Summary
- Final Fantasy 16 producer Naoki Yoshida calls for a unified approach to gaming, hoping that all games can be released under a single platform.
- Yoshida's stance makes sense for a developer like Square Enix, known for optimizing games for multiple systems, including exclusivity for PlayStation.
- While it's unlikely that all video games will be unified under one console, gamers can help ease tensions by treating each other more respectfully during console debates.
Naoki Yoshida, the legendary producer behind Final Fantasy 16, recently weighed in on the seemingly eternal console wars and shared his idea for how to end them. The topic of which console is superior in the ever-changing video game market is almost as old as the medium itself, with every new hardware generation bringing with it a legion of devoted followers ready to fight tooth and nail in the name of their preferred system.
These fierce debates have only grown with the rise of social media, and while competition is healthy in any industry, the arguments over the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S can lead to some incredibly toxic discourse. Major figures within the gaming industry have taken note of this and called for more civility among diehard console fans, with one of the most notable examples being lead God of War Ragnarok actor Christopher Judge. However, the console wars don’t seem to be slowing down anytime soon, especially with Microsoft itself admitting that Xbox has fallen behind in the current generation.
Now Final Fantasy 16 producer Naoki Yoshida is giving his opinion on the console wars and calling for a more unified approach to gaming in the future. In a recent interview in Tawain (which was subsequently translated and shared on ResetEra), Yoshi-P wished that all games could be unified under a single platform as an end to the increasingly volatile console wars. Many users in the comment section of this post seem to agree with this sentiment, with some pointing out how Yoshi-P’s stance makes sense for a developer often tasked with optimizing games for multiple systems.
Of course, the Final Fantasy franchise has often been at the head of the console wars, stretching back to how the original Final Fantasy 7 become a defining exclusive for the first PlayStation back in 1997. While there have been plenty of cross-platform Final Fantasy titles in the decades since, most of the mainline entries have been exclusive to Sony hardware, including this year’s Final Fantasy 16. A PC port of the game is planned, but Yoshida has stated that it will take a long time to release due to his team’s efforts to optimize Final Fantasy 16 for the PlayStation 5.
Naoki Yoshida and the developers at Square Enix Creative Business Unit 3 probably won’t have this issue with Final Fantasy 16 if all games were released under a single platform, so his calls for this make sense from a developer’s perspective. While the chances of all video games being unified under one console are incredibly slim considering how massive competing companies like Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo are, gamers can at least help ease tensions between the different console fandoms by treating each other more respectfully online - especially when it comes to debates about the PS5 or Xbox Series X/S.
Final Fantasy 16 is available now for PS5.
Source: ResetEra