SquareSoft AGM. Seconds out, round one!
Shareholders make their concerns heard loud and clear...
SquareSoft, like most companies of any stature, has and annual general meeting to discuss the past, present and future of the company. Due to the spiralling costs of the Final Fantasy Movie, the shareholders were not best pleased with the Square board.
Read on and enjoy. The questions were posed by individual shareholders and are answered by company president Nao Suzuki.
Why did former vice-president [Hironobu] Sakaguchi resign his position?
Mr. Sakaguchi firmly stated that he wanted to think about the future as a creator, from PlayOnline to what comes after the movie. We decided it would be a wiser policy to retain him under an exclusive contract as a game creator, so we agreed to his desire.
Hmmm… The general consensus is that Sakaguchi resigned following the company posting record losses at the close of the previous fiscal quarter. This was to appease the massively angry shareholders who, having realised that Square had effectively gambled almost all the company’s assets in an unproven field wanted something drastic doing.
Why did you not release a strategy guide for Final Fantasy IX?
At the time, former vice president Sakaguchi said that the process of inserting difficult puzzles in the game and then following up on them in a hint book is too unkind to players, especially beginners. That's why he wanted to make a game that was perfectly playable without a strategy guide. In place of a guide, we decided to release strategy information gradually online, to take advantage of the opportunity to connect the game to PlayOnline. We believe this has produced definite results.
We have also decided, however, to publish a strategy guide for Final Fantasy X.
Sakaguchi becomes the whipping boy. Square’s shareholders are obviously angered by the fact that the company failed to capitalise on the game with the release of a guide. Notice that there will be a guide for FFX.
Losses due to project cancellation appeared in the statement of profits and losses. Could you give us the details about these losses?
We had contracted with an outside supplier for a game slated for overseas markets. However, after carefully considering the project's progress and our brand image, we decided to cancel the project in the end.
A cancelled outsourced Square game? The mind boggles. Driving Emotion Type S 2 perhaps?
Could you explain why the average length of time Square employees have worked at the company is only 3.8 years? Also, do you have anything new to replace Final Fantasy?
There are two reasons for that. The first is the merger of Square Visual Works [a CG development company] and Squarts [Square's QA and user support section]. Personnel within the company also were given official transfers whenever they moved to a new section, including our movie studio in Honolulu.
The second reason is simply that the game industry is one of low employee retention. We're not merely losing personnel, though; we have been hiring new employees to keep our current development lines.
This has certainly been the Year of Final Fantasy. We've produced Final Fantasy X, the movie, Final Fantasy IX, and a set of ports as well. As a company, though, it is our fervent desire to have a brand that can exceed the success of the Final Fantasy name. That is one of the motives behind working with Disney Interactive to develop Kingdom Hearts, which we expect will do well in America and Europe.
You would think it was pretty easy going at SquareSoft towers wouldn’t you? Apparently not, judging by this meeting. It will be interesting to see if the Final Fantasy movie will be sufficiently successful to assuage the shareholders concerns.
Read on and enjoy. The questions were posed by individual shareholders and are answered by company president Nao Suzuki.
Why did former vice-president [Hironobu] Sakaguchi resign his position?
Mr. Sakaguchi firmly stated that he wanted to think about the future as a creator, from PlayOnline to what comes after the movie. We decided it would be a wiser policy to retain him under an exclusive contract as a game creator, so we agreed to his desire.
Hmmm… The general consensus is that Sakaguchi resigned following the company posting record losses at the close of the previous fiscal quarter. This was to appease the massively angry shareholders who, having realised that Square had effectively gambled almost all the company’s assets in an unproven field wanted something drastic doing.
Why did you not release a strategy guide for Final Fantasy IX?
At the time, former vice president Sakaguchi said that the process of inserting difficult puzzles in the game and then following up on them in a hint book is too unkind to players, especially beginners. That's why he wanted to make a game that was perfectly playable without a strategy guide. In place of a guide, we decided to release strategy information gradually online, to take advantage of the opportunity to connect the game to PlayOnline. We believe this has produced definite results.
We have also decided, however, to publish a strategy guide for Final Fantasy X.
Sakaguchi becomes the whipping boy. Square’s shareholders are obviously angered by the fact that the company failed to capitalise on the game with the release of a guide. Notice that there will be a guide for FFX.
Losses due to project cancellation appeared in the statement of profits and losses. Could you give us the details about these losses?
We had contracted with an outside supplier for a game slated for overseas markets. However, after carefully considering the project's progress and our brand image, we decided to cancel the project in the end.
A cancelled outsourced Square game? The mind boggles. Driving Emotion Type S 2 perhaps?
Could you explain why the average length of time Square employees have worked at the company is only 3.8 years? Also, do you have anything new to replace Final Fantasy?
There are two reasons for that. The first is the merger of Square Visual Works [a CG development company] and Squarts [Square's QA and user support section]. Personnel within the company also were given official transfers whenever they moved to a new section, including our movie studio in Honolulu.
The second reason is simply that the game industry is one of low employee retention. We're not merely losing personnel, though; we have been hiring new employees to keep our current development lines.
This has certainly been the Year of Final Fantasy. We've produced Final Fantasy X, the movie, Final Fantasy IX, and a set of ports as well. As a company, though, it is our fervent desire to have a brand that can exceed the success of the Final Fantasy name. That is one of the motives behind working with Disney Interactive to develop Kingdom Hearts, which we expect will do well in America and Europe.
You would think it was pretty easy going at SquareSoft towers wouldn’t you? Apparently not, judging by this meeting. It will be interesting to see if the Final Fantasy movie will be sufficiently successful to assuage the shareholders concerns.
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