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Square Enix CEO steps down over Blockchain Support? Things may not be as bad as you think

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SE said in a press release that its blockchain-related strategy will continue.

Square Enix CEO steps down over Blockchain Support: Things may Not be as bad as You Think

Original author:CryptoNerdCn

On Saturday, there was some big news in the Japanese gaming world: Square Enix President Yosuke Matsuda was forced to retire because of his support for blockchain and NFT.

Yosuke Matsuda is probably SE's best known president, for no other reason than his previous appearances as a BOSS in Final Fantasy XV and Neal Machine Era.

(This is not a mod, but a regular game DLC)

When I read the news on Sunday, I heard from a Taiwanese gaming media outlet that the comments were mostly about Matsuda's emphasis on blockchain. Since SE has been in the hot seat recently, I quickly looked for a Japanese onereportTo see:

Square Enix has announced that President Yosuke Matsuda is retiring, and that he will officially step down after approval by the company's annual shareholder meeting, scheduled for June 2023.

Current director Takashi Tsuyonori will replace Matsuda, who has been president since 2013. SE explained Matsuda's retirement by saying: "In the rapidly changing business environment surrounding the entertainment industry, our goal is to provide better entertainment to everyone around the world and update our management structure by adopting evolving technological innovations and maximising the creativity of the group. The new management structure is designed to maximise the creativity of the Group to provide better entertainment for people around the world."

The article does highlight the blockchain-related parts:

2023 ganjitsu に発 table した year feel で, matsuda は 12 back (English version では 14) back も "ブロックチェーン" を with いており, new rules eset において "にブロックチェーンエンタテインメントにフォーカス" していると above べていた.

In his New Year's message on New Year's Day 2023, Matsuda used the word "blockchain" 12 times (14 times in the English version) and said he was "particularly focused on blockchain entertainment" in new businesses.

This isn't the first time Matsuda has mentioned blockchain and NFT. New Year's day 2022, matsuda in open letter to the players, said the "Square Enix interested in NFT and chain blocks game" (in fact as early as 2021, SE provides "assets ミリオンアーサー" the electronic label platform service), therefore has also attracted many people's criticism, Yet the day after the announcement, SE's share price jumped 8%.

Everything seems to be off to a great start, and Matsuda may feel that with him at the helm, it's no surprise that SE will make a big mark in traditional gaming this year and explore new avenues in blockchain entertainment as well as NFT.

But there is nothing in this world short of accidents. Embracer Group in May 2022, SE sold Crystal Dynamics, Eidos Montreal and SE Montreal studios to Swedish publisher Embracer Group for $300 million. SE will release 35 games in 2022, but since no new FF title has taken off, FF14 hasn't had a major expansion, and the rest of the games are mostly rehashed or poorly made sequels. Spin-offs (the Dragon Fight IP and the Goddess Sidelined IP were both wasted), as well as some experimental stand-alone IP works, resulted in a very weak main business. Babylon Fall, which was launched in March last year, was suspended on February 27, 2023 and deleted all its data.

Last month, Square Enix reported sales of 255.616 billion yen for the fiscal year ended December 23, down 6.6 percent from the previous year, and operating profit of 41.315 billion yen, down 17.6 percent from the previous year.

Therefore, although many people think that Matsuda's blockchain and NFT strategy led to the resignation of the president, the biggest reason may be the weakness of the industry -- although SE's press release also denied this claim, saying that it has nothing to do with performance, but is just a normal personnel change, the development system will not change, and the blockchain-related strategy will continue (source).

Matsuda has been SE president for 10 consecutive years. Some longtime players may recall that he took over at a time when the original FF14 was so poor that SE was at risk of survival that it had to build an entirely new FF14 from scratch -- since then the new FF14 has completely reversed its reputation and repeatedly broken records for the number of MMORPGs online at the same time. It became SE's most successful game ever (of course, FF14's turnaround was largely the result of taking over producer Naoki Yoshida). FF7RE, DQ11, and Kingdom Hearts 3 are all about him.

Matsuda will step down in June, the same month FFXVI goes on sale. I hope that the latest installment of FF series 16, which he will finally take on as president, will have a better result.