The master of RPG's (Square-Enix)

Member Name: xannus

Product:	Square-Enix
Date:	10/03/09 (78 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Develops amazing games and publishes them too

Disadvantages: Lack of diversity in their offerings

---Introduction---

Square-Enix formed on April 1st 2003 when Squaresoft (most famous for their final fantasy games) and Enix (most famous for their dragon quest games) merged together due to financial difficulties for both companies. Square-Enix is most popular in Japan as this is where both companies originated and they release all of their games in this territory. America and especially Europe miss out on many of their games due to localisation issues and language barriers but recently more and more of their games are being released world wide (see below). The Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest series are considered as the two most popular RPG (role playing game) series in the world and fans of the genre (including myself) were obviously overjoyed when the two companies merged to secure their futures.

---The Games---

Square-Enix has many series of games including their most popular:

Final Fantasy
Dragon Quest
Kingdom hearts
Drakengard
Star Ocean
Front Mission
Fullmetal Alchemist
Valkyrie Profile

They have also developed many current stand alone games including:

Odin Sphere
Driving Emotion Type-S
The Bouncer
Unlimited Saga
Romancing SaGa
Plus many other...

The games have been released as far back as the NES (Nintendo) in 1987 and have since been released for the SNES, Playstation, PS2, PS3, PC, DS, PSP, Xbox and Xbox360.

Square-Enix is famous for their cut scenes especially in Final Fantasy games. The use of CGI generates amazing graphics that always push the system its on, to its limits. This was seen with Final Fantasy VII (7) on the original playstation in 1997. It was the first in the series to use 3D computer graphics and cut scenes. Similarly in 2001, when Final Fantasy X (10) was released on the PS2, the graphics during the cut scenes were second to none and was also the first game to use such complex voice over's for the characters.

Many of the companies' older games have been re-issued on to newer consoles, mainly the Nintendo DS and PSP. For example, the original Final Fantasy and earlier sequels were recently re-released.

---Information---

Square-Enix has recently made an offer to buy the UK game studio 'Eidos' who are most famous for the Tomb raider series of games. It has been widely reported that the offer has been accepted by the struggling Eidos, but at the time of writing, no official statement has been announced. This acquisition by Square-Enix is an attempt to gain a firm foot hold in the European market where Eidos is based so that they can more easily release there games there and widen their audience.
Similarly, Square-Enix recently made a deal with Ubisoft who is one of the largest video game publishers in Europe to release more Square-Enix games in Europe. This proves their attempt in trying to reduce the time gap between Japan and Europe in which their games are released and if at all. This is clearly a step in the correct direction for the company.

---The Future---

The future looks good for Square-Enix in regards to their line up of games and also their widening of sale audiences. At the moment, their most anticipated game is Final Fantasy XIII (13) which will not be available outside of Japan before April 2010 and is to be released on the PS3 and Xbox360. The company also owns Taito which it acquired in 2005 and is another Japanese brand that specialises in arcade hardware and game software specifically for mobile devices. Due to this increasingly broadening range of resources and also the revenue made from the popular figurines, soundtracks and other merchandise from its popular series, Square-Enix looks set to dominate in Japan and eventually in other parts of the world too.

Summary: If you like RPG's and/or good quality gaming, then play some Square-Enix games!