FFXI
Here are a few things to keep in mind as far as Square being multiconsole.
1. Sakaguchi is not involved in any business aspects anymore, he\'s just talking about what may happen, far from guaranteed.
2. Nintendo refused Square any Gamecube developement kits. Also, Yamauchi has been an ass to them, time and time again. That is a large obsticle to overcome before Square will appear on a Nintendo system.
3. The game that will be going multiplatform, if any, will be FFXI, so that they can make tons of money on the PlayOnline subscriptions. Online games need a large userbase to be effective.
4. Microsoft has stated time and again that they want all Xbox online games running through their network, and supposedly they don\'t want their games to be able to interact with other console\'s games. Square won\'t make a profit off this scheme, and so they won\'t do it. MS needs to cave on this, and since they\'ve been talking about this for quite a while with absolutely no headway, don\'t expect any big revelations to hit soon.
Square wants to test the waters with FFXI first, it doesn\'t look like Nintendo will give them the opportunity, and there are some large problems to iron out before you can see it on Xbox. Then there is always the chance that if one or both of these fall through, Sony will "lend" Square some money, kind of as a reminder of who was their big meal ticket last generation.
Also,
I remember articles on how many subscribers they need to break even on Playonline.com
An online game of the FFXI type costs a fortune! You need servers.. not just one, you need many servers. And these cost a fortune! You need GMs which cost money hourly. In order for a online game to make money, and for a company like square to make money without any other online services (they don\'t have a spare server lying around like Sony probably did with everquest) they need as many subscribers as they can get.
On top of that, People pay monthly for this service, and not everybody is ready for that. Lets see how PSO V2 does.. sad part is, PSO v2 is not even a MMRPG, its a TMRPG
Also, we still don\'t know, how long it will be till it goes elsewhere. IGN says that FFX, and FFXI are exclusive for a year. I doubt that has changed.
You can\'t use history as an example either if it does go to multiple platforms. Online games work differently. They are radically different from disc only games. There has never been a situation similar to this to use as example and use as a historical reference.
In other words, square is paranoid about their online system being successfull. Right now other platforms are only being considered. Square will see how the PC and PS2 versions do.
And why has IGN not posted anything on it?