no... you dont look at sales from a relative perspective.... it doesnt matter if you sold to 2% or 10% of the installed base... that might be ok in a secondary analysis...
I don't think the thing people worry about is how many it sold anyway, it sold very well. Its just that it seemed to be so front loaded compared to the others.
I have a feeling that the next GTA will be down again.
It got shat all over because everyone (me included) wanted it to be something it couldn't be (aka Dead Space with a control scheme the original couldn't have, despite heavily downgraded graphics)
Because third parties didn't want to make relatively high-budgeted Wii games from the very beginning, leading its "traditional" market to stagnation, and starting now would be silly (the core audience for this type of games has mostly enstablished itself elsewhere). It's too late for that.
Because third parties didn't want to make relatively high-budgeted Wii games from the very beginning, leading its "traditional" market to stagnation, and starting now would be silly (the core audience for this type of games has mostly enstablished itself elsewhere). It's too late for that.
I'm sure Take Two's happy that sales are on a much larger percent of the userbase than before. I think they mentioned it somewhere in their most recent quarterly financial statements.
You're being a smartass, but yes, they would be if that percentage of adoption continues throughout the next two years as more and more people purchase HD consoles.
I agree if you were talking about games with shooter elements that would be superior (Metal Gear comes to mind) then I agree with you. But I'm strictly talking about traditional shooters.
It works for regular shooters too. There's no inherent reason why every shooter has to be built around the ability to turn and aim at infinite speed. I thought Bioshock worked very well with the pace of console aiming, for example.
No, it really pretty much is. We're pretty much past the part of the generation where development trends have much room to turn around. Nobody is going to launch an ambitious new IP on Wii (because it is 100% certain to bomb), almost no one is going to move a huge AAA IP over to Wii (because the market for 90% of these franchises is already established on PS360), so all that's left is crummy spinoffs -- i.e. exactly what the Wii actually gets.
It certainly is fair to say that this was a bad move, that sensible devs could have built a much better (and cheaper to develop for) market on Wii had they worked together to do so earlier on, and that then many devs and publishers would be in a much less shitty position, but that's all history now -- the game dev community has made its shitty bed and they (and Wii gamers) have to sleep in it.
No, it really pretty much is. We're pretty much past the part of the generation where development trends have much room to turn around. Nobody is going to launch an ambitious new IP on Wii (because it is 100% certain to bomb), almost no one is going to move a huge AAA IP over to Wii (because the market for 90% of these franchises is already established on PS360), so all that's left is crummy spinoffs -- i.e. exactly what the Wii actually gets.
It certainly is fair to say that this was a bad move, that sensible devs could have built a much better (and cheaper to develop for) market on Wii had they worked together to do so earlier on, and that then many devs and publishers would be in a much less shitty position, but that's all history now -- the game dev community has made its shitty bed and they (and Wii gamers) have to sleep in it.
I'm beggining to believe that this Wii am doomed stuff is nothing but wishful thinking from a lot of you (this is GAF afterall). Seriously, I agree that relationships need to be established, etc, but there is no magical door that closes on 3rd party support and can't be reopened. It's been less than 3 years with who knows how many more. It's time to get some perspective and come back to reality.
I'm beggining to believe that this Wii am doomed stuff is nothing but wishful thinking from a lot of you (this is GAF afterall). Seriously, I agree that relationships need to be established, etc, but there is no magical door that closes on 3rd party support and can't be reopened. It's been less than 3 years with who knows how many more. It's time to get some perspective and come back to reality.
Let's assume you are Capcom. You have hired quite a few Majinis that will magically develop for you Resident Evil 6 in less than six months, right in time for Christmas.
Let's assume that developing it for Wii, having to update the RE4 engine, costs you half as much as a PS360 version (which can be considered as a single SKU thanks to their MT Framework making multiplatform development easy as cake).
Your data says that RE4: Wii Edition sold 1.5M and that RE5 sold 4-5M on PS360.
Where would you develop it for? Wii or PS360?
I'm asking because, thanks to the policy third parties have had for the last three years, the current market is fragmented and a relevant percentage of buyers have already bought a platform (and multiconsole owners are an irrelevant percentage). There's no wishful thinking on my behalf, if you read my posts you should know I've always been supportive for Wii controls ;P
Nice editing out my almost there. Yes, I know about DQX -- which happened to represent one of the few multi-million-selling existing series that hadn't already taken a side. The possibility was quite large when there were many series that hadn't picked a spot yet, and therefore would still be seeing a slight graphical/technological upgrade going PS2 -> Wii; almost nothing is going to actually downgrade, though.
I think three :lol s is about right for "RE5 Wii edition," so: :lol :lol :lol
You... you're citing these as evidence that new IPs on Wii... don't bomb?
The point isn't that no one has made any effort until now; it's that the complete failure of every single effort to date (and the pending failure of the ones coming out in the next few months) is going to ensure that the future will see fewer such announcements, not a greater number of more ambitious ones.
I'm beggining to believe that this Wii am doomed stuff is nothing but wishful thinking from a lot of you (this is GAF afterall).
I invite you to consider my post history, my extremely positive reception to the Wii on announcement, and several years of advocating that numerous series would have performed much better with an early launch on Wii. I'm just realistic and I understand that the possibility of changing set trends in any given generation gets tougher with each passing day, that Wii has more or less passed the point at which the demonstrated efforts of third-party publishers could possibly influence it, and that Nintendo themselves are quite capable of going any amount of time without reaching out to third parties, even past the point where it starts to actually impact their sales.
