Coolest rumor of 2007 so far: Chrono Series heads to Xbox 360

[heybtbm]

It appears Square/Enix has sold the rights to a few of their franchises. Specifically, they have sold the rights for their (seemingly abandoned) Chrono franchise to Mistwalker.

Nothing official yet, but still interesting.

http://square-enix-news.newslib.com/story/5218-3209877/

[Aussie2B]

Smells like bullcrap to me. Selling the Chrono license is farfetched as is, but Seiken Densetsu too, and even Kingdom Hearts? Kingdom Hearts is one of their most popular series right now, they wouldn't just dump it.

[s1lence]

Smells like bullcrap to me. Selling the Chrono license is farfetched as is, but Seiken Densetsu too, and even Kingdom Hearts? Kingdom Hearts is one of their most popular series right now, they wouldn't just dump it.

I'll 2nd that motion. Smells like poo

[njiska]

The only thing that gives this story some credit is the ridiculous development cycle of FFXII and Square's historical tendencies to go over budget. Selling Chrono to Mistwalker actually makes a lot of sense as Square isn't really doing anything with it and Sakaguci would no doubt be more then interested in it.

As for the other franchises it's really a crap shoot. It's not entirely unlikely, but it's not overly plausible either.

[diskoboy]

I want to believe this - I really do.

Blue Dragon helped the 360 in Japan, alot. This game would have them literally flying off the shelves. Killing many unsuspecting gamers. :)

[exit]

Square selling Chrono? That seems very unlikely, it's still an easy cash-in for them. All they need to do is spit out a re-make/sequel and they'll just watch the money literally grow on trees.

[petewhitley]

Even if this is true, doesn't that mean Square/Enix would have NOTHING to do with any further games in the Chrono series? So basically some other company bought the name and will make their own sequels to this classic series? Sounds like bad news if you ask me ...

[gepeto]

The only reason I find this hard to believe is the fact out of all the rpgs series that have been milked to death the chrono is not one of them. There is a whole legion of fans waiting for a new strong chrono sequel. Unlike say the driver series the chrono series is a still respected series.

[Auxilla]

No freaking way.Whats with all these crazy 360 rumors all of a sudden.

[incubus421]

No freaking way.Whats with all these crazy 360 rumors all of a sudden.

With the new consoles arriving (PS3 and Wii) the 360 must do something to keep the hype up and their fans excited.

[FantasiaWHT]

<---- Wouldn't ever consider buying another Chrono game.

Despite Chrono Trigger being in my top 5 games of all time, I won't give that series the time of day, regardless of who makes it.

[Richter Belmount]

Even if this is true, doesn't that mean Square/Enix would have NOTHING to do with any further games in the Chrono series? So basically some other company bought the name and will make their own sequels to this classic series? Sounds like bad news if you ask me ...

How so? If the original chrono team would produce it?

[Soviet Conscript]

All they need to do is spit out a re-make/sequel and they'll just watch the money literally grow on trees.


literally? really?

[udisi]

I see nothing unbelievable about this

1st..Square-enix has done nothing new with the Chrono series since PSX and really Chronocross was not as big a money maker as they expected, it did go greatest hits, but it had dropped to a $20 games well before the greatest hits packaging. When you're budgeting a build around selling a $50 game and you end up getting $20 it cuts into the bottom line quick. At this point Chronocross and the chrono series is still successful enough to warrant a good price for selling the series, rather than letting the series die or taking the chance of making a flop and killing it.

2nd..It says it's selling Kingdom Hearts to Buena Vista which is a Disney Company. Imagine that selling the series to the company that it liscences the characters from. Don't forget that SE had to spend money on character rights for this series. It looks like they're just letting disney buy this series. Also not a bad idea, they made good money of the first 2, but not as much as if they didn't have to pay for character rights. The series itself may be worth more to them than actually have to take the risk with making a 3rd title.

3rd...This could be a consolodation and capital raising idea. Maybe SE has spread itself thin and let quality decline by trying to push out too many titles(Hint,Hint). Maybe they're getting rid of seires that they don't see as being longterm pofitable, and are trying to concentrate on making the remaining series better games and more profitable. Many people say the FF series has been declining, maybe SE wants to focus more on making better Dragon Warrior and Final Fntasy games and garenteeing their survival.

I

[udisi]

oh one more thing it din't say in the article that these series would only be on the xbox 360, but implies that since SE wouldn't be the developer that it would open up both the wii and xbox 360 to these titles at the developers discrestion. Who's to say you wouldn't see Kingdom hearts 3 on PS3, xbox 360 and the wii?

[Lothars]

Smells like bullcrap to me. Selling the Chrono license is farfetched as is, but Seiken Densetsu too, and even Kingdom Hearts? Kingdom Hearts is one of their most popular series right now, they wouldn't just dump it.


I really doubt they would get rid of the Chrono License mainly because they really do need to release another game but I would be dissapointed beyond belief if square got rid of the license.

[petewhitley]

How so? If the original chrono team would produce it?

So the original Chrono team isn't part of Square/Enix?

[Richter Belmount]

No its mistwalker now , thats why blue dragon was a big deal in japan it was made by the chrono trigger team from se who left and formed mistwalker along with some of the ff11 team . With Hironobu Sakaguchi heading mistwalker even nobuo uematsu got in on making mistwalker.

[jcalder8]

No its mistwalker now , thats why blue dragon was a big deal in japan it was made by the chrono trigger team from se who left and formed mistwalker along with some of the ff11 team . With Hironobu Sakaguchi heading mistwalker even nobuo uematsu got in on making mistwalker.
If this is the case then I think this is great news and I find it more believable because I bet they are excited about making a new Chrono game and are willing to pay fair market value.

