The "what is a successful game?"/"are exclusives worth it?" cost/benefit thread

[Laa-Yosh]

Halo. It's not a genre defining game,

Then why do almost all FPS games ever since Halo have a recharging health system and allow you to carry only two weapons at once? Checkpoint system? Controller layout?
It hasn't re-defined the entire genre, but it sure made some huge steps.

and the first one sold 5m+

It did a little better then that, actually. But it had very restricted multiplayer capabilities...

 

[Silent_Buddha]

The whole issue of a single games budget gets complicated in many ways. Take for instance the R&D cost of building the new engine, this cost will potentially end up being spread across multiple games, KZ3 may be cheaper to make so the investment in KZ2 while steep will be offset the more they make use of the tech they developed. A lot of investment descisions made today will not play out until way in the future, what seems like a bad descision to some today may turn out to be a great one in the future.

In which case, you take that into considering the success/lack of success when KZ3 is released and discussion started on that.

However, with relation to KZ2 it has no bearing. KZ2 wasn't released as a game + game engine in the way Crysis was launched on CryEngine 2 and thus served as a showcase for the engine as well as the game.

In the end if KZ3 leverages art, assets, and engine of KZ2 (as they should), then KZ3 will be a success probably, but that speaks nothing of KZ2's performance or expectations for it prior to it being released.

Regards,
SB

 

[Squilliam]

Squilliam I think you're going out to left field - Blu-ray was included for one purpose at the end of the day and one alone - to triumph over HD DVD. Forget about all those slides and such that you saw presented back in the day; in game fidelity is not aided by BD as a storage medium.

I always thought of the slides as an exageration and that there was some small sliver of truth to them.

According to this: There are 12 titles on the Xbox 360 which are either 6.8GB installed after the NXE update which reduced the size of the titles or use more than 1 disc. However quite a number of these are recent blockbuster releases.

My estimation was that whilst the graphics fidelity wasn't improved the number of potential different settings and variety of content could be improved, is that not correct?

 

[specwarGP2]

Then why do almost all FPS games ever since Halo have a recharging health system and allow you to carry only two weapons at once? Checkpoint system? Controller layout?
It hasn't re-defined the entire genre, but it sure made some huge steps.

The only genre changing element that Halo brought to the table was the regenerating health system. Everything else you mention had been done before.

 

[nightshade]

The only genre changing element that Halo brought to the table was the regenerating health system. Everything else you mention had been done before.

Not really...apart from Regenerating health, A dedicated button for Grenades, Shields,Checkpoint system,Two weapon at a time & a dedicated button for melee which you could perform with every weapon is something which Halo did for the first time in FPS games. And I think Halo CE was the first FPS to have vehicles with mounted guns.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Not really...apart from Regenerating health, A dedicated button for Grenades, Shields,Checkpoint system,Two weapon at a time & a dedicated button for melee which you could perform with every weapon is something which Halo did for the first time in FPS games. And I think Halo CE was the first FPS to have vehicles with mounted guns.

You'll definitely want to qualify that for console games.

But I could have sworn another FPS on console did dual weapon prior to Bungie doing it in Halo 2.

Regards,
SB

 

[nightshade]

No I am not talking about Duel wielding cause I know Halo was not the first franchise to have it, it was the 2nd. But instead I am talking about the limit of player having one primary & one secondary weapon. Apart from that I dont remember any FPS having a dedicated melee & Grenade button before Halo CE.

 

[Billy Idol]

Killzone 2 sold 'well enough' to have a Killzone 3, that's my take. I don't think we need to read into it beyond that. Certainly Killzone 2 didn't bring in enormous money relative to its costs... but the development costs of Killzone 3 should be so much lower in comparison, that I think Sony would have reasonable expectations of profit there. That in my mind paints the reasoning for a KZ3 than does retroactive 'success' attributed to KZ2. Not that I didn't already give my own expanded criteria for that title though, because it really was about more than sales with that game.

Yeah, this sounds reasonable. Sony/GG may not like it, but in the case of Killzone 2 and 3, they have to make the final budget/cost validation after Killzone 3 to see if the whole effort was worth it or not!

