How Final Fantasy XV’s worn-out developers found new energy after a ‘family day’

Final Fantasy XV explores the importance of friendship and familial bonds in times of adversity. It’s something that the developers know all too well.

At the 2017 Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, FFXV director Hajime Tabata gave a presentation about the challenges his team faced while making the highly anticipated role-playing game. Before its release on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in November 2016, FFXV was notoriously known for its decade-long gestation at Square Enix. The company originally announced it as a spin-off game, Final Fantasy Versus XIII, in 2006. But it wasn’t until 2013 that Square Enix re-revealed it as the next major entry in the long-running series.