that, is just so much higher.
I had dinner with Naoki Yoshida, the director of Final Fantasy XIV, a little while back, and we were discussing our experiences of our two respective projects. What we both came to agree on very quickly, and a dilemma that both myself and he seemed to have, was how a lot of people in the company don’t seem to understand how hard making a top-level triple-A game using current technology is. We really were talking about the best way to get more people in the company to understand that.
Hashimoto I trust these new guys. It’s far better to have them in charge rather than the older generation.
I know that now the series is in safe hands. I have done nine games in the
Final Fantasy series, and there have been ups and downs, but I’m very happy that we have made so many games under my watch.
Amano Even after Sakaguchi left, Square Enix continued. And looking at the series after his departure, I can still sense this ongoing energy. I think that comes from the next generation: those people who grew up playing
Final Fantasy are now the people who are creating it. That power, and that continuing love, imbues this tradition with new energy.
Uematsu I really like what the new composers on the series are doing. Hitoshi Sakimoto, Yoko Shimomura; they are such a good fit, especially for the more modern games. These are supremely high-quality musicians, and have an approach that works much better than what I could produce.
I’m so grateful for my work with Square, though. Thinking back, as someone who never studied music formally, it’s almost like Square Enix was my music school. They gave me 20 years where I could learn to play music and how to compose. What’s more, I didn’t have to pay any tuition fees.
Sakaguchi Nobuo and I often talk about what might have been different if we had taken a different direction with the seventh game and, instead of going down a more realistic route, had continued in the classic style. How might it have evolved and, crucially, what might have been retained that, I think, was lost somewhere in the later games? It’s not about one approach being better than the other. It’s about the style of play. It’s just different. In the old 2D
Final Fantasy games you’d look in every gap and nook and cranny for secrets. In 3D games there doesn’t seem to be the same need or desire to explore.
Kitase With the [forthcoming] remake of Final Fantasy VII, we get a lot of people applying to join the team from other companies. When we talk to these candidates they often say that Final Fantasy VII was the game that made them want to join the industry. It’s so motivational to hear that. Something we created unlocked this deep desire in other people. Moreover, I can look back on my career and see the way in which the Final Fantasy games are linked to people’s personal history and experiences. People associate different games with different moments in their lives. Making that impact on the culture is astonishing to me. Sakaguchi Every time we made a
Final Fantasy game, we’d all get together and review the project in a debrief meeting. Together we’d watch the game’s ending and toast champagne. We had all put so much energy into this thing, so it was an emotional moment. I remember every single one of those closing parties, and that extraordinary feeling of having made something together. That, I will never forget.
“Final Fantasy seemed to follow me around; it’s almost a burden” Hironobu Sakaguchi