Console Exclusives: Significance and Impact *spinoff*

Hell, I still have 20+ games in my Steam Library that I haven't even had a chance to install, much less play. So it's not like I lack for things to play.

Regards,
SB

Please be honest. Your not that interested in the Yakuza games and you probably would not get them anyway. If you really wanted to play them you could buy a used PS3 (or 4) play the games and sell the console afterwards.
 
That's an assumption about behaviour and what people are willing to do. I'd never buy a console, play a game, and sell it afterwards - too much faf. That doesn't mean I'm not interested in playing a game. Another example would be Baldur's Gate Dark Alliance. Would love to play that again. I could get a GPU and emulator going, or I could buy a PS2 second hand and then sell it afterwards, but this is all too much effort. Instead I hope Sony roll out BC in PS4 or PS5 and I can play them that way.

Just because buying a second hand console, playing games, and selling it works for you, you shouldn't assume it works for everyone and can be a measure of interest.
 
I think there's more to Sony's 1st party success than just "investing" in single-player games.
Not only did Sony take a risk in investing in single-player games, they did so by letting the teams keep doing them after soft successes and soft failures.

- Horizon: Zero Dawn appeared after Guerrilla launched Killzone Shadow Fall at PS4's with a lukewarm reception.
- God of War 4 appeared after SIE Santa Monica's latest AAA project, The Order 1886 (with Ready at Dawn), was a failure in sales and critic scores
- SIE Japan makes their fair share of mistakes (namely Knack..) yet they keep pushing the studio for participating in single player games like Bloodborne, Gravity Rush 2, VR games, etc.

Compare this with e.g. EA who will just insta-kill any studio that brings a failure to the market and has a death toll of over a dozen studios by now.

There's been something bothering me when people bring in Metacritic to bolster the importance of 1p exclusives. It's taken me a bit to figure out why.
Like it or not, Metacritic is the de facto standard of game appreciation measurement by the industry.

This is a "reaction video" from God of War's director, made a couple of hours after the review embargo lifted.


His emotional response doesn't come from specific reviewers. It comes from the Metacritic score.
He knows all the bonuses for the team and whether certain team members can remain or not will heavily depend on the Metacritic score.

It's just how the industry works right now. We've known that for years.
 
Silent-Buddha is talking about the relationship between Metascore and consumers (notably their buying behaviours and whether they are attracted to a platform). The industry valuing Metacritic doesn't mean that higher Metascores result in better sales and more appreciation by consumers. We all know of critically acclaimed games that haven't sold well. However, as I argue above, I think it can be taken as fact that better scores on average result in better sales and more appeal on average, unless someone can present data to the contrary.

That said, I don't recall any console manufacturer using Metascores in their marketing. "More 90+ rated games on Metacritic than any other console," just doesn't happen, so Joe Consumer probably isn't even aware of it. I think Joe Consumer just gets an overall impression of a platform when their choice of reading (non-gaming websites and newspapers with tech and gaming sections, for example) happens to rave about a game. If they come across, "Sony's Ps4 has an absolutely amazing game in..." a few times, they'll associate the platform with amazing games even if they have no particular interest in the games they read about. A high Metascore means more positive coverage and a greater reach for this idea of a platform equalling awesome games.
 
The industry valuing Metacritic doesn't mean that higher Metascores result in better sales and more appreciation by consumers.

Actually, I think it means exactly that.
Sure, there are notable exceptions. But with a given marketing budget, time distance to direct competitors and a series of other factors, the publishers have established a good correlation between Metacritic scores and sales performance.

Likewise, many consumers will look at Metacritic scores when trying to decide which game they want within the same genre. Even if you don't look for metacritic specifically, if you type "Game-title score" in google, guess what the first results will lead you to?

Publishers aren't sticking Metacritic scores into contracts just because they like pretty numbers.



That said, I don't recall any console manufacturer using Metascores in their marketing.
No, but they use Metacritic scores in their contracts with developers as performance indicators.

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/...a-meant-bonus-payment-only-with-85-metacritic
https://www.kotaku.com.au/2015/09/heres-what-a-publishing-deal-with-ea-looks-like/

Again: this is not new. It's been known for quite a while.
And looking at Cory Barlog's video will tell you it's still the same today, whatever the publisher.
 
