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

[dobwal]

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.

You can tell how broad of a market a publisher/console manufacturer is targetting based on the level of investment they undertake for a franchise.

Sony not only paid for the development but they acquired GG in the process. GG output at that point was Killzone and ShellShock of which Edios retained the IP (ShellShock 2 was published early this year by Eidos and developed by Rebellion). You don't pour that type of money into a franchise with the intent of targetting a small niche market as neither have spent much time within the mainstream or casual price ranges.

The 360 and PS3 have for the most part targeted the mature market primarily. You only have to look at their top selling games and see that a broad swath of their market look like the perfect target audience for KZ2. Furthermore looking at the retail price history of both the 360 and PS3 would only help solidify that argument.

When your top selling list consists of titles like these, how can you say KZ2 was intended for rather limited hardcore niche market within the PS3 userbase.

Gran Turismo 5 Prologue
MotorStorm
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots
Grand Theft Auto IV
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves
Uncharted: Drake's Fortune
Resistance: Fall of Man
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare

You might be very much right in accessing that KZ2 was too hardcore to accomplish blockbusting sales. I would say in that case, Sony misread the market and that Sony's market presents a level of complexity that can't be described superficially. Looking at the level of investment, the appetite of Sony's userbase and the PS3 retail price history, I see a product that Sony intended for a broad part of the PS3 userbase.

 

[Acert93]

I'm not being snobby - I'd know they'd buy the games if they knew how good they were

Not really.

I have a 360 and keep an eye on used titles and a lot of former hits (Gears 1, Mass Effect, AC, Fable 2, etc) all have a lot of praise. But I have no interest in them. Ditto GTAIV, ME2, SC: Conviction, Fable 3, Alan Wake, FFXIII, and a slew of other really, really good games. And if I had a PS3 I wouldn't be wasting my time with UC2 and KZ2 (maybe rentals) and I would be playing that POS trash you loath aka MW2. Oh, and Madden. Just because a game is "good" doesn't mean I or others is going to like it. And what one person considers important to a game another might not even care about.

The same thing played out with the N64 for me. I imported Mario 64 and Pilot Wings; beat Mario, demoed it to people, but never played it again myself. Pilot Wings was a yawn. I had both Zeldas and felt like I was grinding to beat them. But then I put thousands of hours in Mario Kart 64, GoldenEye 007, and Mario Party. I knew how good Mario and ZOoT were--oozing with quality, some of the best games ever--but I wouldn't have rebought either. I would rent both but neither really appealed to me and offered no real longevity or social elements.

Anyhow, don't presume to know what people would buy if they "knew" how good a game was to you. If I would snub my nose at Mario, GTA, and Mass Effect of free choice don't presume that the reason we are snubbing our nose at PS3 titles is because we don't "get it." Maybe Sony doesn't "get" consumers.

Actually, based on their target of HD hardcore gamers and pretty pathetic lack of online features, services, and appealing games in the competitive market space (day late, penny short) I would say they definitely didn't get it soon enough in terms of where the *mass* was that market segment was. One can disagree with this point, but it isn't a wonder how there is such a high degree of connectivity for the HD market and how many of these online games have flourished.

 

[Acert93]

The first place you need to look with KZ2 is a) the protagonist and b) what compelling gameplay experience did it offer head and shoulders above the market?

Were Sony trying to draw current FPS fans drifting to and from each new major release or were they trying to ignite a groundswell of consumers excitement about THE next big new title to define the market? Being the first/best is pretty important (and in the right market segment and have good demographic appeal) if you want the major sales.

 

[Billy Idol]

Not really.

I have a 360 and keep an eye on used titles and a lot of former hits (Gears 1, Mass Effect, AC, Fable 2, etc) all have a lot of praise. But I have no interest in them. Ditto GTAIV, ME2, SC: Conviction, Fable 3, Alan Wake, FFXIII, and a slew of other really, really good games. And if I had a PS3 I wouldn't be wasting my time with UC2 and KZ2 (maybe rentals) and I would be playing that POS trash you loath aka MW2. Oh, and Madden. Just because a game is "good" doesn't mean I or others is going to like it. And what one person considers important to a game another might not even care about.
.

