True,they try to appeal to a wider audience and in the process forget what made the DS games so good in the first place as they tacked on MP modes,turned to shooter style campaigns,added CO-OP and micro transactions.
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Rumour: Dead Space 4 Cancelled Following Poor DS3 Sales [EA: "Patently False"]
- Thread starter V_Ben
- Start date
This seems to be a common misconception in this thread. There weren't enough survival horror fans to make the series successful. If there were, the 3rd game would have stayed the course.
As it was, there were two options. Cancel the series, or try and mainstream it. The series you liked was dead either way.
You can't listen to your fans when there aren't enough to give you a hit.
The worst thing coming out this generation is "capturing the casual market" and "wider appeal". With every iteration of the game in a franchise, the lure of the original dies amongst your core buyers. This is self inflicted. Blame no one but executives who use those said phrases as business philosophy.
Why would EA even want DS as a franchise at those sales? Making the game smaller in scope doesn't make sense either as they would just be wasting an entire studios resources for little return.
The dude you quoted is right that they should have cut their losses and moved on to a new IP when they had the chance.
But DS2 sold nearly 2 million copies in its first week. If that shit isn't good enough, then the budget was fucked up to begin with. That's ~$120 Million in 1 week.
EA president Frank Gibeau said: "We tried to open up the accessibility of the IP a little bit by adding a little bit more action, but not undermining the horror," he said.
EA says it "definitely do[es] not want to piss off our fans" by taking Dead Space 3 too far from its horror roots, but at the same time concedes it needs to make the series "more broadly appealing".
Dead Space 3 Producer John Calhoun: "We're trying to find ways to make sure that Dead Space 3 is really accessible".
Stupid developers... if only you listen to your fans...
EA says it "definitely do[es] not want to piss off our fans" by taking Dead Space 3 too far from its horror roots, but at the same time concedes it needs to make the series "more broadly appealing".
Dead Space 3 Producer John Calhoun: "We're trying to find ways to make sure that Dead Space 3 is really accessible".
Stupid developers... if only you listen to your fans...
SneakyStephan
Banned
More people like the road scenery from need for speed than mirrors edge
Sad truth but what can you say.
More people like transformers 2 than amelie poulin, oldboy or eternal sunshine.
Doesn't mean you have to watch transformers or that there is no room for the other movies.
That's why movies can be considered an artform (despite all the mass market factory produced tripe) and gaming can not.
It's just a business indeed and people will argue for and defend that there is no room for middling budget 'for the art/for the love of the craft' games.
Black Republican
Member
If Dead Space 2 wasn't successful enough to make a regular sequel, what good would that have done?
DS2 did very well because it was a survival horror. When the Action game alarm bells started ringing people just didn't give it a chance.
toddhunter
Member
Option 3 is to not throw a AAAAA+ budget at everything and accept strong but not COD sales level games as something that is "ok".
There are many reasons why they don't do that... but none of them involve particularly long term thinking. Survival horror games can do just fine.
Monster closet games no more no less. Hope those left get to work on another title. Most people complaining didn't even buy the game. Bought all three and Mirrors Edge day 1. People act like those games were some high intelligence stuff.
Deadspace 1/2 were stomping monsters heads apart a spaceship. Why all of this dudebro racism? They were always mindless gore games.
Loved Mirrors Edge but that wont sell honestly. (Still play from time to time. ) Most people championing it will just but on sale at 20 bucks anyway.
Deadspace 1/2 were stomping monsters heads apart a spaceship. Why all of this dudebro racism? They were always mindless gore games.
Loved Mirrors Edge but that wont sell honestly. (Still play from time to time. ) Most people championing it will just but on sale at 20 bucks anyway.
Diddy Kong
Banned
God damn fuck EA
I didn't beat the game even but I watched the ending expecting ENDING SPOILER
. And that's what happened....I feel bad saying this, as its my favorite survival horror series of all time (yes series, RE4 is better, but DS and DS2 are better as a "series", can't vouch for DS3), but Saturday when I preordered tomb raider I saw that it was permanently $39.99 or that's what GameStop's weekly ad seemed to imply. I was shocked, the game wasn't out until what, 3-4 weeks ago? I had it preordered the second I could! Then I played the demo. I normally don't judge games based off the demo (I hated DS2's), but something felt off. It didn't quite feel like gears, but it wasn't my dead space. But thank you EA for ruining another series, go back to fucking up Dragon Age and Mass Effect 4.
After 2, this would have ruined my day, but as it stands, I can't really be anymore than disappointed by this. Goodnight sweet prince... :/
Looks like your AAAA game came out to be another EAAAA game...
the obvious "death" of Clarke or Isaac
Which knowing me and my Mass Effect boner I'll buy anyways.
Looks like your AAAA game came out to be another EAAAA game...
I'll stop with the jokes now...
