Akihiko Yoshida leaves SquareEnix

[Fangu]

Akihiko Yoshida, who first joined Square Soft in 1995 to work as a character designer on titles such as Final Fantasy Tactics, Tactics Ogre, and more recently Bravely Default and Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn, has announced his departure from the company he’s been working with for almost two decades.

http://www.siliconera.com/2013/12/05/bravely-default-character-designer-leaves-square-enix/

 

[Strangelove]

i made an audible gasp of despair at this news

he was my favourite

 

[Geostigma]

Wow.

GG Square Enix.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

Oh, man, I loved his artwork.

 

[Telcontar]

First person to get this reference, gets a cheese cake.

 

[Roger]

Dude did great work salvaging FFXIV, hate to see him go. I hope they bring in new talent for FFXVI character design.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

You might be thinking of Naoki Yoshida there, Minato. He's XIV's savior.

Still, it sucks. I love Akihiko's designs.

 

[Dark and Divine]

 

[Super Mario]

GG Square Enix, you've killed one of your potential golden gooses.

 

[Ⓐaron]

Welp, this sucks.

 

[Tetsujin]

I have decided to leave Square Enix, but I believe our relationship will continue going on.

 

[Strangelove]

He will probably end up like all the others who have broken off from Square and gone freelance, meaning he will probably be back for a bunch of games in the future. Only now he gets to work with other people too.

 

[Ghost X]

ninja'd

More importantly, where is he going?

 

[Farron]

This is tragic, but we'll be seeing his artwork in the future no doubt, hopefully.

I wish him tons of luck for his future.

 

[Splintered]

He will probably end up like all the others who have broken off from Square and gone freelance, meaning he will probably be back for a bunch of games in the future. Only now he gets to work with other people too.

That's my impression. He even says he's still working on Bravely Default. I hope freelancing does good for him, he deserves it.

 

[Fangu]

^ This, yes, and probably. I hope so. I love his work, as we all know especially on XII and the Ivalice series.

 

[Masamune]

Oh well, at least SE still have Nomura.

Hopefully he's going to team up with Matsuno elsewhere.

 

[Kermitu Kleric Katie]

Oh well, at least SE still have Nomura.

My thoughts exactly. Nomura's designed a lot of my favorite characters, such as the cast of VII, Gilgamesh, Setzer, etc.

It's still sad to see him leaving, XII had some cool characters.

 

[Masamune]

My thoughts exactly. Nomura's designed a lot of my favorite characters, such as the cast of VII, Gilgamesh, Setzer, etc.

I thought Setzer was designed by Amano, not Nomura? If he was, that makes his butchering in KH2 even more inexplicable.

Also, you might need one of these for my last post:

Spoiler

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Setzer and Shadow's original designs were done by Nomura. On the other hand, Vincent's original design was done by Amano.

 

[Strangelove]

I thought he had a part in the backstory/character of Setzer and Shadow? (Don't really know much about the design process for FFVI though)

 

[Masamune]

Setzer and Shadow's original designs were done by Nomura.

That's hilarious.

 

[Super Mario]

I thought setzer was done by amano for the snes??

 

[Strangelove]

According to the Japanese FF Wiki, Nomura suggested a prototype for Setzer when they were making FFV but it wasn't used. The way they talk about it sounds more like it's talking about the actual character rather than just visuals (using words like 設定 which tends to be more actual story stuff). It also gives Nojima the potential blame for KH2, since he wrote KH2 but apparently didn't know FFVI and the fact that his role was originally for Rufus Shinra.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

May well be that he was just responsible for the stories for Setzer and Shadow rather than their appearances as well. Given that he's primarily known for his designs, it may be easy to confuse the notions where it's written that he created those two, particularly since his artwork was already being used as recently as FFV.

The fact that he definitely designed Daryl further confuses the matter.