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Sony’s PlayStation 5 announcement event just concluded, and from Square Enix via the Luminous Productions studio, the first announcement of a next-gen game developed in-house. Project Athia (working title, of course) will be the first game released by the studio and will have some level of console exclusivity for PS5; a PC release has also been announced but there’s no indication yet as to whether it will also be held back for an exclusivity window. In any event, no release date was teased.

The initial teaser video is right here:
There’s no UI layer to what is shown, and therefore it’s hard to tell what might be gameplay and what might be in-engine cutscenes, but it looks like what you might expect: a prettier and smoother-running Final Fantasy XV-styled game. There’s no particular reason to think that we’ve just seen the next flagship Final Fantasy game here, but the monsters and obvious magic use do point that the game will be some sort of fantasy RPG, possibly with some modern flourishes. I mean, the character’s haircut and shoes look pretty stylish...

Source: Gematsu

Hopefully not much longer than that, of course. Today, Square Enix announced that the previous release date for the remake, March 3, has now been pushed back about five weeks to a new date of April 10. A press release from the Remake team quotes producer Yoshinori Kitase as saying that it was a "tough decision" to "apply final polish."

I didn't realize just how close we were getting to the original release date until I read this news; I suppose that one delay like this isn't so bad, but let's not make a habit of it, eh?

It's easy to fall behind this time of year, as we're all getting ready to move into 2020. But Square Enix is not taking a break, and starting with The Game Awards last week, the team has been rolling out more apertifs for the game releasing in March of next year. Below, see the newest trailer; it focuses on Cloud and his development from mercenary to hero. It's got a little bit more combat and also some good snippets from Barret's (literal) elevator pitch to Cloud in the prologue and Tifa and Cloud's reunion at 7th Heaven.

Gematsu also reported earlier this week on Squenix' publication of a lot of new images, including a couple iconic scenes, and some newly-written character descriptions. The first explanations of Aerith's abilities in-battle are detailed here, too, as well as a first look at stills of Shiva, the Train Graveyard and Shin-Ra Headquarters.

Squenix also set up some good marketing for us recently, with a load of wallpapers and avatars of Tifa, Cloud, and Barret, with Aerith apparently coming soon. Those can be grabbed from the offical site. Also on social media, there's a brief teaser of Cloud on the FF7R Twitter feed. They're showing a little more of the soundtrack with each video, too, which is pretty great. All in all, a nice little gift for fans awaiting the game's release in March.

Last time I posted about Final Fantasy concerts, the released dates for the A New World series stopped in early January, in Kansas City. Now, though, this chamber ensemble has a half-dozen more shows lined up to treat fans in early 2020:

• Chicago, January 18
• Berkeley, CA, January 31
• San Diego, two shows on February 1
• Nashville, February 8
• Ann Arbor, Michigan, March 13

All shows, as typical for the New World series, will feature Benyamin Nuss on piano and direction by Eric Roth. Tickets for all of these shows are already on sale, so hopefully there's one near you.

Source: A New World

There's a new trailer for Final Fantasy VII Remake that was just released at Tokyo Game Show today, unveiling a number of new scenes and characters. Well, let's put "new" in quotes, I guess, since it's hard to be all that new when you're remaking a twenty-year-old game, right? Anyway, Gematsu brings us the new trailer in both English and Japanese, and in it you'll get some looks at Reno, Rude and Tseng, as well as President Shinra. Naturally, Aerith appears quite a bit as well, including in battle, and we get our first look at the Shiva summon and the Crazy Motorcycle Chase too.

Oh, yeah, and let's not forget about the Honeybee Inn, because, yeah... that's teased there too.

Stay tuned for an endcap of Cloud, Barret, and Tifa looking out over what has to be Cosmo Canyon. It's gorgeous.

Last week, Square Enix started up their microsite to present their TGS 2019 lineup, for the show starting September 12. There will be a huge number of games across all of the studios for which Square Enix develop firsthand or otherwise publish. The first two days, as usual, will be open to industry personnel only, with the last two days open to all ticketholders.

Four games will be playable: Final Fantasy VII Remake, Crystal Chronicles Remaster, Dragon Quest XI S, and as always, Final Fantasy XIV. All of those plus Avengers, Trials of Mana, Imperial SaGa Eclipse, Star Ocean: First Departure R, Dragon Quest X, Romancing SaGa 3, Tropico 6, Brave Exvius: War of the Visions, and Octopath Traveler mobile will appear in the TGS Mega Theatre as trailers and/or gameplay videos too. Ten games will appear as stage shows as well, and the company will be selling merch and music, though there's no indication of what new products might appear.

The stage shows on September 14 and 15 will be broadcast live on both YouTube and Niconico; the first day will start with Dragon Quest X and XI events, followed by Trials of Mana and Final Fantasy XIV. The second day will begin with a SaGa show, then Avengers, Crystal Chronicles, and Star Ocean. On the first day, Square Enix will also stream a couple in-studio shows featuring the Trading Card Game and an announcement of a new Square Enix board game. After that, there will be studio shows for Tropico 6 and Brave Exvius.

That's everything we know at the moment, but the exact details of what we'll see, particularly for Final Fantasy VII, will probably leak out during the industry days leading the show.

Source: Gematsu