The thing for these publishers (EA more than anyone) to take is that maybe their budgets and expectations for every game are too out of control. They literally live on a everything needs to be a $50 million game and sell a minimum of 5 million copies basis and since they're the biggest publisher it's killing this industry.
People brought this up back when the horrible new Syndicate came out but if they made a lower budget PC only game based on the original it would have likely made a profit, just not a 3 million unit profit that they seem to want with everything. That UE4 game I mentioned looks amazing and looks to be what most horror fans want, and it's being made by 6 people or something crazy like that. It probably won't take much to turn a profit for them.
Does that mean their DLC policy is like the meat department?
Syndicate was just handled poorly all around. From design to advertising. It was sent out to die from the get-go and it's like EA knew it would from the amount of support they showed it in marketing.
Of course... sure... that's why Resident Evil and Silent Hill aren't so big franchises, right?
Those first games never were succesful, right?
Carnby
Member
I'm with you. It should be easy to avoid EA games. I can't think of anything else they publish that I like.
They don't want 2 million sales, they want 5-10 million sales. The series either grows in response to the increased development costs, or its a failure in the eyes of the pubs. Rather than refine what was good about the horror elements in DS1, they make it more accessible by giving the player a near inexhaustible supply of ammo in DS2-3, and making Issac move and aim a lot faster, effectively killing the sense of dread and tension whenever necromorphs show up.
Interfectum
Member
They could have dialed back the budget and made another game like Dead Space 1.
Welcome to the gaming industry.
Not well enough.
Low budget mid tier games don't really exist anymore. Not from major publishers, anyway.
sacrificengineer
Member
I almost thought that I won't find this pic in this thread.
Lack of common sense in EA is astonishing.
Fox Mulder
Member
Why did it have to be a mainstream AAA series anyways? The death of single player and niche games is the saddest part about the industry today.
I knew this was coming. Did you guys see the insane numbers they were expecting out of it?
That said, I don't think it's done. I think it'll just come back later. Can we get a new protagonist next time? Isaac's really not that interesting of a character. At his best, he was 'most iconic' for going GRAHHHH! not being some 'deep' guy. It also made the whole experience less tense because he barely seemed freaked out by the monsters by the third one.
If Visceral goes under SOMEBODY hire the armor designer. The costumes in Dead Space series and even the new Army of Two are SO much better than 99% of costumes in other video games.
I want them to make a Mirror's Edge sequel so some of you can realize how much you are overrating this series.
That said, I don't think it's done. I think it'll just come back later. Can we get a new protagonist next time? Isaac's really not that interesting of a character. At his best, he was 'most iconic' for going GRAHHHH! not being some 'deep' guy. It also made the whole experience less tense because he barely seemed freaked out by the monsters by the third one.
If Visceral goes under SOMEBODY hire the armor designer. The costumes in Dead Space series and even the new Army of Two are SO much better than 99% of costumes in other video games.
I want them to make a Mirror's Edge sequel so some of you can realize how much you are overrating this series.
Do we have current sales figures for DS2? I recall 2M being banded around shortly after launch, but I don't know how well it sold after that.
I'm not sure what you're describing would have got 50% more sales than DS2.
ToyMachine228
Member
While I was severely disappointed in Dead Space 3 in just about every aspect I do still love the universe and the potential it holds. Sad that Visceral won't get a chance to right the ship with a Dead Space 4.
Many people here and in the industry think: BIG MONEY, big game... well, I think you can make a really great game with a limited budget, with limited expectations but without betraying your original fans.
Look Resident Evil, for example... what Capcom have done with the poor thing...
Look Resident Evil, for example... what Capcom have done with the poor thing...
Would have helped if they stopped with their stupid Origin exclusive stuff. Sorry, I have no desire to fragment my game purchases across several clients,　especially when one is far worse than the other.
diffusionx
Gold Member
Because the game is expensive to make. Expensive games need high sales.
I didnt think DS3 had any jump sacres tbh. I guess instead of horror I should have put "tense atmosphere" which DS1 had in spades. DS2 lost a bit of it, and DS3 was all out action, hold the fire button down. Limb dismemberment didnt really matter anymore when you can collect ammo left right and centre. Only way to get a really good atmosphere was to play the game on new game+ and pick the hardest settings.
Well judging by statements from their CFO last week, they're not just cutting unprofitable titles, but also titles with low profits since those both drag down their margins and run a much higher risk of becoming unprofitable if their sales dip.
If Dead Space was only somewhat profitable at 2-2.5 million copies, it would probably be killed in favor of investing in bigger retail games and more profitable digital titles.
toddhunter
Member
What I'm interested in is the assumption that to make a game go from 2 million to 5 million you have to make it "mainstream/action" based.
If EA had made DS2 and DS3 even better horror games, would they have actually reached those marks anyway? Everybody will leap to say "no the market isn't there" but based on what? All the complex follow up sequels that haven't been made for 10-15 years?
