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Media Create Sales: June 1-7, 2009
- Thread starter donny2112
- Start date
Allan Holdsworth
Member
Other New IP RPGs published by Marvelous from a quick look at garaph...
NDS Contact - 6,064
NDS Avalon Code - 14,893
WII Muramasa - 23,900
PSP Valhalla Knights -14,089
Nibelung Valesti
Member
How much will Infinite Space sell? I hope it doesn't bomb... I want this game in a comprehensible language...
Versipellis
Member
More or less, yes.billy.sea said:
Layton's puzzles are a little more "straightforward" than those you find in this game, which is more based on lateral thinking. Here's a preview (mild spoilers alert, but nothing serious).
Sloane and MacHale are not the leading characters; they're the authors of the book used as a reference for this game.
Going into Japanese game stores these last few weeks (and even months) is so depressing if you care about sales enough. There are enough shoppers around, but the amount of things being bought just seems so low compared to even a year ago. I think the stores will be lucky to ring up customers at an average of one per five minutes.
That, and all the stuff that's just on sale these days. They still haven't sold out of the Biohazard 5 360 bundles, and the Gyakuten Kenji DSi bundles are still around too (an indication that Kenji is having a hard time selling to new fans without DS systems).
That, and all the stuff that's just on sale these days. They still haven't sold out of the Biohazard 5 360 bundles, and the Gyakuten Kenji DSi bundles are still around too (an indication that Kenji is having a hard time selling to new fans without DS systems).
Action Jackson
Member
Of All Trades said:
This post makes too much sense.
Cygnus X-1
Member
farnham said:
Actually, I cannot blame them. It's very difficult to predict how much will sell a game on Wii, if it's a non-Nintendo game and if it's a new franchise.
farnham said:
I wouldn't criticize the companies for lacking courage- given the current Wii market, I'd say it was a smart business decision to undership. Could ARF have sold a bit more? Probably..but nothing crazy. Maybe another 3-4K if it was more widely available, but nothing in the long run changes about the title. It will struggle to hit 60K and will rely on selling better in the West.
ARF definitely isn't sold out, in case anyone was wondering.
I think people need to now keep an eye out for Wii Sports Resort and how it will do. The pre-sale push is underway, and the game should be big, but I'm having my doubts as to whether it will be huge in one day like Smash Bros. or Mario Kart Wii were. I'm expecting more of a performance closer to Wii Fit. Nintendo is overdue for a 2009 million seller.
I think people need to now keep an eye out for Wii Sports Resort and how it will do. The pre-sale push is underway, and the game should be big, but I'm having my doubts as to whether it will be huge in one day like Smash Bros. or Mario Kart Wii were. I'm expecting more of a performance closer to Wii Fit. Nintendo is overdue for a 2009 million seller.
Stumpokapow
listen to the mad man
cvxfreak said:
The industry is in general. It's pitiful that only one game has even cracked 500k this year (2 if you count MHP2G's Best re-release sneaking up around 500k in annual 2009). Just pitiful.
Stumpokapow said:
I would also count Biohazard 5 among the three this year, mainly because if there were only a PS3 version, it would have been way beyond 500K anyway. (And it has nothing to do with my fandom, I swear. :lol)
schuelma said:
Actually, it's not that intense yet. Nintendo doesn't tend to employ in-your-face marketing in game stores as much as Capcom or Konami might. But the ads are there, and onlookers should see them. I think Nintendo is counting on the name speaking for itself, which is fair. Monster Hunter 3 on the other hand is already intense for a game a few weeks away, and will only get bigger.
Nintendo has put up notices for the red DSi and the black Wii. They should get bigger in the coming weeks, too.
Even DQIX doesn't have a lot of ads in dedicated game stores. In fact, SE is cleverly putting up big posters in front of convenience stores to catch the attention of people who may not frequent game shops.
Stumpokapow
listen to the mad man
HK-47 said:
1) Rising cost of rice is making it harder for people to buy games!
2) Taro Aso's manga fandom and immense personal popularity causing people to get into manga instead of games.
3) Video game buyers too scared of otaku gari to leave the house
All very likely explanations!
Stumpokapow said:
Well, to be fair, no a lot of high profile stuff were released in Japan so far. I think in general we're seeing more and more that only two types of releases can get massive numbers in Japan these days:
a) big franchise/brand titles
b) successful casual games
The buying power of core gamers are steadily decreasing for new IPs and spin-offs either because they want to spend less and hence only buy the titles they're sure that they'll like (known IPs, established brands), or because they no longer want to throw down full price for games they're unsure about.