I'm asking because, thanks to the policy third parties have had for the last three years, the current market is fragmented and a relevant percentage of buyers have already bought a platform (and multiconsole owners are an irrelevant percentage). There's no wishful thinking on my behalf, if you read my posts you should know I've always been supportive for Wii controls ;P
Right. The problem is that this is a prisoner's dilemma-like situation. If everyone had settled on Wii as a major software platform upfront, every publisher would be better off now; if any, say, two or three publishers had committed full-bore right out of the gate and seen huge software success right away, they would have dragged everyone else in after them in pursuit of those same profits; but every publisher acted in a risk-averse way (because creative-work publishing firms are universally more risk-averse than is actually good for them), no one built up that market upfront, and now everyone has suffered as a result.
The problem is that someone who was ready to have H1 2007 core games to launch could have dived into the pool then and probably made a killing, but it's not really possible for someone to lead the pack now in the same way; almost no one is buying the Wii for core games, and no established market exists, so people who are trying anything purely core-oriented are getting burned left and right. Unlike early on, it would now take something like five or six developers all simultaneously getting on board -- which is what people thought might happen after E3 2006, and then after Christmas 07, but which in fact hasn't really happened with anybody. (And, of course, Nintendo does still probably have the money necessary to pay five or six big publishers to get on board at once, but they won't, so that's a moot point too.)
It certainly is fair to say that this was a bad move, that sensible devs could have built a much better (and cheaper to develop for) market on Wii had they worked together to do so earlier on, and that then many devs and publishers would be in a much less shitty position, but that's all history now -- the game dev community has made its shitty bed and they (and Wii gamers) have to sleep in it.
Pretty much. The big question now is, will third parties be just as thickheaded next generation as they are now? Are they going to rethink their strategies?
You forgot Tales of Graces, but those are three games. Three pretty big games in Japan, but in general not that big worldwide. The Wii doesn't have serious western support which isn't helping them. Where is Rockstar for instance? Where are the big western games? The Wii might have three big Japanese names, but there is more needed to really push third parties. You need the western development studios as well. And don't call me out because now Bethseda is making a Wii game, because I want to see first what kind of game they are going to produce.
Srubking said:
:lol
I'm beggining to believe that this Wii am doomed stuff is nothing but wishful thinking from a lot of you (this is GAF afterall). Seriously, I agree that relationships need to be established, etc, but there is no magical door that closes on 3rd party support and can't be reopened. It's been less than 3 years with who knows how many more. It's time to get some perspective and come back to reality.
Nope, it's only logical. Look, I'm a huge pro-Wii guy but looking at the future (there are several good titles from other publishers, pfew) and with all the E3 buzz, there are no signs of improvement for "big" support. That is the real reality. Untill third parties announce one big game after the other for Wii (let's say in a time span of what, 4 months?) then the Wii has a fighting chance again in winning over big franchises and courting third parties.
Pretty much. The big question now is, will third parties be just as thickheaded next generation as they are now? Are they going to rethink their strategies?
I actually expect that, if Nintendo isn't completely boneheaded, next gen will be easier for them: they'll be outputting at HD resolutions, and probably making a big hardware jump while both Microsoft and Sony make smaller leaps. Ideally they'll be in a place that's close enough for real cross-platform systems to exist.
Let me make a huge prediction, actually: assuming the next Nintendo system is within porting distance of the next MS and Sony systems (and I think it will be), the determining factor in Nintendo's third-party support will be their network infrastructure. If they can deliver something equivalent in functionality to current PS3 PSN, with no retarded friend codes, full DLC, communication, etc. they should be able to retake the third-party lead, but if they offer a gimped network experience like the current Wii they're toast.
Untill third parties announce one big game after the other for Wii (let's say in a time span of what, 4 months?)
That's a great way to put it. I wouldn't ever make a claim like "there are no good games for Wii" or "being announced for Wii," but so far the kind of run of announcements that would prove that a shift to Wii as a platform had occurred has simply not manifested itself.
Right. The problem is that this is a prisoner's dilemma-like situation. If everyone had settled on Wii as a major software platform upfront, every publisher would be better off now; if any, say, two or three publishers had committed full-bore right out of the gate and seen huge software success right away, they would have dragged everyone else in after them in pursuit of those same profits; but every publisher acted in a risk-averse way (because creative-work publishing firms are universally more risk-averse than is actually good for them), no one built up that market upfront, and now everyone has suffered as a result.
The problem is that someone who was ready to have H1 2007 core games to launch could have dived into the pool then and probably made a killing, but it's not really possible for someone to lead the pack now in the same way; almost no one is buying the Wii for core games, and no established market exists, so people who are trying anything purely core-oriented are getting burned left and right. Unlike early on, it would now take something like five or six developers all simultaneously getting on board -- which is what people thought might happen after E3 2006, and then after Christmas 07, but which in fact hasn't really happened with anybody. (And, of course, Nintendo does still probably have the money necessary to pay five or six big publishers to get on board at once, but they won't, so that's a moot point too.)
One should also consider the fact that early adopters, as time goes by, become an irrelevant percentage of a console's demographics. So, even if most Wii early adopters were kids or Nintendo fans only buying Nintendo games, a steady flow of quality third party efforts would have lured everyone else on the top selling platform, keeping the largest part of the gaming market in one place and - in the end - maximizing everyone's profits.
With the way the Wii was selling from the very beginning (I'll tell you more, even the buzz from E3 2006 should have been more than enough to raise a few eyebrows), it wasn't hard to predict where most of the gaming population would have gone. Too bad everyone else was trying to figure out where all those "soccer moms" came from to notice they had always been there, in front of their eyes, but they were too busy making money to notice.
'Kay, well, maybe I don't really get an ambitious IP or a bomb is. Whatever, I won't bug you about it.
The problem is that someone who was ready to have H1 2007 core games to launch could have dived into the pool then and probably made a killing, but it's not really possible for someone to lead the pack now in the same way; almost no one is buying the Wii for core games, and no established market exists, so people who are trying anything purely core-oriented are getting burned left and right.
