News

Ah, top x lists. Defined solely to create arguments and page views among a site's readership, because nobody has ever agreed with such a list completely, ever. IGN knows this, as do we all, and right here I'm going to throw them some more page views out of the goodness of my own heart.

Well, not really. I'd have a hard time caring about this, given how generally without merit I find most of these lists, but this one is tailor-made for CoN: three of the games we cover are in the top five, and not one of them is Final Fantasy VII.

Don't worry, Final Fantasy VII is on there! While Square Enix claimed over a quarter of the spots on the overall list, the games we cover came in as follows:

• Final Fantasy VI: 1st
• Chrono Trigger: 2nd
• Final Fantasy IV: 5th
• Final Fantasy VII: 11th
• Final Fantasy Tactics: 14th
• Final Fantasy I: 73rd

The only game of ours that didn't get included was Final Fantasy V.

Enjoy arguing the list here, at least until they release a new list. Have fun - it's miserable to navigate.

Source: IGN

Sorry for the general lack of tidbits over the last month. It's been a crazy time in Rangersville. Let's catch up a bit, knowing that some of these things might not actually be news to some of you any more. Again, sorry!

The 25th Anniversary showcase that Squenix threw for the Final Fantasy franchise has now come and gone, and it definitely seemed to be quite the to-do in celebration of one of the longest-running and biggest-selling franchises in gaming history. Big names from each of the big three console makers spoke to talk about how Final Fantasy has impacted their own companies and gaming as a whole; no word on if Microsoft was mocked by the other two for not having much to contribute on that score. Shinji Hashimoto took the stage to announce the big bundle, a collection of every one of the first thirteen main-line Final Fantasy games either for PlayStation, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, or PSP. The package also includes a video disc, an artbook, a two-disc music compilation, a special Amano piece, and even a code for a Final Fantasy XIV item (which obviously will be the thing that really moves units). It's on sale on 18 December for about $450 US/350 Euro/280 GBP. If you have that kind of cash laying about - and who doesn't? - there's probably nothing stopping you from ordering from the Square Enix store. You just probably won't be able to play most of the games. Now, if they'd just offer a lesser version of the package without the games, I'd order one right now, I think. I have most of the games in the package already and these new releases don't appear to actually contain anything new.

Also coming from the celebration was the announcement of three new Ultimania books, called "Final Fantasy Memorial." These, too, release on 18 December Each of the three books covers an era of Final Fantasy games, from I - VI, VII - IX, and X - XIV. They can be ordered from the Square Enix shop as well, and there will apparently be a bonus gift for buying all three together. Of course, to do that will set you back another $120 or so. They do promise some new, never-before-seen artwork, and the implied promise of lots of words in Japanese that you probably can't read. Continuing the trend of 25th Anniversary merchandise, there will be novelizations released in Japan sometime later this year of the first three Final Fantasy games. You know, in case you wanted to read hundreds of pages to find out what happens in a game you probably played more than a decade ago. These will cost you a lot less, so maybe they're easier trinkets to pick up for collectors!

The Tokyo Game Show is coming up soon, and that's always a big deal for Squenix. However, and this should not shock you, but there will be no Versus at TGS this year. According to a member of the Japanese Square Enix Members site, Hashimoto has said that XIV and Lightning Returns will be the priorities this year on the Final Fantasy front. However, if you want to see Dragon Quest X in HD, TGS will have a stage demo at the show, running the game on Wii U. With regards to what is playable at TGS, it's not yet known. However, it appears that Bravely Default, Final Fantasy III for PSP, and the rebooted Final Fantasy XIV will be represented along with a variety of other games either developed or published by the many-headed Squenix behemoth.

There's more new news about Lightning Returns coming up, as well, which Death Penalty will be writing up hot on my heels!

Source: andriasang, SiliconEra

While CoN turned 15 this week, the slightly bigger news for the year remains that the Final Fantasy series itself turns 25 this year. We discussed back in March the special website set up for the Japanese Squenix audience, but on Wednesday (again, the day after the massively more important news), the company released an English-language celebration site as well.