 

[groper]

There are more than one ways to redefine a genre.
You can redefine a genre by redefining the MP segment of the specific genre (IW with COD1).
You can redefine a genre by redefining the atmosphere and the flow of the gameplay (IW with MW)
Or you can do all of the above while at the same time you apply successfully gameplay mechanics that other developers have tried to develope&apply before you but they just failed to deliver. ( Epic with GoW1)

 

[specwarGP2]

No I am not talking about Duel wielding cause I know Halo was not the first franchise to have it, it was the 2nd. But instead I am talking about the limit of player having one primary & one secondary weapon. Apart from that I dont remember any FPS having a dedicated melee & Grenade button before Halo CE.

None of those things you mentioned originated with halo. Duke Nukem had a dedicated melee (kick). SWAT 3 had primary and secondary weapon slots as well as dedicated buttons for flashbang and frag grenades. (pretty sure Rainbow Six did too, but I never played it)

 

[liolio]

I don't know if the argument can stand and or thus to which extend France can be relevant to US anyway I just read that in France (source GFK) the PS3 accounts for the two thirds of the BRD players on the market. In US BRD user base have grow quicker than in France still there could be some truth behind the "ps3 used as a BRD player argument". I'm not pushing the argument to prove that PS3 owners don't buy games (which is obviously false) but it could still give hint on the nature of the ps3 user base.
There is no reason or plot behind the fact that while selling well PS3 exclusive don't sell as well as one could expect, simply the user base is made of average gamers (neither casual, neither the most hardcore) that simply considered the BRD as worth it, you may add brand fidelity on top it (please no fight on this, it's normal when you've been satisfied by one brand product (the PS2) ceteris paribus to stick with the same brand ). There is no reason for this kind of demographic to not be attracted to the biggest IP on the market (which are multi platform this gen) as the same demographic on 360 does the same.
There is also the matter of buying power and how much this demographic is willing to spend on games, especially if you add the BRD movies budget to the mix, it could simply be normal that the biggest IP take the lion's share in games sales.

 

[Gubbi]

Halo:CE is a great example what an exclusive can do for a platform. Halo:CE wasn't great or genre defining because you could melee with your rifle or throw grenades with your off-hand, it was great because:
1. Flawless integration of vehicles.
2. Vivid graphics. There's a lesson here for Guerrilla Games who, despite the technical tour-de-force Killzone 2 is, regressed from Quake I's palette where we got green, brown and gray to the palette in KZ2 where we only get gray.
3. Great gameplay: Weapons balance, pacing, enemy A.I. and map design (loved the vistas hovering over a battle in a banshee)
4. Great storytelling.

While others games had done some of the things before, none had done it all.

Cheers

 

[NRP]

But it had very restricted multiplayer capabilities...

Restricted how, exactly? Do you mean online multiplayer? Did any other console game at the time have online multiplayer?

Halo supported system link (aka LAN parties), and the multiplayer was pretty customizable for the time. Halo LAN parties were huge. We all bought TVs, Ethernet cables, switches, etc just so we could LAN Halo. Hell, at least one company (Major League Gaming) built a business around Halo's multiplayer capabilities.

Calling Halo's multiplayer capabilities "restricted" misses the mark IMO.

 

[function]

Restricted how, exactly? Do you mean online multiplayer? Did any other console game at the time have online multiplayer?

Lots of Dreamcast stuff did. Quake 3 and Unreal Tournament would be two FPS examples, and they could use modem or broadband adapter (as well as mouse and keyboard).

Halo could easily have supported online, but MS didn't have Live ready so I guess Bungie weren't allowed to put it in. I guess you could call it a management imposed restriction.

 

[nightshade]

Vivid graphics. There's a lesson here for Guerrilla Games who, despite the technical tour-de-force Killzone 2 is, regressed from Quake I's palette where we got green, brown and gray to the palette in KZ2 where we only get gray

Forgive me for going a bit OT here, but I just cant stop myself when one says that KZ2 has nothing but gray color palette. IIRC there are atleast 6 different color palette in KZ2 and out of all those gray is the least used palette. The prime color palettes of KZ2 are Green,Blue & yellowish orange.

