Square Enix has revealed that Neo: The World Ends With You “underperformed” the company’s expectations for the game.
Speaking in the first-half results briefing for 2022-2023 (thanks, VGC), Square Enix president Yosuke Matsuda revealed that “while Neo: The World Ends With You was received well by users, it has underperformed our initial expectations”.
Despite that, Matsuda said that Square Enix hopes both Neo: The World Ends With You and Life Is Strange: True Colors, which was also released earlier in 2022, “continue to sell well over the long term”.
The disappointing sales may surprise some, especially considering the praise it received at launch. The JRPG holds a score of 82 on Metacritic, and NME gave the title four out of five stars in our own review.
NME‘s Jordan Oloman said that the title is “an immensely stylish game that is teeming with smart JRPG systems”, and praised “the moreish combat, rewarding puzzles and clever writing that come together to wrap you up in the rich atmosphere of Shibuya”.
While the title launched on July 27, it later received a PC release through the Epic Games Store in September.
NME also sat down to chat with developers for Neo: The World Ends With You, who shared that a lot of work went into making each protagonist stylish and fashion-conscious.
In other news, a Battlefield 2042 update will address some of the community’s biggest issues when it launches this week. EA has outlined that the patch – set for Thursday (November 25) – will reduce weapon bloom, make hovercrafts more balanced, and more.
Many of these issues have contributed to Battlefield 2042 being hit by thousands of negative Steam reviews at launch, which in turn led to the shooter becoming one of Steam’s worst-reviewed games of all time.
The post Square Enix admits ‘Neo: The World Ends With You’ “underperformed” appeared first on NME.
