Into the Future: The History of Square Vol. 7
Laptop Battery This is part seven of Lucas DeWoody and Josh Valone's History of Square. To view part six, please click here.
Though Square had just announced it would once again support Nintendo platforms, the Sony faithful didnt have a lot of time to fret over it because they were too busy playing the companys latest gem, Final Fantasy X. Released seven days before Christmas 2001, FFX featured not only updated graphics but was also the first to feature voice-acting. FFX was hailed by critics and fans alike but served yet again to wedge between those who agreed with the companys recent interactive movie goal and those who loathed it. Featuring the most time simply watching the story progress yet, FFX once again showed the companys commitment to the concept.
Not resting on the incredible money-making ability of the Final Fantasy series, Square had been working behind the scenes on an RPG that merged the series with, oddly enough, characters from the Walt Disney company. Not taken incredibly seriously by the gaming press when the agreement was first announced, the final product would turn heads when it released in March of 2002.
Kingdom Hearts, the final title of the project, melded Disney and Final Fantasy characters together in a surprisingly tight game that sported a hack-and-slash battle system that played somewhat like a 3D
Mana title. Players led the main protagonist, Sora, on a journey between different Disney realms on a quest against a mysterious force known simply as the Heartless. The storyline for the title was especially surprising. It was dark enough to make some wonder how the decision was made to put Disney in it at all. But these people were overlooking one simple thing: Disney and Final Fantasy are both so popular in the land of the rising sun that merging the two in a single game might as well have been a license to print money.
Kingdom Hearts would sell well enough to get sequels on both the PS2 and Gameboy Advance.
In May 2002 Square released
Final Fantasy XI less than a year after the release of
FFX. The title took the series online for the first time in its history, but it would not prove to be a bug-free outing.
FFXI would struggle to gain a significant user base after the initial launch boom and it seemed at first as if the company might not even bring the title overseas at all. Further confusing the matter was the companys surprising announcement it would officially end the long-held stance that each Final Fantasy title would never see a sequel featuring the same characters. The company made the announcement while revealing the sequel to
FFX, titled
FFX-2. For a time Square actually seriously considered releasing
FFX-2 as
FFXI in North America and Europe, but in the end the company announced it was committed to releasing the true
FFXI outside of Japan and would do so as soon as possible. In the meantime, a change even more drastic than the end of the true sequel policy was taking place.
In April 2003, Squaresoft merged with its biggest competitor in the RPG market, Enix (creators of the Dragon Quest series), creating what amounted to an RPG monopoly in Japan. This was in addition to the fact that Square had already put a significant investment into Game Arts (creators of the
Grandia and
Lunar series), making the new company owners of practically every big name in RPGs. The company officially changed its name to Square Enix Co. Ltd. and the merger went amazingly smoothly. So smoothly, in fact, that it caught the gaming public off guard as few had taken prior rumors suggesting a merger entirely seriously. In fall 2003, Square-Enix released
Final Fantasy X-2 in North America, and finally gave
Final Fantasy XI a firm release date for March 2004, much to the relief of those who had heard it might never venture outside Japan at all. The first Squaresoft title for a Nintendo platform since 1995 was also released in December, as
Sword of Mana landed on the Gameboy Advance, ending an eventful year for the company.
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