It’s hard to imagine nowadays but Final Fantasy 14 was once regarded as an objective failure for Square Enix. When the MMORPG released in 2010, it was panned by critics and fans, eventually leading to its PlayStation 3 release being indefinitely postponed and the game was eventually shut down after only two years. But ever since it was revived as A Realm Reborn in 2013, Final Fantasy 14 has only become more and more popular and has now passed a significant milestone.
According to IGN, during a hands-on preview event for the upcoming Final Fantasy 14:Endwalker expansion, director Naoki Yoshida revealed that Final Fantasy 14 now boasts over 24 million players. Yoshida shared a chart with press to show how the player count has grown since A Real Reborn released eight years ago. In 2015, it had 4 million players. By 2017, this had jumped to 10 million, and this has now more than doubled in the last five years.
Not only that, but Yoshida adds that this has led to Final Fantasy 14 becoming the most profitable entry in the entire Final Fantasy series. Yoshida adds that, going forward, Square Enix will only continue to invest in the game and ensure that it continues to be highly enjoyable for its players.
With a comeback of this magnitude and growing players counts and profits, it’s hardly surprising that Square Enix wants to keep supporting Final Fantasy 14. The aforementioned Endwalker expansion will mark the end of the main storyline which began back in 2013, but Yoshida has already said that the game will continue with a brand-new storyline. In fact, Yoshida has mentioned supporting Final Fantasy 14 for at least another 10 years.
Square Enix is by no means going to rely on Final Fantasy 14 profits going forward. The company still has a few important releases happening within the next couple of months, with its Guardians of the Galaxy game out by the end of October and its Final Fantasy 7 battle-royale spin-off The First Soldier launching for Android and iOS scheduled to release later this year.
And then in 2022, it’ll have PlayStation 5 and PC exclusive Forspoken, alongside Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin, which recently got a release date and a second playable trial to gather feedback from players. This isn’t taking into account Final Fantasy 16 either, which still lacks a release date and has been shrouded in mystery ever since its announcement in 2020.
Final Fantasy 14 is available for PC, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation 5.
Source: IGN
