Square Soft vs Square Enix: Understanding the Merger Myth

Did Merger with Enix really cause the end of Square Soft's glory days for Final Fantasy? Today we assess the Square Enix Merger Myth.

Join our Facebook group, ULTIMA: Square Enix + JRPGs:
ULTIMA Discord:

Ultima-Chan Artist IG: @Casas

#FinalFantasy #FinalFantasyVII #FFX

[Valynis]

Before the departure of Sakaguchi, there was another. Tetsuya Takahashi, lead on Xenogears, took another bunch of people with him to form Monolithsoft. They're now enjoying a lot of success with the Xenoblade series under Nintendo. Another departure was Yasunori Mitsuda, who went independant after his work on Chrono Cross. Losing talents like that must cause an impact at some point.

[hian]

The merger did not cause the decline in quality, but it was a symptom of the "Wada direction" that did.
The push for the merger, and ousting of Sakaguchi from his board direction was a part of the desire to merge and so ties together with the problems that arose post the merger.

The merger did not happen because of TSW, it happened in despite of it. If anything, the failure of TSW nearly tanked the merger talks until the profits of FFX and KH rolled in, which you yourself took note of.

The failure of TSW was just a convenient reason to push Sakaguchi aside, as one of the major opponent of the merger talks and the new direction of FF which was decided to begin featuring sequels and more spin-offs.
Even with the losses of TSW, the largest reason Squaresoft went into the red that year was due to FFX being delayed which shifted the projected profits for that fiscal year, a year forward.
However, the overall losses were quickly covered. Wada and other shareholders simply used that to bury Sakaguchi as he wasn't playing ball.
Sakaguchi trademarked Mistwalker before TSW was even in theatres in prep for the move. This is why so many people quit and you have people like Uematsu reiterating this point in interviews to this day.

So sure, while it's technically right to say the merger didn't cause the decline in quality, you could say the corporate elements that desired the merger did.
Ultimately, it's a distinction without a difference, because the point still stands that there is a generational shift in quality between the classic Squaresoft and what came after.
Whether you draw the line to a year or two before the merger, or to the merger is basically just quibbling over trite details since you don't characterize a company by two years of over a decade long period of daily operations and titles.
By which I mean to say :
You could merely say, shit started going downhill roughly around the merger and the point would stand.

The argument that the merger "caused the decline" is not one I hear very often, but when I do, it isn't generally meant as "Enix screwed over Squaresoft". Rather it's a clumsy way of saying "When Square and Enix merged, SE became a huge corporate hellscape with little soul left, with the creatives left under the bootheel of their corporate overlords".
They're not saying the merger caused decline because of faults in staffing on projects etc.
That's not an ureasonable read at all.

[lordnica]

"A unhealthy obsession with high graphic"

[akiinmoonlight]

Squaresoft: ultimate masterpieces
Square enix : flawed masterpieces

[NIXNE]

I really believe FF7R will be the turn around SquareEnix needs

[Cetra]

Everytime somebody says "uh, FFX-2, uh SE, proof that after the fusion it was crap" I tell them about the Japanese cover which flat out says the old brand name.

[TheKingOfNthing]

This video was really cool and informative. I learned quite a few things that actually never knew

[Chewynd]

To be honest, Final Fantasy has been sort of back on track for years, XIV is going from strength to strength, XV, while not perfect was still pretty decent, World of Final Fantasy was a solid turn based RPG that harkened back to the older games. That being said, I'm really happy they're starting to use third party engines, I honestly think XV would have been a whole lot better if they'd have used Unreal

[ealDealOfficial]

In response to the question at the end: I loved FFXV and Kingsglaive. I hadn't been as hyped or vested in anything Square related since X. SE being less fondly looked at now is down to similar reasons as the rest of the current AAA gaming industry, only SE (Enix especially) is far, far less guilty than Bethesda, ActiBlizzard, EA, and even Ubisoft.

[Seabass_Fiction]

BUSHIDO BLADE
PARASITE EVE
XENOGEARS
VAGRANT STORY
FF: TACTICS

[spongebobfan]

Just wanna randomly squeeze in the fact that the merging and relationship between Square Soft and Enix was represented in Megadimension Neptunia VII through the character S-Sha, who almost died filming, gets saved by E-Sha by putting inside her the soul of S-Sha and how E-Sha tells S-Sha in the story that she was never a bother nor a detriment despite them being in one body.

[BearBoyJW]

I typically do talk about XIII being the reason for things going the way things did with Versus, but it is interesting to really think about the fact that the domino effects of Spirits Within lingered that far up the timeline to affect a lot of the decisions and such that has plagued the franchise. Which also coincidentally still affected other titles and teams as well.

[Gounen]

I'm (re)playing X-2 remastered right now - I love it!

[azuraflame]

i feel like there is a lot more to talk about on this topic but you did a really great job of condensing some main issues. i would love to see this talked about at length in an upcoming video.

[wheresatari]

I have been around since the beginning, and I love XIII (though it wasn't always that way) and DQ11. X-2 had its issues, like a campy story, but its combat was fun. I will never understand elitists. They spend more time complaining and boycotting on principal than they do gaming, it seems. You don't have to play something, but please stop dragging everyone down because of your opinion. Honestly, I have found something to enjoy about every entry, problems or not. So, I will continue to spend my time actually playing and having fun while they live in anger and rage in comments sections.

[ngu]

I haven't enjoyed a Square game since FFX and that changed when I played DQXI, which was an Enix franchise...

[RulerOfYore]

*Enraged and Unreasonable elitist who won’t accept facts want to know you’re location*

[funghazi]

FFX-2 is a perfect game don't @ me

[rasaanshakur]

I remember going to see The Spirits Within as a kid and literally falling asleep. Tried watching it as an adult... I fell asleep.

[aamrakamran]

There was a dude named hian who broke down the merger and misconceptions well on the reasonant arc podcast.