Kupo Chronicle #22 - The Creator's Exile

Mogs In The Cradle And The Silver Spoon

Welcome to the Kupo Chronicle, the premium edition of the Wark Digest newsletter, where we explore the Final Fantasy universe in long-form and drill down into unique moments of the series’ history. I’m Chris, aka Hoogathy, and this week, as the godfather of Final Fantasy’s latest magnum opus arrives on consoles with Square Enix’s help, we’re taking a look back at his schism from the company he helped build, where he’s been since, and what this might mean for the future.

This week’s newsletter is 3051 words, a 14-minute read.

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Today, Square Enix released Fantasian Neo Dimension, a game originally developed by Mistwalker for Apple Arcade. You may know the name of its director, Hironobu Sakaguchi, if you’ve followed Final Fantasy Union for more than five seconds.

Square Enix publishing a Mistwalker game is a huge deal, even if only symbolically. Sakaguchi was the driving force behind most of SquareSoft’s pre-merger hits; if he wasn’t leading them directly, he was producing or at least consulting. He put the company on the map, akin to the way Shigeru Miyamoto pioneered for Nintendo. But after all that he left, formed Mistwalker, and has put out much fewer games since.

So, it’s a great sign that he’s partnered with Squeenix to put his former iOS exclusive RPG onto consoles. Sakaguchi and Square back again: it’s like watching nature heal.

This “reunion” of sorts has been a long time coming. Sakaguchi has been doing more Final Fantasy-adjacent things in recent years, but actually collaborating with his alma mater is a different level altogether. That fence has been broken for two decades, and even if it’s hard to say what this will mean for the future, at least he’s officially crossed that aisle once more.

In light of Sakaguchi’s return, let’s take a look back at his departure—why he left, the ramifications, and what it might mean now that the fences are mending.