News

Bandai, the manufacturer of the SwanCyrstal, WonderSwan Color and WonderSwan, announced that they will stop mass production of the SwanCrystal (their latest version of the handheld device).  Furthermore, they have no future hardware plans as of now.

http://www.gamesarefun.com/cgi-bin....,30952,

While it was never brought over to the North American market, the WonderSwan was able to establish a nice little niche market over in Japan.  Sales have really sagged in recent weeks though.  Bandai is to the point where they are only moving 800 to 1,000 units weekly.  

The WonderSwan Color garnered much of its attention through ports of popular game made to the system, particularly those by Square and Capcom.  Square ported Final Fantasy I, II and IV, and Romancing SaGa to the system while Capcom brought its Ghouls 'n Ghosts, Pocket Fighter, and Mega Man and Bass.

Bandai handheld plans are now to develop software for the GameBoy Advance, hoping to release a game this coming fall in Japan.  

Source: GamesAreFun
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This is just one less competitor to Nintendo's dominance in the handheld market.  As already stated up above, it was never released in the North American market and only established a niche in Japan.  Every bit of competition against Nintendo helps it though.  On the positive side, this will result in the GameBoy Advance getting another quality developer in the form of Bandai.  

Next up for Nintendo (about a year or so away though): Nokia's N-Gage.

In a recent issue of VJump, There are two pages dedicated to FF: Crystal Chronicles. They show new artwork of the main characters and a moogle carrying a letter.

Here are the Scans :

Scan 1
Scan 2
Source: Square Insider

Apparently Mog Central has returned to the Final Fantasy world, with Moogles in Multi-Colored trousers and no arms.

Also, the skills / magic system seems to be based on the FF7 Materia System. You will be able to add various crystals to gain new magic and skills, and also to increase your stats.
Source 2: Square Insider

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The moogles in these scans scare me. They look like some kinda pieced together genetic creature or something.

The Materia-esque gameplay will make this game really interesting, IMO. Giving it a depth to the character customization and allowing everyone to have a differnt type of character if they wanted. I wonder if they will have to have a Phoenix-Final Attack combo. heh.

People have asked for a more clear-cut definition of the rules here at CoN for quite a while. We finally have them fully outlined at http://www.cavesofnarshe.com/forums/rules.php for your review.

These rules are really just a written form of the common-sense regulations the moderators of the CoN forums and the ops of CoNChat have been using for a very long time.

If for some reason we find you in violation of one of these rules in the forums, we will do our best to educate rather than simply prosecute. If there is anything we can do to make your stay better, please let us know.

The CoN has expanded to fit a third game to its gallery!

After months of hard work, the Final Fantasy 5 section of the CoN has finally been opened.  All members and visitors are now welcome to learn more about the game that was only recently released in the United States in the Final Fantasy Anthology collection.  Enjoy new layouts by Kame and Hikaroo, hopefully with more to come.

We at the CoN hope everyone enjoys the new section after putting so much work and time into getting all the info down and right -- and there's even more coming.  Stay tuned for a walkthrough of the game, and visit the brand new FFV forum, just opened today.

The first FF5 CoNQuiz will be available on 1 March.

Shareholders of Square and Enix met in Tokyo yesterday to vote on the merger agreement between the two companies. As expected, it was approved.

http://www.rpgamer.com/news/Q1-2003/021303a.html

The companies will each publish one more game under their separate titles (Final Fantasy X-2 from Square and Dragon Quest Monsters III: Caravan Heart from Enix)  Their companies will officially start their operations together on April 1st under the title of the Square Enix Corporation.  The first title published under their new name will be Vision of Ziraat, the Final Fantasy XI expansion set.  

The merger will help reduce costs by allowing Square to no longer be force to publish games through Sony Computer Entertainment. Instead, they can just do it through means already in existence at Enix.

Source: RPGamer


While this merger should be good because saves the two companies money, I think it will be even more important because of the creative infusion it should provide to each company.  In many's opinion, the Final Fantasy series has become stagnant in its recent releases.  Final Fantasy IX was a good game [especially after FFVIII (keep in mind that this is entirely my opinion )], but it was not great by any means.  It was just not all that memorable of a game especially after many of the previous incarnations of the series.  FFX had a very good plot, but it lacked in the area of gameplay.  There was not much you could not get by without just pressing the X button.  Hopefully, the best of both companies will shine in Final Fantasy XII when it is released.

On Enix's end, hopefully with the "Square" part added to their name, their games (which are usually of high quality) will be a bit more successful in the North American market.

From http://www.rpgamer.com/...

http://www.rpgamer.com/news/Q1-2003/021203b.html

Hey, I know for a fact that we have at least one forumgoer from Australia, so this is valid.    Australians will now have the opportunity to pick up a Playstation 2 unless they previously imported one, and there's a specific little package available that will give them a free game upon purchase.  The most notable of the five available games is Square's recent release, Kingdom Hearts.

I think that a package like this is going to attract many Australians to the deal and will just help to broaden Square and Sony's hold on the video game market.  Though Gamecube and XBox are putting up a fight, Sony is still the leader in the market and hey, getting another continent will only add to the mix.  When their first taste is of a certain company, in this case possibly Square, they may just follow that company and its games for quite awhile.  I know the first RPGs I played were all from Square and I followed the company for quite awhile before discovering some third party companies, so this is a good, smart move by the companies.