For example, the latest mainline entry in the Final Fantasy franchise, Final Fantasy 16, was released in 2023 (around 7 years after Final Fantasy 15), and the company has yet to make any announcement about a potential Final Fantasy 17. Similarly, while the Dragon Quest franchise has seen remakes in the form of Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake and Dragon Quest 7 Reimagined, there has been no release date for Dragon Quest 12: The Flame of Fate, despite Dragon Quest 11 having come out all the way back in 2017.

The enhancements made to its development pipelines have been part of Square Enix’s medium- to long-term plans, with the main goal being to “achieve the shift ‘from quantity to quality,’ while completing the transition of major titles to a multi-platform strategy.”

Looking to the future, both the Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy franchises have releases in the works, with Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth coming to Nintendo Switch 2 and Xbox Series X/S on June 3rd, Final Fantasy 14: Evercold coming out in January 2027, and Dragon Quest 10‘s Expansion 8.0 coming out on June 25th, 2026.

Dragon Quest fans might have more to look forward to, however. Earlier this week, series creator and director of Dragon Quest 12: The Flames of Fate, Yuji Horii, announced that there will be a livestream on May 27th that will revolve around the “next game” in the franchise. While Horii didn’t go into too many details, he said that there will be “various other things” for fans to look forward to.

Dragon Quest 12: The Flames of Fate was announced all the way back in May 2021. No release window or platforms were announced at the time, and since then, Square Enix has stayed largely silent about it. In the meantime, however, Horii has reassured fans of the series that the RPG is still in the works. Development, however, seems to have been tumultuous, with lead series producer Yu Miyake having stepped down from his position in April 2025, as well as the project itself seeing quite a few delays.

It is likely that, since Square Enix wants its games to be multi-platform, Dragon Quest 12: The Flames of Fate will come to PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S. In May 2025, Horii had also discussed the idea of bringing it to the Nintendo Switch 2. Since Nintendo’s console wasn’t out at the time yet, Horii noted that he couldn’t reveal too many details about such a port. “Yes, I believe it could be compatible with Switch 2 as well,” he said, without going into further detail.

That is not to say that Hamaguchi believes that turn-based games should go away, however. He noted that the genre also has its own strengths. “Games where you evaluate the situation, contemplate your moves, and build upon the decisions you make are deeply universal, closely tied to the very nature of human thought.”

He even went on to bring up other recent games—like Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, for example—that are able to bring in real-time action elements despite their combat systems being turn-based. “It’s also true that when we look at younger players, they increasingly favor more real-time experiences in games,” he said. “I believe they’re a generation that’s naturally accustomed to receiving instant feedback upon input.”

“With that context in mind, it may have been inevitable for turn-based games that incorporate real-time decision-making through action elements to gain prominence. I think this reflects players’ desire for both the excitement of strategy and the immediacy of response.”

With the Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy, Hamaguchi said that the development team was concerned about how moving the 1997 original into the world of real-time action combat would “reduce the room for strategic thinking and the momentary tension of choosing commands that were present in the original game.”

Ultimately, however, the studio was able to bring in elements of the original Final Fantasy 7‘s Active-Time Battle system into the Remake trilogy by allowing players to pull off special moves after a certain number of regular attacks filled up an ATB bar.

It is worth noting that Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 was far from the first game to blend real-time elements with turn-based combat in an RPG. Titles as old as 1996’s Super Mario RPG on SNES featured similar elements. We would also see these elements make their way into other titles like 2008’s Xbox 360 JRPG Lost Odyssey, as well as Nintendo’s Mario & Luigi franchise.

Interestingly, Final Fantasy 16 producer Naoki Yoshida had expressed the belief that a modern audience would be more receptive to real-time combat in RPGs rather than turn-based systems. In an interview from 2022, he spoke about growing up with turn-based RPGs, as well as opinions about the combat systems from younger players these days.

“I’m from a generation that grew up with command and turn-based RPGs,” Yoshida said. “I think I understand how interesting and immersive it can be. On the other hand, for the past decade or so, I’ve seen quite a number of opinions saying ‘I don’t understand the attraction of selecting commands in video games.’”

