Finally, I have some free time this week to write this article.
Last Saturday, there was a shocking news in the Japanese gaming industry: Yosuke Matsuda, the president of Square Enix (hereinafter referred to as 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 content from official game 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 position, I quickly looked for 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 Kitayama will succeed Matsuda, who has been the president of the company 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 word "blockchain" 12 times (14 times in the English version) and stated that he was "particularly focused on blockchain entertainment" in new business fields.
In the New Year's message announced on January 1, 2023, Matsuda used the word "blockchain" 12 times (14 times in the English version) and stated that he was "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 rose by 8%.
Everything seemed like a perfect start. Yosuke Matsuda may have thought that under his leadership, SE would create brilliance in the traditional gaming field this year without any surprises, and explore new paths in the field of blockchain entertainment and NFT.
However, the world is full of surprises. 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 because there was no new FF game to carry the weight, and FF14 did not have a major expansion, most of the remaining games were either reheated or poorly made sequels and spin-offs (the IPs of Dragon Quest and Kingdom Hearts were wasted), as well as some experimental independent IP works, resulting in very weak main business. And this year, the decline continues. "Babylon's Fall," which started operating in March last year, was shut down and all data was deleted on February 27, 2023.
Finally, 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 main 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, the development system will not change, and the blockchain-related strategy will continue (source).
Yosuke Matsuda has been 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 FF14 was in a crisis due to extremely poor quality, and SE had to start from scratch to create a brand new FF14—after that, the new version of FF14 completely reversed the previous reputation, repeatedly breaking the record for the number of simultaneous online players in MMORPGs, and became the most successful game of SE (of course, the credit for the revival of FF14 mainly goes to the producer who took over, Naoki Yoshida). The subsequent FF7 Remake, DQ11, and Kingdom Hearts 3 also owe a lot to him.
Yosuke Matsuda will step down in June, which happens to be the month when FFXVI will be released. I hope that the latest installment of the FF series, which he will oversee as president for the last time, will have a better outcome.
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