Final Fantasy 14's Yoshi-P says there's an "extremely low" number of Xbox players in Japan, but Dawntrail is the "starting point" of more Square Enix games on Xbox

Final Fantasy 14 director and producer Naoki 'Yoshi-P' Yoshida says the Dawntrail expansion's release on Xbox is the "starting point" of more Square Enix games releasing on Microsoft's console.

In an interview with Eurogamer, Yoshida was asked about the market potential for Square Enix games on Xbox platforms, and he admitted the small population of Xbox players in Japan makes for an uphill battle. However, it's a battle the company is insistent on climbing, as Yoshida said Dawntrail marks the start of a policy change at Square Enix that'll result in more and more Square Enix games on Xbox.

"I want you to just take this as a general argument, but when it comes to the Xbox platform and the fact that it was difficult for Japanese titles to be released on the platform, that's tied into the fact that in the Japanese market there is an extremely low number of users on Xbox," said Yoshida. "And naturally, because we are Japanese developers, we have a desire for many people in our country to play our games. I think that applies to developers in any country, whichever country they come from, they want many people from their own country to play their games. Because of that, it's really a tough point in terms of a business standpoint. I think that's generally one perspective of how you can look at things in terms of the situation."

Yoshida said Final Fantasy 14 is the "starting point" of the "multiplatform strategy" Square Enix first announced back in May that could mark the end of PlayStation-first Final Fantasy games. "We do want to release more Square Enix games on Xbox, and there will be more of our titles released on Xbox," Yoshida said. "So I hope players will look forward to future things to come on the platform."

Final Fantasy 14's controversial Viper changes were a hot topic within the dev team, too, as Yoshi-P admits the alterations were being considered "right until the last minute".