Like we mentioned earlier, Final Fantasy XIII’s Xbox 360 port has just been officially announced in Japan. (It’s one of several news bits leaking out of a conference Microsoft is holding over there at the moment, an event where they’re also announcing the Kinect’s price and release date in Japan.)

The news is sad indeed for PS3 fanboys over there, but even the rest of have something to be a little distraught about: The dev team was apparently planning extensive downloadable content for FFXIII, but it all got cut.

“We were planning to make some DLC, but that plan wound up not happening,” director Motomu Toriyama told Famitsu magazine in this week’s issue. “I’m sorry!” (Toriyama was answering a query about how he said before FFXIII’s Japanese release that PS3 owners should “hold on to their saves from the end of the game” for a surprise down the line.)

Why is Square waiting until now to release FFXIII on the 360 over there, by the way? “Because we feel that there are a lot of 360 owners worldwide, and a lot of people in Japan who own nothing but 360s,” producer Yoshinori Kitase told Famitsu. “Thanks to the new [slim] system and such, the situation’s a lot different than it was in July 2008 [when Square Enix announced at E3 2008 that FFXIII would be PS3-exclusive in Japan].”

That’s likely not enough to please Sony fanboys over there, and they’ll be doubly angered to learn that the Japanese 360 release of FFXIII amounts to an “International Edition” of the game, with English voices, subtitles in all the European languages you can think of, and “My Hands” from Leona Lewis serving as the main theme song. There’s a new easy mode that increases the item drop rate and makes the game easier in other ways, and the package comes with a booklet containing art concepts, scenes from events that cut from the game, and an original novella covering some of the events that take place after FFXIII’s ending.

“The scenes we removed had to be cut for tempo-related reasons,” Toriyama said. “There’s a scene where Serah and Snow are buying a birthday present for Lightning; that got cut because showing Snow going to the bathroom didn’t really match with how serious the story was getting!”

The 360 FFXIII is hitting Japan December 16.

via 1up