5punk

Square Enix Delivers Games to PC Users Via Steam
Author: valve valve
Category: Valve news update Valve news update
Publish Date: Tue, 24 Feb 2009 08:51:46 -0800

THE LAST REMNANT will be available for download beginning April 9, 2009

LOS ANGELES (February 24, 2009) — Square Enix, Inc., the publisher of Square Enix® interactive entertainment products in North America (Square Enix), and Valve Corporation (Valve), a developer of leading-edge technologies and software, announced today an agreement to bring Square Enix titles to customers worldwide via Steam®, Valve's leading platform for digital content distribution and management.

Beginning April 9, THE LAST REMNANT will be available for purchase via Steam, which makes PC games available online to more than 15 million users worldwide. An action RPG from the makers of the FINAL FANTASY® series, THE LAST REMNANT will be the first Square Enix game to utilize Steamworks and be distributed via Steam. Square Enix will continue to add to its roster of games on Steam, providing users with instant access - after purchase, they can download the game immediately and start playing. Pricing will be announced at a later date.

"We are excited to offer the millions of Steam customers online access to Square Enix titles beginning with our major action RPG, THE LAST REMNANT," said John Yamamoto, president and chief executive officer of Square Enix Inc. and Square Enix Ltd. "Square Enix is committed to delivering the best quality titles to PC gamers and distribution on Steam is one of the many steps we are taking to increase accessibility for fans in North America and PAL territories."

Once players have a Steam account, they can sign in from any PC to access their Steam-distributed Square Enix games. Because games are associated with their account and not their computer, players can get lost in the world of their favorite game anytime, anywhere.

"Square Enix is a fantastic addition to the Steam lineup," said Jason Holtman, director of business development at Valve. "We are thrilled that Square Enix chose to bring its diverse portfolio of titles to Steam and know that our customers will be ecstatic to hear this news."

For more information about Square Enix games coming to Steam, please visit www.steamgames.com.
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Intersting choice for a PC game, I can't see how it would be improved from the 360 release apart from faster loading times. A suprising and welcome return, don't think we've seen a PC game from them since FF8. Not sure I'll be buying it again just yet, but PC games age a lot better than console games, and it'll be there on Steam for ever.

ooh, hope this means future final fantasy games will be released via steam.

Lee wrote:ooh, hope this means future final fantasy games will be released via steam.

Last Remnant uses the Unreal Engine, like Mass Effect did, but we can hope.

Lee wrote:ooh, hope this means future final fantasy games will be released via steam.

AFAIK they do not have plans to port any of the newer FFs over to pc. Which makes me cry.

Just tried the Last Remnant demo - it's a bit of a stuggle without a gamepad. The only (default) mouse control is camera movement in-game, you have to go through the menus with the keyboard - there's no cursor.

Shame they didn't try harder to make it more accessible to PC owners, as it's rather a good game, but as is only it's more likely to cause frustration from the outset to non-360 gamepad-owning players.

It doesn't look graphically superior, either - it's still around 720p even when set to 1680, just scaled up with no antialiasing. The textures load way faster, but it's a real pity they didn't take a leaf out of Mass Effect's book with a revised interface.

I've just tried this too, I think it looks lovely. Makes me wish they could update XI's graphics. You are right about using the keyboard to move around with, but I have a Logitech PS2 controller that works much better. (I hate the x-box controllers.)

Akiakaiu wrote:Makes me wish they could update XI's graphics.

but with XII.

It really made me sad that the city views and cut scenes were so wonderfully designed, but the poor old PS2 made it all jiggedy jaggedy pixels.

I never got on with XI, mostly because it was released here so long after Japan and the US and was actually quite hard to get hold of even when it did come out. Everyone had such a massive headstart, it was very lonely as a newcomer.

FatherJack wrote:
It really made me sad that the city views and cut scenes were so wonderfully designed, but the poor old PS2 made it all jiggedy jaggedy pixels.

I never got on with XI, mostly because it was released here so long after Japan and the US and was actually quite hard to get hold of even when it did come out. Everyone had such a massive headstart, it was very lonely as a newcomer.

Yeah, not sure why they did not release them closer together, kinda silly in my book. But with level sync they are trying to make it easier for people to start now. I just wish they would drop support for the PS2 or have it so people who can use "premium" graphics would have the choice.

Akiakaiu wrote:I just wish they would drop support for the PS2 or have it so people who can use "premium" graphics would have the choice.

We never got a PS2 release at all here as the hard disk peripheral never came out, I actually would have liked one - at the time (2004) I really wanted an MMO I could play on the TV.

The 360 version was yet another 2 years away, by which time I'd firmly migrated to PC gaming. Rereleasing the same 2002 game in 2008 with no major graphical updates just seems crazy, though it hasn't stopped the Phantasy Star Online makers doing it with their game, FFIX's senior by about 2 years.

Soz I just got a 9800GT+ in my system and damn the difference in this game from my 8600. I thought it was fast thinking it was on turbo mode....... turns out I was lagging on normal mode. With the new card the battles run 100x faster, then I tried turbo mode O.O Hope you didn't want to hit those triggers cause an entire round is done in <10 seconds.