Yoichi Wada Resigns as Square Enix CEO

[Rockym]

Breaking news:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=529926

Staff edit- as mentioned below some news helps.
The Square Enix CEO, Yoichi Wada, has resigned from the company. He had been CEO for about 12 years after having joined the company in 2000, the late PS1 era, as CFO (Chief Financial officer) and rapidly rising through the board during the subsequent year.
Not being a programmer, artist, director or otherwise involved in the sharp end of development he had no real games to his name but his directorship saw the infamous Japanese R4 case come to the fore. Similarly during his tenure we saw the merger between one time rival Enix and Square as well as a lot of acquisitions (Taito, the somewhat floundering Eidos and even an attempt to grab Temco) and a serious push into the publishing space (though their acquisition of Eidos was seen largely as gaining a foothold here).
However not all was rosy and in recent years many have criticised Square Enix's offerings, especially those of the Japanese divisions which had handled their major franchises like Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Front Mission and Dragon Quest, on the basis of quality and diluting the brand with bad ports and spinoffs.

 

[Hero-Link]

This is AWESOME news! FINALLY!!

He keeps doing bullshit moves and ruining franchises... let's hope whoever picks up will continue the Square Enix quality control.

The only decent game I remember being released since he took over was TWEWY

 

[BORTZ]

Let's try to be more informative next time you post news. A hyperlink doesn't really cut it.

 

[Gundam Eclipse]

I am unsure how I feel, maybe their JP side endeavors will get better, but I hope the effort and quality on their Western end doesn't get too badly affected, they have done an amazing job on there, alongside Eidos.

 

[Guild McCommunist]

I forgot that the president is responsible for every failure of the company in the fans' eyes.

God people are just stupid.

 

[ShadowSoldier]

I was ninja'd!

Oh well. The dude sucks. Maybe Square will be taken seriously again.

 

[RupeeClock]

I forgot that the president is responsible for every failure of the company in the fans' eyes.

God people are just stupid.

I know right?

If you ask me, it seems like Square Enix's Squaresoft side of things aren't very capable of designing new dungeons at all, they have what it takes to remake a favourite game sure, but actually make new content?

People criticise FF13 often for being extremely linear, well the new dungeon in Chrono Trigger DS, Lost Sanctum was an extremely linear hall that extended a little bit longer, each time you walked from start to finish, fought the same monsters over and over, and appeared badly scripted fetch quests.
There was also the arena mode in Chrono Trigger DS. That was...just awful.

Some of the blame probably lies with the President, I mean they continue to refuse to do the one thing that'd make them a fortune; remake Final Fantasy VII.
That being said I don't know what Wada was responsible for, if he had anything to do with pushing Lightning as far as possible, etc.

 

[Guild McCommunist]

To be fair Square Enix's western operation has just been better. We got Tomb Raider, Deus Ex: HR, Just Cause 2, etc.

I couldn't give two shits about their Japanese division, its always gonna suck, but their western side for the past 10+ years has been excellent.

Oh and the FF spinoffs have been very good.

I know right?

If you ask me, it seems like Square Enix's Squaresoft side of things aren't very capable of designing new dungeons at all, they have what it takes to remake a favourite game sure, but actually make new content?

People criticise FF13 often for being extremely linear, well the new dungeon in Chrono Trigger DS, Lost Sanctum was an extremely linear hall that extended a little bit longer, each time you walked from start to finish, fought the same monsters over and over, and appeared badly scripted fetch quests.
There was also the arena mode in Chrono Trigger DS. That was...just awful.

Some of the blame probably lies with the President, I mean they continue to refuse to do the one thing that'd make them a fortune; remake Final Fantasy VII.
That being said I don't know what Wada was responsible for, if he had anything to do with pushing Lightning as far as possible, etc.

Well I don't see the president jumping into a dev's studio and just fucking things up. They just handle the business side of things, game quality is an entirely different thing. To say that FFXIII is Wada's fault is pretty dumb, or any other grievances about their game quality.

 

[ShadowSoldier]

People criticise FF13 often for being extremely linear, well the new dungeon in Chrono Trigger DS, Lost Sanctum was an extremely linear hall that extended a little bit longer, each time you walked from start to finish, fought the same monsters over and over, and appeared badly scripted fetch quests.
There was also the arena mode in Chrono Trigger DS. That was...just awful.