Recently, Hamaguchi had also spoken about the decision to turn the remake of Final Fantasy 7 into a trilogy, and how there was simply no other way to achieve the level of detail and world density that Square Enix wanted.

“It wasn’t so much about ‘wanting’ to make it a trilogy – the accurate assessment is that, upon objectively evaluating the sheer volume of the story and the content that needed to be depicted, no option other than a trilogy was realistic,” he explained.

Among the changes made to Final Fantasy 7 to facilitate the trilogy was to heavily expand on the earlier parts of the story for Final Fantasy 7 Remake. While the city of Midgar served as a relatively small part of the larger RPG, the 2020 remake instead turned it into a dense, massive game in its own right. This level of density and sense of scale was the team’s intention with all of the locations of Final Fantasy 7.

“The Midgar segment of Final Fantasy 7 is a relatively short part of the original game, but it is incredibly dense with information regarding the game’s world, characters, and story,” he said. “It became clear early on that if we were to faithfully recreate this using modern techniques, we would need a substantial amount of content just to make it work as a standalone title.”

Hamaguchi also discussed the work that the team had to do in order to create clear breakpoints in the story of Final Fantasy 7, where each entry of the Remake trilogy could end. One example of this is the end of Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth.

“In the original plan, the story didn’t clearly break at the forgotten capital and Aerith’s fate,” he said. “At that time, I suggested to producer [Yoshinori] Kitase-san, ‘Considering the narrative focus, wouldn’t it be better to treat Aerith’s fate as a natural break to this section?'”

Co-director Tetsuya Nomura added on to Hamaguchi’s statement by saying, “From there, the overall framework for the entire trilogy came together very smoothly.”

Just last month, Hamaguchi had also spoken about how the development team was avoiding making any large changes to the Final Fantasy 7 story, since it is “one of the aspects of development we were most sensitive about.” The few changes that were brought in, he said, were largely to better align the story’s emotional beats with the player’s own emotions and flow while playing the games.

“It wasn’t so much a matter of adding or changing the story, but rather adjusting things in a way that ensured that the player’s emotional pacing aligned with the flow of time,” Hamaguchi explained. “That process required revisiting scenes again and again, and honestly, it was one of the aspects of development we were most sensitive about.”

While no announcement has been made for a title or release date for Final Fantasy 7 Remake Part 3, the studio is currently working on bringing Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth to Nintendo Switch 2 and Xbox Series X/S on June 3rd. For more, check out our review of the Nintendo Switch 2 release of Final Fantasy 7 Remake Intergrade.

He promised “various other things” besides this and asked fans to look forward to it. It follows his tease from last January, where he said the team would have a “lot to announce this year.”

Obviously, the first assumption would be new details on Dragon Quest 12: The Flames of Fate, which has faced delays (and reportedly resulted in producer Yu Miyake being reassigned while Yosuke Saito stepped up). Horii assured fans that the next mainline title is still in the works and that the developer would share new information “little by little.”

Perhaps this is the start of that information drip-feed, though given how it’s the series’ 40th anniversary and almost five years since the sequel’s announcement, it’s not unreasonable to expect more. Of course, there may also be announcements for other remasters in the series, especially following the recent release of Dragon Quest 1 and 2 HD-2D Remake. We may even see another remake akin to Dragon Quest 7: Reimagined. Stay tuned as always for more details.

“Yuffie was designed as a standalone protagonist for the DLC, so she has an excellent balance of long-range and close-range attacks, as well as physical and magical abilities. As a result, she’s turned out to be a very versatile character. I always include her in my party during battles myself…but in the final game, both Vincent and Cid have been designed with incredibly appealing combat capabilities. They’re characters I can’t wait for everyone to actually try out.”

That’s good news since Vincent’s high magical stats and Limit Break transformations can be devastating when used correctly, while Cid’s dragon-focused moves make him great for controlling the action in the early going. Hamaguchi also opened up about Sephiroth’s Supernova and the Knights of the Round summon, effectively confirming that they’re in the game.

It looks like the game is coming along quite nicely, and while there’s still little to no news about an official announcement, we know that preparations are “steadily underway.” The sequel is also confirmed to launch on multiple platforms, namely Xbox Series X/S, PS5, PC, and Nintendo Switch 2, bucking its predecessor’s trends. As always, stay tuned for more updates.

