How to sell next-gen consoles, Marketing, Positioning, and Pricing [2020]

Nesh said:
Thats something I wonder. So we wont be seeing any Series X exclusives taking advantage of the hardware real capabilities for 2 years and Hellblade 2 will be released so far away from launch?
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If a game is ready to be shown in-game it means it will arrive pretty soon max 2 years. Remember the UC4 in engine trailer it tooks time for the final game to arrive, it is better to show gameplay.

I don't like in engine presentation this is valid for Sony, MS and third party. ND is the one doing it on Sony side.

After Ninja Theory had 7 months to create a nice vertical slice of gameplay, it will maybe be enough if they were not too impacted by COVID-19.

At the end press begin to downplay the visual impact of next generation

https://twitter.com/x/status/1258433850255892480

40r3my.jpg


 
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Microsoft admits "we set some wrong expectations" with Xbox Series X "gameplay" reveal

Eurogamer said:
Perhaps the biggest culprit was the much-hyped gameplay reveal of Assassin's Creed: Valhalla, which itself was teased by publisher Ubisoft by a trailer that went live after an elaborate Twitch stream that unfolded over the course of a day. This gameplay reveal turned out to contain no gameplay at all, rather, flashy in-game cinematic camera work. The reaction to this video has been similarly negative, with thousands of dislikes and angry comments across the various channels it's been uploaded to.
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GM of XBox Game Marketing:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1258584474155053058


Assassin's Creed Valhalla's Creative Director:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1258539675947429889





Shifty Geezer said:
Indeed. Never look to gamers to be just in their outrage. ;)
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40qy6v.jpg





RobertR1 said:
After seeing those tweets Az linked, disorganized is probably a better word for what happened.

They should have decoupled the AAA/mainstream games from this showcase and spent the extra time to highlight whether the game was an indie dev or a smaller house and if it's exclusive or not, etc. Maybe key features like RT, 120fps.

That would give some nice clarity and set a clear expectation these aren't your AAA titles. To randomly group them together and give no context just created confusion all around.
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Assassin's Creed Valhalla is your AAA title, they kept mentioning how great it'd be to see gameplay, then they didn't show any gameplay. And after not showing any gameplay, they bragged about how great it was that they saw Valhalla's gameplay.



Shifty Geezer said:
The problem here is MS have been too honest. Gamers (consumer) don't want reality but dreams.
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Where's the honesty in claiming you'll be showing gameplay and then not showing gameplay? It's the exact opposite, gamers wanted reality (gameplay) and Microsoft delivered dreams (pre-scripted renders done on non-final hardware).


Can't we all just admit the very obvious, which is Microsoft dropped the ball by promising gameplay and not delivering gameplay, and then move on with our lives? Everyone + their dogs pointed that out, then Microsoft themselves pointed that out, then game developers pointed that out. It's taking anything but denial to not admit this at this point.

I don't even know how one can attribute this to "Microsoft being too honest". That makes no sense at all.
 
TheAlSpark said:
Folks need to keep in mind the nature of creating consistently high fidelity art, and what that means for budget, time, and overall scale.
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The publisher, studio, and platform holder set the expectation... It is better to underpromise and overdeliver than overpromise and underdeliver. This is how a game must be revealed. One was a reveal before launch, no lie just honest gameplay...





At least MS understood they can't do this or they will receive a backslash. I hope this is the last time of the generation. Sony needs to take a lesson from this too.
 
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chris1515 said:
The publisher, studio, and platform holder set the expectation... It is better to underpromise and overdeliver than overpromise and underdeliver. This is how a game must be revealed. One was a reveal before launch, no lie just honest gameplay...





At least MS understood they can't do this or they will receive a backslash. I hope this is the last time of the generation. Sony needs to take a lesson from this too.
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Why does Sony need to take a lesson when they seem to have learned?
HZD, Killzone Shadow Fall, SpiderMan, GoW, all looked spectacular and just as good as their first videos
 
Nesh said:
Why does Sony need to take a lesson when they seem to have learned?
HZD, Killzone Shadow Fall, SpiderMan, GoW, all looked spectacular and just as good as their first videos
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Yes but they did the error with UC4 never agains. Same better to do one big and impactful event.
 
Well it's Sony's turn next. All they gotta do to set the industry on fire is to show the following:
* Horizon sequel PS5 only in glorious, unhindered, industry benchmark setting next gen graphics that blows everything away in a 5min gameplay sequence followed by a trailer. (by that time faith is 99% restored and next gen graphics expectation reinvigorated)
* GT7 PS5 only, with graphics rival GT Sport's Scape render.
* BluePoint's new game PS5 only. Also industry leading in graphics as they promised already.
* Spiderman 2 PS5 only. Almost matching movie's CGI, crazy dense city and devoid of pop ins.
* A few new PS5 only game teases from other first party studios.
* AAA third party PS5 exclusives such as Silent Hill
* A/AA exclusives (Quantum Error, God Fall, etc)
* PS5 enhanced cross gen games in 4k/60 with bolted on Raytracing
* Knack 3 in 8k/120fps

* One last thing. A face of Kratos emerges that looks like the CG trailer from God of War PS4, only this time in real time in game graphics. Fades away with a text "Ragnarok begins".

Honestly just show Horizon 2 and Spidey 2 and people will be happy for a long long time.
 
iroboto said:
You’re going to be heavily disappointed.
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Which part? I don't expect everything to be shown in one presentation of course but it would be unrealistic if they don't end up showing a whole bunch of PS5 only games from both first and third party studios. Knowing the graphical leap they have achieved this gen from last gen, I say it's pretty much a guarantee that we'll have our socks blown off.
 
ultragpu said:
Which part? I don't expect everything to be shown in one presentation of course but it would be unrealistic if they don't end up showing a whole bunch of PS5 only games from both first and third party studios. Knowing the graphical leap they have achieved this gen from last gen, I say it's pretty much a guarantee that we'll have our socks blown off.
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I just don’t think any company will be able to close the gap from reality to expectation that you have of them.
 
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ultragpu said:
to this
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Both those aren't really mind-shattering, the last shot looks great, but not that much from what we have today, what he means is that a generational leap from say PSX to PS2 isn't what to expect, from GT2 to GT3 we went from a pixelated game to something that seemed unreal at the time.
Same for MGS2, people didn't even believe it. Lay MGS1 and 2 side by side, that's what shocked people.
 
I will rather try to keep my expectations low and hopefully be surprised. 10+ TF games have been out there in plain sight on PC hardware since 2017, but hopefully these closed systems can squeeze out a bit more eye candy. I think from 2021 and out we should start to really see what they are capable of. It will take time to shift from legacy game engines and learn to harness the power.
 
Barrabas said:
I will rather try to keep my expectations low and hopefully be surprised. 10+ TF games have been out there in plain sight on PC hardware since 2017, but hopefully these closed systems can squeeze out a bit more eye candy.
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Pretty easy to forecast. Look at the games of 2013 on a 5 TF 780 Ti and see how a 1.8 TF PS4's best games compare.
 
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