The second anniversary livestream for Final Fantasy XV is over, and to be frank it was one heck of a weird show. Square Enix opened by telling us that three of the four previously announced DLC character episodes have been cancelled. Episode Aranea, Episode Lunafreya, and Episode Noctis have all been axed. Episode Ardyn, meanwhile, is still in development, and is set to release in March 2019. You can watch its teaser trailer above. What's more, an Episode Ardyn animated short will launch prior to the episode.
The cancellation of those three additional scenarios comes courtesy of the developer's recent refocusing, which cost the company a hefty $33 million. Apparently, in-house studio Luminous Productions is now set on creating big budget titles only, so we guess that the DLC episodes just didn't fit the bill.
On top of all this, it was also revealed that Hajime Tabata, the director of Final Fantasy XV, has left Square Enix to pursue his own business. A letter from Tabata was read out on stream, in which he thanked the publisher, the development team, and fans of the game for all of their support.
Thankfully, the seemingly bad news ended there. Final Fantasy XV: Comrades is still getting a standalone release, and there's a Final Fantasy XIV crossover event coming to Final Fantasy XV in the near future. We've embedded the latter's trailer above, which features Noctis with cat ears.
And that's about it for the Final Fantasy XV second anniversary livestream, and, by the sounds of it, that's about it for Final Fantasy XV in general. What do you make of all this? Were you looking forward to the additional character episodes, or are you well and truly done with the game? Go for a drive in the comments section below.
Comments 61
Final Fantasy XV has been an absolute, near unforgivable mess from start to finish, and I'm saying that as someone who enjoyed the game.
Just seems like typical, disjointed SquareEnix right now. It's tough to watch but it's similar to what Capcom was going through earlier this gen. Capcom turned it around so hopefully SE does too and sooner rather than later. It still has plenty to offer this industry. hopefully management can get the house in order.
@ShogunRok A sad mess. The only DLC episodes that might have redeemed it for me, at least a bit, have now been canceled. The Ardyn episode looks okay...but the teaser clearly shows they wanted to go back and tell the story when it was promoted as Versus XIII. This, I believe, is a case where it's already too late to fix it. Ugh.
All resources redirected to ff7 remake! Due sometime in 2023
@ShogunRok I could not agree more, and I'm someone who was extremely disappointed with the day one version. I wish they had released FFXV like DQXI: a single, massive, and complete package with no DLC.
As much as they’ve overmilked FFXV, I really enjoyed the story continuation in the episodes! It sucks that 3 will now be left untold.
Hopefully Square puts out a physical complete edition once everything is out, although that seems very unlikely as they seem to be shying away from physical editions all together lately (FFXV Monsters Of The Deep, FF World Maxima PS4, The Last Remnant).
Dang man, that stinks. I was really starting to look forward to it all in a replay I was gonna do once it was all out. I can’t believe the developmental mess it’s had and continues to have. A great game, but I can’t believe the developmental troubles are still there.
It’s sad to see him go as well.
@Boxmonkey With the final episode due Q3 2201!
At least all this means I might finally pick the game up at some point as I’ve held off from buying an “incomplete” version of the game up until now.
I've tried 2 times to get into this game , and idk I just couldn't do it. I finally came to the conclusion this game isn't for me and that's ok. Hopefully 16 will be different .
Work on a good game now please.
The saddest thing is that none of this is a surprise to me; it's what I've come to expect from SE nowadays.
@IBeAGamer Final Fantasy 15 isnt a bad game though. Its a hot mess of confused ideas - and yes, a poorly told story - but the gameplay is very very good. And its one of the few games to come along these days that didnt have major technical issues at launch.
Im as ready for Square to move on to their next game as much as anyone. It seems increasingly a waste of resources to keep pumping them into ff15 at this point, although the stories in recent days likely explain why.
As with my comments on the last SE article, they clearly need someone to come in at the top who can get them back on track because at the moment things look quite chaotic from the outside.
I've never been so happy to hear a game project has been cancelled
Squareenix is a mess after hironobu sakaguchi left, he shouldn't be fired after just 1 mistakes (ff movie).
Is the FFXV x FFXIV crossover event a free update?
After all this time, all this money they've demanded from people, they're not even going to tell the full story??