It works for regular shooters too. There's no inherent reason why every shooter has to be built around the ability to turn and aim at infinite speed. I thought Bioshock worked very well with the pace of console aiming, for example.
I still highly disagree due to the lack of accuracy and the likes but no matter. Different strokes different folks I guess.
charlequin said:
The point isn't that no one has made any effort until now; it's that the complete failure of every single effort to date (and the pending failure of the ones coming out in the next few months) is going to ensure that the future will see fewer such announcements, not a greater number of more ambitious ones.
Whoa cowboy. I wouldn't go THAT far. Let's not forget Tales of Symphonia 2, Monster Hunter G, Red Steel, and No More Heroes. Not to mention that games like Tatsunoko vs Capcom and Tenchu IV performed poorly on the platforms they were ported to as well.
charlequin said:
I invite you to consider my post history, my extremely positive reception to the Wii on announcement, and several years of advocating that numerous series would have performed much better with an early launch on Wii. I'm just realistic and I understand that the possibility of changing set trends in any given generation gets tougher with each passing day, that Wii has more or less passed the point at which the demonstrated efforts of third-party publishers could possibly influence it, and that Nintendo themselves are quite capable of going any amount of time without reaching out to third parties, even past the point where it starts to actually impact their sales.
Right. The problem is that this is a prisoner's dilemma-like situation. If everyone had settled on Wii as a major software platform upfront, every publisher would be better off now; if any, say, two or three publishers had committed full-bore right out of the gate and seen huge software success right away, they would have dragged everyone else in after them in pursuit of those same profits; but every publisher acted in a risk-averse way (because creative-work publishing firms are universally more risk-averse than is actually good for them), no one built up that market upfront, and now everyone has suffered as a result.
The problem is that someone who was ready to have H1 2007 core games to launch could have dived into the pool then and probably made a killing, but it's not really possible for someone to lead the pack now in the same way; almost no one is buying the Wii for core games, and no established market exists, so people who are trying anything purely core-oriented are getting burned left and right. Unlike early on, it would now take something like five or six developers all simultaneously getting on board -- which is what people thought might happen after E3 2006, and then after Christmas 07, but which in fact hasn't really happened with anybody. (And, of course, Nintendo does still probably have the money necessary to pay five or six big publishers to get on board at once, but they won't, so that's a moot point too.)
I completely agree with this. That saying I have no doubt that the Wii can hold its own in terms of third party support or hell even non-casual third party support. I mean looking at the future this is the first time that the system doesn't seem to be in some kind of drought. However I will say that the system will probably never be the fore front of the 15-35 year old tech savvy male demographic. You are right the time has passed. These games are way too established and expensive to move to the Wii. And while Nintendo CAN pay off some developers to establish a market for these games on the Wii they won't. They seem to be taking baby steps when it comes to these things. It took years after the DS's success before Nintendo got a game that appealed to this market (Grand Theft Auto ChinaTown Wars) to be released, and looking at the Wii only Monster Hunter 3 seems to be the only game Nintendo has got on board for this market...the Japanese only one as well.
Let's assume you are Capcom. You have hired quite a few Majinis that will magically develop for you Resident Evil 6 in less than six months, right in time for Christmas.
Let's assume that developing it for Wii, having to update the RE4 engine, costs you half as much as a PS360 version (which can be considered as a single SKU thanks to their MT Framework making multiplatform development easy as cake).
Your data says that RE4: Wii Edition sold 1.5M and that RE5 sold 4-5M on PS360.
I would make it for all 3, but that is neither here nor there. RE6 is one game. By the two posts below yours it is clear that if the Wii doesn't get all of the major franchises exclusively announced one after another every month then it is shit 3rd party support. That 's insane let alone ridiculous. Capcom doesn't have to give the Wii RE6, but they can give it a real 3rd person RE game or some other game. Are you saying that Tatsunoko is shit support because it isn't their premiere franshise?
Quality 3rd party support /= only the biggest most popular franchises.
No More Heroes, Boom Blox, De Blob, Red Steel (this one didn't quite live up to the ambition, but the sequel seems to fix the problems).
dammitmatt said:
You're being a smartass, but yes, they would be if that percentage of adoption continues throughout the next two years as more and more people purchase HD consoles.
GTA4 has already shown significantly worse legs than it's predecessors so there's absolutely no reason to assume that it will. It's really not remarkable that it managed a higher attach rate, individual games almost always have higher attach rates on smaller installed bases.
I would make it for all 3, but that is neither here nor there. RE6 is one game. By the two posts below yours it is clear that if the Wii doesn't get all of the major franchises exclusively announced one after another every month then it is shit 3rd party support. That 's insane let alone ridiculous. Capcom doesn't have to give the Wii RE6, but they can give it a real 3rd person RE game or some other game. Are you saying that Tatsunoko is shit support because it isn't their premiere franshise?
Quality 3rd party support /= only the biggest most popular franchises.
Consider that making RE6 for all three would require much higher manpower (they would be two different games because they have no tools that allow efficient PS360+Wii development... yes, they could develop some, but it takes time and they never bothered).
Yes, I also think they should have made a 3rd person RE game for the Wii, and every time I look at Darkside Chronicles screenshots a part of me cries for it being a sequel to UC instead of a full-blown action game. But that's the kind of support that Capcom, except Tatsunoko and MH3, is giving the Wii: outsourcing stuff to TOSE and Cavia while their internal teams work on their biggest franchises for PS360 only (so yes, I'm saying their Wii support is subpar).
Oh, charlequin, one more thing. Seriously, I don't wanna look like I'm part of an angry mob. But you wrote that, excluding all the good stuff you excluded, what's left is crappy spin-offs. But why would you make a spin-off of a franchise that's not even established on the platform? Who's the target audience? It seems like even these games shouldn't really exist.
