News Square-Enix cuts losses by 75%

Square-Enix has reported quarterly losses that are dramatically reduced from the same period last year.
http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/2013/08/07/square-enix-cuts-losses-by-75/1

 

I have not bought ANY games for over a year (no, i haven't pirated any either). A few indie ones have tempted me but nothing screams - "Bloody masterpiece - must be played"

 

All this F2P, browsergames and minigames for mobiles is totally destroying the game-industry.

During the last few years there was only very little games published that I'd call any good, while there's now millions of these "casual" timewaste games.

I don't know who to blame tho, as I can't really say which came first, the crappy games or the people who play them.

 

pretty much only played starcraft2 and battlefield 3 in the last few years, and the occasional steam purchases of walking dead and portal.
I use to buy games monthly back in the console games, but now big publishers are making games to last years rather than weeks.
Saves me money though if the playability of the game lasts a long time

 

I reckon Nokia is to blame since they seem to have started the whole mobile gaming trend with snake on all there handsets !

 

genuinely, i have never heard anyone blame the decline of the games market on Nokia because of snake.
that game, so damn good....

anyway, good to hear that SE are pulling things back, I'm not surprised there manga\anime business is one of the pillars holding them up, it's rare to see an anime aired that doesn't have an SE logo in the titles. some people say it's because of SE that anime \ manga is what it is today.

 

Agreed. Lately I'd say I buy 1 or 2 games every half year, including the humble bundles. When I do buy games, they're usually ones that were released 3 years ago.

 

Eh?

What games that have recently come out last years? I wouldn't put BF3 on that list.

 

Sorry to go against the grain in this thread, but Tomb Raider is a must buy from Eidos (I refuse to refer to square as they're the one doing their level best to destroy the company). Picked it up in the steam summer sale for £7.49 and it is just incredible!
I'm also a very hard to please gamer.

 

I think the bigger problem is that we demand larger and better games every year. We have no desire to wait nor do are we willing to make compromises as consumers. We decry publisher slowness, we decry their lack of polish. But we at the end are at fault just as much as the publishers for rushing a game.

We wanted yearly annual updates and refreshes. We got them. We wanted cheap free games, we got them.

If we wanted quality, we as consumers should've waited, should've been patient. Polish comes at a price. And that's time. At the rate we're going, a new game a year will burn out the industry. Make it a 2-3 year window. And each release will seem better and bigger.

 

Im somewhat glad about this, after losing THQ i'd be pretty upset by a decent place like square enix folding up. Just a shame the mobile crap is holding up the company as they may ditch other platforms and itd be a shame!

 

I don't expect publishers/developers to release one title per year. Not at all. But let's be serious, there's tons of companies outthere and during the last five years all we got was a mere hand full of acceptable or good games, while the majority of released games were utter crap and only rehashes of games that had been done before allready. The MMO-business is even worse.

I want games that keep me occupied for some time, but that requires content and longlastin interesting storyline and that can't be done within a year or two. However, most companies only improve the graphics and release yet another increment every other year. For FPS, RTS, racing or sports that may work to some degree, but not for RPGs.

And again, all we see lately is a ton of F2P and minigames, as the publishers only want some fast bucks ruining the whole gaming-industry themselves to some degree by going that route.

 

Believe it or not, but S.E. is already bankrupt is just a matter of few time. They have NO idea for great games from YEARS now.