The World Ends With You producer Tomohiko Hirano was perhaps a little too blunt with fans in a recent interview with PC Invasion. Hirano says straight away that Square Enix doesn’t have any plans for what’s next in The World Ends With You series. However, he encourages fans of the franchise to continue sharing their love for the two games with Square Enix. He says that if fans do that then it’s possible Square Enix “will have us make a sequel.”

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Hirano doesn’t completely pull the rug out from The World Ends With You fans, however. He also mentions that he still has ideas for what could be featured in a The World Ends With You Part 3. More specifically, he mentions that there are still “many areas in the city of Shibuya” that they could put into a game. As such, if Square Enix approved it, Hirano would very much love to make another The World Ends With You game.

However, Hirano is only one piece of The World Ends With You’s development team. Series director Tatsuya Kando is also a key component of the franchise’s past, as well as any future it could still have. But Kando isn’t as interested in the series’ future as Hirano is. “I feel like I’ve done what I can for the time being,” says Kando, adding that he packed NEO: The World Ends With You with “fourteen years’ worth of thought and emotion.” For now, he’ll focus on fan feedback and how the game was perceived, then think about “the best path forward” after.

For fans of The World Ends With You and its sequel, these comments are obviously not what anyone wants to hear. A third game will likely require just as much of a miracle as it took to get the second game. The World Ends With You is, for the time being, going back on Square Enix’s shelf.

With that said, it’s not all disappointing news. Tatsuya Kando believes that NEO: The World Ends With You is everything that he wanted a sequel to be. He got to say everything he wanted to say. If The World Ends With You had to end as it is, then Hando seems to be content with it. For fans, that’s hopefully enough. Perhaps another The World Ends With You anime would be a better fit.

NEO: The World Ends With You is available now on PC, PS4, and Switch.

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Source: PC Invasion