Except FFXIII, the ENTIRE game was linear. Chrono Trigger wasn't. And not to mention, FFXIII had a bit of false advertising behind it involving the combat.

To be fair Square Enix's western operation has just been better.

They haven't been selling enough.

 

[Rydian]

Except FFXIII, the ENTIRE game was linear. Chrono Trigger wasn't. And not to mention, FFXIII had a bit of false advertising behind it involving the combat.



They haven't been selling enough.

He's talking more recent developments. Chrono Trigger for the DS had additional content, and he extra dungeons they added sucked. I couldn't even bring myself to finish one of them.

 

[ShadowSoldier]

He's talking more recent developments. Chrono Trigger for the DS had additional content, and he extra dungeons they added sucked. I couldn't even bring myself to finish one of them.

Ah, so not the game itself but the bonus stuff, the stuff that was actually new?

 

[Hero-Link]

I forgot that the president is responsible for every failure of the company in the fans' eyes.

God people are just stupid.

He makes the final decision. So yes.

If you work in a big company, the final decision is always from the big boss, mainly the Director/CEO.

 

[Rydian]

Ah, so not the game itself but the bonus stuff, the stuff that was actually new?

Yup. It was almost pathetic, really amateur in the way it worked. The screen would fade out and in in order to have NPCs vanish (something the base game never did, it gave them proper walking animations to move around), many of the new areas were bare in details, etc.

Looked like a 15 year old intern added the new levels with RPG maker or something, it was that jarring heading into the extra content from the main game.

 

[RupeeClock]

Well I don't see the president jumping into a dev's studio and just fucking things up. They just handle the business side of things, game quality is an entirely different thing. To say that FFXIII is Wada's fault is pretty dumb, or any other grievances about their game quality.

Except FFXIII, the ENTIRE game was linear. Chrono Trigger wasn't. And not to mention, FFXIII had a bit of false advertising behind it involving the combat.

That's not what I was saying, I was saying that the actual creative design team seem to be seriously lacking beyond remaking a game.
The new content in Chrono Trigger DS was largely bad, because they don't seem to know how to design a good dungeon any more.
What games are going to get made typically falls with the CEO's decision making though, don't they?

 

[ShadowSoldier]

That's not what I was saying, I was saying that the actual creative design team seem to be seriously lacking beyond remaking a game.
The new content in Chrono Trigger DS was largely bad, because they don't seem to know how to design a good dungeon any more.
What games are going to get made typically falls with the CEO's decision making though, don't they?

Yeah it does. Final word is always from the CEO, which is why he gets... executive producer I think it is (?) in all the games. He was the one who said "we won't remake Final Fantasy VII until we make something better than it". He also said that their games are lacking quality and that they have to get them out quicker. But look at what's happened, nothing's been working. They've been relying on ports to make an income.

Even their big games like Hitman, Tomb Raider, Deus Ex, it isn't even made by them, and Wada has stated that they've been selling poorly. Though I don't entirely think 3 million sold is that bad.

 

[Kwartel]

That's not what I was saying, I was saying that the actual creative design team seem to be seriously lacking beyond remaking a game.
The new content in Chrono Trigger DS was largely bad, because they don't seem to know how to design a good dungeon any more.
What games are going to get made typically falls with the CEO's decision making though, don't they?

Indeed. Maybe he really limited the resources in terms of both money and time. A CEO needs to lead the teams and if they generate crap, there should be consequences..

 

[J-Machine]

Good now let's remove Nomura's influence in the company and we might actually get a good game out of them.

 

[Hyro-Sama]

Meh

This sort of good news I guess. The management wasn't the only contributing factor to SE's recent struggles but w/e. I'll just watch from the sidelines as this thread goes down in flames.

 

[raulpica]

I couldn't give two shits about their Japanese division, its always gonna suck

ITP: Personal opinions expressed as facts

 

[Gahars]

So much for all those "Wada you waiting for?" jokes I had saved up.

Damn it, Square Enix, you've screwed me again!