Hironobu Sakaguchi

Hironobu Sakaguchi is an industry figurehead, having co-founded Square with Masafumi Miyamoto in 1983 and later moving on to establish his own independent games venture, Mistwalker. As legend tells, Square's first games failed to achieve the success needed to keep the company afloat. With no other options, the pair decided to conclude their venture into the games industry by creating one final game with the company's final remaining funds. They called it Final Fantasy. Released in Japan for the Famicom on December 18, 1987, Final Fantasy became an instant hit in Japan and abroad. Sakaguchi considered the venture absolved and further development continued. Final Fantasy developed into a wildly successful franchise under his watchful eye, and now spans from stand alone stories to spin-offs and direct sequels. After directing every title in the flagship series through Final Fantasy V, Sakaguchi took on the role of executive producer for the series along with producing many of Square's other game projects.

Sakaguchi has enjoyed a distinguished career in game development with his titles selling over 80 million units worldwide. A long-time proponent of bringing together the story-telling tradition of film and the interactive elements of games, he took on the directorial role on Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, an animated motion picture loosely based on previously established Final Fantasy themes. Unfortunately, the movie was a catastrophic financial failure (in fact, the second-biggest animated box office bomb in cinema history) losing over $120 million and leading to the closure of Square Pictures. The upset, for which Sakaguchi was personally held responsible, affected Square's financial capital and may well have precipitated the merger with rival role-playing game creator Enix. As a consequence, feelings towards Sakaguchi's tenure at Square are somewhat mixed.

In 2000, Sakaguchi became the third person inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences' Hall of Fame. After voluntarily resigning from Square, he founded the game development studio Mistwalker with the financial backing of Microsoft Game Studios. In February of 2005 it was announced that Mistwalker would be working with Microsoft Game Studios to produce two role-playing titles for the Xbox 360 game console. Nevertheless, despite Microsoft's financial backing, Mistwalker remains independent of console exclusivity.