“We’re very excited about how the game is currently progressing. I have already completed over 40 full playthroughs! I can’t wait for as many people as possible to experience the game for themselves, and myself and the team are working hard to ensure we can create an unforgettable gameplay experience.”

When asked about a potential release window, Hamaguchi remained largely quiet. However, when the publication then asked about the relatively short gap of time between the release of Final Fantasy 7 Remake Intergrade and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth on the Nintendo Switch 2—with the latter coming out on June 3rd—Hamaguchi teased that the trilogy might be closer to its end than we thought. He noted that releasing the titles on the platform in quick succession led to better pacing for the overarching story.

“With large-scale titles like this one, it’s common for a long gap to exist between the first and second instalments,” he explained. “However, because they were ports, we decided we could deliver them without leaving much of a gap. We want to capitalize on this cadence and moment to tie the experiences together without any gaps, from Remake to Rebirth to finally the third instalment that lies beyond them.”

Recently, Hamaguchi also confirmed that, despite the team adding its own twists to the Final Fantasy 7 story with the Remake trilogy, there are no plans to make any major changes to the overarching story.

“When it comes to the overarching story, I place my trust in what Kazushige Nojima writes and have no intention of altering that based on my judgment,” he said. “However, with the significant increase in visual fidelity in these remakes, arranging events and the passage of time exactly as they were in the original game can sometimes result in scenes that feel implausible.

“When changes in time or dates don’t feel convincing, it also breaks the player’s emotional engagement.”

Hamaguchi has also recently confirmed that the development of Final Fantasy 7 Remake Part 3 is on schedule, and that the team has already begun preparations to officially unveil the game to the world. In the meantime, you can check out the free demo for Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth on Nintendo Switch 2 and Xbox Series X/S. Take a look at our review of its initial PS5 release while you’re at it.

To achieve this, Hamaguchi spoke about having trust in the writer of the game, Kazushige Nojima. However, while there won’t be major changes to the story, he noted that the increased visual fidelity in the remake trilogy has led the studio to rearrange some of the story’s events, since they would “feel implausible” otherwise.

“When it comes to the overarching story, I place my trust in what Kazushige Nojima writes and have no intention of altering that based on my judgment,” he said. “However, with the significant increase in visual fidelity in these remakes, arranging events and the passage of time exactly as they were in the original game can sometimes result in scenes that feel implausible.

“When changes in time or dates don’t feel convincing, it also breaks the player’s emotional engagement.”

To help with this potential issue, Hamaguchi explained that the development team would have discussions to decide whether any given story beat would need more groundwork in order to hit the same emotional beats as the original Final Fantasy 7.

“It wasn’t so much a matter of adding or changing the story, but rather adjusting things in a way that ensured that the player’s emotional pacing aligned with the flow of time,” Hamaguchi explained. “That process required revisiting scenes again and again, and honestly, it was one of the aspects of development we were most sensitive about.”

While Square Enix has been largely quiet about Final Fantasy Remake Part 3, aside from confirmation that development has been progressing smoothly, Hamaguchi revealed in the same interview that the team has begun preparations to officially unveil the game.

“I’m unable to share concrete details at this time. What I can say is that development itself is proceeding on time and on schedule. We believe it’ll become a title we can deliver with confidence as the culmination of the trilogy,” he said. “We know many fans are eagerly waiting, and preparations toward the announcement are steadily underway. Please look forward to it just a little longer.”

This year saw the release of Final Fantasy 7 Remake Intergrade on Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch 2, and June 3rd will see the second entry come to those platforms as well. In the meantime, a demo has been released on Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch 2, giving players a taste of what they can expect from the massive second entry of the trilogy. In the meantime, check out our review of the Nintendo Switch 2 release, which we gave a score of 9 out of 10. Our only complaint was the fact that its frame rate is locked to 30 FPS.

Director Naoki Hamaguchi more or less reiterated the same to Comicbook.com, but once again assured that everything is going according to plan. “I’m unable to share concrete details at this time. What I can say is that development itself is proceeding on time and on schedule. We believe it’ll become a title we can deliver with confidence as the culmination of the trilogy.”