Actually, I think it means exactly that.
I think you've missed my argument. I'm saying I think it means that, but it's not proof and there is no proof. Proof would require sales figures and Metascores to be compared and a clear correlation drawn. In the absence of such proof, it's a safe assumption.

No, but they use Metacritic scores in their contracts with developers as performance indicators...
That still doesn't show how library Metascores affect public perception of a platform, if at all. You haven't addressed Silent-Buddha's point, that he doesn't think there's a correlation between critical acclaim and public value in that awareness on a platfrom level. I agree it can be implied and, certainly in the absence of any better info, is a meaningful way to compare libraries, but that doesn't prove that a higher number of 90+ metascore games increases a platform's value and gives it a competitive edge. There's also a question of whether number of highest game scores or mean average game scores or interquiartile game scores or whatever is the deciding factor for consumer perception.

Silent-Buddha is right to question it, but I think that decent arguments are made in favour of Metacritic scores.
 
That's an assumption about behaviour and what people are willing to do. I'd never buy a console, play a game, and sell it afterwards - too much faf. That doesn't mean I'm not interested in playing a game. Another example would be Baldur's Gate Dark Alliance. Would love to play that again. I could get a GPU and emulator going, or I could buy a PS2 second hand and then sell it afterwards, but this is all too much effort. Instead I hope Sony roll out BC in PS4 or PS5 and I can play them that way.

Just because buying a second hand console, playing games, and selling it works for you, you shouldn't assume it works for everyone and can be a measure of interest.

If you are really interested in something you are willing to make some effort to experience it. For the Yakuza series you have had 15 years to buy a PS family console to experience the games. If you are not willing to do that you can't really claim that you are interested.
 
There are different degrees of interested - it's not a binary choice. Are you interested enough to buy a £50 game for your existing console? What about buying a new console? What about buying a two thousand pound retro console off eBay on an international import of a rare, exotic machine? What about getting a second job and never seeing your family for 8 months to make enough money to buy that thing you're interested in? Which one of those scenarios counts as 'being interested' such that less demanding scenarios count as being 'disinterested'.
 
Exactly. I'm interested in playing Nintendo games but not enough to spend another $400 on hardware to do so.
 
I think you've missed my argument. I'm saying I think it means that, but it's not proof and there is no proof. Proof would require sales figures and Metascores to be compared and a clear correlation drawn. In the absence of such proof, it's a safe assumption.

That still doesn't show how library Metascores affect public perception of a platform, if at all. You haven't addressed Silent-Buddha's point, that he doesn't think there's a correlation between critical acclaim and public value in that awareness on a platfrom level. I agree it can be implied and, certainly in the absence of any better info, is a meaningful way to compare libraries, but that doesn't prove that a higher number of 90+ metascore games increases a platform's value and gives it a competitive edge. There's also a question of whether number of highest game scores or mean average game scores or interquiartile game scores or whatever is the deciding factor for consumer perception.

Silent-Buddha is right to question it, but I think that decent arguments are made in favour of Metacritic scores.

Almost.

The biggest thing that I bring up and everyone has missed.

Metacritic scores are an echo chamber of people who already are interested in that type of game. As such it doesn't include people that aren't interested in that type of game. Is someone interested in GTA V going to also be interested in Legend of Zelda: BOW? There's a high likelihood that not everyone that likes GTA is also going to like Zelda. But people that don't like Zelda are unlikely to play or rate Zelda in the first place.

Hence why I used StarCraft 2 (93 metacritic). The majority of the users on this forum aren't interested in RTS games, so does SC2 having a high Metacritic rating mean that it will sell more copies than HZD (89) or COD: Infinite Warfare (77) with a lower Metacritic score? And will the majority of people on this forum also agree that SC2 is a better draw for the average consumer than HZD or COD: IW because of the higher metacritic score?

On a per SKU basis, does Battlefield 4 (81) or COD: Inifinite Warfare (77) represent a worse draw for the average consumer than GOW (94) or HZD (89)?

Cross genre comparisons become almost meaningless due to this. Even same genre comparisons become tricky if there's an established playerbase for a franchise.

Did Resistance: Fall of Man (86) ever come even remotely close to any of the CODs (PS3 version only)? Nope. COD 3 (88) was also in the launch window of PS3.

Which did better on X360? Halo: Reach (91) or COD: BO (87)? It wasn't the one with the higher metacritic score.