I love the base game, but all this is utterly ridiculous
@Rob_230 nope, the game was abysmal in every single way.
its good news for me considering that a new main game (ff16) will be on its way
and square how bout actually making ur visual works tech demo into a real game (the middle eastern one and the cyberpunk samurai theme)
Lunafreya gets screwed again.
Final Fantasy XV is a top 5 FF game for me. Respect to Tabata for taking the reigns late in development and making something out of it. He's got a fan in me. Hope he sticks around making console games.
Once Episode Ardyn is out I'll replay the entire thing.
I really really wanted Episode Lunafreya 😭 And in general FFXV is one of the games I enjoyed the most this generation so I am sad. I'll replay the whole thing after Episode Ardyn is released
"Lunafreya episode been axed"
Troubleshoes voice Just my luck.
Yet another time Squeenix tackles and feels underwhelmed in DLCland.
And finally. Finally... Final Fantasy XV is coming to an end.
Thank God for that.
@Boxmonkey
Exclusively on PlaySwitch One X Pro
As much as I love FF and especially FFXV, this is for the best.
@Miles_Edgeworth define "demanded".
I recently went for the Royal edition which includes all the DLCs to date (I think).
I have yet to play the DLC episodes but I found the game underwhelming. Glad I only payed ~£20 for the game.
I think I am almost done with all the side quests. I did like the 4 protagonists and other characters like Cid, Cindy (I wonder why), Iris, even Lunafreya and a few others.
But it does feel like the story was written by a twisted schizophrenic person on drugs. It feels like nothing is logical. The open world is beautiful but empty with nothing to do except FedEx-ing between diners and monsters to complete hunting quests.
The game is a mess. The second part ruins the game. As if they decided to wrap up the game without having a clue of how to do so and rushed it. Travelling to the past is a way for the devs to admin they never found a better way to send you back to the open world.
Everything is painfully slow: getting in and out of the car, climbing a ladder, even the little pause after a fight. All of this breaks the dynamic of the game and you end up missing a few things.
And I am not even mentioning the amount of bugs and crashes I had on the game.
So it makes sense for them to focus on the FF7 remake or a completely new game instead of adding paid content to a broken game.
This is actually great news to me now I can finally buy that Royal Edition that I wasn't buying because of more DLC incoming and since it's only 1 now I don't mind
Well, at least ShogunRok won't complain any more because SE is doing more FFXV
I finished Episode Gladiolous, played Episode Promto only for a few minutes and never touched Episode Ignis. Also only played the Comrades Beta, I still see me finishing the remaining Episodes and maybe even get the Royal Edition DLC upgrade.
I'm looking forward to see Tabata's next project.
i think some people may have missed some information, yes they cancelled the 3 DLC's but they did say the stories will still be told in another form
on a side note does anyone know if our current Comrades data will carry over to the new version or will we have to start again?
and i wonder what the "AAA Project" is that they have moved onto, FFXVI perhaps or something completely different?
@WanderingBullet yes
@Neolit Never understood the extreme hate people have against the free updates and paid DLC for FFXV.
@HungryWolf what gets me is people were moaning that they was milking the games and that they should stop and move on and when they do that, they moan about not getting DLC for certain characters
make up you minds people!
On one hand I wasn't the biggest fan of giving the game a new ending with the Noctis DLC, but on the other I was looking forward to this DLC, even the Noctis one, out of curiousity for what they would do.
Perhaps we'll be getting a XV-2?
CRIKEY!
@FullbringIchigo Awesome. Might try to re-install FFXV when the event releases. Thx!
Good riddance to this entry in the series. If I could, I'd summon Knights of the Round on every copy of the game in existence. It'd take 50,000 years to watch the animation but it'd be worth it.
@3MonthBeef The sales of one game don't live in a vacuum and don't necessarily mean guaranteed sales of future games. Criticism after the fact is absolutely relevant, especially since all of this criticism is aimed at the future of the company. The comments here, and on every FFVII remake article, and most SE articles are a bad sign for SE. They now have a poor reputation thanks to the mess that was FFXV's development and subsequent milking. Even if FFXV was profitable for them (which is a minor miracle considering) that poor reputation will catch up with them eventually.
Taking bets that like everyone else who left the FF series, Tabata will somehow end up working for Nintendo?