Thankfully, he also acknowledged the fervor among fans for new information. “We know many fans are eagerly waiting, and preparations toward the announcement are steadily underway. Please look forward to it just a little longer.”

That part about “steadily underway” likely refers to Hamaguchi’s stating last February that the team planned to “share more updates on the Final Fantasy 7 Remake Project than ever before” in 2026. Of course, we go back to the classic question of “When?”

On the bright side, there have been other details revealed about Final Fantasy 7 Remake Part 3 over the last two-plus years. It features a “more powered-up version” of the popular card game Queen’s Blood, and sticks to Unreal Engine 4 rather than moving to Unreal Engine 5. Hamaguchi also confirmed it’s in a playable state, though there’s obviously plenty of work left when it comes to polishing massive projects like this.

Final Fantasy 7 Remake Part 3 is coming to PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PC, and Nintendo Switch 2. As always, stay tuned for more details.

The demo consists of the beginning all the way up to the conclusion of Chapter 2 – a hefty amount of content for free. Best of all, not progressing to the Mythril Mine means you’re free to explore around, engage in random battles, and whatnot.

Of course, the other benefit is that your save data carries over, and unlocks some useful items and a Kupo Charm (which increases gathered resources). You can even unlock some Achievements/Trophies in the game. Just make sure that you don’t create a save file for the base game first – it won’t be possible to transfer demo data, though the bonuses will still apply.

Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth launches on June 3rd for Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC via the Microsoft Store. Check out our reviews of the PS5 and PC versions to see if it’s worth it. You can also read about how Final Fantasy 7 Remake fared on the Switch 2 (the answer being: Very Good).

Among the merchandise is a vinyl record set of the original’s beloved soundtrack, a variety of new figurines, as well as plush toys based on various characters, including Tidus, Yuna, Wakka, Lulu, Auron, and others. The merchandise can already be pre-ordered through the official Square Enix e-Store. The set will feature two discs, each with two sides featuring just about all of the most iconic tracks from the RPG, from various boss battle themes to the famous moody opening track, To Zanarkand. The soundtrack can be picked up on July 1st, and is priced at ¥9,350 (roughly $59).

Final Fantasy 10 marked the franchise’s debut on the PS2, and was one of the first showcases of just how much power the (at the time) new console hardware could offer to game developers, thanks to its striking visuals and beautiful pre-rendered cutscenes. It was also the first entry with fully 3D environments, with the previous 3D games—Final Fantasy 7, 8, and 9—making use of pre-rendered backgrounds alongside their 3D character models.

The story of Final Fantasy 10 revolves around star blitzball players for the team Zanarkand Abes – Tidus – finding himself transported to an entirely new world, Spira, where the city of Zanarkand is believed to have been destroyed ages ago. With his primary goal of getting back to his own version of Zanarkand, Tidus finds himself accompanying summoner Yuna on her pilgrimage, traveling the world and encountering many of the different cultures it has to offer. Along the way, he also discovers the nature of an entity named Sin, who had previously attacked Zanarkand and continues to terrorize the world of Spira to this day.

While Final Fantasy 10 left behind its predecessors’ active-time battle system, instead opting for a purely turn-based style, it introduced its own twists by bringing in an extensive skill tree—the Sphere Grid—through which players could unlock new abilities and raise the stats of all characters.

Currently, Final Fantasy 10 is playable through an HD remaster released on PS4 and PC back in 2016, and Nintendo Switch and Xbox One in 2019. PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch 2 players can make use of backwards compatibility to enjoy the seminal RPG.

Just a couple of years after the original’s 2001 release, it would get a sequel, dubbed Final Fantasy 10-2. Along with being noteworthy for the fact that it was the first direct sequel released for a mainline Final Fantasy game, 10-2 also focused its story on the events following Final Fantasy 10, with Yuna, Rikku, and newcomer Paine teaming up to once more travel across Spira and potentially even find Tidus. The gameplay went back to the classic active-time battle system, and a new class system was implemented through the introduction of Dress Spheres, using which the three protagonists could switch between a variety of Jobs.