I actually expect that, if Nintendo isn't completely boneheaded, next gen will be easier for them: they'll be outputting at HD resolutions, and probably making a big hardware jump while both Microsoft and Sony make smaller leaps. Ideally they'll be in a place that's close enough for real cross-platform systems to exist.
Let me make a huge prediction, actually: assuming the next Nintendo system is within porting distance of the next MS and Sony systems (and I think it will be), the determining factor in Nintendo's third-party support will be their network infrastructure. If they can deliver something equivalent in functionality to current PS3 PSN, with no retarded friend codes, full DLC, communication, etc. they should be able to retake the third-party lead, but if they offer a gimped network experience like the current Wii they're toast.
That's one of my greatest fears actually. Note, I'm not much of person who likes online gaming (90% of my gamingtime is offline, so this gen is really tough for me ) but I also think the online capabilities and set-up of Nintendo's next console will determine the third party output. But I wonder at times if Nintendo will actually do this... they are a bunch of stubborn basterds afterall.
charlequin said:
That's a great way to put it. I wouldn't ever make a claim like "there are no good games for Wii" or "being announced for Wii," but so far the kind of run of announcements that would prove that a shift to Wii as a platform had occurred has simply not manifested itself.
Exactly. There are several cool announcements like Silent Hill, Tatsunoko vs. Capcom, Dead Space Extraction, Final Fantasy the Crystal Bearers etc. but these kinds of announcements aren't very frequent for Wii. And that's what the console needs. But isn't receiving.
So far, I can think of Zack and Wiki (bombed on initial release, crawled to decent though not amazing sales after discounting), MadWorld (bombed big), No More Heroes (didn't actually "bomb" since Grasshopper only requires an extremely number of of sales to recoup, but sold a very low amount), Fragile (bombed in Japan), Arc Rise Fantasia (bombed in Japan), Muramasa (bombed in Japan)...
Flying_Phoenix said:
Whoa cowboy. I wouldn't go THAT far. Let's not forget Tales of Symphonia 2, Monster Hunter G, Red Steel, and No More Heroes. Not to mention that games like Tatsunoko vs Capcom and Tenchu IV performed poorly on the platforms they were ported to as well.
Sure, maybe "performances ranging from bomb to mediocre" would be better. ToS2 did alright in general, though it came nowhere near ToS1's 400k performance in the US and represented a continuing slide for the series in Japan, where every "real" entry this gen on three platforms has been outsold by the latest PSP fanservice spinoff.
(Which fits pretty well with my broader theory, actually. I think Tales would have done very well to target Wii right upfront, developing Vesperia for that system and ensuring that Tales fans knew that console Tales lived solely on Wii. Their scattershot approach hurt the entire series, not just the Wii entry, but it also probably ensured that ToG won't turn things around at this late stage.)
I mean looking at the future this is the first time that the system doesn't seem to be in some kind of drought.
Honestly, I think people who own a Wii in addition to an HD system or gaming PC are going to find it quite a worthwhile investment if they enjoy weird and niche games; there's a lot of stuff that'll never be financially successful but should be fun coming out and I don't think that will necessarily stop.
Scrubking said:
By the two posts below yours it is clear that if the Wii doesn't get all of the major franchises exclusively announced one after another every month then it is shit 3rd party support. That 's insane let alone ridiculous.
This is the tragedy of lowered expectations. A 360 owner can expect to see "all the major franchises announced... one after another"; why can't a Wii owner?
While I do agree that there's room between giving the Wii nothing and giving it stuff in addition to the HD games, franchise dilution is a huge issue here. Nobody wants to get told "if you're an RE fan, you need a 360 and a Wii"; people want to buy one system and play all the games in the series that they like. And this is where Wii's differing power level is a double-edged sword: it can't benefit from the significantly rising tide of multiplatform games.
Oh, charlequin, one more thing. Seriously, I don't wanna look like I'm part of an angry mob. But you wrote that, excluding all the good stuff you excluded, what's left is crappy spin-offs. But why would you make a spin-off of a franchise that's not even established on the platform? Who's the target audience? It seems like even these games shouldn't really exist.
It makes sense when the franchise is big enough (see Resident Evil). This is why Dead Space Extraction on the Wii puzzled me: it was a spinoff for an underperforming game on other platforms. Who's their target audience, then?
Interesting that you'd have that stance. However, if we think that this generation will last longer than normal, then it's possible for big named games to come out which will effect some kind of shift, and to be honest, it would be in their best interest to do so now in preparation for the next generation of consoles. As cynical as I am about Wii 3rd party development, I do have a feeling companies are going to jump on board, but we haven't seen the fruits of it yet. For example we now know that Bethesda is making a "core" Wii game, and probably a high budget game at that. I'm sure there are other companies who have jumped on board, but we haven't heard anything yet.
Another thing to consider is if the latest string of "core" games on the 360/PS3 bomb or don't do so well at retail, then we may see some changes also. The game isn't over yet. I'll agree that it's getting harder by the day, but I'm not yet convinced third parties can't make a move. Just using my friends and roommates as an example...all it takes is one big budget game and they'd be all over the Wii like white on rice. We'll have to see how things play out, but I'm holding out hope.
Unlike early on, it would now take something like five or six developers all simultaneously getting on board -- which is what people thought might happen after E3 2006, and then after Christmas 07, but which in fact hasn't really happened with anybody. (And, of course, Nintendo does still probably have the money necessary to pay five or six big publishers to get on board at once, but they won't, so that's a moot point too.)
I largely agree with everything you've said on the topic - even if I disagree with the degree of responsibility for the current situation you're placing on Nintendo themselves - but I wonder if the launch of MotionPlus is perhaps the last roll of the dice for a substantial (note: not anywhere near as significant as could have been achieved earlier) wave of support for the system.
