01-29-2011, 06:00 PM
Square was pretty good. Because the products that they were making was relevant and palatable.
But Square is still making games like it's 1998. The whole 'turn based RPG' model is tried and true, but has a limited market, and where they 'innovate' usually tries to gloss over what it is at its core. See the recent games, where you can elect to have it played for you so that you don't have to deal with the battle system.
Part of the problem is that Square has serious groupthink issues - they seem to be out of touch with what normal people really like about games. Evidence of that? Look at FF XIV; they kept all the worst parts of FFXI (the horrible grind, repetition, arbitrary bullshit) while cutting out most of the fun. Not only that, they managed to make their menu system somehow even worse.
Square needs to toss out their old paradigm and approach RPGs from a completely fresh standpoint if they want to buck their slide into irrelevance.
But Square is still making games like it's 1998. The whole 'turn based RPG' model is tried and true, but has a limited market, and where they 'innovate' usually tries to gloss over what it is at its core. See the recent games, where you can elect to have it played for you so that you don't have to deal with the battle system.
Part of the problem is that Square has serious groupthink issues - they seem to be out of touch with what normal people really like about games. Evidence of that? Look at FF XIV; they kept all the worst parts of FFXI (the horrible grind, repetition, arbitrary bullshit) while cutting out most of the fun. Not only that, they managed to make their menu system somehow even worse.
Square needs to toss out their old paradigm and approach RPGs from a completely fresh standpoint if they want to buck their slide into irrelevance.
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