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Lionel Richie · May 9, 2017

Messofanego said:
Looks like Arkane is the Platinum of western developers in terms of sales versus quality

This is a damn good analogy, especially considering Arkane creates games that apparently don't have a huge audience but are definitely awesome (haven't played Prey though but it looks great).

Phediuk · May 9, 2017

I'm really disappointed at the reception to this game. People keep saying how they don't like handholdy AAA corridor shooters, blah blah, but then a game comes out that's the complete opposite of all of that and people are either indifferent or outright hostile toward it.

Anyway, game's been terrific so far and probably my GOTY.

ZombieSupaStar · May 9, 2017

Nirolak said:
Tomb Raider is also a series that is clearly out of sync with the market, so we're going to have a bad UK sales thread about Shadow of the Tomb Raider as well, but basically these were decisions made ages ago.

When Matsuda took over as CEO, he had basically every Square Enix new IP canceled in favor of existing titles. This caused IO interactive to lose half its staff, Crystal Dynamics to lose their new IP, and Eidos Montreal to lose their new IP and go into a variety of turmoil as they had to quickly get staff on a new project (which became Tomb Raider, along with canceling Obsidian's Deus Ex game and taking Deus Ex entirely in house).

These days Matsuda changed his mind as Square Enix's existing IPs all started facing significant sales headwinds, so now they're all on new IPs, whether they be based on licenses (see Marvel), or actually new (which is what Tabata's team of Final Fantasy 15 fame is supposed to be doing).

Which part of the dart board Matsuda will hit tomorrow is currently unclear, so for now, their focus will be on new IPs and Japanese eSports for new initiatives.

oh god I never knew about that, and now I wish I never had.

Jawmuncher · May 9, 2017

Poimandres said:
Before we all jump to gloomsville, hasn't this game been sitting at number 1 (down to 2 at times) seller on Steam since release?

jmga said:
According to SteamSpy the game has sold more than 100K copies(probably first day sales entirely), which is quite good knowing that they didn't even release a demo on PC and Dishonored 2's bad performance.

The game is awesome and it runs great for what I have seen, so at least on PC I think it will sell great with some time and thanks to word of mouth.

It's gonna depend a lot on the budget of the game. Much like what was said about Deus Ex (Which this is selling similarly too). This amount of sales doesn't look bad to us, but could be terrible for Bethesda. It'll be interesting to see what they say about the game.

UberTag · May 9, 2017

Wagram said:
They had a bad TV commercial.
Mixed reception demo.
No reviews.

Recipe for success right there.

Bethesda's approach to game marketing is to do the exact opposite of what Ubisoft does.
Doesn't seem to be a profitable strategy.
Perhaps they should give Vivendi a call and ask if they'd be interested in buying some stock.

Alebrije · May 9, 2017

This is good.........price drop will come faster than expected.

Will get it once this happens.

Think Bethesta is doing so much games and loosing focus.

Lord of Castamere · May 9, 2017

UberTag said:
Bethesda's approach to game marketing is to do the exact opposite of what Ubisoft does.
Doesn't seem to be a profitable strategy.
Perhaps they should give Vivendi a call and ask if they'd be interested in buying some stock.

Bethesda is already owned by corporate shills. I doubt Zenimax wants competition.

Ushay · May 9, 2017

Better get working on that Arx Fatalis reboot then Arkane

g23 · May 9, 2017

I think word of mouth will boost this game's sales overtime. It's too good to be a commercial flop.

Phediuk · May 9, 2017

g23 said:
I think word of mouth will boost this game's sales overtime. It's too good to be a commercial flop.

Did Dishonored 2 end up having any legs?

That was another flop that really bummed me out.

tariniel · May 9, 2017

Alebrije said:
This is good.........price drop will come faster than expected.

Will get it once this happens.

Same boat here, I have too much other stuff to play to justify $60 on any new game right now. I'll keep an eye out for it and grab it at around $30. I enjoyed the demo though, I usually hate jump scares but I liked the mimics in this game for some reason. Instead of getting angry and shutting the game off, I got angry and chased them with the wrench instead.

Jawmuncher · May 9, 2017

Phediuk said:
Did Dishonored 2 end up having any legs?

That was another flop that really bummed me out.

Not really. It's been stagnating on steamspy even after the demo and half-off, so i doubt the world of mouth is doing much.

