On Jul 04, 2025, Square Enix and Sony announcedFinal Fantasy 16as a timed PS5 exclusive during Sony’s big PS5 event. That announcement was huge among manyFinal Fantasyfans, as both the ambition of the PS5 and the ambition ofFinal Fantasy 16seemingly went hand-in-hand. And what followed its explosive reveal was equally enticing.
Square Enix promisedFinal Fantasy 16players a mature experience, promised fans that development was going rather well, and promised everyone that more information would be coming in 2021. However, when looking at the stage set for the game in 2020 and the current stage in 2021, it’s hard not to ask whereFinal Fantasy 16is.
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Final Fantasy 16 At The End of 2020
As aforementioned,Final Fantasy 16’s reveal was easily explosive in scope yet tempered in how much it was showing. The trailer set it up as well as revealed its timed console exclusivity. Square Enix launched a website shortly after, detailingFinal Fantasy 16’s characters and settings, discussed the mature experience they were aiming for, and discussed how big 2021 was going to be. According toFinal Fantasy 16’s producer, 2021 was going to be the biggest year of his career, with bigannouncements forFinal Fantasy 14andFinal Fantasy 16taking place.
That’s a huge claim, but given everything that has happened forFinal Fantasy 14, it holds up there. In fact,Final Fantasy 14’s surging popularitycaused it to “sell out” at one point.Final Fantasy 16, on the other hand, has been a no show all year. It wasn’t at Square Enix’s E3 show, it hasn’t been at any of Sony’s State of Plays, and nearly 8 months into the year, there has been next to nothing to deliver on that promise. There’s been a couple of small updates, likeFF16recording British English lines first for the first time and the fact that it’s probably skipping Tokyo Game Show, but that’s all. As a simple observation, it’s not the year that was seemingly promised back in 2020 (which could be for any number of reasons that are at no fault to Square Enix).
Final Fantasy 16 in the First Half of 2021
In February 2021, there was a reason for this sort of silence revealed. Once againaccording toFinal Fantasy 16’s producer, Square Enix and he want to keep information close to the chest to prevent speculation and unrealistic expectations. On the one hand, this makes sense because, as seen with games likeCyberpunk 2077, unrealistic expectations and hype happens in the game industry. At the same time, the silence has the complete opposite effect. No doubt that whenFinal Fantasy 16decides to show its hands, fans will be ready and willing to see more, but 2021 isn’t being remembered as the year ofFinal Fantasy 14andFinal Fantasy 16.It’s being remembered as the year ofFinal Fantasy 14.
Certainly, that’s not a bad thing for the franchise, butFinal Fantasy 16came out swinging in 2020 just to go mute in 2021. If Square Enix didn’t want to openly talk about it for several months, then waiting to reveal it could and may have been an option. EvenElden Ring, which went mute for two years, had unrealistic expectations and baseless speculation build up in the silence. It’s not really certain what, if anything, changed in the past few months, butFinal Fantasy 16promised a big 2021 and it doesn’t seem like it will deliver. Again, this could be for any number of reasons, including the pandemic, but it seems the biggest thing is at what point is Square Enix willing to communicate and, if it wasn’t ready to deliver on said promises, why did it announce it last year.
Of course, a good showcase and release date announcement this year is not off the table. PerhapsFinal Fantasy 16will end 2021with a bang at The Game Awards in December, maybe it’ll appear at a different show, or maybe the update will come out of the blue. Either way, while there is time for Final Fantasy 16 to leave its mark on this year, it hasn’t had a presence yet. And it’s time to do so is dwindling.
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