It's apparent from impressions here and elsewhere of launch M+ software that we're finally seeing games that live up to what gamers expected from the Wii but that - for a number of reasons, technology being the main one - just weren't delivered in the first couple of years, several notable exceptions notwithstanding.
I wonder if it's possible that Nintendo could take advantage of this and stage a mini-relaunch of the system? It seems like they're attempting this in Japan with WSR\MotionPlus, Monster Hunter Tri and Kuro Wii, hoping - I'd imagine - to reinvigorate the casual market and attract the core. While it might never make the Wii the dominating platform it should be, perhaps if handled properly it could at least see a PSP-like resurgence of interest from third parties?
I think it's the best Wii owners can hope for right now.
No, he's saying you need big names and quite a few of them to attract crowds of gamers. If the Wii had a new GTA, the Elder Scrolls, Metal Gear Solid, Resident Evil (third person), mainline Final Fantasy, Call of Duty Infinity Ward etc. you would have a lot of attention from gamers. Problem is, you won't get them with a game like T vs. C. (Sadly enough)
We'll see about Red Steel II and I'm happy to eat my words if it does well. NMH, again, is benefiting from dev costs far lower than almost any other existing developer can aim for. And Boom Blox is pretty clearly an expanded-market game rather than a "core" one -- I've pretty consistently agreed that stuff that has an obvious expanded-market/party-game element can do phenomenally on Wii even if it also has core elements (see also: RB/GH.)
And again, my agenda isn't to claim that no one should develop for Wii, but to descriptively point out why most devs won't. I'm glad that Grasshopper had success there and I'd argued early on that other niche-market devs (like N1, as one example) should go to Wii to get a similar effect, but their form of success can't possibly translate to a company like EA or Capcom.
ZAK said:
Oh, charlequin, one more thing. Seriously, I don't wanna look like I'm part of an angry mob. But you wrote that, excluding all the good stuff you excluded, what's left is crappy spin-offs. But why would you make a spin-off of a franchise that's not even established on the platform? Who's the target audience? It seems like even these games shouldn't really exist.
Logically, I mostly agree with you, they shouldn't exist; they're a form of bet-hedging that's actually pretty illogical and doesn't tend to play out very effectively.
I think the "reasoning" is something like this: we want to support the Wii because everyone says "OMG the Wii sells so much," but we don't want to "risk" putting a "real" game there and killing that series' brand/we don't want to "risk" putting a "real" team there and hurting that team's cachet. So we'll get a B-list team, tell them to make a B-list game, and we'll put a big name on the box but make it clear that it's a spinoff. Then we almost definitely won't have a huge hit, but our fanboys will ensure we don't have a huge failure either! (Cue douchebag executive high-fives.)
Again, a much better plan would have been to split franchises that benefitted from Wii controls off and establish them for really realz on the system early on, or to focus a lot of high-budget new IPs that had significant co-marketing support from Nintendo right during the first year when they would have helped shape the perception of the system, but by hedging their bets third-parties made life worse for everyone and I think the opportunities they had to deliver really unqualified successes solely through their own action have largely passed; you'd have to see Nintendo and a number of third-parties all working together to change the trend now and I don't see any evidence of that.
Jocchan said:
It makes sense when the franchise is big enough (see Resident Evil). This is why Dead Space Extraction on the Wii puzzled me: it was a spinoff for an underperforming game on other platforms. Who's their target audience, then?
Lightgun gamers. The one genre that has succeeded unambiguously on Wii is lightgun shooters :lol and they probably made this game to take advantage of that, putting Dead Space on the box to try to boost the DS brand.
However, if we think that this generation will last longer than normal, then it's possible for big named games to come out which will effect some kind of shift, and to be honest, it would be in their best interest to do so now in preparation for the next generation of consoles.
Well, honestly, if I could dictate the decisions of eight major publishers Sim City-style, I'd tell them to do it. The threshold for how much support needs to come at once to change people's minds keeps going up but still probably isn't literally impossible to reach. But the publishers are excessively risk-averse, as I mentioned above, and any one of them would be looking for several others to jump in at the same time -- but they can't really strike a "deal" with their competitors to do so.
That's where Nintendo would come in, and I do think that even now, if Nintendo chose to they could create a pretty big swing in their favor on the third-party development issue, but again, I see no evidence (or possibly anti-evidence) that N will do so.
Cosmonaut X said:
I largely agree with everything you've said on the topic - even if I disagree with the degree of responsibility for the current situation you're placing on Nintendo themselves
Do you think I place too much blame or too little on them? I've been accused of both. :lol
My flippant but still relatively true answer is that I place 100% of the blame on third-parties and 100% on Nintendo. If you give me more than 100% to work with I will happily place 150%, 200%, 1000%, you name it, on both too. I think either set could have prevented this situation with a serious and well-thought-out effort and instead both chose not to.
Lightgun gamers. The one genre that has succeeded unambiguously on Wii is lightgun shooters :lol and they probably made this game to take advantage of that, putting Dead Space on the box to try to boost the DS brand.
Actually, it didn't succeed that much... or at least not as much as people think.
We have Umbrella Chronicles selling 1.2 million, the HOTD 2+3 port probably getting past a million too... and that's it. Oh, and Link's Crossbow Training (forgot about that).
Everything else bombed hard. So we have 2 third party games selling decently, a first party one selling really good (as usual), and nothing else.
That said, I agree that lightgun shooters, if done well, are an excellent fit for the Wii and - guess what? - I think most people buying Extraction will have no idea about what Dead Space is about.
That doesn't change the fact that it was a huge success. It did somewhere in the vicinity of 500k, and you don't need a Suda style budget to make a profit from that.
charlequin said:
And Boom Blox is pretty clearly an expanded-market game rather than a "core" one -- I've pretty consistently agreed that stuff that has an obvious expanded-market/party-game element can do phenomenally on Wii even if it also has core elements (see also: RB/GH.)