Chobel · May 9, 2017

Man, that's bad. I guess this is the end of Prey IP.

ArkkAngel007 · May 9, 2017

Unlike Dishonored 2, there wasn't much marketing behind it. Coupled with no review copies to give media and content creators content to open up the mindshare, it's not much of a surprise.

A damn shame too, given that it's an amazing game.

Word of mouth could lead to some steady trickle of sales throughout the year, so hopefully the interest to continue the IP will exist. This could easily become what Bioshock should've been after 2.

gafneo · May 9, 2017

That's what they get for cancelling Prey 2 for this dud.

Betty · May 9, 2017

gafneo said:
That's what they get for cancelling Prey 2 for this dud.

That would've sold the same.

Human Trashcan · May 9, 2017

Kyoufu said:
0 marketing by my observations.

Yeah, they really sent it out to die

Shame, because it's brilliant. But maybe they did focus testing and determined that it wasn't gonna sell anyway, who knows. Really fucking bums me out though, I love the game and want more immersive sims always.

Scully Scully Scoo · May 9, 2017

As if casuals give a shit about reviews. This game has received virtually 0 marketing thats why it is failing.

Jawmuncher · May 9, 2017

Betty said:
That would've sold the same.

Realistically we'll never know.

BUT I doubt it. Since it was poised to come out during the PS3/360 era. I feel like it'd have a better chance for higher sales there. Especially since the original would at least be somewhat in people minds and you have the fact that it's a sequel to help carry things.

Duxxy3 · May 9, 2017

That's what happens when you don't allow advance reviews. Sorry.

Floody · May 9, 2017

Only reason I knew it was out was because the OT has a great title, had no idea it was releasing so soon beforehand. Then I saw them going after the 3 man indie team for having Prey in the title which turned me off supporting the game. Will buy it when it's much cheaper, have more than enough to catch up on anyway, maybe I'll move Dishonoured 2 up just to support Arkane a bit.

flaxknuckles · May 9, 2017

Betty said:
That would've sold the same.

hell nah an open-world space bounty hunter shooter wouldn't have sold as bad as this.

Matt · May 9, 2017

HateGames said:
As if casuals give a shit about reviews. This game has received virtually 0 marketing thats why it is failing.

Of course they do.

Lord of Ostia · May 9, 2017

Phediuk said:
Did Dishonored 2 end up having any legs?

That was another flop that really bummed me out.

Dishonored 2 isn't as good as Prey, tbh. There are a few ways in which Dishonored doesn't improve upon the first game, and in some ways is worse than the first, so I'm not surprised it isn't doing as well.

Poimandres · May 9, 2017

flaxknuckles said:
hell nah an open-world space bounty hunter shooter wouldn't have sold as bad as this.

It probably would have sold even worse...

Peroroncino · May 9, 2017

Matt said:
Of course they do.

Best selling game of 2017 so far has only 71 on meta. So I'd wager that they really don't.

Poimandres said:
It probably would have sold even worse...

Space bounty hunter? Where do I sign up?

Jawmuncher · May 9, 2017

Poimandres said:
It probably would have sold even worse...

Ya'll just trolling now

Matt · May 9, 2017

Bansai said:
Best selling game of 2017 so far has only 71 on meta. So I'd wager that they really don't.

That there are lower scoring games that succeed in no way means that reviews don't matter.

It just means they aren't the only thing that matters.

flaxknuckles · May 9, 2017

Poimandres said:
It probably would have sold even worse...

You are on shrooms if you think so.

PFD · May 9, 2017

It feels like they sent it out to die

I'll def buy this on sale (too many games), but I feel there was little to no marketing for this title

hawk2025 · May 9, 2017

Lord of Ostia said:
Dishonored 2 isn't as good as Prey, tbh. There are a few ways in which Dishonored doesn't improve upon the first game, and in some ways is worse than the first, so I'm not surprised it isn't doing as well.

Completely agree.

Prey feels like a fully realized vision. Dishonored 2 is good, but it doesn't feel this... committed.

Poimandres · May 9, 2017

Bansai said:
Space bounty hunter? Where do I sign up?

I would have bought the shit out of it. I think it looked awesome. New Prey is good as well though, but I wonder how much more interested some people would be if it had a different name.

Jawmuncher said:
Ya'll just trolling now

What was the last bounty hunter style game? All that comes to mind for me is Strangers Wrath and... yeah... another great game that didn't sell very well. There's no reason to assume that the Prey 2 concept would have sold well.