I mean his old work mates at Grezzo and MonolithSoft are hiring after all...
Just don’t put Nomura at the helm of anything. Otherwise it’s just a waste of money and we would be waiting 12 years.
@NoxAeturnus
I remember when articles and comments about FFXIII and the sequels hurt the FF franchise future.
Today, here we are, again, articles and comments saying that updates and DLC planned for FFXV hurt and dilutes the franchise.
FFXV is the fastest selling FF with 8.1m units sold by September 2018.
What I want to say is, we all be here again when comments are whining about the combat, or other changes being made in FFVII Remake, but still hyped to the roof for the game.
My best spin on this is, at least they haven't charged anyone for season pass 2 yet, or whatever it would have been called. Ardyn should be free for anyone still playing at this point and disappointed in the cancelation of the other 3. I'll be using this as yet another example of why I don't like to pay for things in advance, or buy games before they are "complete".
I did enjoy half my time with 15, the first half, but I don't think I could recommend it to anyone.
I'm done with FF. When does DQXII release?
I'm sad the three DLCs were canceled, but at least now I can consider FF15 complete.
Looking forward to playing the base game sometime next year when I've got the free time.
Haven't even started the game, at some point I probably will.
@KingdomHeartsFan Maybe this means they will Release Octopath on PS4 and XB1 to help make up for the losses like they are doing with World of Final Fantasy
It's probably for the best to just cancel 3/4ths of the DLC than having them go to someone that will finish them but have them be utter junk.
I enjoyed Final Fantasy XV for the most part, but I am absolutely tired of seeing it. Hopefully this means it won't be a decade before Final Fantasy XVI.
@3MonthBeef The increased development costs from the mess that is FFXV’s something like 10-year development speak money. I wouldn’t be surprised if they canceled episodes also incurred some decent unnecessary costs. The unfathomable management messes that Square has must do awful things to their costs with more than FFXV. We don’t need to do anything different for Sqaure’s profits to be affected.
@Jaz007 those losses might have been included with that $33 million they recently announced they lost during the restructuring
it would make sense and could explain why it was so high
Absolute mess of a project, and one that will make me think twice about buying a Final Fantasy in the future. I was considering picking up the season pass and extras to give the game another go once it was finally getting towards what it should have been the first time around, but definitely won't be bothering now that I know it's never going to be completely finished. Square Enix messed up big time with this and they've gone way down in my estimation.
@3MonthBeef There is no evidence they’re doubling down, just that this continue to happen. And they don’t care about the millions these ridiculous developments cycled cost? I guess they won’t care about the millions they’d lose from less sales either. They just have other sources of funding to make up for the lost sales.
Do they care about the money or no? You’re contradicting yourself here. They care about the money in all ways.
FFXV was a still a great game, side-quests being the only real issue is the other thing to remember too. @shogunrok didn’t say it was a bad game by any means.
CELEBRATORY LIVESTREAM WHOO CELEBRATE WITH THIS NEWS WHOOO
Nobody could've been that excited about dlc. With the amount of time it takes square to make anything, any dlc they released would've flown under the radar.
This is a bit disappointing as I really wanted to see Episode Aranea, but not entirely unsurprising considering they also cancelled the offline custom character creation.
As someone who loved FFXV, I'm kinda ready for them to get off this game and move on to the FF7 remake. Every time I come back to this game, I have to download a gigantic patch. The new content is nice, but seriously, can we move on to something else now?
@SwanPrincess83 I know i did not buy a lot games from Square Enix because of that did buy Dragon Quest 11 though. 😁
@HungryWolf They just should have ugraded the graphics give every character a 5th weapons and add in some small new stuff. Im ready to play some turnbased goodness again. 😁
Happy they've finally abandoned this half finished mess of a game, but I would hope the resources would be used for something better. I guess we'll see how Kingdom Hearts 3 turns out, hopefully Square haven't completely lost it.
@HungryWolf Sure, I see that. FF is a lot of things to a lot of people. It's still a big name, it still pulls in sales numbers. But eventually their poor management of the franchise and their company will catch up with them.
I'm not gonna lie, Tabata was a very good project manager but a terrible terrible game designer, he should never be allowed to make games imo
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