Final Fantasy 16's Retail Marketing has Begun in Japan

Final Fantasy is still pretty popular in Japan. This is going to be a huge release in terms of pushing PS5s in that country.

The artwork for this game is just utterly gorgeous. I wish my stores would plaster posters of it at the games section

So excited to play this game in June. I think it will perform very well. Well maybe not Japan... PS5 has sold 2 million in Japan but sales for software are non existent and they love the Switch too much. I'd love for it to perform really well there but I don't see it at the moment, I can't imagine it selling nearly 1 million in the first week like most FF games first week sales at the moment. But outside of Japan I see the game doing great. I've pre-ordered the expensive limited edition for it. Hope Square Enix and Sony will keep pushing a huge marketing campaign for it in the lead up to release

@Ralizah Is modern FF really still particularly popular in Japan though? Even at its peak it was never exactly DQ there.

I wasn't sure about this one after the abysmal letdown that was 15, but they've slowly won me over.

If it ends up being another letdown, I'll slap myself for it, but I've been with the series for so long, and played every (mainline) entry, would be wrong to stop now.

In the words of one loud and vulgar character of the series: There ain't no gettin' off this train we on...

@Browny

He’s also one of the best characters Final Fantasy ever produced.

@themightyant It's a clever strategy, get in with the instore promotion early before everywhere is filled with Tears of the Kingdom promotion.

@Sam_ATLUS I may be mistaken but don’t software sales only include physical? I remember reading somewhere that PlayStation sells a majority of its games digitally, whereas Switch users tend to buy physical - practically all elementary school kids own a switch buy physical.
By the way, I have also seen Wild Hearts well promoted over the few months here in Japan. It’s flying under the radar in the west but it’s going to be big here.

@MB81 you think it's kids keeping physical alive? I assumed the opposite, the older holdouts such as myself refusing to let it die.
Though in switches case there's a variety of reasons. Games hold their resale value, it's a cartridge which makes it feel like a tangible product, and general distrust of Nintendo's legacy console interest.

@Balosi yea man I work with kids and they all buy physical. They still want the physical product in their hands, they obviously don’t have a credit card so if they have money they buy it in a shop, and if their non-gamer parents are buying they are distrustful of spending so much on a purely digital product.
Japan is always behind the west as well for digital trends. DVD rental stores are still everywhere, streaming only became popular in the last 5 years and only recently can you watch terrestrial TV on demand.

I'm currently in Japan and have seen FF16 marketing like this in quite a few places now. Starting to get quite excited about the release!

Forget Japan, I'm still a massive FF enjoyer, the only 3D series entry I've never played was FF 11 unfortunately. Maybe some day we will see a remaster.

i really hope this game turns out to be steller. the ff IP is in dire need of repair as there has not been a good mainline entry in well over a decade. still don't know what to expect here, but i know what i want to see — first and foremost, a serious, well written story; little fanservice, an emphasis on exploration, discovery and secrets, moogles, chocobos, world map and other ff staples.