Nirolak · May 9, 2017

Matt said:
That there are lower scoring games that succeed in no way means that reviews don't matter.

It just means they aren't the only thing that matters.

Generally I feel that the games that succeed are:

1.) Games that are great fits for the current taste of the market.

2.) Games that aren't great fits for the current tastes of the market, but are considered exceptionally great at what they do.

Prey I would consider to not be a great fit for the current market, so I think it would need to both look conceptually exciting upon cursory examination to generate initial interest, and then have a notably strong critical (or at least widespread word of mouth) reception to help cement purchase intent.

I don't think it really does either of those well. Things like the goo gun or transformations don't seem especially novel compared to the kinds of things you could get with the gravity gun or a bunch of transformation mechanics in other (very old) games, reviews are suppressed by Bethesda, and an 89% approval rating on Steam is not even in the upper 25% of games on the platform, suggesting there aren't as likely to be hardcore evangelists out there pushing the game.

Jawmuncher · May 9, 2017

Poimandres said:
I would have bought the shit out of it. I think it looked awesome. New Prey is good as well though, but I wonder how much more interested some people would be if it had a different name.

What was the last bounty hunter style game? All that comes to mind for me is Strangers Wrath and... yeah... another great game that didn't sell very well. There's no reason to assume that the Prey 2 concept would have sold well.

The bounty hunter genre (As in being a real bounty hunter and not just a title *cough* metroid *cough*). Is so small i don't you can really compare it to anything else sales wise. At the end of the day it was still a sequel to a successful game, so it would have had the benefit of that previous games success to fall back on at least to an extent. While that doesn't necessarily mean a success (Deus Ex MD and DisHo2 being recent examples). I do think with that alone, it'd be able to sell better than what is essentially a new IP with nothing to fall back on.

Matt · May 9, 2017

Nirolak said:
Generally I feel that the games that succeed are:

1.) Games that are great fits for the current taste of the market.

2.) Games that aren't great fits for the current tastes of the market, but are considered exceptionally great at what they do.

Prey I would consider to not be a great fit for the current market, so I think it would need to both look conceptually exciting upon cursory examination to generate initial interest, and then have a notably strong critical (or at least widespread word of mouth) reception to help cement purchase intent.

Yeah, that a pretty good high level division. Obviously there are other factors that come into play as well, but generally titles would need to fill one of those two designations.

GlassAwful · May 9, 2017

The commercials aren't laid out well to show the game's strengths... I type this as the commercial just played on Comedy Central...

Anyway, it's too fast cut and trying to look bombastic when the actual game really isn't and these fast cuts don't really look that special compared to other games.

They should have done something to emphasize the paranoid atmosphere and unique setting of the game or the ingenuity encouraged in tackling objectives in an open environment. Bioshock at least managed to present a unique setting and gameplay for the time, this one just looks like a generic shooter.

-edit. I should say seeing as they didn't have a lot of pre release hype, the limited marketing they relied upon seems lackluster.

Nessus · May 9, 2017

Maybe this is when that whole "not letting people review your game beforehand" thing bites them in the ass since no one even knows it's out, even people who might have been interested in it.

Magic Mushroom · May 9, 2017

Alebrije said:
This is good.........price drop will come faster than expected.

Will get it once this happens.

Think Bethesta is doing so much games and loosing focus.

It's not good at all. It might be the death of the immersive sim and criple Arkane.

Poimandres · May 9, 2017

Jawmuncher said:
The bounty hunter genre (As in being a real bounty hunter and not just a title *cough* metroid *cough*). Is so small i don't you can really compare it to anything else sales wise. At the end of the day it was still a sequel to a successful game, so it would have had the benefit of that previous games success to fall back on at least to an extent. While that doesn't necessarily mean a success (Deus Ex MD and DisHo2 being recent examples). I do think with that alone, it'd be able to sell better than what is essentially a new IP with nothing to fall back on.

But it was basically a sequel in name only. Sure, Tommy would have featured in some capacity, but it was far removed from the original. Is that any different to using the same property for a brand new game like has happened here? That seems like the kind of reasoning that led to Bethesda using the Prey name for this game.

The original Prey was moderately successful a decade ago. I don't think the name holds much weight at all. I actually think the current Prey game would be in a better place with a different name. Get some new IP buzz going on.

