Is Vision of Abyssea A Future Square Enix Franchise Or FFXI Expansion?

Square Enix is awfully protective of Abyssea, even though it hasn’t been announced. The publisher filed multiple trademarks related to Abyssea in Europe.

Heroes of Abyssea, Scars of Abyssea, and Vision of Abyssea were registered for use with video games and computer software. In addition to a trio of English trademarks, Square Enix registered foreign language equivalents such as Abyssé Terre Défendue and Verbotene Welt Abyssea.

This is something Square Enix tends to do that for important releases such as Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies where we discovered five trademarks months before it was announced. Perhaps, Abyssea is a new Square Enix franchise then? That’s one possibility. The pie in the sky idea I have is a new series of Final Fantasy XI scenarios. VanaFest 2010 is this weekend and Square Enix is bound to announce something new about their eight year old MMO.