Search the Community

Business Division 1 is a Square Enix Japan studio headed by legendary Square Enix Producer & Executive Officer, Yoshinori Kitase. Business Division 1 also includes legendary Square Enix Director & Writer, Motomu Toriyama. For more details on the studio please see here. Right now the studio has 4 rumoured projects and they're: FINAL FANTASY X-3 New Parasite Eve title The Lightning Saga – A collection featuring all 3 games from the FINAL FANTASY XIII series on PlayStation 4 & Xbox One FINAL FANTASY X/X-2 HD Remaster – Windows PC For more details on these rumoured projects please see here. To be honest, the chance of one of the first two being in development right now is 80%. NOTE: Some people are getting confused. The poll asks which you hope is happening most. The reality is it's highly likely 3 of these 4 are happening.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UOxOOCxHaY Here's an updated list of all the stuff that suggest an FFX-3. [*]Auron spotted near the end in the Final Fantasy VII Remake trailer [*]Motomu Toriyama confirming he is working hard on a new project that will be announced this year. While this is looking more likely to be VII Remake, he's not directing it. [*]Kazushige Nojima's infamous novella X-2.5 [*]Nojima's audio drama that follows X-2.5 [*]Nojima admitting he would like to see a X-3 [*]Nojima wrote X-2.5 and the audio drama thinking "this should be a game" [*]Nojima also revealed "there’s a plot from start to finish, and if there’s some way we can have it show up elsewhere… well, so I’ve said to Square Enix." [*]X/X-2 HD's amazing sales - It sold over 500,000 copies in Japan in less than a year and was a best seller in China getting it's very own PS4 bundle [*]X & X/X-2 HD's recent awards [*]Square Enix's quick PlayStation 4 port of Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster that still includes the audio drama. The audio drama was one of their key points for picking up the PS4 port, saying it's "fully intact". [*]Toriyama being on the Final Fantasy Committee* [*]Shintaro Takai, art director of the Final Fantasy X series including X/X-2 HD and Daisuke Watanabe (scenario writer on X & X-2) are both without their names attached to any announced projects. [*]Verendus from NeoGAF believes a X spin-off is in development [*]ff-reunion.net thinks Toriyama is making X-3. - They continually believe this. [*]Square Enix's continued promotion of Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster on PS4 - they were promoting it 5 months after release. [*]Character designer Tetsuya Nomura revealed in October his favourite Final Fantasy woman at the moment is Yuna. He later had a drawing of Tidus & Yuna released by Square Enix to thank people for their support of X/X-2 HD. [*]BD1 (Yoshinori Kitase's division with Toriyama in it) has held multiple events/updates related to the Final Fantasy X series in their title Mobius Final Fantasy. *Motomu Toriyama is a member of the four person Final Fantasy Committee and the other three are in charge of a AAA Final Fantasy title. The main purpose of the committee is according to Kitase "We get together and update each other with current information or issues on our projects. [We] make sure there are no release date overlaps or bug issues." In other words, If Toriyama isn't heavily involved on a new Final Fantasy game it would make no sense for him to be on the committee.

The evidence that supports this keeps adding up. Auron spotted in Final Fantasy VII Remake trailer Motomu Toriyama confirming he is working hard on a new project that will be announced this year. Kazushige Nojima's infamous novella X-2.5 Nojima's audio drama that follows X-2.5 Nojima admitting he would like to see a X-3 X/X-2 HD's amazing sales. X & X/X-2 HD's recent awards Square Enix's quick PlayStation 4 port of Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster that still includes the audio drama following all this. Toriyama being on the Final Fantasy Committee* Shintaro Takai, art director of the Final Fantasy X series including X/X-2 HD and Daisuke Watanabe (scenario writer on X & X-2) are both without their names attached to any announced projects. Verendus from NeoGAF believes a X spin-off is in development ff-reunion.net thinks Toriyama is making X-3. *Motomu Toriyama is a member of the four person Final Fantasy Committee and the other three are in charge of a AAA Final Fantasy title. The main purpose of the committee is according to Kitase "We get together and update each other with current information or issues on our projects. [We] make sure there are no release date overlaps or bug issues." In other words, If Toriyama isn't heavily involved on a new Final Fantasy game it would make no sense for him to be on the committee.