Boom Blox and De Blob are pretty expanded market friendly, yes, but they're still "ambitious new IPs". What I took issue with here was your statement that no such games should be made on Wii as they were 100% certain to fail (and subsequent underlining of that by saying that it was no exaggeration).
I'm of the opinion that Nintendo handled the pre-launch, launch and near-post-launch period of the Wii's lifespan brilliantly, and I think they deserve huge credit for this. I believe - though I obviously have no way of proving this - that they reached out to third parties in a modest way in this crucial early stage. However, I suspect - and public comments from senior figures like Iwata suggest this - that they expected third parties to make a move with little or no further incentives from Nintendo themselves, and that the huge excitement and continued sales success would be a sufficient driver for third parties to jump aboard.
When it didn't, I think they made some cautious moves to move things along - securing Monster Hunter 3 being a fairly notable one - but I don't think they moved quickly or decisively enough to secure the kind of support that would have dragged everyone - or nearly everyone aboard - and this is where they're most vulnerable to criticism. For all their daring in some areas, they can be remarkably conservative in others.
I still have more blame to heap on third parties, though, as I think they were even more conservative than Nintendo at this early stage. Alarm bells should have been ringing by mid-2006, and by early 2007 they should have been deafening even the most hidebound executive. Perhaps Nintendo should have been more aggressive in courting them, but I find it harder to blame Nintendo for not encouraging them out of their own ignorance and inactivity than I do condemn them for it.
That doesn't change the fact that it was a huge success. It did somewhere in the vicinity of 500k, and you don't need a Suda style budget to make a profit from that.
The game did less than half of that in America, and its Japanese sales are a completely insignificant 20k. Is there an actual source for 500k worldwide, or is that just a particularly generous estimate? (All that Wikipedia has is Chartz numbers, lulz.)
Still, though, again, this is the tragedy of lowered expectations: 500k worldwide is not in any way a tremendously impressive accomplishment, even when one is forced to hold it up as a nigh-unique example of success in a sea of failure.
(And if you wanted we could debate on the word "ambitious" here, though I don't really want to...)
I'm going to say again that Boom Blox is beside the point here. If Wii owners were satisfied being the system where any game can succeed (as long as it's in relatively large part a 2-4 player party game) then there wouldn't even be a point of argument here. I've never debated that Wii can sell copious amounts of software in the right conditions, only what specific kind of market exists on the system now and what kind might exist in the fiture.
MMV had some shipped numbers about a year or so back that put the game at 400k shipped, and I'm sure they've shipped more since then. Their target was 500k.
Have to say I'm with the 'unbelievers' here, that's pretty much it for the Wii in terms of being treated as the market leader it is by third parties.
While I never expected it to get in on, say sequels to already going HD franchises (Assasins Creed, Mirrors Edge etc), there are so many missed opportunities that would have been perfect for the Wii but which have been put on PS360 instead. Older examples lke Beyond Good and Evil come to mind - not a huge franchise sure, but given the original was best on GameCube and it was very Nintendo like (sort of Metroid meets Zelda in some ways), and even had a stylised art style, it was a no brainer for Wii. Yet it was put on PS360, which in my opinion has hurt the game by making it too 'graphic' for the perceived wants of that audience.
Castlevania was the biggest one of E3 for me. Konami has consistently mishandled the franchise for years, but with the established DS fanbase, retro prescence on the Wii because of the Virtual Console, and failure of the last few console games, Castlevania was begging for re-invention back home on Nintendo where it began. Judgement fits the 'cheapo Wii spinoff' story, but for once it actually came out first, so it wasn't a 'spin off' of an existing PS360 game and as such wasn't established on any current home console, and if any, was established on the Wii. So it was free of 'existing environment' concerns. Konami also really wants it to be re-established as a series in Japan, and there's only one console that can do that.
And yet, there it is on PS360, a new announcement (if an adapted one of an already existing game). Castlevania will join the crowded pool of games trying to be graphically intense and 'mature' (read: teenage) in theme on that platform environment. It will be released and forgotten about within a month like most games. It does look pretty good though.
Have to say I'm with the 'unbelievers' here, that's pretty much it for the Wii in terms of being treated as the market leader it is by third parties.
While I never expected it to get in on, say sequels to already going HD franchises (Assasins Creed, Mirrors Edge etc), there are so many missed opportunities that would have been perfect for the Wii but which have been put on PS360 instead. Older examples lke Beyond Good and Evil come to mind - not a huge franchise sure, but given the original was best on GameCube and it was very Nintendo like (sort of Metroid meets Zelda in some ways), and even had a stylised art style, it was a no brainer for Wii. Yet it was put on PS360, which in my opinion has hurt the game by making it too 'graphic' for the perceived wants of that audience.
Castlevania was the biggest one of E3 for me. Konami has consistently mishandled the franchise for years, but with the established DS fanbase, retro prescence on the Wii because of the Virtual Console, and failure of the last few console games, Castlevania was begging for re-invention back home on Nintendo where it began. Judgement fits the 'cheapo Wii spinoff' story, but for once it actually came out first, so it wasn't a 'spin off' of an existing PS360 game and as such wasn't established on any current home console, and if any, was established on the Wii. So it was free of 'existing environment' concerns. Konami also really wants it to be re-established as a series in Japan, and there's only one console that can do that.
And yet, there it is on PS360, a new announcement (if an adapted one of an already existing game). Castlevania will join the crowded pool of games trying to be graphically intense and 'mature' (read: teenage) in theme on that platform environment. It will be released and forgotten about within a month like most games. It does look pretty good though.
That is going to depend on the quality of the game. It would have been wise for Konami to poach the talent from other successful third party action game franchises for Castlevania.
