This week, I finally have some free time to write this article.
Last Saturday, there was a shocking news in the Japanese gaming industry: Yosuke Matsuda, the president of Square Enix (SE), was forced to retire due to his support for blockchain and NFT.
Yosuke Matsuda is probably the most well-known president of SE, not because of anything else, but because he appeared as a boss in Final Fantasy XV and NieR: Automata:
(This image is not a mod, but official content from the game's DLC)
When I saw this news, it was already Sunday, and I learned about it from a Taiwanese gaming media. Most of the comments were criticizing Matsuda for placing too much emphasis on blockchain. Since SE is currently in a precarious situation, I quickly looked for some reports from Japan to read:
Square Enix announced that President Yosuke Matsuda will retire and officially step down after approval at the company's annual shareholders' meeting scheduled for June 2023.
Current director Takashi Kitao will succeed Matsuda, who has been serving as the company's president since 2013. SE explained the reason for Matsuda's retirement, saying, "In the rapidly changing business environment surrounding the entertainment industry, our goal is to provide better entertainment to everyone around the world by adopting continuously evolving technological innovations and maximizing the creativity of the group, and to update our management structure. The new management structure aims to maximize the creativity of the group and provide better entertainment to people around the world."
The article also emphasized the blockchain-related part:
In the New Year's message announced on January 1, 2023, Matsuda used the term "blockchain" 12 times (14 times in the English version) and stated that he is "particularly focused on blockchain entertainment" in new business fields.
In the New Year's message announced on January 1, 2023, Matsuda used the term "blockchain" 12 times (14 times in the English version) and stated that he is "particularly focused on blockchain entertainment" in new business fields.
This is not the first time Yosuke Matsuda has mentioned blockchain and NFT. On New Year's Day 2022, Matsuda stated in an open letter to players that "Square Enix is very interested in NFTs and blockchain games" (in fact, as early as 2021, SE provided the electronic sticker platform service "Asset Million Arthur"), which also attracted a lot of criticism. However, on the second day of the announcement, SE's stock price soared by 8%.
Everything seemed like a perfect start. Yosuke Matsuda may have thought that under his leadership, SE would achieve great success in the traditional gaming field this year and explore new paths in blockchain entertainment and NFT.
However, unexpected events are the most common in this world. In May 2022, SE sold Crystal Dynamics, Eidos Montreal, and SE Montreal studios to Swedish publisher Embracer Group for $300 million. In 2022, SE released 35 games, but without a new Final Fantasy game leading the way and without a major expansion for Final Fantasy XIV, most of the remaining games were either rehashed sequels or poorly made spin-offs and derivatives (the IPs of Dragon Quest and Kingdom Hearts were wasted), as well as some experimental independent IP works, resulting in very weak performance in its main business. And this year, the decline has continued. "Babylon's Fall," which started operating in March last year, was shut down and all data was deleted on February 27, 2023.
According to the financial report released last month, Square Enix's sales for the fiscal year ending in December 2022 were 255.616 billion yen, a decrease of 6.6% compared to the previous year, and operating profit was 41.315 billion yen, a decrease of 17.6% compared to the previous year.
Therefore, although many people think that Matsuda's blockchain and NFT strategy led to his resignation as president, the biggest reason may still be the weakness of the core business—although SE's press conference denied this claim, stating that it has nothing to do with performance and is just a normal personnel change, and the development system will not change, and the blockchain-related strategy will continue (source).
Yosuke Matsuda has served as the president of SE for 10 consecutive years. Some old players may still remember that he took office at a time when the original version of Final Fantasy XIV was in a crisis due to extremely poor quality, and SE had to start from scratch to create a completely new version of Final Fantasy XIV. After that, the new version of Final Fantasy XIV completely reversed its reputation, repeatedly breaking the record for the number of simultaneous online players, and became the most successful game of SE (of course, the credit for the revival of Final Fantasy XIV mainly goes to the producer Naoki Yoshida). And the subsequent releases of Final Fantasy VII Remake, Dragon Quest XI, and Kingdom Hearts III also owe a lot to him.
Yosuke Matsuda will step down in June, which happens to be the month when Final Fantasy XVI will be released. I hope that his final work as president, the latest installment in the Final Fantasy series, will have a better outcome.