Especially with how relatively little each installment actually costs to produce as I recall, with MW2 at least they blew WAY more on marketing than actual development. Reign that in some, and you probably have one of the only seriously profitable AAA games.as long as they still sell in the millions then i don't think activision will be crying too much.
as long as they still sell in the millions then i don't think activision will be crying too much.
Especially with how relatively little each installment actually costs to produce as I recall, with MW2 at least they blew WAY more on marketing than actual development. Reign that in some, and you probably have one of the only seriously profitable AAA games.
Especially with how relatively little each installment actually costs to produce as I recall, with MW2 at least they blew WAY more on marketing than actual development. Reign that in some, and you probably have one of the only seriously profitable AAA games.
Maybe it's just how much advertising was that made it look like it was less. Looking at other budgets, yeah, it's pretty high up there, though it's easier to defend on games like this versus, say, Too Human or Shenmue.Didn't they spend like $50m for developing and $150m for advertising MW2? That's not cheap at all...
I really hope another mega-franchise takes over next generation, one that is not such a typical action shooter, or at least reinvent the franchise next generation and not have the whole campaign as a Michael Bay film. I don't want COD to die as a franchise since I know many people enjoy it, but please let a game that can mature the medium take over in sales so that other companies can copy that instead of making COD-clones.
N64/PS1 Era: Final Fantasy
PS2/GCN/Xbox Era: Grand Theft Auto
PS3/Xbox 360/Wii Era: Call of Duty
Next Generation: ???
N64/PS1 Era: Final Fantasy
PS2/GCN/Xbox Era: Grand Theft Auto
PS3/Xbox 360/Wii Era: Call of Duty
Next Generation: ???
Well what's an up-and-comer this gen that has the potential to attract millions of sales with a development and style that's easy to emulate?
I've been expecting this day especially as sales have gotten progressively more front-loaded. That and the general rule a franchise can only attain social-phenomenon status for a single generation (Mario being the only known exception).
Stop now and they can have a Halo/GTA that still sells well from a base of fans and cultured quality. It won't move next-gen hardware and it won't be the "it" thing but it could still put down 10 million a release. Keep pushing machine gun sequels and and we could have another Guitar Hero/Tony Hawk, beating a dead horse and losing all the stored goodwill.
Since I'm not invested in anyway with this franchise and don't care for Activision's douche-baggery the later is find with me.
That is because there were a large number of accounts created at launch just to give MW3 a low score as soon as people could submit them. I don't think it's representative of the average mainstream opinion of the game. It's been #1 each week since launch on XBL, but some people just probably haven't felt the need to move on from Black Ops, so it'll be interesting to see if BO2 does better this year.That is, what you get when you subtract the user percentage score on Metacritic from the Metascore.
Multiple Nintendo franchises have "long tail" sales patterns, actually. Zelda and several of their casual series are the first that come to mind. Not as dramatic as Mario's, but still pretty stretched out compared to most games with high sales.
Didn't they spend like $50m for developing and $150m for advertising MW2? That's not cheap at all...
Man.. it'd never happen.. but what happens to Activision if they spend $200 million on a game and then it bombs? Ouch.
Man.. it'd never happen.. but what happens to Activision if they spend $200 million on a game and then it bombs? Ouch.
Introduction
Growth
Maturation
Decline
Death
All things follow this path. Although one could argue that Activision fed CoD fast as they could through it in order to keep their stock in the growth/maturation phase. But how long will that hold?
How many more IPs can you sacrifice to the short term investment Gods before you have no lineup? Haven't they already halted all new IP development except their major franchises?
You really couldn't be more spot-on.Guitar Hero'd
Also, used game sales are to be blamed
They've made enough money from the Call of Duty franchise and have several profitable revenue streams. They won't be in trouble any time soon. The stages you mentioned is for a product's life cycle; there's no death stage because a manufacturer usually introduces a new product at the decline stage. I don't think Activision will be creating any new IPs at this stage in the generation, and this applies to a lot of publishers. Early next-gen is when we will be seeing some major innovation from a lot of third-party publishers.Introduction
Growth
Maturation
Decline
Death
All things follow this path. Although one could argue that Activision fed CoD fast as they could through it in order to keep their stock in the growth/maturation phase. But how long will that hold?
How many more IPs can you sacrifice to the short term investment Gods before you have no lineup? Haven't they already halted all new IP development except their major franchises?
That's becaue BLOPS was the best COD game ever.
*Covers head*
But, for real, it was.
That's becaue BLOPS was the best COD game ever.
*Covers head*
But, for real, it was.
The average CoD fan seems to disagree with you there. Most CoD people I know refer to it as "Shit Ops" for some silly reason.
Pfft. They probably prefer MW2 over COD4 as well.
I actually liked MW3.
Maybe that's because I never really got into Black Ops, so I compared MW3 mostly to MW2, which was not very good online.
Modern Warfare 3 online blows. That's why. A lot of people I know got so sick of it they went back to Black Ops.
Because some believe it brings a negative influence on the industry, and they're not wrong. You see so many developers imitating the CoD formula.why exactly are some of you happy about this? you don't like COD? don't play it.