49 Facts About Square Enix

In October 2008, Square Enix conducted a company split between its corporate business and video game operations, reorganizing itself as the holding company Square Enix Holdings Co.

Several of Square Enix's franchises have sold over 10 million copies worldwide after 2020, with Final Fantasy selling 168 million, Dragon Quest selling 84 million, and Kingdom Hearts shipping 35 million.

In 2009, Square Enix acquired British game publisher Eidos Interactive, which was later absorbed into Square Enix Europe.

Square Enix is headquartered at the Shinjuku Eastside Square Building in Shinjuku, Tokyo, and has over 5, 000 employees worldwide through its base operations and subsidiaries.

Square Enix was founded on September 22, 1975, as Eidansha Boshu Service Center by Japanese architect-turned-entrepreneur Yasuhiro Fukushima.

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Square Enix focused on publishing games, often by companies who exclusively partnered with the company, and is perhaps most famous for publishing the Dragon Quest series of console games developed by Chunsoft.

Square Enix was started in October 1983 by Masafumi Miyamoto as a computer game software division of Den-Yu-Sha, a power line construction company owned by his father.

Buoyed by the success of their Final Fantasy franchise, Square Enix developed notable games and franchises such as Chrono, Mana, Kingdom Hearts, and Super Mario RPG (under the guidance of Super Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto).

Square Enix was one of the many companies that had planned to develop and publish their games for the Nintendo 64, but with the cheaper costs associated with developing games on CD-based consoles such as the Sega Saturn and the Sony PlayStation, Square Enix decided to develop titles for the latter system.

In January 2005, Square Enix founded Square Enix China, expanding their interests in the People's Republic of China.

In September 2005, Square Enix bought the gaming developer and publisher Taito, renowned for their arcade hits such as Space Invaders and the Bubble Bobble series; Taito's home and portable console games divisions were merged into Square Enix itself by March 2010.

The project was allegedly canceled by Square Enix after introducing seemingly impossible milestones and without payments made, resulting in Grin declaring bankruptcy and its co-founders blaming Square Enix for being "betrayed".

In March 2011, Square Enix founded mobile development studio Hippos Lab and Square Enix Montreal in 2012.

In October 2012, Square Enix was perceived as a "force in mobile" games by Kotaku.

On March 26, 2013, citing sluggish sales of major Western games, Square Enix announced major restructuring, expected loss of ¥10 billion and resignation of President Yoichi Wada, whom Yosuke Matsuda replaced.

In March 2013, Square Enix India opened in Mumbai; however the studio was closed in April 2014.

In 2014, Square Enix signed a strategic alliance with French video game company Ubisoft; it has served as the Japanese publisher of video games since 2009.

In March 2014, following the success of Bravely Default, Square Enix said it will "go back to their roots" and focus on creating content that will appeal to their core audience.

In 2015, Square Enix created a new studio known as Tokyo RPG Factory to develop what was then dubbed Project Setsuna.

In 2019, Square Enix opened an Indian office again, now in Bangalore, which expanded into publishing mobile games for the Indian market in 2021.

On May 1, 2022, Square Enix announced that it would sell several assets of their Square Enix Europe subsidiary to the Swedish holding company Embracer Group for $300 million.

Square Enix stated that the sale will further help it in investment into blockchain and other technologies, and to "assist the company in adapting to the changes underway in the global business environment by establishing a more efficient allocation of resources".

Square Enix stated that it would remain publisher for the Life Is Strange, Outriders and Just Cause franchises, implying that they are not included in the sale.

On October 1, 2008, Square Enix transformed into a holding company and was renamed Square Enix Holdings.

In December 2013, Square Enix's development was restructured into 12 Business Divisions.

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In 2019, Square Enix announced that their eleven Business Divisions would be consolidated into four units by 2020 with a new title, Creative Business Unit.

Business model of post-merger Square Enix is centered on the idea of "polymorphic content", which consists of developing franchises on multiple potential media rather than being restricted by a single gaming platform.

Standard game design model Square Enix employs is to establish the plot, characters, and art of the game first.

Square Enix won IGN's award for Best Developer of 2006 for the PlayStation 2.

Square and Enix initially targeted Nintendo home consoles with their games, but Square Enix currently develops games for a wide variety of systems.

Square Enix has developed titles for handheld game consoles, including the Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, PlayStation Portable, Nintendo 3DS, and PlayStation Vita.

In 2008, Square Enix released their first game for the iPod, Song Summoner: The Unsung Heroes.

Square Enix made a new brand for younger children gaming that same year, known as Pure Dreams.

In November 2017, Square Enix stopped publishing the Hitman franchise and sold the IP to game developer IO Interactive.

Square Enix has served as the Japanese publisher for Activision Blizzard and Ubisoft games since 2009.

In 2004, Square Enix began to work on a "common 3D format" that would allow the entire company to develop titles without being restricted to a specific platform: this led to the creation of a game engine named Crystal Tools, which is compatible with the PlayStation 3, the Xbox 360, Windows-based PCs and to some extent the Wii.

Square Enix released Concerto Gate, the sequel to Cross Gate, in 2007.

On May 8, 2012, Square Enix announced a collaboration with Bigpoint Games to create a free-to-play Cloud gaming platform that "throws players into 'limitless game worlds' directly through their web browser".

On October 9, 2014, Square Enix launched another online game service in Japan called Dive In, which allowed players to stream console games to their iOS or Android devices.

Some Square Enix games are available in Japan on the G-cluster streaming service.

Square Enix continues to cater to the arcade audience in Japan with arcade-only titles, with game producers in 2015 stating that Square Enix has a loyal fan base that values the arcade gaming experience.

In November 2019, Square Enix announced a "Ninja Tower Tokyo" theme park by its newly established Live Interactive Works division.

In 2005, Square Enix released Final Fantasy VII Advent Children, a CGI-animation film based on the PlayStation game Final Fantasy VII, set two years after the events of the game.

In 2016 Square Enix revealed a film called Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV based in the world of Final Fantasy XV and a new web series released on YouTube and Crunchyroll entitled Brotherhood: Final Fantasy XV.

In 2010, however, Square Enix launched a digital manga store for North American audiences via its Members services, which contains several notable series published in Gangan anthologies.

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Square Enix has created merchandise for virtually all of their video game franchises, many items are available only in Japan.

Square Enix designed a Chocobo character costume for the release of Chocobo Tales.

Rabites from the Mana series have appeared in several pieces of Square Enix merchandise, including plush dolls, cushions, lighters, mousepads, straps, telephone cards, and T-shirts.

Square Enix has made merchandise for third party series, including figures Mass Effect and Halo in 2012.