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Okay, yes, there's even more Final Fantasy XIII-2 DLC coming. You want to know part of the reason why it's so hard for me to write tidbits these days? Even as much as I like Final Fantasy XIII (and have -2 sitting on my desk, waiting to be played), when most of the news coming out is about DLC, it starts to be a bit soul-deadening. My scarred essence notwithstanding, there's a lot coming down the chute in the near future: Snow and Valfodr are coming to the Colosseum next month, to be followed closely thereafter by a massive update including Lightning's "Requiem of the Goddess," White Mage and Black Mage costumes for Serah and Noel respectively, and a pack of sixteen different costumes for your Moogle. Oh, yeah, and Snow got put in Prada too, and they forgot to tell us before. Almost missed out on that one!

Now that we have that out of the way, check out the new Square Enix streaming music site, which is almost like a Pandora for Squenix tracks. Once you fight your way around the interface a bit, you can listen to tracks streamed through your browser from a variety of Squenix properties. The selection appears to be a bit small at the moment, but it's still a potentially interesting new branding push for the gaming juggernaut, as the music produced by Square Enix remains well-received even as the games it produces sometimes are less so. Were the company to add more tracks and improve the interface, this could be a big winner down the line.

For those waiting to try Dragon Quest X, the first MMO to be put in the hands of Enix' biggest property, you'll still be waiting a while. However, a release date has been announced for Japan, which naturally brings us in the West one hypothetical step closer to playing. The game will be out on 2 August in Japan for Wii; again, no information on whether it will appear as a WiiU launch title in any market. The game will cost ¥1000 per thirty days of play, with small discounts offered for paying instead in 60- or 90-day chunks. You'll be able to register 100 friends within the game, as well, and be able to see what servers they're on and potentially what they're up to. Additionally, the Japanese release will feature free play for children from time to time. There's no age limit, though - not that they'd be able to enforce it, really - and that makes it seem to me more like a creepy trap than anything else. The beta's going well, too, with it looking to expand to up to fifty thousand players in the near future, and 24-hour server uptime coming soon as well.

Source: Final Fantasy XIII Net, andriasang

People have been waiting for Versus XIII for a very long time, which certainly grated on those fans when they instead got Final Fantasy XIII-2 first. Personally, I find that a bit odd, given that it's hard for me to look down on a game in favor of a game that we've barely ever even seen, but to each their own and I digress anyway. The news here is that Squenix are now just flat-out trolling gamers by releasing some Versus XIII content not as a trailer video, or as a demo, but as a DLC track for Theatrhythm. The released track is nice enough, at least in its thirty-second snippet, a quiet piano track with a Japanese vocal. And, I'm sure that instead of actually being a troll, it's more of a "this is a way to show them that we're still going to release this game" sort of thing. Still hilarious if you think back to the fact that it's been over five years since news of the game started coming forth.

Speaking of Theatrhythm, that game was released on 4 April in Japan, and Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance released the week before in the same locale. Why is that again relevant? Because this week, both games got their North American release dates officially confirmed by Squenix. The launch order will be different over here; the music rhythm game will be out on 3 July and KH3D will drop on the last day of the month. Apparently there's a fairly critical bug in KH3D that can stop some players from continuing the game - I, unfortunately, have no idea what that is because it's only written up in Japanese. One would assume it would be fixed before the pending Western release.

If you thought the last bunch of Final Fantasy XIII-2 DLC was nuts, there's more this week, coming out in Japan on 10 April. This time, Noel can dress up as Ezio from Assassin's Creed, while Serah's new outfit is called "Exposure and Defense" and is based on one worn by a member of Japanese girlpop group AKB48. Also available at the same time will be Gilgamesh, who can be fought and added to your party as a Commando, and Final Fantasy VIII's PuPu (known as Koyo-Koyo in Japan), who can become a Medic. Only Serah's outfit will be free DLC, it seems. The costumes don't stop there, though; while they're not DLC, Final Fantasy XIII universe characters are going to appear in men's fashion magazine Arena Homme+ in the next issue. It appears that this magazine is British, though I've never seen one and therefore can't confirm firsthand; wherever it's published, it features new fashions for men from Prada draped on well-posed Final Fantasy characters, including Lightning. Sazh, in particular, is looking pretty suave.

We'll wrap this week with a bit of MMO news. First, Squenix have decided to do some public demos of Dragon Quest X this spring in Japan, starting at shopping malls in three cities. There won't be any new information coming from these, they're just a chance to get the game out in front of more people than the closed beta allows on its own.

Source: Kotaku, andriasang

Square-Enix's Seiken Densetsu or "Mana" series has hit hard times recently, with the unsuccessful dungeon crawler Children of Mana, real-time strategy RPG Heroes of Mana, and Havok physics-running Dawn of Mana. Yesterday evening series creator Koichi Ishii announced two upcoming titles in the storied series: Song of Mana for mobile devices and Shepherd of Mana for the PS3.

