Stretch your memories all the way back to September 14th, 2011 when Final Fantasy X HD was annoucned for the Vita and PS3 (in that order) and realize that it's been over two years between then and now. Keep in mind that the PS3 version of the game was sort of announced as an "Oh yeah, that too" deal. Keep in mind that X-2 was added later on. Just consider all of that for a moment, as the only version of the game that we have a release date for at this point in time is the PS3 one. March 18th, 2014, a full two and a half years after the original announcement of the Vita game, is when the also-announced PS3 version is getting released. With no news on the Vita version, as in the version of the game that was originally planned and announced. I'm not sure that I'm harping on this enough.
Of course, in Japan, the games have a singular release date of December 26th, just before the end of this year, making the time between announcement and release...well, not really all that better, no. There's something to be said of the type of release over there, however, as the PS3 version is releasing with both games on one disk, as it's planned over here, but the two Vita carts will be bundled together in one box for the exact same price. One might take this as a hopeful sign for the Non-Japan releases, but then again, one probably hasn't dealt with Squeenix all that much if they take it as a sign of anything at all. As we know by now, Squeenix just does things and the less sense we try to make of it all, the better we'll all be in the long run. Though, I suppose -some- rationalizations could be made.
Releasing a digital-only game in Japan, I suspect, is just short of a death knell for any potential sales you hope to see from it. One of those little 'secrets' of the game industry as a whole is that Japan, by and large has a certain approach to video game releases. Games are bought up on release or a little after, beaten and then resold to the retailer in much greater numbers than such a practice sees here. This is generally why you see re-releases of popular games that only have a few alterations made to it, because you're trying to sell this version of your game with new stuff to the people who already bought it, played it and sold it back because it was finished. Kill the ability to resell and recoup some of that money on the consumer-side is simply something that is not on in Japan, so despite them being one of the world leaders in Internet availability and speed, they are just not having that Digital Future bullshit. Which...I could make something of, but another night.
The issue most at hand here is that it's been widely thought that outside of Japan, FFX HD and FFX-2 HD would be digital-only on the Vita because fuck you. I say 'because fuck you' since...well it's kind of obvious. Space is something we're constantly fighting for because the largest memory stick available, the 32 gig, is simply not enough space for most Vita owners. Both FFX HD and FFX-2 HD will not fit on the same Vita cart. I don't know the full size that a Vita cart can offer, but some Vita games are already in the 3 Gig range. So if you figure on both games, combined, being ~6 gigs, then that's already too much for half of the Vita memory sticks out there. (4 and 8, I'm figuring the 8 only actually has ~7 gigs available and I don't know how much of that would then be OS stuff or what have you) Basically what I'm getting at is that FFX/X-2 HD being Digital-Only is not merely bad as it is most of the time, but it's downright unfriendly to the consumer since they're just projecting the image of not caring about what the consumer is going to do for the 'privilege' of buying and playing your game.
Hopefully the delay is simply attributed to the logistics of bundling the two carts together outside of Japan and making a shiny package with it, or maybe even setting up some sort of wacky Limited Edition specifically for Vita buyers. Hell, maybe they're just waiting to announce that every copy of the Vita version comes with a download code for Type-0. Also Chocobo/Moogle plushies. I'm being facetious because I figure it's better to imagine wild, never-going-to-happen scenarios and be disappointed when -they- don't happen, rather than looking at the reality of the situation (in which it's honestly not too much of a fucking hassle to release goddamn Carts) and being ultimately let down (as I always anticipate Squeenix doing anymore). So I'll just be over here with my delusions, thank you very much.
I'm kind of stuck buying the games no matter what because I want Squeenix to acknowledge the Vita, but I'll be damned if I'm happy about buying something digital-only from them
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