So far, there's not a lot of information on the English site; however, along with the launch of the overall site there is a teaser article advertising a pending series on the history of every numbered game in the series. There's no indication on when the individual game articles will be published, but no matter when that is, there should be some very interesting information contained therein.

Happy birthday again, Final Fantasy, and thanks.

Source: Final Fantasy 25th Anniversary

Another year, another birthday message (last year not withstanding, during which time I was far too preoccupied with the impending presence of my flesh-and-blood baby to actually write much for this baby I've had fifteen years now). That's right, scorekeepers at home, this birthday is our fifteenth, and you might have noticed we've given the site - and we hope you - a present in the form of a shiny new revision. We've taken the liberty of generously forcing all of you to see it, though all of our classic skins are still available for you to switch back if you don't think the new skin, called "Skyglade," is the fanciest thing we've ever done. If you want to switch back, though, you can; the way to do it on the site is on our style selector, and the way for the forums is in your control panel. And, if you're not seeing it on the site but think you should be, try to reset your CoN skin selection entirely.

Skyglade represents years (on-and-off) of design work on the part of Tiddles and myself to make sure we could bring you something that freshens things up without losing the qualities people enjoyed most in Persona (fanart in particular, which you'll have seen before if you're a forum regular, designed especially for this theme by Rujuken). Not only that, you'll notice that all our themes are carrying a special anniversary version of our logo. As I've said before, the Caves of Narshe is a hobby run by professionals, so if you want to know more about why Skyglade is the best thing we've ever done for the site and its users (like it or not!) check out our freshly-updated CoNHistory.

Fifteen years is a long time. I've said this before, but it's worth repeating: over that kind of time, a lot of things change for all of us. It's made it mostly impossible to churn out content at the
rate we once could, which makes all the more proud of our accomplishments so far this year. It's among our greatest sources of pride that we can still be here presenting you this site, a site which we're still excited to improve. A site which we hope, and indeed know, is still useful and relevant to players of the old games, and can continue to be over time. We owe a great debt to every single human, animal and robot who has helped us along the way, including Climhazzard, from the patient staff who've tirelessly trawled through game data, to the fanfic writers and fanartists, to every single forum poster and chatter who's stopped by and chatted with us along the way.

I've mentioned before that our fifteen-year mark predates just about every Final Fantasy site that still exists, but thinking of fifteen years made me wonder what other sites on which CoN has seniority. Here's a few: Livejournal. Myspace. Facebook. Twitter. Flickr. Photobucket. Microsoft. (At least Microsoft was almost as ugly back then as CoN.) CoN is even older than Wikipedia! Anyway, listing those is certainly just a conceit - we'd never be considered to be in the ballpark of any of those sites, but it's worth noting that you don't just start a site and keep it going that long unless you have at least some of the dedication required to build a sustainable project from the ground up, and we do have that in common with those web Illuminati.

The sites in that list, even the ones spiraling into oblivion, are an interesting part of CoN's evolution, particularly as it relates to our slowing community growth. We know that we can never supplant Facebook or Twitter. We know that the way we operate the informational sections of our site is no longer trendy in the face of crowdsourced content. We're cool with it, because we're not looking to be everything to everyone. We are looking to remain the best source of gameplay information for the games we cover, and we are looking to keep you reading this interested in talking to all your fellow CoN members. Of course, we want you all to stay involved, and we'll do everything we can to help. We know that we're a niche, and we're thrilled that you choose to spend some of your attention and time with us - we know firsthand that the supply of both is finite and more and more splintered every year. So, if you don't have the time to come here and post or chat the way you used to, that's alright. We understand. Try to do us a favor, though - if you're on your social network of choice, why not share or retweet our posts and content? The more people we expose to CoN, the better off we are as a community. If you don't think your friends will care, then you're hanging out with the wrong folks online and need to spend more time here, anyway. Of course.

