Daily Briefing: Wednesday 9th March

Final Fantasy 35th Anniversary Site LIVE... And A Stranger Of Paradise Demo Soon

Ahead of tonight’s State of Play, Square Enix have launched a site celebrating FF’s 35th anniversary. Right now, the two projects on the page are Stranger of Paradise and Chocobo GP, but under “New Titles” it says “And More...”. That’s a heavy hint towards State of Play announcements of Final Fantasy titles tonight, perhaps 7’s Part 2, or maybe the Geforce-leaked remake of FF9 or Tactics. Based on PSN listings, a third demo for Stranger of Paradise will be launched.

• Square Enix are having some trouble finding success outside their core franchises, but Final Fantasy is almost certainly a sure-fire win, especially when they keep creating genuinely fantastic games. Perhaps FF16 will make an appearance tonight?

Square Enix Open A Music Youtube Channel With Over 5,500 Tracks

Game music licensing is a nightmare - the only way to get access to most truly exceptional music has been through piracy in the past, which has resulted in major issues across Youtube channels trying to provide users what they want, when the rights owners refuse to. Now, Square Enix have opened a genuinely gargantuan Youtube channel full of playlists with music across a huge range of IPs - including launching with an interview with Square Enix’s Music Director and two 2-hour long custom mixes.

• Amazing. Nintendo, take note. Of course, audio quality isn’t going to be perfect on Youtube, but in terms of free access, this is a stand-out move for experiencing their media. It’s mostly FF and Nier for now, but here’s hoping it’ll grow!

Nintendo Delays Advance Wars 1+2 Because Of Ukraine

Nintendo have announced a delay from the original release of April 8th, due to the theme of the game coming across as insensitive during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. They’ve given no new date, which is unfortunate - but of course, they don’t know when the conflict will end. This is the second time Advance Wars has seen a delay due to real world events. The original American release of Advance Wars was on September 10, 2001, one day before the 9/11 Twin Tower attacks, which resulted in the European release happening instead in January 2002.

• That’s some bad luck for a game focused on war involving heavy weaponry, but it speaks to Nintendo’s reasonable and conscious approach to PR - of course, it would be bad form to push a PEGI 7 game about showing both sides of an invasion.