OT (sorry): Hey, Josh...you listed here some of the absolute best games this gen (in my opinion) and I highly recommend you to give them a try (especially: don't miss Gears 1!!!).

 

[Silent_Buddha]

OT (sorry): Hey, Josh...you listed here some of the absolute best games this gen (in my opinion) and I highly recommend you to give them a try (especially: don't miss Gears 1!!!).

Heh, you missed his point. He KNOWS it's a good game, to other people. But it has absolutely zero attraction for him.

Thus his point, that you can't make blanket statements that just because someone thinks a game is fantastic that it'll obviously be a good gaming experience for someone else.

IE - Just because some people liked Gears, KZ2, UC2, or Halo 3 doesn't mean that people who chose not to play them would like them if they did.

For example, I think any RPG that uses turn based combat is far superior to any of the realtime/psuedo-realtime RPGs, but most people don't agree, and I'm fine with that. Even if I personally think they are missing out on the greatest RPG experiences in the world.

Regards,
SB

 

[Billy Idol]

Heh, you missed his point. He KNOWS it's a good game, to other people. But it has absolutely zero attraction for him.

Thus his point, that you can't make blanket statements that just because someone thinks a game is fantastic that it'll obviously be a good gaming experience for someone else.

IE - Just because some people liked Gears, KZ2, UC2, or Halo 3 doesn't mean that people who chose not to play them would like them if they did.

For example, I think any RPG that uses turn based combat is far superior to any of the realtime/psuedo-realtime RPGs, but most people don't agree, and I'm fine with that. Even if I personally think they are missing out on the greatest RPG experiences in the world.

Regards,
SB

I just wanted to 'encourage' him to give some of this games a shot, as I think that they are highly entertaining, and not because I am a military Gears preacher

I did not argue against his point of view (which I understand as it applies somehow to me aswell: I never got into the GTA games), although a main argument (if you ask me) is often simple the available time: there are so much games releasing every month and usually one only has a limited amount of time available...so you have to choose which games you buy and naturally you choose the one you get atracted to the most.

That is why I can really understand that the release date of a game is very important and difficult to determine...it would be a nice theoretical experiment to look at the sales of the same game, just released at different times in the year (I know, not possible) with respect to the category 'short time sales/revenue' and 'long time sales/revenue'.

 

[Prophecy2k]

For example, I think any RPG that uses turn based combat is far superior to any of the realtime/psuedo-realtime RPGs, but most people don't agree, and I'm fine with that. Even if I personally think they are missing out on the greatest RPG experiences in the world.

Until today i thought I was all alone in the world

 

[totalcluedo]

The prevailing essence of this thread seems to be insecurity and misinformation. Sony are delighted with there first party. There hit rate from new ip's (Which theres been alot of) is almost perfect. Sony will increase not decrease first party resources. In 2010/2011 from Sony you're going to get some of the best games ever made.

On an individual title basis i'l only give one example. On a worldwide level Uncharted 2 is on course for 5 million lifetime sales.

 

[obonicus]

With possibly an exception or two, no one here is privy to what Shuhei Yoshida (much less Kaz Hirai or god forbid Stringer) think about the performance of Sony titles, so let's not be so quick as to claim they're ecstatic (or disappointed).

 

[totalcluedo]

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.

Where has Sony ever said Killzone is intended to rival Halo?. To get 10million+ sales takes more than a quality game, marketing, it needs to seep into mainstream culture and become an iconic game. A good example is Microsoft putting huge resources into the Forza franchise so it rivals Gran Turismo. What have they got to show for it?. Zilch is the answer. How many franchises in the industry are capable of these type of sales?. Halo, Gran Turimo, GTA and now Call of Duty is all.

Also costs to develop Killzone 2 was pretty much on par with other bigger titles from Sony at 27 million Euros.

 

[Dregun]

I have a theory on why KZ2 didn't sell as well as many people expected it to or what they thought Sony's expectations where.