Song of Mana is a multiplayer rhythm game in which characters from earlier Mana games must save the Mana tree by occupying Mana Fields surrounding the Mana Tree in a circle, always numbering one fewer than the number of players; the players stand in a circle just outside of that. Tunes from throughout the Mana series are played - while the music is playing, the players in the circle walk in unison around the fields. When the music suddenly stops, everyone must race to enter one of the Mana Fields. The player who is left without a Field is eliminated from the game, and one Field is also removed to ensure that there will always be one fewer Field than there are players. The music resumes and the cycle repeats until there is only one player left in the game, who is the winner. The winner saves the world - winning a game of Song of Mana sends in-game currency and experience points to the characters in Shepherd of Mana.

Shepherd of Mana looks to be a big-budget extravaganza. Players design their own hero or heroine ("the Savior") and choose from a selection of job classes (Fighter and Mage are the only two revealed thus far) to determine their available weapons, skills, and spells. The player-character encounters a colorful cast of potential teammates throughout the adventure, and the characters he or she recruits and the decisions the Savior makes shapes Shepherd of Mana's plot, including endgame villains and the ending. All we know of the plot thus far is that the Mana spirits are being captured by a mysterious force known as The Sleepers and indoctrinated into performing acts of evil. The Savior and his or her allies must track down the spirits running amok and purify them with a Cane of Mana fashioned from a branch of the Mana Tree in order to harness their power and defeat the Sleepers.

Song of Mana and Shepherd of Mana will be released for iOS devices and the PS3 respectively in autumn of 2013. For heaven's sake, let's hope these turn out better than Dawn of Mana, which we all know was awful, bordering on sacrilege.

Source: Press release

Just how prevalent is downloadable content these days? Well, think back a few weeks. You might have heard that Bioware took heat on Mass Effect 3 for offering day-one DLC that wasn't available to everyone for free. Final Fantasy XIII-2 is taking a bit of heat for the same thing, of course, so it's really awesome intercorporate synergy that you will soon be able to download Mass Effect content into Final Fantasy XIII-2, namely armor worn by the crew of the Normandy. In a separate pack, you can also download Ultros and Typhon to fight and add to your monster pack. Ultros is a SYN, and Typhon is a COM, for those already excited by the prospect.

With regards to other Squenix games with DLC, check out the news this week that Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy now is confirmed to come to the West. That link discusses Europe specifically, but the release was also confirmed for North America on the Square Enix Facebook page.

Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance is coming out in Japan next Thursday, a release that has been anticipated since the Nintendo 3DS was announced. With the game all but out now, video from the Premiere Event to show the game and celebrate the tenth anniversary of the franchise showed up online. Additionally, an advertisement made from game footage and clips of the event has been on the air in Japan. andriasang has both on one convenient page for KH fans.

Finally, a new domain has been registered and a teaser video produced for a mystery new game, apparently to be released this Summer in Japan. Rumor has it that the game will be called Crystal Conquest, but no other details are available. Kotaku guesses that it will be a smartphone game, and that seems like a pretty reasonable guess.

Source: andriasang, Square Enix Members Europe, Kotaku

That's right, in news intended to either make you feel quite old or quite young, Final Fantasy turns 25 this year; the original game was released in December 1987. Always one to stand on ceremony (and, increasingly, nostalgia), Square Enix obviously have something planned for the occasion.

So far, the site doesn't do much; it merely links to all of the core games of the series, as well as Theatrhythm and Final Fantasy Brigade, a Japan-only social RPG released at the beginning of the year. It also links to the anniversary performance of Distant Worlds, which will take place in London on 2 November (tickets go on sale tomorrow, the 15th!).

It might not be a bad idea to check back on that site soon, you never know if they might have something fun planned for later this year!

Source: Final Fantasy 25th Anniversary

Though there have already been a few minor DLCs for Square-Enix's recently-released Final Fantasy XIII-2, like extra costumes for the main characters and some fights in the Colosseum, a larger pack is dropping within the next week. The first major piece of DLC, titled "Sazh: Heads or Tails?" is being released on XBox Live on Tuesday, 28 February, and on PlayStation Network on Wednesday, 29 February. Additionally, this will unlock the card games that were awkwardly left out of the casino in the original game. On the same days, another DLC will be available giving access to even more costumes for the main characters.

The costume piece isn't really all that exciting, in my opinion, but it will be very nice to have some DLC in the game, especially since it appears to feature Sazh, a really fun character from the original game. It's also nice that it will unlock the card games promised in the original, as it was really amateurish to have the "card game" option available to be selected, only to display a message saying it would be available in upcoming DLC. I'll definitely be grabbing this on Wednesday.

Source: RPGamer

It's been a while since the last Squenix tidbits, largely due to the number of hours put into the Final Fantasy V section revamp. Because of that, I'm going to assume that a lot of the news that came out in the meantime we all already know from sources that are less generally interesting than CoN, and I'll try to just get us caught up from the last couple weeks.

Just yesterday, the closed beta for Dragon Quest X began, for instance. Odds are you're not part of it, right? You can still see the beta testers' site for some minor details, though. Interestingly, it seems like you need to have a 16GB or larger flash drive to install the beta; having no Wii, I can't say if that's truly odd or not, but it seems that way to me. andriasang has a number of beta screenshots, so check them out; I'm sure video and more screenshots from testers will be emerging soon enough.

Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy also released in Japan a little over a week ago. Famitsu rated it pretty well, though people do seem to think that a good score from Famitsu isn't what it used to be. If you don't trust Famitsu, though, perhaps you might trust, say, Nobuo Uematsu? The composer of so many of the songs included in Theatrhythm posted to Twitter that the game made him so nostalgic that he wept. That seems like a pretty good endorsement if you've been playing Final Fantasy games since the eighties, like this author. At launch, the songs available for DLC were discounted from ¥150 (currently $1.86) to ¥100 ($1.24). Originally, that discount was meant to run for just about three weeks, but it's recently been extended for an extra month, into mid-April. The initial batch of DLC has songs from Final Fantasy II, IV, V. VII, VIII, IX, X, and XIII. There's also a promotional game where you can pseudo-play a bit of the game via Flash with some of your social media friends. Yeah, that's kind of hokey, since you don't get to actually play. However, I'm totally stumbling through the Japanese-only site right this second to try to figure it out - so far, I've discovered that it has the Final Fantasy VI ending theme in it somewhere!

You may have forgotten that Kingdom Hearts 3D is still a thing. It is, though, and it's coming out in Japan on 29 March, under five weeks from now. Even sooner, though, is 3 March, the day when Square Enix is planning a pre-launch event somewhere in Tokyo for the game. No other details as yet, but I would be surprised if they didn't show the 10th Anniversary Special Edition package for the game, which contains the new game, copies of both Nintendo DS Kingdom Hearts games, a 3DS shell cover, a dozen artwork postcards, and a truly cool looking box to hold it all. I can't believe it's been ten years since the original Kingdom Hearts already - the new one will release exactly ten years and one day from the original. That was on the PlayStation 2, kids.

To wrap it up for this week, on 30 March there will be another batch of cards for the Final Fantasy CCG in Japan. I don't really remember looking at too many of these in the past, but this batch has a focus on Final Fantasy VI, and has some really cute artwork. andriasang has a selection from the 320-card set; check page two for a hilarious Ultros (which is how he looks in Theatrhythm!).

Source: andriasang, Siliconera, Kotaku

The Tokyo Game Show will be back yet again this year, with the dates recently set to be 20-23 September, 2012 in the Chiba prefecture. This year, the show will be adding two new "corners," sections of the show set off for specific platforms - in this case, for PC and Smartphone/Tablet gaming.

Additionally this year, the show's organizers, CESA, will be producing video of the show for online viewing. No other details are available at this time, but it's likely that these will include booth tours and possibly game demo video. It's also likely that these will be produced only in Japanese, so brush up now.

The show expects nearly two hundred thousand visitors over the four days, split between industry professionals and the general public.

Source: andriasang

Sakaguchi, busy as always, made the news twice recently with regards to his work with Mistwalker. The biggest news is that, now that it's been out for over a year in Japan and is coming out in Europe this week, is that The Last Story is getting a North American release this summer. The localization for North America is being done by XSeed, known for localization of other RPGs; no other details are known at this time. Now that both Xenoblade and The Last Story will be available worldwide, perhaps the Wii can - too late - become a go-to destination for RPG players?

Of course, to partner with that interesting news, Sakaguchi is also working on three non-RPG games for iOS. These will be his, and Mistwalker's, first foray into Apple's world, and it's clear that none of the games are necessarily meant to appeal to his core audience. The first game will be somehow surfing related, and he gave no details on the other two games at all other than to say that they were small and "palate cleansers" for him after the development of The Last Story. All that said, it seems like there's not much there to keep our attention, but if he surprises us with something interesting for iOS, we'll make sure to keep you updated.

Source: Kotaku, TUAW

Some of you out there may not have seen much from Square Enix' toy division, or even known that Squenix has a toy division. Most accurately, it's called Square Enix Products, and they produce figures and toys for a wide array of game franchises, not just for Squenix properties.

With the New York Toy Fair last week, the company took the time to set up some displays of their new action figures for 2012, and Square Enix events manager Wilbur Lin and a cameraman walked through the big ones to share with the fans. All eight videos are now available on the Squenix Members Blog, and if you're a gaming, toy-collecting nerd like I am (or would be if I had more money), I would bet that there's at least one franchise shown there that you play. Square Enix is producing figures this year from the universes of Uncharted, Metal Gear Solid, Street Fighter, God of War, Halo, Mass Effect, and Arkham Asylum.

For those who just care about the Final Fantasy toys, the final video shows large, articulating figures of Lightning and Serah in their Final Fantasy XIII-2 costumes, and some smaller chibi figures of Cloud, Squall, and Yuna. The chibis come in packs of two of the same character, with different costumes and/or props, and have changeable expression faces (three pre-made, and one blank that you can draw yourself). I know what you're thinking - why would you ever need a face for Squall other than the totally blank one, right? Ha! Anyway, the two packs of the chibi characters appear to be set to retail at $19.99, and Lightning and Serah will be set for $54.99 apiece - a bit staggering, since I paid $14 for Final Fantasy XIII new, but the figures really do look pretty neat if you're a big fan.

Source: Square Enix Members, Square Enix Shop