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+--- Thread: Squeenix Squeened out some of their properties (/showthread.php?tid=7382)
Squeenix Squeened out some of their properties - Dark Jaguar - 9th May 2022
They sold off Deus Ex and Tomb Raider, well basically all their non-Japanese studios. At first, everyone was wondering just why they did it. Speculation ran through many possibilities. Some suggested they were trying to make up for "lackluster" sales in FFXIV (their MMO is actually extremely successful right now, to the point that you would be forgiven for forgetting they actually have three MMOs still in operation, another Final Fantasy and a Dragon Quest: So You Want To Be a Hero.... or was that Dragon Quest: To Heir is Human? No I got it, It's Dragon Quest: In Pursuit of the Death Angel). Others suggested they were attempting to "slim down" their operation in preparation for being bought out by Sony. Still more assumed it was just good ol' fashioned Japanese business culture making them desire to have all their companies within the home country.
No, none of that please and thank you. It was the least of these, a tease if you please for NFTs. I won't insert the Kefka laugh yet. They sold off Tomb Raider, that OTHER PS1 game with the big boombas lady "competing" with their own Tifa, in order to get more spendable capital to spend on NFTs. Customer good will? Providing products people actually want to buy? That's so old-hat. The future is forcing their product on the unwilling, and the future demands ever higher profit year after year forever, or until we all die. NOW I'll insert the Kefka laugh, because it's more nihilistic and thus character appropriate.
RE: Squeenix Squeened out some of their properties - A Black Falcon - 9th May 2022
Part of why they sold it off is apparently because they lost $200 milliion on the Avengers/Guardians of the Galaxy games and were like 'that's it,l we're out of patience with our Western division that hasn't had a hit in some time, it's not like the Tomb Raider games have been huge recently either...' so they sold Eidos for $300 million.
Were NFTs also part of the reason, perhaps, but it's likely that the disastrous failures of the Marvel games was also a definite factor, along with the underperformance of everything else Eidos had made for some time.
RE: Squeenix Squeened out some of their properties - Dark Jaguar - 10th May 2022
The new Tomb Raider games have sold in the millions ABF. They ARE successful, they turned a good profit, but sadly Square-Enix like so very many other giant companies isn't satisfied with "profitable". It has to be "more profitable". They cut them away because the games didn't sell as well as their unreasonable projections.
It's the same reason Dead Space's studio was canned. Dead Space 3 sold as good as a survival horror game ever had to that point, and it STILL wasn't enough to satisfy EA.
The whole industry is poisoned... and the toxin is capitalism.
RE: Squeenix Squeened out some of their properties - A Black Falcon - 10th May 2022
Capitalism has brought us the entire modern world. It is not the problem. Selling a division because it just lost you $200 million thanks to a failed project is the way this industry works. What should they do, continue spending a lot for studios who are highly unprofitable? Tomb Raider may still be profitable to some extent, but in the last few years Squeenix's big bet with their western studios was on the Marvel games, and that was a total failure.
I mean, I have no strong opinion here since I haven't played an Eidos game for a long time and don't think I have ever loved anything they published other than Thief, but I get why Squeenix would react that way to the amount theyr apparently lost of their two Marvel games, particularly when Eidos in general had apparently been under-performing for a while.
Their prospective new owner, the Embracer Group, have bought up a huge number of smaller to midsize studios in the US and particularly Europe. Their thing is midsize-budget games, not massive-budget AAA stuff, so perhaps they will do better with more cost controls on these studios? We'll see in a few years, I guess.
RE: Squeenix Squeened out some of their properties - Dark Jaguar - 10th May 2022
Alright, let's just say you and I massively disagree on financial issues, but the concrete facts are that Tomb Raider IS in fact profitable. Square-Enix didn't ditch a money losing enterprise and I don't really have a clue where you're getting this idea from, but the games sell well.
I'm not arguing that "money losers" should be clung to forever, I'm saying that that's not what's actually going on here. Also, Embracer scares the hell out of me and they should scare you too.
Go back to enjoying your capitalism.
RE: Squeenix Squeened out some of their properties - A Black Falcon - 10th May 2022
Capitalism, when properly controlled by government and mixed with some socialist elements, is the best economic system we have. There are not alternatives that are viable at all.
Anyway, I'm definitely no fan of Embracer. Their model is "basically buy up the whole Western A to AA-tier developer industry, excepting studios being bought by Microsoft and Sony and such", and that's really sad; the industry is a better place with more developers, not fewer, and more publishers, not fewer. The insane consolidation we are seeing is absolutely horrible for the industry. I don't like that Microsoft and Embracer seem to be basically buying up all of the mid-tier Western studios, no. Overall I'd rather that Square had kept Eidos.
So, what did Square say about why they sold Eidos? Looking it up, it's both what you said and what I said -- they're investing more in "AI, blockchain, and the cloud" and also say that these three studios (Square-Enix Montreal, Crystal Dynamics, and and Eidos) weren't profitable enough. And if you look into why they weren't profitable enough, the Marvel games are a big part of why, though Tomb Raider has a part too, I think the last one wasn't as successful as earlier titles. But on that former part, yes, that they're selling studios while investing in crypto stuff is utterly despicable, no question about it. That's about as wrong as you can get. But if the studios were as profitable as you suggest they would be much less likely to be selling them.
With that said, mismanaging your studios, selling them, and investing in blockchain nonsense are not exactly moves that a competently run company does. So yeah, Square definitely looks bad for this one.