I don't think anyone can deny that a very large majority of PS3 owners where not typical gamers upon the release of KZ2. During the HD-DVD vs Blu-Ray war many people who purchased the PS3 did so mainly because it was (and some extent still is) the best Blu-Ray player one could buy. We can assume that the success of Blu-Ray was contributed to the PS3, therefore we have to assume that the majority of PS3 sales was for Blu-Ray playback.

By going into AVSFORUM you can read and see installs from people who purchased the PS3 as the premiere way to get Hi-Def movies on some pretty lavish systems. I frequented those boards during the HD-DVD vs Blu-Ray war and it was continuously brought up that the PS3 was being used by its owners for watching movies instead of playing games. Many custom installers where using the PS3 during installs for people looking for theater rooms, in fact I remember reading an article about installers who were contacted only to install a PS3 so the owners could watch Blu-Ray movies.

The PS3 is in an interesting place, it technically has 2 seperate markets in encompasses, one that allows it to sell large quantities of Blu-Ray movies and the other that allows it to sell large quantities of Games. If we only focus on the market that purchased the PS3 to play games we would reduce the amount of PS3's we are using for attach rates. If anyone remembers the attach rates a year or two ago I think we can see that they are improving as more and more people who are purchasing the PS3 are doing so as a gaming console that plays Blu-Ray instead of a Blu-Ray player that plays games.

I personally believe that if KZ2 was released today it's attach rates would be much different then they where; just as I would assume the same for UC2 if it was released 6 months later as more PS3's are being purchased to play games instead of movies. As the price of the PS3 goes down more people who are interested in a "console" are buying it, where before the high price kept the machine in a market out of reach for many gamers.

 

[totalcluedo]

With possibly an exception or two, no one here is privy to what Shuhei Yoshida (much less Kaz Hirai or god forbid Stringer) think about the performance of Sony titles, so let's not be so quick as to claim they're ecstatic (or disappointed).

Why not, everyone seems to be saying the games dont sell well in contradiction to all available evidence?.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

The PS3 is in an interesting place, it technically has 2 seperate markets in encompasses, one that allows it to sell large quantities of Blu-Ray movies and the other that allows it to sell large quantities of Games. If we only focus on the market that purchased the PS3 to play games we would reduce the amount of PS3's we are using for attach rates. If anyone remembers the attach rates a year or two ago I think we can see that they are improving as more and more people who are purchasing the PS3 are doing so as a gaming console that plays Blu-Ray instead of a Blu-Ray player that plays games.

If that were true then the PS3's performance as a game console would be truly pathetic in comparison to the other consoles. A 1.5:1 advatage for X360 compared to PS3 isn't so bad. If you were to segregate some amount of PS3 as BRD machines making something like a 3:1 ratio, that would be disasterous.

Then again, it's as good a reason as any as to why PS3 moves so much less software compared to either of the other two consoles. Great in winning the HD format war, but not much for the bottom line as I'd imagine Sony doesn't get as much per BRD sold versus Game sold. As well the last financials didn't paint a pretty picture for Sony's disk duplication (which is where you'd get some idea as to how well BRD may be paying off for Sony).

I personally believe that if KZ2 was released today it's attach rates would be much different then they where; just as I would assume the same for UC2 if it was released 6 months later as more PS3's are being purchased to play games instead of movies. As the price of the PS3 goes down more people who are interested in a "console" are buying it, where before the high price kept the machine in a market out of reach for many gamers.

But then 6 months from now you could say, "In 6 months if they released it, it would sell more." Then 6 months from that point you could repeat that exact saying. Then 6 months from then you could repeat that exact same comment.

KZ2 released when it did. Trying to extrapolate sales for if it had released later doesn't really serve a purpose as you could say the exact same thing about every title ever released. Especially if you buy into the theory that attach rates done decline in general with increased user base (I don't).

Regards,
SB

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Why not, everyone seems to be saying the games dont sell well in contradiction to all available evidence?.

What evidence? Sales data? Nope. Rumored developement and marketing budgets compared to number of sales? Not for some titles. Vague statements from Sony that the Playstation brand (PS2, PSP, + PS3) is profitable month to month? Maybe. Then again the Playstation brand just dropped 1.3 Billion USD from 2008 to 2009, so that may have to be revised also...