The game did less than half of that in America, and its Japanese sales are a completely insignificant 20k. Is there an actual source for 500k worldwide, or is that just a particularly generous estimate? (All that Wikipedia has is Chartz numbers, lulz.)
Still, though, again, this is the tragedy of lowered expectations: 500k worldwide is not in any way a tremendously impressive accomplishment, even when one is forced to hold it up as a nigh-unique example of success in a sea of failure.
This is not lowered expectations, but rather realistic expectations. Just because a handful, yes a handful, of games can sell 4 million in a month doesn't mean that every game must sell that much or be a failure. NMH was beyond niche and the fact that it sold as much as it did was an amazing success. Like I said earlier some of you people need to come back to reality and realize that every game has a different standard for success - a standard that we are rarely privy to. Not every game needs to sell millions to be successful.
Sadly this type of warped, unrealistic thinking is pervasive here and is sadly spreading and getting worse. Now 1 Million gets laughed at on here and soon it will be 2 then 3. The same thing applies to the 3rd party situation. I agree that things aren't good, but FFS the Wii is just getting started and people are actually claiming game over already. The exaggeration this place is prone to is beyond ridiculous.
That's where Nintendo would come in, and I do think that even now, if Nintendo chose to they could create a pretty big swing in their favor on the third-party development issue, but again, I see no evidence (or possibly anti-evidence) that N will do so.
I think this is much more possible in Japan. I think its far too late in the West given the sensibilities of many developers. I'm not saying its likely or anything, but in Japan everything is so effed up I think there is more of an opportunity. Things seem pretty much settled in the N.A market.
Realistic expectations that have been lowered from "I want the third-party support that a market leader gets!" (a reasonable starting position for someone who's bought a market-leader system) to "I want third-party support as good as a pretty decent second-string system!" all the way down to "I want third-party support that's better than the GameCube!"
The fact that in 2007 people were arguing that Wii should get, essentially, every series by dint of its market performance, and that people were seriously offering up ideas like "Square-Enix is moving FF13 to Wii," but now people are just begging for any meaningful support, is indicative.
Scrubking said:
Like I said earlier some of you people need to come back to reality and realize that every game has a different standard for success
Blah blah blah yes I'm fully aware of all of this. It's still irrelevant to the point which is that that the Wii is not a system that one looks to for huge, unqualified successes of moderate-plus budgeted core games developed by third parties, because such successes do not exist.
You can see where I've said a few times that Wii's a pretty good choice for truly niche games that require very, very low sales before they meet a profit, but, again, if Wii core-gamer owners were collectively satisfied with ultra-niche titles we wouldn't be having this discussion. Instead, people also want relatively "big" games -- which is quite reasonable -- but the incompetence of third party publishers, combined with Nintendo's unwillingness to use money to counteract said incompetence, has allowed most or all of the window in which such titles might reasonably succeed on Wii to close.
Have to say I'm with the 'unbelievers' here, that's pretty much it for the Wii in terms of being treated as the market leader it is by third parties.
While I never expected it to get in on, say sequels to already going HD franchises (Assasins Creed, Mirrors Edge etc), there are so many missed opportunities that would have been perfect for the Wii but which have been put on PS360 instead. Older examples lke Beyond Good and Evil come to mind - not a huge franchise sure, but given the original was best on GameCube and it was very Nintendo like (sort of Metroid meets Zelda in some ways), and even had a stylised art style, it was a no brainer for Wii. Yet it was put on PS360, which in my opinion has hurt the game by making it too 'graphic' for the perceived wants of that audience.
Castlevania was the biggest one of E3 for me. Konami has consistently mishandled the franchise for years, but with the established DS fanbase, retro prescence on the Wii because of the Virtual Console, and failure of the last few console games, Castlevania was begging for re-invention back home on Nintendo where it began. Judgement fits the 'cheapo Wii spinoff' story, but for once it actually came out first, so it wasn't a 'spin off' of an existing PS360 game and as such wasn't established on any current home console, and if any, was established on the Wii. So it was free of 'existing environment' concerns. Konami also really wants it to be re-established as a series in Japan, and there's only one console that can do that.
And yet, there it is on PS360, a new announcement (if an adapted one of an already existing game). Castlevania will join the crowded pool of games trying to be graphically intense and 'mature' (read: teenage) in theme on that platform environment. It will be released and forgotten about within a month like most games. It does look pretty good though.
Actually, you picked two rather interesting games for your examples there.
Beyond Good & Evil is actually probably the most interesting choice because I think it's one of the only games where I've ever seen a long and well explained reason for why the game is not appearing on the Wii, as opposed to the traditional "Wii gamers don't play those kinds of games." answer: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=357298
As for Castlevania, that game was never originally intended to be a Castlevania title, but was rather just a title called Lords of Shadow made by Mercury Steam in Spain and announced back at Games Convention 2008. I think the whole reason they rebranded it Castlevania and started throwing the name Kojima Productions all over it is because they knew they had a good product and wanted it to sell better. The originally intended 360/PS3 Castlevania game is actually no where to be seen. (To Note: GameTrailers filed that video under Lords of Shadow, though it's actually not related to that game). Also, considering the last three Castlevania DS games all sold under 35,000 copies in Japan, I can't really blame them for focusing heavily on the West with that series. There doesn't seem much hope to ever re-establish it there.
Not in the slightest. While GTA 1 and 2 were fairly popular, the shift to 3-D is what pushed GTA to the huge hit that it currently is. GTA3 had huge legs and sold great over time. As with pretty much all core series, the sales get more and more frontloaded over time. I think the case can be made that Vice City could be a decent candidate for comparison but definitely not GTA3.
sionyboy said:
After all by the time the GTA:SA came out the PS2s LTD was significantly higher than the PS360 was when GTA4 came out.
Wonderful insight. I completely agree. Where did those other GTA buyers go? Perchance some of them might be Wii owners this generation?