Somebody help me out with a game where this approach to appeal to fans was actually tried, the devs succeeded in making a great game and it still bombed.
Why is it expensive though? Because it's being designed as a AAA game when horror fans don't need it to be to enjoy it.
And that's not realistic. Every game cannot have COD money. Because they don't have the COD logo slapped on the box. $120M in one week for DS2 should have been very healthy and easily made a profit. EA is just not handling their budgets, apparently. How could DS2 not have made a profit? That should be enough to not deviate from the formula and continue the series; not some delusional "DS3 must sell 5 Million copies!" nonsense. If DS3 sold 5 million copies in its first month, that would have been ~$300 Million. Just exactly how much did it cost to develop and market DS3?
Ah well, at least it looks like CliffyB's belated advice about voting with our wallets was actually quite prescient, although I expect he thought the opposite would happen and punters would lap up another shooter with a '3' on the end no matter what shitty business model they use or how generic 'action' they make the gameplay.
I won't miss it's pisspoor micro transactions and the shift to make every game into one of Epic's generic faceshooters, it's a shame you had to take a decent horror IP like DS with you though.
Next on the list- I'm not expecting great things from Mass Effect 4, and I'm sure EA are sharpening the axe already.
I won't miss it's pisspoor micro transactions and the shift to make every game into one of Epic's generic faceshooters, it's a shame you had to take a decent horror IP like DS with you though.
Next on the list- I'm not expecting great things from Mass Effect 4, and I'm sure EA are sharpening the axe already.
Just being a devils advocate here but if a company has a brand that doesn't run well they discard the brand right? So why not with Dead Space? The first two parts didn't sell all that well I believe and now the third one doesn't either so why continue with it if it doesn't net big profits? They are a company that need to make money and Dead Space isn't making enough. Maybe another IP will do the trick. Any other publisher / developer would've done the same I'm sure.
DS3 was a good game, and it was a ton of fun to play co-op actually. However it felt rushed out the door and not anywhere near up to snuff of the first two games. The acting at times was just cringe worthy, it was kind of shocking compared to how good the first two games handled the story and voice work.
I am a huge dead space fan and this really sucks if it's true. The universe has a lot of potential for future games and if they killed it because they were expecting Call of Duty type sales numbers they can just go fuck off. Maybe they can reboot the series for next gen and recapture some fans.
I am a huge dead space fan and this really sucks if it's true. The universe has a lot of potential for future games and if they killed it because they were expecting Call of Duty type sales numbers they can just go fuck off. Maybe they can reboot the series for next gen and recapture some fans.
darkjedi187
Member
That's some sad shit. EA just killed one of my favorite series this gen. Hopefully the employee's at Viseral will all find new and better jobs that don't hold them back from making great games.
What was the point of the whole thing exactly? They axed the Montreal division of Visceral Games after they were done with Army of Two 3.
DragonSworne
Banned
So does anyone else think EA will cancel all their games?
Surely they realize micro transactions ruined this game and dissuaded people from picking it up
Microtransactions is going to hurt EA really hard these next few years
Surely they realize micro transactions ruined this game and dissuaded people from picking it up
Microtransactions is going to hurt EA really hard these next few years
Slowly playing through the first one, and it's absolutely terrific, they nailed it with the atmosphere and tension and I'm actually reluctant to move my character forward due to paranoia at what is going to pop out of the vents at every turn.
And then it sounds like they shitted on everything I just praised for the first game, going to savour 1 & 2 for as long as I can. :/
It's no wonder I rarely buy EA games these days, because they keep axing their good stuff.
And then it sounds like they shitted on everything I just praised for the first game, going to savour 1 & 2 for as long as I can. :/
It's no wonder I rarely buy EA games these days, because they keep axing their good stuff.
peanutbutterlatte
Member
"I took a massive shit in the pool, now nobody wants to swim in it! I'm shutting the fucker down."
The thing that truly terrifies me about some companies like EA when it comes to this generation as we've gone on is realizing that no, if those IPs didn't exist before this current gen, they probably wouldn't have sold well enough in this day and age to warrant continuing games.
Good companies this generation made a new IP, saw there were some problems with it that hampered sales, but instead of shelving the idea as a failure, decided to IMPROVE the formula and wound up with a huge hit on their hands. Then you have companies like EA, who instead of figuring they need to improve the formula, they need to totally change it to make it more appealing to this mythic "mass audience." Only late do they realize that this never works, and even worse they all have Alzheimer's apparently as this decision is repeated again, and again, and again.
Personally, I'd love to know what's bloated game development costs so much that even a reasonable successful game isn't good enough to say it was a success. I still think it's mismanagement in many cases, but who knows?
Wolfgunblood Garopa
Member
How anyone in their right mind seriously thought that this kind of content should be a blockbuster is beyond me. It has a large enough audience for what it is. This isn't that difficult, I don't get why it's such a problem.