Square Enix Updates From Tokyo Game Show 2014: ‘Final Fantasy 15’ New Director Announced To Be Hajime Tabata, Tetsuya Nomura To Focus On ‘Kingdom Hearts 3’ Instead

While "Final Fantasy" fans may have their faith restored with the release of a new trailer, there is also the somewhat alarming news that the highly anticipated game will get a different director. Yesterday, on the opening day of the 2014 Tokyo Game Show, Square Enix announced that Hajime Tabata would be taking over the director's position for "Final Fantasy XV" while Tetsuya Nomura focused on other projects, namely, "Kingdom Hearts 3."

"In reviewing our development structure, we have decided to assign Hajime Tabata as the new director for Final Fantasy XV. Currently, Tabata and the entire development team are working, whole-heartedly, towards completing the production of Final Fantasy XV and ensuring the delivery of the highest quality Final Fantasy title to date," said Square Enix CEO Yosuke Matsuda, as reported by Kotaku.

Matsuda went on to say that, "as the director of Final Fantasy XV, Tetsuya Nomura has mainly worked on the original concept for the story and universe in addition to creating the characters. Hereafter, he will be focusing his efforts on the production of titles that can only be made possible by Nomura." As for the implications of this change, perhaps it means that fans of both franchises may be seeing the new installments before they originally thought.

No official release date has been announced for either "Final Fantasy 15" nor "Kingdom Hearts 3," but both games now have trailers with gameplay, which in the very least means that a good percentage has been completed on both projects. This is especially good to see for "Final Fantasy 15," which many fans feared that the game may have been on an indefinite hiatus based on how long it has taken to be completed.

With the announcement that Tetsuya Nomura will be focusing on "Kingdom Hearts 3," perhaps fans can hope that the game will be fast tracked for a 2015 release. Since Nomura promised in 2008 that there would be a "Kingdom Hearts" game every year, it would certainly give Square Enix the opportunity to continue to fulfil that promise.