In late 2013, director Motomu Toriyama and producer Yoshinori Kitase released Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII for PlayStation 3 & Xbox 360 and a month later they released Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster for PlayStation 3 & PlayStation Vita. The Lightning Saga was finally finished and a new generation of consoles had begun. Released alongside Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster in Japan was a HD Remaster Ultimania included in this was an interview with Kazushige Nojima, the main scenario writer of Final Fantasy X & Final Fantasy X-2 along with Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VIII and Final Fantasy XV. Nojima touched on the possibility of a potential third entry in the sub-series by trotting out the typical fan demand mantra – saying that if there were enough demand, then there could possibly be new developments. He himself would, however, like to see a sequel such as “Final Fantasy X-3.” Clearly, Nojima already has a story in mind because he wrote a novella titled Final Fantasy X-2.5 ~The Eternal Calm~ that released alongside the HD collection in Japan. Now a 2.5 seems a bit weird if there isn't going to be 3. This isn't all though, included in the HD collection is an audio drama also written by Nojima that follows up the events of the novella, however it brings zero closure and instead opens up a million possible outcomes. Sin is back, Auron has a daughter, Yuna is dating another summoner, Tidus has his own issues after his head was blown off and it sounds like Auron is coming back along with Braska and Jecht. Nojima said the usual "if there were enough demand", well Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster sold like crazy and sold over 500,000 copies in Japan alone. In an interview with Famitsu.com, Motomu Toriyama confirmed he was in Business Division 1, which is headed by Yoshinori Kitase. This Business Division structure started in December 2013. Of course this is no surprise since these two have worked together since 1999 as director & producer respectively and even before that on Final Fantasy VII in different roles. So of course, whatever Toriyama is directing, Kitase is of course producing. Of course, some people are going to think, didn't they say it wasn't in development? Well yes, Shinji Hashimoto & Kitase both said so over a year ago but this when they would have still been getting sales from North America, Australia & Europe for X/X-2 HD. Chances are they were waiting to see how the HD collection performed before beginning development. Not to mention, you aren't just going to say to a journalist, "Yeah we're developing this game for PS4 & Xbox One. Please be excited". On December 27, 2014 in a developer survey with 4Gamer.net, Toriyama said “My next title is in well underway in development. We'll be able to announce it in 2015, so please look forward to it!” Recently, Square Enix president & CEO, Yosuke Matsuda confirmed a new JRPG for home consoles will be revealed at or around E3 2015. E3 of course occurs next month and Square Enix is holding a conference which is a very expensive thing to do and with Final Fantasy XV confirmed to only have a small showing and Kingdom Hearts III likely to be the same, they must have a big announcement planned. Shinji Hashimoto also recently promised more PlayStation 4 announcements from Square Enix in 2015. Shinji Hashimoto is almost certain to be the executive producer of Toriyama's new title. In addition, Business Division 1 is the only major division to have no big projects announced. Division 2 is working on Final Fantasy XV, Division 3 is working on Kingdom Hearts III, Division 4 is working on Dissidia, Division 5 is working on Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward, Division 6 is working on Dragon Quest XI while Division 7 is working on Star Ocean 5. Also, most of the core team behind the Lighting Saga is not working on any announced Square Enix projects. This includes: Yuji Abe (Game Design Director) Nobuyuki Matsuoka (Battle System Director) Daisuke Watanabe (Scenario Writer) - Same role role for FFX & FFX-2 Masashi Hamauzu (Composer) - Same role for FFX & FFX-2 And don't forget, Square Enix is releasing a PlayStation 4 port of Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster on May 12-15 which boasts even further enhanced graphics. This is rather quick and they're the only developers porting PlayStation 2 games to PlayStation 4 at this stage. Not to mention, the audio drama is still included. Did I also mention Final Fantasy X has won awards recently? Final Fantasy X won a Users' Choice Award and PlayStation Gold Prize at the PlayStation 20th Anniversary event. And even more recently it won a Famitsu Award. Square Enix is also doing something related to Final Fantasy X-2 on May 25 & 26. Bit odd to do something with a game that is 12 years old and the PS4 port comes out a couple weeks before then. And before someone brings up Mobius Final Fantasy, development is likely to be finished before E3 begins so the staff from that title will likely be working on Toriyama's title afterwards. They've also most likely outsourced part of the game. Also, Yoshinori Kitase is still an executive at Square Enix, so Square Enix still has complete faith in the man who directed Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VIII along with Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI with others. Motomu Toriyama has also now directed more Final Fantasy games than Hironobu Sakaguchi and unless he's working on a new IP, his new record is set to be made bigger. Yes, I know a lot of you might have negative feelings towards these two after Final Fantasy XIII but you must remember the game suffered from development issues and in case you forgot they addressed all the criticisms (Linear, no towns, no mini-games, quests) from Final Fantasy XIII to the extreme in Final Fantasy XIII-2 and Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII. And to anyone who's still saying that X or X-2 had a perfect ending, I agree completely, I love those endings, but Nojima wrote the novella and audio drama and they're canon so they really should bring closure some how. Even if it resulted in a movie like Kazuyuki Ikumori the director of Visual Works said he'd like to make one of, I'd be very excited for that too. In conclusion, I personally can not wait to see Motomu Toriyama and Yoshinori Kitase's new title. I have been waiting for this since April 2014. I personally like every single game Toriyama has ever directed or written and the same can be said for every single game Kitase has worked on that I've played. Even if their title turns out to not be Final Fantasy X-3 and is instead a new IP or even Parasite Eve 4 I will have no issue with it at all. I am excited for their new title whatever it is. Toriyama is my favourite director while Kitase is my favourite producer. Please be excited, I know I am.