Some things don't change. We're here, and so far in 2012 we've done a pretty bang-up job of new content. Our Final Fantasy V Advance project was a bit of a shambles in 2011, but we stepped up and really got it done in 2012. Skyglade was two completely separate projects for years before now, and it's just in the last few months that we got together and really made it happen. There's still life in this site, and that means there's still something for you to contribute. Among Square Enix fans, you guys are pretty much the best of the best, and that's why we're here. We want to hear from you, and we want to continue to create the content that creates more of you. You can say what you will about the state of Square Enix and the Final Fantasy franchise, and you should. But what CoN has is the kind of Final Fantasy that gamers everywhere should experience, and that's why we're all here. We want to continue to be the best portal on the internet to evangelize some of the finest games yet made, and the best way to do that is for all of us to be here and continue to do what we've done for one, two, five, or even fifteen years.

Insert "Challenge Accepted" meme here. Except, please, totally don't. You know that we don't roll that way. But take today to get back in touch with us - we've got small tokens of appreciation for those who do!

The rumored future of Final Fantasy games features in this edition of the Squenix Tidbits, and not all of it is awesome. Of course, most people would probably say that is of zero surprise, but, that's how it is.

Let's get the bad news out of the way: Kotaku reports today that Final Fantasy Versus XIII is finally dead; while the reporting is mostly conjecture at this point, it's pretty reasonable conjecture given the utter lack of visible progress on offer from Squenix. The real question, beyond the simple matter of the game dying, is when it died. Has the company been pouring resources into the development until very recently, or was it quitely shelved a long time ago? The answer to that question might determine what resources are available for other games, which is important due to the widespread notion that the flagship series is worth next to nothing these days. Perhaps having more people available could help.

The next rumor is that Final Fantasy XV is going to be an open world game, in the style of Final Fantasy XII. On top of that, the Squenix source quoted indicates that the game's already been in some level of production for four years, with full development kicking off in January 2010, will have a combat system that calls back to both Final Fantasy XII and Vagrant Story, and will have cities that not only really exist but are populated by crowds of people, not just a few "important" townsfolk. Along with these points, it's also rumored that the game will be released for every platform available in the release generation. Given that the game hasn't even been unveiled officially yet, it would stand to reason that this would include the next offerings from Microsoft and Sony, as well as possibly even the WiiU.

The Final Fantasy 25th Anniversary event is coming up at the end of August, running from 31 August to 2 September. The first day will be for the press and some selected members of the Japanese Square Enix Members site, with the last two days open to the public. While this will obviously have massive amounts of Final Fantasy nostalgia, given the nature of the event, the company is looking to show the future of the franchise at the same time, with events to discuss more of the next aspect of the Final Fantasy XIII series, more information about Final Fantasy XIV 2.0, and a live recording of a Square Enix podcast dedicated to the future of the Final Fantasy series. With this event and the Tokyo Game Show both on the radar, a lot of questions about what's next for Final Fantasy might become resolved very soon.

Source: Kotaku, Gameranx, andriasang

The site leak from a couple weeks back was confirmed today as Square Enix officially announced the existence of the Final Fantasy VII re-release on PC via its official site and social media.

The site is either really poorly optimized or is getting absolutely hammered right now (probably a bit of both, in fact), so you might not be able to reach it. It's pretty general information, and most of it is stuff that was reported before from the leak. One thing certainly worth noting is that the site says the game will be available exclusively from the Square Enix store, which would imply that the achievements and cloud saving features will be unique to this game and will not use technology like Steamworks. Additionally, the exclusivity might mean that a Steam (or Origin, if you're a masochist) release may not be in the cards at all.

Will it still be worth the rumored twelve-dollar entry fee without Steam? I'm no longer sure it is for me, but I'll have to see how it looks and runs, first. That information isn't yet available, nor is any kind of real release date.

Source: Final Fantasy VII PC