Sales of Final Fantasy 16 did not meet Square Enix's high expectations, said president Takashi Kiryu.

Last week the company's latest earnings report was released and while net sales increased, operating profit dropped 79 percent from ¥14.4bn to just ¥3.0bn.

During a post-earnings call to analysts, Kiryu said the high end of the company's expectations were not met and the slow adoption of the PlayStation 5 was a limiting factor, Bloomberg reports.

Final Fantasy 16 was released as a PS5 exclusive, but is expected to launch on PC in the future.

Square Enix will now take steps to boost sales of the game now that hardware supply is less constricted and the console userbase continues to expand.

The company's net sales for HD games had increased, thanks to the launch of Final Fantasy 16 and the Pixel Remasters, although operating income was down due to the cost of development.

For MMOs, net sales decreased compared to the previous year. However, this is due to the success of Final Fantasy 14's Endwalker expansion last year; this year will be a lull in sales ahead of next year's Dawntrail expansion.

As a result of the low profit numbers, stock has fallen as much as 15 percent in Tokyo, with shares trading at around ¥5,620 - their lowest since May last year.

In a previous statement last month, Square Enix said sales of the game were "extremely strong", having surpassed 3m units worldwide in under a week.

"Taking into consideration the sales figures of the acclaimed Final Fantasy 7 Remake and the difference in size of the install base of the PlayStation 4 at the time of this title's release, we can see that the attach rate of Final Fantasy 16 is considerably high, given the PS5 install base," said Square Enix at the time.

"Square Enix considers the initial sales results of Final Fantasy 16 to be extremely strong, and we will continue to carry out a wide range of initiatives to encourage even more people to play the game."

The company is infamously critical of sales and often sets inflated targets, noting earlier this year that "lacklustre" sales were a trend across many of its games launched last year.