I've listened to the podcasts of a fair few reviewers as they talk about this phenomena, and it's actually quite interesting to hear their thoughts on why sales don't always match the review scores that they give to a game.

While there are obvious cases where sales performance matches, there are also obvious cases where it doesn't. And my main point from before is that when you try to compare metacritic scores across genres and then try to associate average consumer interest (usually represented by sales) in those titles, the comparison completely falls apart.

When comparing titles within the same genre, it should generally be representative, but that isn't always the case. For example, I believe HZD (89) sold more copies than the PS4 version of The Witcher 3 (92).

Regards,
SB
 
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There are different degrees of interested - it's not a binary choice. Are you interested enough to buy a £50 game for your existing console? What about buying a new console? What about buying a two thousand pound retro console off eBay on an international import of a rare, exotic machine? What about getting a second job and never seeing your family for 8 months to make enough money to buy that thing you're interested in? Which one of those scenarios counts as 'being interested' such that less demanding scenarios count as being 'disinterested'.

In the context of having been "interested" in the Yakuza series I would say somewhere between one and two (closer to one).
 
Almost.

The biggest thing that I bring up and everyone has missed.

Metacritic scores are an echo chamber of people who already are interested in that type of game. As such it doesn't include people that aren't interested in that type of game. Is someone interested in GTA V going to also be interested in Legend of Zelda: BOW? There's a high likelihood that not everyone that likes GTA is also going to like Zelda. But people that don't like Zelda are unlikely to play or rate Zelda in the first place.

Hence why I used StarCraft 2 (93 metacritic). The majority of the users on this forum aren't interested in RTS games, so does SC2 having a high Metacritic rating mean that it will sell more copies than HZD (89) or COD: Infinite Warfare (77) with a lower Metacritic score? And will the majority of people on this forum also agree that SC2 is a better draw for the average consumer than HZD or COD: IW because of the higher metacritic score?

On a per SKU basis, does Battlefield 4 (81) or COD: Inifinite Warfare (77) represent a worse draw for the average consumer than GOW (94) or HZD (89)?

Cross genre comparisons become almost meaningless due to this. Even same genre comparisons become tricky if there's an established playerbase for a franchise.

Did Resistance: Fall of Man (86) ever come even remotely close to any of the CODs (PS3 version only)? Nope. COD 3 (88) was also in the launch window of PS3.

Which did better on X360? Halo: Reach (91) or COD: BO (87)? It wasn't the one with the higher metacritic score.

I've listened to the podcasts of a fair few reviewers as they talk about this phenomena, and it's actually quite interesting to hear their thoughts on why sales don't always match the review scores that they give to a game.

While there are obvious cases where sales performance matches, there are also obvious cases where it doesn't. And my main point from before is that when you try to compare metacritic scores across genres and then try to associate average consumer interest (usually represented by sales) in those titles, the comparison completely falls apart.

When comparing titles within the same genre, it should generally be representative, but that isn't always the case. For example, I believe HZD (89) sold more copies than the PS4 version of The Witcher 3 (92).

Regards,
SB

You compare very good game with excellent game. Compare a sub 75 single player games sales to a 85+ single player game the difference in sales is huge.. And out if new Ip a establish franchise will aklways benefit from other episode or popularity if muktiplayer mode like for FPS with COD...

Another things to know for multiplayer or GAAS game metacritic score don't matter so much marketing and word of mouth matters more Ghost Recon Wildlands is at 70 and it is a commercial success, Destiny is at 76%... I agree metacritic is not a good metric for multiplayer game. The journalists need to test a game as fast as possible and multiplayer interest is ib long term when the game keep playing for tens or hundreds of hour...

I think exclusives is one important factor not the main one driving sales. Brand and price comes before but it is an important one more than power, If ir was not the case Microsoft would not prepare next generation investting into GAAS game and single player game like the new Fable...
 
You paid $400 for a PS4 and don't play PS4 games, so there's that :)

It was for Awesome:Robot Dinosaurs, so it was the right decision.:yes:

It was $350 ... (and I had plenty of Amazon Gift Cards) for Awesome: Robot Dinosaurs and Graham's game (when it gets released).

I just have no interest in the other typical Sony-style exclusives.
 
In the context of having been "interested" in the Yakuza series I would say somewhere between one and two (closer to one).

