Final Fantasy XVI Producer Ready to Sacrifice Short Term Success, Wants to Head Steady With an “18 Month Sales Plan”

Square Enix’s Final Fantasy is gearing for its latest title. Slated for a June 22 launch, this title will be the sixteenth entry of the series. Final Fantasy XVI will be a timed exclusive for PlayStation 5 at its launch. Much to the disappointment of the game developers, fans’ excitement for this long-running series has gone a little cold.

The pre-orders of Final Fantasy XVI have begun, but are currently at a much slower pace than expected. To belay any losses, producer Naoki Yoshida has laid out some plans to make this release successful stating he will do what it takes to make this sixteenth entry as successful as its earlier counterparts.

Final Fantasy XVI producer shares his sales plans for the title

Naoki Yoshida recently sat down with Yoichi Ochiai for his Weekly Ochiai Interview. During the interview, Yoshida shared his views regarding the poor sales projections. He shared that he would not want to look at the first week of sales. The first week is usually consumed to cover the cost of marketing and PR.

He stated that whenever he plans out a title, he plans the estimated cost of everything and shares that with the studio. He said, “So our policy at Creative Business Unit 3 here is that at the very least, create a game where you yourself think it’s interesting, and make the game earn in black numbers”. Black numbers is a Japanese term that means a game is earning profits, and red numbers mean loss.

Yoshida has been with the FF series for a long time. He stated his plans have been making profits since FF XIV. This was due to his marketing strategies keeping every market in mind. He plans accordingly for the US and Japanese markets.

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Sharing his strategy for this title, he said, “Therefore this time, I’ve laid out a plan on sales that would last about 18 months”. He plans on gradually increasing the sale of the title rather than pushing it from the get-go. For this, he plans to convince gamers to get FF XVI together with their PlayStation 5 purchase. He plans to create hype among younger generations and target promotions through word-of-mouth.

This might actually be a successful strategy for this long-running series. Rather than getting an explosive launch, gradually winning the hearts of fans who have loved the earlier entries is a commendable approach.

What are your thoughts on Final Fantasy XVI producer Naoki Yoshida’s tactics to market the game? Let us know in the comments section below.

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