Square Enix Hints at Multiplatform

[*NormalGamer*]

cube.ign.com/articles/638/638866p1.html

Square Enix Hints at Multiplatform

Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest could go multiplatform in the next generation.

by Anoop Gantayat

August 3, 2005 - Are all the Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest fans out there ready to reserve that PlayStation 3? You may want to do a bit more scouting first. Recent comments from Square Enix president Yoichi Wada suggest that his company's two prized series could be taking a multiplatform route in the next generation.

Commenting to Japanese site Mainichi Interactive on August 3, Wada explained, "The market for next generation game machines will be split into 'high end' and 'low end' according to the type of user. Rather than one hardware dominating, the various machines will carve out their own share."

Final Fantasy is already known to be taking a multiplatform path, as the Crystal Chronicles and Final Fantasy XI offshoots will be appearing, respectively, on Nintendo's Revolution and Microsoft's Xbox 360. Square Enix has confirmed that the Final Fantasy series will come to PlayStation 3, although it hasn't gone into specifics.

Multiplatform development of Dragon Quest, on the other hand, would be a surprise. While Square Enix has brought offshoots of the Dragon Quest series to Nintendo's portable systems, with a DS version of Slime Mori Mori Dragon Quest due shortly, the series has stayed a PlayStation thing on home consoles since the original 32-bit PlayStation system.
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NG: Interesting. Looks like there a bit of hope of the FF series(not counting FF:CC) and DQ series coming back on Nintendo consoles. ^_^

[Jason-RN]

I'm not if IGN's prediction of Square-Enix expanding onto all three consoles is correct. All Wada said is that the industry will be split. For all we know, Square-Enix will choose to only develop for "high-end" or "low-end" systems. That would be a stupid move, but they might do it.