Earlier today in Japan, Square held a meeting to discuss future projects with analysts. At the meeting, Square President Hisashi Suzuki commented that "the company will strengthen the Final Fantasy brand name." It seems the company is poised to do just that. With announcements regarding new FF games, remakes and franchises, Square is ready to pimp its top series like the cash cow it is. Nothing was said about GameCube (nor X-Box) at the meeting though it looks like things could be getting better, not worse, between Nintendo and Square.

Final Fantasy X, was recently delayed (ironically enough) to July, right around the GameCube’s launch in Japan, suggesting that Square’s ties with Sony are tight indeed. However, in the US, it looks like the game will be released after NGC’s October launch in November 2001, closer to Turkey Day and the frenzied holiday shopping spree it leaves in its wake.

The Real good news is that Square actually may be coming around on the handheld front. Although handheld versions of FFII and FFIII are still coming Bandai’s Wonderswan handheld, Square’s Vice President Hironobu Sakaguchi indicated other FF remakes may not follow. Evidently, remakes of Final Fantasy IV, V, and VI would be "technically impossible to develop on Wonderswan Color," Sakaguchi seemed interested in bringing these to Game Boy Advance instead. A new Final Fantasy game was also mentioned to be in development for a handheld console –though Sakaguchi did not indicate which one.

Square have hinted at Nintendo involvement before and it is believed Square has at least one NGC development kit for research purposes. Before now however, no formal plans of any sort had been made public, marking this the first indication of any actual Square projects appearing on either of Nintendo’s upcoming systems. Despite the two companies almost non-existent relations over the past years, President Suzuki stated that "we will do our best to have our games on the Nintendo system."

Wow. Check out GameSpot for the full report and let us know what you think of the big news. Could NGC support be far behind or is that too much to hope for?