During the presentation of Square Enix's financial results for the previous fiscal year 2007/2008, company president Youichi Wada refused to commit to a new release date for Dragon Quest IX: Hoshizora no Mamori Hito. Wada said he of course would like to release the game during the current fiscal year. However, he added that he had said the same thing already last year. When pressed as to whether the game's sales figures were included in the forecast for the current fiscal year, Wada avoided a clear answer. Given that the Square Enix president thinks the game could sell up to 10 million copies and the company's forecast for FY2008/09 projects total worldwide sales (for all games) to reach only 11.5 million units, it's safe to assume Dragon Quest IX's sales have not been included.

Fans of online games at least have something to look forward to. With Final Fantasy XI celebrating its sixth anniversary, Square Enix is apparently willing to finally unveil its next-gen MMO game soon.

Meanwhile, the company is currently re-structuring its development organization in a bid to stay competitive. While the organization was profitable right now, Wada warned that this could change very quickly unless bold reforms were undertaken. As a result of these reforms, the development of a major mobile phone-based title linked to a console game has been cancelled.

For the 12-month period that ended on March 31st, Square Enix could report a net profit of 9.20 billion yen ($89.3 million USD) on sales of 147.52 billion yen ($1.43 billion USD). These figures translate to a 9.8% decline in sales and a 20.9% increase in net profit. The company sold a total of 14.41 million copies worldwide (Japan: 7.52 million, North America: 3.79 million, Europe: 3.02 million, Asia-Pacific: 80,000). Particularly successful were the DS remakes of Dragon Quest IV (1.15 million copies) and Final Fantasy IV (590,000 copies), as well Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings (540,000 copies), Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII (1.25 million copies) and Dragon Quest Swords (600,000 copies).

For the current fiscal year 2008/2009, Square Enix projects sales of 160 billion yen ($1.55 billion USD) and a net profit of 12 billion yen ($116.13 million USD). Worldwide sales are expected to reach 11.5 million units (6.6 million in Japan, 2.7 million in North America and 2.2 million in Europe).

• GameWatch