 

[Nesh]

2. Vivid graphics. There's a lesson here for Guerrilla Games who, despite the technical tour-de-force Killzone 2 is, regressed from Quake I's palette where we got green, brown and gray to the palette in

Actually the color gray was only in the first area of the game. We got green, yellow, red, brown and other colors later on which were the main colors throughout the game.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Calling Halo's multiplayer capabilities "restricted" misses the mark IMO.

I've meant online, of course. Halo2 brought an explosion here and increased over the sales of the first Halo significantly.

 

[Semitope2]

The only genre changing element that Halo brought to the table was the regenerating health system. Everything else you mention had been done before.

Not really...apart from Regenerating health, A dedicated button for Grenades, Shields,Checkpoint system,Two weapon at a time & a dedicated button for melee which you could perform with every weapon is something which Halo did for the first time in FPS games. And I think Halo CE was the first FPS to have vehicles with mounted guns.

No I am not talking about Duel wielding cause I know Halo was not the first franchise to have it, it was the 2nd. But instead I am talking about the limit of player having one primary & one secondary weapon. Apart from that I dont remember any FPS having a dedicated melee & Grenade button before Halo CE.

Are you guys serious? Talk about checklist games. These things should not even be looked at individually or as significant developments in a genre. They SHOULD be decisions developers make to bring across the experience they want the gamer to have. It's hard to believe that in a creative industry things like that are considered significant.

Squilliam I think you're going out to left field - Blu-ray was included for one purpose at the end of the day and one alone - to triumph over HD DVD. Forget about all those slides and such that you saw presented back in the day; in game fidelity is not aided by BD as a storage medium.

Gaming is aided by the storage medium and its going to become more so in this generation. Maybe the main reason of its inclusion in the ps3 was to drive bluray forward but it does serve a purpose for gaming.

 

[dobwal]

Has any of those titles reached Halo3´s number of sales on the 360?

Nope (even though historically GTA is a bigger franchise than Halo), but if KZ2 that could pulled those GTA4/Gears/COD4 360 type of numbers in the same fashion it would of been labelled a blockbuster. And would naturally be seen as a complement franchise to the Halo series on a rival platform.

KZ is Sony's attempt to rival MS top franchise. Its hardcore features has nothing to do with its inability to accomplish what games like Gears and GTA have managed with same level of violence or setting.

Sony still has plenty of hope that KZ can achieve that goal because while the massive investment to produce instant blockbuster has failed they did not fail in terms of producing a quality title with a respectable following. As long as Sony is successful of building around what now is a good foundation, the fanbase will respond.

 

[Crossbar]

Nope (even though historically GTA is a bigger franchise than Halo), but if KZ2 that could pulled those GTA4/Gears/COD4 360 type of numbers in the same fashion it would of been labelled a blockbuster. And would naturally be seen as a complement franchise to the Halo series on a rival platform.

KZ is Sony's attempt to rival MS top franchise. Its hardcore features has nothing to do with its inability to accomplish what games like Gears and GTA have managed with same level of violence or setting.

Sony still has plenty of hope that KZ can achieve that attempt because despite the mass investment to try to produce instant blockbuster has failed they did not fail in terms of producing a quality title with a respectable following. As long as Sony is successful of building around what now is a good foundation, the fanbase will respond.

I think you are wrong, of course Sony wants every title to sell well, but they have a wide spread of titles that fits different niches, together they cover a lot of ground, and I am saying that KZ is not meant to fit the same wide niche as Halo. The niche of Gears of Wars may be more comparable, it´s a lot about how the title is marketed, but I am no going to try to analyze that.

By targeting a more narrow niche you´ll have a less potential buyers by definition and that is probably why those titles has not reached Halos number. Not saying those niches must be small, they may still be large chunks.

If you still think KZ was marketed to sell to the same wide niche as Halo3, we are just of different opinions and that is OK by me.