E3 2019: What We Don’t Want To See From Square Enix’s E3 Press Conference

After a very mediocre showing in E3 2018, we have some things that we believe Square Enix should absolutely avoid in this year’s upcoming E3.

Though Square Enix continues to publish video games with high quality, the company has often received criticism for some of their most recent choices. From announcing games too early, to canceling promising future projects, the company has been a common source of fan displeasure. Despite the success of several recent games they published, like Kingdom Hearts III, the corporation has suffered from some financial losses in the past few months.

Economic losses could have come from to creating Luminous Productions, and certain recent games underperforming (obviously not Kingdom Hearts). Square Enix can still turn things around before year’s end though. The latest Final Fantasy VII Remake teaser reignited fans interest in the company. The original Final Fantasy VII is one of the most influential games ever, so if Square continues to showcase more footage of the remake in this year’s E3, than they may be able to win over more fans.

Square Enix At E3 2019: What We Don’t Want To See

However, we have some ideas that we think Square should avoid doing in this year’s E3. They have made several mistakes in the past, and we hope they’ve learned from them.

Have An Actual Presentation

Last year, Square Enix did something pretty absurd for their E3 conference. Rather than have a real presentation, they instead showed off a pre-recorded live-stream. The live-stream just showed some trailers, with very few of them being new. While we got an extended look at the upcoming Tomb Raider game, Square Enix’s 2018 E3 conference felt lazy and disappointing.

Hopefully, they will have an actual presentation at this year’s upcoming E3. We are not against Square Enix showing off new information in pre-recorded footage; it just needs to be an authentic presentation. Go into more details of all their games, have at least one person making the announcements, and reveal games that players want to see.

Show Off Games That Gamers Care About

Remember The Quiet Man, that exciting new game that Square Enix revealed in last year’s E3? Did you know it was released last November with very little fanfare and had received critically panned?

The Quiet Man was never destined to be a big game, yet Square Enix chose to incorporate it in its E3 conference last year. They included it over any new information on Final Fantasy VII and the Avengers game they are helping to developed. Announcing new IP and games in E3 is as vital as showing-off new footage of games that people are dying to see. And, in fairness to Square last year, they did show off a lot of Shadow of the Tomb Raider. But the absence of Final Fantasy VII was so jarring, especially since The Quiet Man was shown off instead. Square should focus on revealing more new information on games that fans have wanted to witness for a while.

Stop Announcing Games Early

The Final Fantasy VII Remake was first announced in E3 2015 and has yet to be released. Kingdom Hearts III was announced in E3 2013 and was only released earlier this year. Final Fantasy XV was initially unveiled as Final Fantasy Versus XIII in E3 2006 and was issued a full decade later.

Here’s the thing, Square Enix has had issues of announcing games stupidly too early. Often time’s games only barely enter production before Square decides to share them, and for whatever reasons they take forever to make. We get it, making video games is hard work. Sometimes it takes a long time, maybe not ten years. Still, Square should stop announcing games that are still in the early stages of production. They should introduce games that are deeper in production and show gameplay footage when they first announced them. Several developers have talked openly about how Square Enix announces video games too soon; will their words fall on deaf ears in this year’s E3?

Of course, we won’t know if Square Enix has announced a game too early until years later. We hope that Square will not continue that habit in the future, with this year’s E3 being the time they finally let go of that dumb tendency.