[WiseSalesman]

They just announced new Seiken Denetsu games recently, and Kingdom Hearts has been a mega cash cow for SE. I could see them dumping Chrono, if for no other reason than stagnation, but the other two? Bad business decision.

[Emuaust]

maybe all these crazy rumours are started by crazy MS PR people?
Looks Like BS
Smells Like BS

Must be BS!

[Poofta!]

looks extremely believable to me. btw, i didnt see seiken densetsu being mentioned in that link.
udisi made excellent points on why this is plausible


i hope they do sell them, i want quality multiplatform releases.

only thing im surprised is that they havent re-released chrono trigger on gba/ds/psp yet.

[Aussie2B]

1st..Square-enix has done nothing new with the Chrono series since PSX and really Chronocross was not as big a money maker as they expected, it did go greatest hits, but it had dropped to a $20 games well before the greatest hits packaging. When you're budgeting a build around selling a $50 game and you end up getting $20 it cuts into the bottom line quick. At this point Chronocross and the chrono series is still successful enough to warrant a good price for selling the series, rather than letting the series die or taking the chance of making a flop and killing it.

You're talking about US sales which have absolutely nothing to do with anything. It's Square Enix of Japan that owns the licenses and produces the games, and even if the Chrono series was the most unpopular series in existence in America, the Chrono license would STILL be worth a lot to Square Enix. Both Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross were massive successes in Japan, and just past July both were re-released under yet another budget line for the PlayStation. If a PS1 game is still viable in 2006, then that's really saying something. That wasn't even the first time they were re-released in Japan, so that shows that not only did the original release do exceptionally well but the re-release also did so well that they did another. Add this to the fact that they're also continuously making new print runs of the soundtracks and are even discussing releasing a brand new arranged soundtrack for Chrono Cross even after all these years have passed, and you have a series that is STILL raking in tons of money even with no new entry in years.

Essentially, your logic on this is the equivalent of saying it would make sense for Square Enix to dump the Dragon Quest license because sales in the US have always been underwhelming, which would be a laughable prospect if you brought that up to the executives of Square Enix of Japan.

[udisi]

You're talking about US sales which have absolutely nothing to do with anything. It's Square Enix of Japan that owns the licenses and produces the games, and even if the Chrono series was the most unpopular series in existence in America, the Chrono license would STILL be worth a lot to Square Enix. Both Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross were massive successes in Japan, and just past July both were re-released under yet another budget line for the PlayStation. If a PS1 game is still viable in 2006, then that's really saying something. That wasn't even the first time they were re-released in Japan, so that shows that not only did the original release do exceptionally well but the re-release also did so well that they did another. Add this to the fact that they're also continuously making new print runs of the soundtracks and are even discussing releasing a brand new arranged soundtrack for Chrono Cross even after all these years have passed, and you have a series that is STILL raking in tons of money even with no new entry in years.

Essentially, your logic on this is the equivalent of saying it would make sense for Square Enix to dump the Dragon Quest license because sales in the US have always been underwhelming, which would be a laughable prospect if you brought that up to the executives of Square Enix of Japan.

No, no I'm not ignoring the japanese market, yes the series is still raking in cash in japan as budget titles(Since there are no development costs), and the soundtracks do produce money. In Japan Soundtracks are a lot bigger than they are over here. Tons of titles have soundtracks over there. Soundtracks over here though have not faired as well. I'm not saying the Franchise is dead, otherwise they wouldn't be able to sell it for a good price, but SE hasn't created anything new from the liscense in years and may be cashing in on it. Game development costs continue to skyrocket and the budget that will be needed to create another Chrono series game capable of satisfying it's audiance would be a big risk if the game isn't big in the US as well as Japan. You're gonna need both markets to make back the money vested in developmet. I garentee you Chronotrigger cost less than Chronocross to develop and if anything the retail price of Chronocross was less than the cost of Chronotrigger. To make money they have to sell more units, or as the case is in Japan be able to maket the souindtracks and re-issues. Most money noadays is make purly off of number of units sold. As the Dragon Quest series goes, it did quite well with 8, I wouldn't say it was underwelmig, if fact I think it did better than they expected.

My main point is say it takes 50 mil to develop FF13, and 30 mil to develop Dragon Quest 9, and so on and so on in the SE lineup, they can gain cash and save risk by cutting some series out of development and concentrating on their bigger franchises. Up front each series costs them a ton of working capital, and none of that money will be realised(if ever) till the game releases. If they can put more programmers on a project they can get the game out faster and make their money back faster. Also with less series they don't have to commit as much money and risk losing it. Now I would think selling of say the Saga series or maybe front mission series off since they haven't seen bilateral success, but maybe they're not worth a good enough price, maybe no one is interested in those series at the price SE wants, maybe I underestimate the income that mech stategy brings in Japan, but I would have thought they would sell off some of those, but the Chrono series and Kingdom hearts also made sense to me. Chrono just because they haven't been doing a lot with it in the last 6-7 years Chrono Cross was released in AUG of 2000, anything since then has been a money recovery or money milking operation. Kingdom hearts is a liability due to character liscensing and probably royalties. Very few series last sucessfully past 2 or 3 installmets. Yes, we all can name series that have last more than 2-3, but for every long lasting series there's what 10 ...20? series that fail, probably more. both the Chrono series and the Kindgdom hearts series are only 2 instalments long, I'd say they're better off selling now, rather than waiting till say when people say the last 3 KIngdom Hearts are been a let down and the series peaked a long time ago.