Develop 100 - 2008

Page 67

THE WORLD’S MOST SUCCESSFUL GAME STUDIOS

34

SQUARE ENIX

TOP TITLES

JAPAN PUBLISHER

HIGHEST UK CHART

£11.47m FORMATS

UK RELEASE REVENUE DATE

Founded: 1975 Owned by: Square Enix

1 FINAL FANTASY XII

STATISTICS

Last year’s position: 41

SQUARE ENIX EUROPE

1

NINTENDO

36

PS2

FEB 07

£7.21m

Head count: 1639 Revenue per capita: £6,998

2 MARIO SLAM BASKETBALL

DS

FEB 07

£1.47m

CONTACTS Address: Shinjuku Bunka Quint

3 KINGDOM HEARTS II

Bldg., 3-22-7 Yoyogi, Shibuya-ku,

SQUARE ENIX EUROPE

5

PS2

SEP 06

£0.80m

SQUARE ENIX EUROPE

44

PSP

OCT 07

£0.53m

SQUARE ENIX EUROPE

28

PS2

NOV 06

£0.42m

TOTAL:

£10.43m

Tokyo 151-8544, Japan. www.square-enix.com

4 FINAL FANTASY TACTICS: WAR OF THE LIONS

5 FINAL FANTASY VII: DIRGE OF CERBERUS

Ten years on from Final Fantasy VII, its Western breakthrough, and the bulk of Square Enix’s UK sales are still attributable to the never-ending franchise. The game giant’s relevance in Western markets has arguably even declined, with its always-excellent RPGs appealing to a huge but nevertheless now well-defined niche

of gamers. Yet in Japan Square Enix is a superpower – the number two Japanese developer in terms of 2007 sales, according to Famitsu magazine, and with more than 1,600 staff the fourth biggest by headcount. The famously platform agnostic company (even cinema is simply another destination for

(91% of total revenues)

its content) concentrated mainly on DS in 2007, but the finalisation of its cross-platform engine, Crystal Tools, will help it make a broader impact in 2008. The engine will power Final Fantasy XIII and Final Fantasy Versus XIII, and also Square Enix’s unnamed next-gen MMOG.

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