Stuff like KH, FF, RE, etc will still sell without a doubt. But I haven't seen any new IPs do particularly well (500k+) in Japan since early PS2 days honestly. It's been all downhill since then.
JoshuaJSlone
Member
That almost anyone interested in Gyakuten Kenji would've already had a DS for one of the previous four Gyakuten games seems very unsurprising to me.cvxfreak said:
JoshuaJSlone
Member
Well, depends how you mean "early"; I'd consider Monster Hunter and Yakuza products of PS2's later days. I also take it you mean more core IPs, since things like Wii __, Brain Age, Nintendogs, and Layton come to mind too.duckroll said:
I didn't know that it started so low. According to the Famitsu top 500 Avalon Code sold 45k in 2008 – so it trippled its first week. Which isn't that bad.Allan Holdsworth said:
I don't believe that Arc Rise Fantasia will hit the 40k mark, though. Wii RPGs tend to have no legs at all, sadly. Well, maybe I'm just overly sceptic by now...
JoshuaJSlone said:
Yeah, I was referring to core IPs, since I already mentioned that successful casual games can do very well. Basically targeting people who are not us. Since if they're good games, people like us will buy it anyway, because we can see it, and yet they appeal to a crowd not limited to people like us.
Yakuza is pretty much the last successful new IP from Japan, yeah. Even with Yakuza and Monster Hunter, they didn't take off massively right off the bat. It took a ton of word of mouth and at least one re-release/sequel before the franchises really took off. That just shows how hard it is to fight for market share among core gamers these days imo.
test_account
XP-39C²
How so?farnham said:
Flying_Phoenix
Banned
I don't get why people think Arc Rise Fantasia is such a "bomb". It's only its opening week and clearly it didn't have such a big budget. And looking at past games of its relevance on other platforms seems to be doing similar to them (not saying that's a good thing).
This is just the late 2000 decade Japanese market. These kind of games have been going downhill for some time. Yes there are exceptions like Monster Hunter, Tekken, Blazblue, Yakuza, and Demon Souls. But they are just that, exceptions.
IMO it more so has to do with the lack of the core gamer market more so then competitive market share. Games like Kingdom Hearts, Final Fantasy, and the likes appeal to more then just the serious gamer.
This is just the late 2000 decade Japanese market. These kind of games have been going downhill for some time. Yes there are exceptions like Monster Hunter, Tekken, Blazblue, Yakuza, and Demon Souls. But they are just that, exceptions.
duckroll said:
IMO it more so has to do with the lack of the core gamer market more so then competitive market share. Games like Kingdom Hearts, Final Fantasy, and the likes appeal to more then just the serious gamer.
Flying_Phoenix said:
It certainly has a much higher budget than Luminous Arc though. And it's performing worse. Both games share the same developer and publisher, and Arc Rise Fantasia is a relatively big deal for the developer in particular. Mikage managed to attract several members of Tales Studio to join his company to make this game, and it's been in development for 2 years or more.
For it to perform worse than the SRPGs that he made with his much more amateur team with much less development time, is not good news because it just means MMV is now less likely to be interested in a "big" project with Image Epoch, when it sells worse than their small projects with MMV.
Flying_Phoenix
Banned
duckroll said:
I'm not saying that this game didn't bomb due to its budget, but more so due to its (what's the right word for this) "relevancy" in the gaming market. Big for Marvelous or not it looks pretty tame and average compared to other JRPG's on the market. And factoring that in it really didn't perform that much lower then your usual JRPG that doesn't have a brand name or huge marketing push behind it.
EDIT - I'm not trying to say that this isn't bad but more so that this isn't surprising or unusual.
idlewild_ said:ick @ those numbers
are the only big games on deck for next 2 mos WSR, DQIX and MH3? anything that might pick up the other systems?
I believe so. I don't see PS3 doing anything but going lower, honestly.
idlewild_ said:
Assuming the difference in MC is close to Famitsu, then yes.
Kurosaki Ichigo said:
You're funny.