It seems like most everyone is missing my point. Chris Remo said that the "entire success" of the Wii was due to people who don't like GTA and Halo. The absurdity of that statement just floored me. Of course some GTA owners from last gen on the PS2 are on the Wii this generation. I don't think anybody truly believes that they just up and disappeared into the ether. My whole purpose in pointing out the disparity between San Andreas and GTAIV was to show that a significant portion of the GTA-buying audience is not currently present on the PS3+360, and I think it's pretty clear, due to the Wii's very large userbase, that at least some of them are on Wii.
dammitmattt said:
Are you sure that you still want to say it's "significantly" down?
I think the more worrying thing about GTA4, in comparison to GTA:SA, is just how it has sold. The shape of the curve, if you will.
It isn't just that it has sold less overall than GTA:SA did in the same time frame. We also know that GTA4 sold more up front, which means (because it has sold less overall) that its legs have been significantly shorter.
You're not that naive. You know that individual game tie ratio almost always goes down (I say "almost" pretty much exclusively due to a game like Wii Fit that just outsold the Wii this month) as the userbase goes up. There is next to zero chance of it remaining constant.
charlequin said:
that sensible devs could have built a much better (and cheaper to develop for) market on Wii had they worked together to do so earlier on,
I'm still holding out hope to see how The Conduit does. High Voltage Software is pretty much the poster child for a dev that saw where the winds were blowing and made a significant change (hopefully) early enough to make a difference for them. For other devs, I'm just hoping they can stand up porting teams/outsourced developers to move down PS360 content to the Wii. I'm not expecting much core new IP for the Wii outside of small games (which may or may not include The Conduit depending on your definition of "small").
I'm honestly more pissed that the PSP is getting the games Wii owners have been wanting since the beginning. Seriously, not cool Japan.
On the bright side I guess it does show that something can be revived even when it's considered dead. But it's obvious that developers aren't going to do it without some kind of incentive.
I don't know (nor do I care) about mainline games on Wii, but I fully expect for the support and talent in this industry to shift to Wii, eventually. This will happen, it's just a matter of "when." The reason I can be so confident is because I think publishers and developers are self-interested enough for the alternative to be inconceivable. The shift will happen over the long-term; it won't be sudden, it will be gradual. Such is the outlook the disrputive innovation model projects.
It seems like most everyone is missing my point. Chris Remo said that the "entire success" of the Wii was due to people who don't like GTA and Halo. The absurdity of that statement just floored me. Of course some GTA owners from last gen on the PS2 are on the Wii this generation. I don't think anybody truly believes that they just up and disappeared into the ether. My whole purpose in pointing out the disparity between San Andreas and GTAIV was to show that a significant portion of the GTA-buying audience is not currently present on the PS3+360, and I think it's pretty clear, due to the Wii's very large userbase, that at least some of them are on Wii.
I think you're misinterpreting Remo's statement. He said that the entire success of the Wii is that it has had success with people who aren't interested in GTA or Halo. I don't think that means nobody on Wii would have bought GTAIV. Your numbers show that GTAIV is currently lagging behind San Andreas by 1.37 million copies. Even if we make the assumption that these 1.37 million people are on Wii, it's still "significantly" less than even the amount of copies sold on PS3. I say significantly because that was the word you used to describe GTAIV's performance compared to San Andreas's. The hypothetical amount of sales GTAIV would have sold on Wii versus the amount it has sold on PS3 is an even bigger difference percentage-wise than GTAIV's performance versus San Andreas's.
If we couple that fact with the enormous hardware and software advantage the Wii has over both the 360 and PS3, one can say that the success of the Wii (i.e., its hardware and software advantage over the 360 and PS3) can be attributed to its ability to tap into a different demographic.
Of course this is ignoring things like potential new buyers, time of release, install base, and all the other problems when comparing two not completely equivalent things. Regardless, your analysis is a bit off and contains a bit of overreaction.
So far, I can think of Zack and Wiki (bombed on initial release, crawled to decent though not amazing sales after discounting), MadWorld (bombed big), No More Heroes (didn't actually "bomb" since Grasshopper only requires an extremely number of of sales to recoup, but sold a very low amount), Fragile (bombed in Japan), Arc Rise Fantasia (bombed in Japan), Muramasa (bombed in Japan)...
No More Heroes is somewhere around a quarter million to half a million. The game "average" as a regular game and "amazing" as a niche game.
charlequin said:
Sure, maybe "performances ranging from bomb to mediocre" would be better. ToS2 did alright in general, though it came nowhere near ToS1's 400k performance in the US and represented a continuing slide for the series in Japan, where every "real" entry this gen on three platforms has been outsold by the latest PSP fanservice spinoff.
Those PSP fanservice spinoffs are amongst the best selling in the series in Japan since its prime. I mean I really don't get where you x-nay Tales of Symphonia 2 from being impressive from an obvious spin-off and even give a nudge to it selling far worse to a main entry in the series (that was also by far the best selling in the series as well).
charlequin said:
Honestly, I think people who own a Wii in addition to an HD system or gaming PC are going to find it quite a worthwhile investment if they enjoy weird and niche games; there's a lot of stuff that'll never be financially successful but should be fun coming out and I don't think that will necessarily stop.
It's the result of cheapen development. Wii games are far cheaper to make due to Wii owners not expecting cutting edge presentation in their games. And as a result of this many types of games are not only financially feasible on the Wii but are possible to make on the Wii as the audience won't turn their heads from them for not being up to par with tech (I.E. 2D Wii Games like "A Boy and His Blob" and "Dragonball Adventure", Adventure games like "Broken Sword: Director's Cut" and "Rabbids Go Home", platformers such as "The Munchables" and "KORE Gang", etc.) HD gamers may hate to admit it. But one thing their consoles certainly lack is small and medium sized development support in the retail space.