In the context of Yakuza. I was almost completely uninterested in the series until a couple months ago when I started to watch Bikeman and CohhCarnage play Yakuza 0 and Yakuza 6 (Bikeman got an exception from SEGA that allowed him to stream past the embargo level of Yakuza 0). Since then I've also watched them play some Yakuza Kiwami (Yakuza 1).

While I already know I'm not going to like the QTE game segments (Karaoke, Dance, etc.) most of the other mini game segments are huge draws for me. I love management games so running things like running the comfort bar, baseball team, taking over retail properties, etc. really get me wanting to play the game. The fact that there is discovery without having to have a map cluttered with icons everywhere for quests and POIs is a big plus. The fact that while it's semi-open exploration, the exploration area is limited means that I'm unlikely to miss something is also a huge plus. While I wouldn't consider this an open world game due to the relatively small exploration areas, it's as close to me liking an open world game as I'm going to get.

I do like the gall of some of the people on this forum though.

First I have people telling me what games I should like.

Now I have people telling me what games I don't like.

Seriously. I don't understand why some people feel the need to lecture other people on what games they should or shouldn't like. I don't go around telling people they are wrong if they don't like the games I like or like the games I don't like. :p

Regards,
SB
 
I do like the gall of some of the people on this forum though.

First I have people telling me what games I should like.

Now I have people telling me what games I don't like.

Seriously. I don't understand why some people feel the need to lecture other people on what games they should or shouldn't like. I don't go around telling people they are wrong if they don't like the games I like or like the games I don't like. :p

Regards,
SB

This is OT, but anyway. Where has people told what games you should like and what games you do not like? Quotes or it didn't happen.
 
While I already know I'm not going to like the QTE game segments (Karaoke, Dance, etc.)

The dance game in Yakuza Zero is not QTE based. You would know that if you had actually played it.

While I wouldn't consider this an open world game due to the relatively small exploration areas, it's as close to me liking an open world game as I'm going to get.

I thought you had not actually played the game?
 
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This is OT, but anyway. Where has people told what games you should like and what games you do not like? Quotes or it didn't happen.

Sure...

Please be honest. Your not that interested in the Yakuza games and you probably would not get them anyway. If you really wanted to play them you could buy a used PS3 (or 4) play the games and sell the console afterwards.

Implying that I'm lying and that I'm not extremely interested in the Yakuza games?

The dance game in Yakuza Zero is not QTE based. You would know that if you had actually played it.

From what I saw, it's move to X location on a grid, hit QTE button in time with the music (too soon or too late and you don't get credit), move to next location on the grid, hit different QTE button in time with the music. Higher difficulty opponents decrease the time window to get to the location and hit the correct button. It's basically a QTE with movement involved with longer paths taken to get to the next button press increasing your score.

I thought you had not actually played the game?

You are correct, I haven't played it yet. No one I know owns the game. It's not the type of game they are interested in. But as I've mentioned multiple times in multiple posts in multiple threads. Twitch streams and YouTube lets plays are one of my main avenues for game discoveries. If I watch something and it makes me want to play it, it's a game I want to play.
  • Dark Souls series.
  • Darkest Dungeon.
  • Defender's Quest.
  • Final Fantasy XV
  • Guild of Dungeoneering
  • Zombie Night Terror (Basically Zombie Lemmings that kill people)
  • FTL
  • Ori and the Blind Forest
  • One Piece Pirate Warriors
  • Slay the Spire
I could go on and on and on with games that I had absolutely Zero interest in until I saw it being played on Stream or in a YouTube VOD. I own most of them now(don't own Slay the Spire yet) as I know I want to play them. So far, I haven't regretted buying them (haven't gotten to play all of them). Well, I do somewhat regret FFXV but on balance it left a positive impression.

Currently Yakuza 0, Yakuza Kiwami, and Yakuza 6 have given me that same feeling of wanting to play the games. Those join Persona 5 on PS4 as the only games on the platform that have really made me feel the way those games in the above list made me feel as I watched them being played. Persona 5 because its a good turn based RPG at it's base. Yakuza games because I REALLY dig some of the mini games. The main gameplay loop (fighting gangs over and over and over again) is kind of meh. But those mini games look absolutely fantastic.

Had I seen the PS3 versions of the Yakuza games being played way back when, they probably would have joined Ni No Kuni as one of the only games on PS3 that made me want to play it.

Regards,
SB
 
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