Wii sales are crap. We know this. We've known this. However as long as retailers continue to only order "bomba" amounts of games for the Wii (likely influenced by how much confidence the publisher is putting into the game via advertising), it seems highly unlikely that it even could get better. Retailers should be happy not having extra stock around. Unfortunately for the Wii, unless the retailers order subsequent shipments, the average consumer would never even know these games existed. Can't buy what you don't know exists.
donny2112 said:Wii sales are crap. We know this. We've known this. However as long as retailers continue to only order "bomba" amounts of games for the Wii (likely influenced by how much confidence the publisher is putting into the game via advertising), it seems highly unlikely that it even could get better. Retailers should be happy not having extra stock around. Unfortunately for the Wii, unless the retailers order subsequent shipments, the average consumer would never even know these games existed. Can't buy what you don't know exists.
Why put all the blame on the retailers? One of the biggest factor for retailers orders aside from advertising is pre-order numbers. Especially for genres like RPGs. It is extremely unlikely that there will be a huge group of potential buyers for genres like RPGs who will go into a store and look on the shelves and go "oh hey cool I think I'll buy this RPG today!" RPG gamers are generally more well informed in terms of gaming releases and what not. If pre-order numbers for a new upcoming console RPG is really low, why would a retailer want to suddenly order MORE in the hopes of people coming in and suddenly deciding to buy the extra stock? The shelf space can be used for stocking up other genres which are more likely to sell to browsing customers instead. Don't you agree?
donny2112 said:You're funny.
Wii sales are crap. We know this. We've known this. However as long as retailers continue to only order "bomba" amounts of games for the Wii (likely influenced by how much confidence the publisher is putting into the game via advertising), it seems highly unlikely that it even could get better. Retailers should be happy not having extra stock around. Unfortunately for the Wii, unless the retailers order subsequent shipments, the average consumer would never even know these games existed. Can't buy what you don't know exists.
If the Wii fanbase were that interested in Arc Rise Fantasia, the game would have sold its first shipment in the first day.
This obviously did not happen so it's not retailer's fault. RPGs aren't going to show unusual legs only for being on Wii. If the game bombed in the first week it wouldn't have sold better with a huger shipment.
Schuelma has said it better:
And you still can buy "phantom" wii games (like Fragile) on Amazon.
AceBandage
Banned
Could we really have expected more out of ARF, though?
Has any company set up an RPG userbase for the console?
Has any company set up an RPG userbase for the console?
Stumpokapow
listen to the mad man
duckroll said:
Definitely Yakuza, Layton, and MH are really the only rising star IPs I've seen in the last few years (you might also qualify Rhythm Heaven, but I think that remains to be seen). I wonder if Inazuma might pick up similarly; it has had excellent growth since the rather underwhelming launch, and L5 is obviously committed to it, but I'm not sure it's got any staying power.
duckroll said:
Somewhat off subject, but would you also say Japanese RPG gamers are fairly averse to non-well known RPG brands, as well?
That seems to be the impression I get from the lamenting over non-brand name DS RPGs failing to light up the chart based on the quality of the game itself. If that is the case, then it falls on the publisher to get the name out to the public to build up awareness/desire for the game.
duckroll said:
For the retailer, yes. The retailer can't control how much a publisher wants to push a game in a typically front-loaded genre like RPGs. For the publisher, it makes sense to push awareness of a title to make that first week as high as possible, which would lead to more pre-orders and, thus, retailer orders, though.
Spiegel said:
Yeah, the four used and four new copies of the game on Amazon.co.jp really help sell the game to foot traffic in the retailers, since, you know, that was the whole premise behind the concept of the game being "invisible" to the average consumer.
dcdobson said:
Yeah but not that much more.
It sold 18K first day, selling through half its shipment. Would you agree that everyone that wanted to buy it first day did?
If so, then even if there were seventy thousand more copies available, there is no way it does much more than what it did in the following three days (10K) given the extremely front loaded nature of RPG's.
Now, sales might be hurt in next weeks chart if there is no further shipment, but again, we're not talking some huge difference here. I think ARF is probably worth a small second shipment, but that's about it. It was never going to be a hundred thousand seller and this constant "well it would have sold MORE if it had been better supplied" seems to be nothing more than a red herring.
bryehn said:
http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2009/06/sloane-machale/
schuelma said:
My point is that looking at 26K, it's easy (and has been done multiple times with various games) to call it "yet another Wii bomb." However when that first week number is also a relatively high percentage of the entire first shipment indicating that it couldn't have gotten significantly higher regardless, is it still okay to say it's mainly the Wii's fault that the game "didn't sell"?