Magic Mushroom · May 9, 2017

gafneo said:
That's what they get for cancelling Prey 2 for this dud.

It's a fucking great game versus a game that might have sucked balls.

Trojan · May 9, 2017

Alebrije said:
This is good.........price drop will come faster than expected.

Will get it once this happens.

Think Bethesta is doing so much games and loosing focus.

tariniel said:
Same boat here, I have too much other stuff to play to justify $60 on any new game right now. I'll keep an eye out for it and grab it at around $30. I enjoyed the demo though, I usually hate jump scares but I liked the mimics in this game for some reason. Instead of getting angry and shutting the game off, I got angry and chased them with the wrench instead.

Good for individual consumers in this instance but bad for the studio and industry. If sales remain flat it could mean no sequel, and I think it's bad for the games industry if new IP like thia are frowned up because sales don't meet expectations.

Antiwhippy · May 9, 2017

Messofanego said:
Looks like Arkane is the Platinum of western developers in terms of sales versus quality

Plat's last game was a million seller though. >_> <_<

Van Bur3n · May 9, 2017

Thanks, Bethesda.

Acerac · May 9, 2017

Fantastical said:
Bethesda deserves it for their awful review policy. Sad that a great game had to suffer because of it.

That plus their ridiculous need to sue minor devs who can't afford to defend themselves in court make it easy to ignore their titles for me.

Shredderi · May 9, 2017

Oh I have no doubt that OG Prey2 would have sold more, whether or not it was actually the better game or not. It just had a lot more going for it in terms of distinctive qualities. It would be unique even if it came out today and not in 2012 like it was supposed to. I think that alone would give it more mindspace.

Jawmuncher · May 9, 2017

Poimandres said:
But it was basically a sequel in name only. Sure, Tommy would have featured in some capacity, but it was far removed from the original. Is that any different to using the same property for a brand new game like has happened here? That seems like the kind of reasoning that led to Bethesda using the Prey name for this game.

The original Prey was moderately successful a decade ago. I don't think the name holds much weight at all. I actually think the current Prey game would be in a better place with a different name. Get some new IP buzz going on.

It was set in the same universe and had story ties. So that alone is enough to carry it. You can change things up radically and still be a sequel. Kind of like how RE6 to RE7 was though in this case it wasn't shifting the view points. So that keeping the name made sense.
In the case of Arkane's prey, I want to say there was an interview or something of the sort that basically said the name "Prey" was basically mandated to be used. Since Bethesda had to use it for something or risk losing the copyright/trademark or whatever they have for it.

I think the name itself would carry weight if it was as sequel to the original. Maybe not now since it's been so long. But for the original timeframe the game was supposed to release, I think it would've been fine (It's not like that game was coming out the date arkanes prey did had it come out).

I agree about the name thing though. I think it would've been in a better place with a different name. All the name did was make people mad who still thought of the original and confuse those who still remembered the game.

Belker · May 9, 2017

I hadn't realised it was out until I saw people on my friends list playing. It is listed as unavailable from my rental place though, so there's *some* demand for it among hardcore gamers. (That is if we assume it's mainly the hardcore that would have a game rental sub.)

I had no interest in the game because it wasn't intergalactic bounty-hunter game that was going to be Prey 2. I added it to my list, I think, mainly because it's something different from a developr I like. I plan to stream it.

Poohblaster · May 9, 2017

Chanc3r said:
Well I'm waiting for reviews so this is what Bethesda wanted right?

Me too! Great work Bethesda!

NecromorphTX · May 9, 2017

Bethesda, the king of marketing.

Nope.

LiquidSolid · May 9, 2017

Poimandres said:
What was the last bounty hunter style game? All that comes to mind for me is Strangers Wrath and... yeah... another great game that didn't sell very well. There's no reason to assume that the Prey 2 concept would have sold well.

Bizarre comparison. Does anyone care about that "sub-genre"? The appeal of Stranger's Wrath was that it was a great shooter in the Oddworld universe, not that it was a bounty hunter style game. Prey 2 wasn't a "bounty hunter style game" either, it was an open world sci fi shooter with platforming elements.

Personally, I think Prey 2 would've been a MUCH easier sell than Prey 2017 and that would've led to far more success. The CG trailer alone told you everything you needed to know about Prey 2 and it looked amazing. Whereas Prey 2017's CG trailer started out insanely slow and didn't really tell you a whole lot about the game.

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