is a Japanese game director, the previous Luminous Productions COO and head of studio who formerly worked for Square Enix and currently the CEO of JP Games.

He was the head of Square Enix's Business Division 2 and part of the Final Fantasy Committee that is tasked with keeping the franchise's releases and content consistent.

Tabata resigned from Luminous Productions and Square Enix Group on October 31, 2018.

Career While in middle school, Tabata played a historical role-playing game made by Koei and first imagined how much fun it would be to make his own game. In his last year of university, he applied for jobs in the video game industry and in other media arts such as documentaries, television and film. He worked at several different video game publishers prior to his being hired at Square Enix, which he said gave him experience making action games, arcade games, and role-playing games.

Square Enix In the aftermath of the 2011 Tohoku earthquake, the international outpouring of support for Japan was paralleled at Square Enix by fan letters about the then-upcoming release of Type-0, and encouraged Tabata to make something special for the fans and those living through difficult times.

He became the director of Final Fantasy XV, taking over from Tetsuya Nomura in December 2013, a change that was announced in September the following year. He used to be co-director on the project. During his work on Final Fantasy XV, Tabata joked about his busy schedule, mentioning he regularly got only three hours sleep. Tabata, whose previous experience was with portable gaming devices, said that he was excited to work on console systems and wanted to "help players dive even deeper into their experiences".

Tabata formerly served as producer for Final Fantasy XV downloadable content. His work on the downloadable content was planned to continue into 2019. He and staff within Square Enix Business Division 2 were also working on a new intellectual property targeting the next-generation of consoles. Development for this project began in earnest in 2018, after previously only having a small team of 20-30 people assigned to it.

In March 2018, Tabata created a new Tokyo game studio for Square Enix called Luminous Productions, which consists of several key members from the Final Fantasy XV team. He was the COO and head of studio for Luminous Productions.

Tabata resigned from Luminous Productions and Square Enix Group on October 31, which was confirmed by Square Enix on November 7. In addition, 3 of the 4 DLCs for Final Fantasy XV were cancelled.

JP Games, Inc. With the announcement of his resignation from Square Enix, Tabata began starting his own company, JP Games, Inc., which was launched in January 2019, to create a new project. The first project, The Pegasus Dream Tour, a game themed around the 2020 Summer Paralympics, was released in June 2021 for iOS and Android.

Works Year Title Platform(s) Credit(s) 1999 Monster Rancher 2 PlayStation Event director 1999 Deception III: Dark Delusion PlayStation Event director 2004 Before Crisis: Final Fantasy VII Mobile Director, concept 2005 Last Order: Final Fantasy VII Anime Special thanks2006MonotoneMobileDirector 2007 Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII PlayStation Portable Director 2008-10 Kingdom Hearts Coded Mobile Co-director 2010 The 3rd Birthday PlayStation Portable Director 2011 Final Fantasy Type-0 PlayStation Portable Director, original scenario design 2014 Final Fantasy Agito iOS, Android Producer 2015 Final Fantasy Type-0 HD PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Windows Producer, director 2015 Final Fantasy: Brave Exvius iOS, Android Special thanks 2016 Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV Film Producer 2016 Final Fantasy XV PlayStation 4, Xbox One Director 2017 Mobius Final Fantasy iOS, Android, Windows Collaborative event support 2017 King's Knight: Wrath of the Dark Dragon iOS, Android Special thanks 2017 Itadaki Street: Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy 30th Anniversary PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita Special thanks 2017 Final Fantasy Dimensions II iOS, Android Special thanks 2017 Monster of the Deep: Final Fantasy XV PlayStation 4 (PlayStation VR) Producer 2018 Dissidia Final Fantasy NT PlayStation 4 Special thanks 2018 Final Fantasy XV: Pocket Edition iOS, Android, Windows Producer 2018 Final Fantasy XV Windows Edition Windows Producer 2018 Final Fantasy XV: Pocket Edition HD PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch Producer 2021 The Pegasus Dream Tour iOS, Android Producer, Director

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