What evidence?

Regards,
SB

 

[obonicus]

Why not, everyone seems to be saying the games dont sell well in contradiction to all available evidence?.

Because a lack of evidence for one claim doesn't mean the opposite claim can be made.

 

[totalcluedo]

If that were true then the PS3's performance as a game console would be truly pathetic in comparison to the other consoles. A 1.5:1 advatage for X360 compared to PS3 isn't so bad. If you were to segregate some amount of PS3 as BRD machines making something like a 3:1 ratio, that would be disasterous.

Then again, it's as good a reason as any as to why PS3 moves so much less software compared to either of the other two consoles. Great in winning the HD format war, but not much for the bottom line as I'd imagine Sony doesn't get as much per BRD sold versus Game sold. As well the last financials didn't paint a pretty picture for Sony's disk duplication (which is where you'd get some idea as to how well BRD may be paying off for Sony).



But then 6 months from now you could say, "In 6 months if they released it, it would sell more." Then 6 months from that point you could repeat that exact saying. Then 6 months from then you could repeat that exact same comment.

KZ2 released when it did. Trying to extrapolate sales for if it had released later doesn't really serve a purpose as you could say the exact same thing about every title ever released. Especially if you buy into the theory that attach rates done decline in general with increased user base (I don't).

Regards,
SB

Another post with little basis in reality. You people just make this stuff up as you go along dont you?. Wheres the evidence the PS3 sells less software comparative with install base?.

The best selling shooters on PS3 are the COD games, Resistance and Killzone.

The best selling racing games on PS3 are GT5P and Motorstorm.

The best selling 3rd person games on PS3 are MGS4 and the Uncharted games.

This whole thread is a pile of poo/misinformation/agendas/FUD.

 

[Dregun]

But then 6 months from now you could say, "In 6 months if they released it, it would sell more." Then 6 months from that point you could repeat that exact saying. Then 6 months from then you could repeat that exact same comment.

KZ2 released when it did. Trying to extrapolate sales for if it had released later doesn't really serve a purpose as you could say the exact same thing about every title ever released. Especially if you buy into the theory that attach rates done decline in general with increased user base (I don't).

Regards,
SB

I realize one could continue the trend you described, however my thought was removing the intial adopters of the system as a large majority of them purchased the machine for Blu-Ray playback. I was just theorizing about shifting the starting point ahead six months to remove some of the noise introduced by the initial sales of the console.

If we took an extreme example and said 1M PS3's sold for Blu-Ray playback and 1M sold for Gaming in the first 6 months and based our attach rates off of these figures a game could sell to 1M gamers and still only have a .5 attach rate. In my opinion we have another year before PS3 sales reach the point where we can start offsetting the intial sales as a Blu-Ray player. A percentage of the market was always going to use the PS3 as a dedicated Blu-Ray player, I believe that the early adopters of the system where a large portion of those individuals thereby skewing attach rates this early in the consoles life cycle.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

I personally believe that if KZ2 was released today it's attach rates would be much different then they where; just as I would assume the same for UC2 if it was released 6 months later as more PS3's are being purchased to play games instead of movies.

But how could Assassin's Creed 1 and Call of Duty 4 become multi-million sellers in 2007 then?
The interest in games has been there on the PS3 for years. Just not for Sony exclusives, as it seems.

 

[Toaddio]

But how could Assassin's Creed 1 and Call of Duty 4 become multi-million sellers in 2007 then?
The interest in games has been there on the PS3 for years. Just not for Sony exclusives, as it seems.

Do you have access to a list of the top 50 (or even 20) best selling games on the PS3?

 

[totalcluedo]

Because a lack of evidence for one claim doesn't mean the opposite claim can be made.

The whole basis of this thread seems to be that Sony 1st party games dont sell 10million like Halo (until GT5 most probably) so all there games are struggling in sales. Games that sell like that are like gold dust. To suggest that Sony 1st party games that routinely sell 2, 3, 4 million units are failing on what was a $400 system is absurd no other word for it. All that with an emphasis on new ip's which makes it even more impressive.