• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

IGN Wii-k in Review: 12.14.07

ethelred

Member
papelnabangka said:
You're big mistake was applying GAF hype(or internet hype in general) to real world applications.

Oh, okay. Excuse me while I go look for that massive eye-roll smilie.

Frankly, I don't care that the game failed. I have no interest in it, and I don't care for most Nintendo games in general. I laugh at its failure. Most of the people in this thread, on the other hand, should be a tad more concerned rather than resorting to cheap spinning.
 

donny2112

Member
ethelred said:
You think? I don't know. I don't have month by month reckonings for way back then, just lots of final LTDs, so it's a bit hard to quantify exactly.

Rogue Squadron was the best selling third-party GCN game through November 2002, and GHIII is a little higher than it. In fact, using LanceStern's magical cut-off point, the Wii leads 9 (using the numbers from the first page) to 6. This should not be interpreted as the Wii doing well for third-party software. It's just doing better than the GameCube. ;)

Edit:
It's also worth noting that the Wii has >2x the install base of the GameCube at this point in its lifespan.
 

Lathentar

Looking for Pants
ethelred said:
Marketing isn't the issue here. It's actually a cheap copout.

Metroid Prime 2 was released in the tail end of a year that saw the release of a lot of high profile, competitive software aimed at the gaming demographic. The same cannot be said of Metroid Prime 3, which got its whole "Big Three" nickname precisely because it was one of only three notable, major hardcore games being released (and, of course, that number was eventually whittled down to two). It's still performed anemically. That's not really a good thing. The game has had a lot more breathing room, a lot more focus, and a lot less competition than its predecessor had. It also had a lot more of a positive reception critically and popularly. None of that has amounted to all that much.

Trying to lay the blame for all of this at the feet of "poor marketing" is an easy answer that attempts to elide what should be much deeper concerns about what this game's failure means.
You realize when the marketing was just starting and the game was about to hit the videogame world was swamped with 'Bioshock - Best Game Ever' marketing and reviews. Thats all anyone was talking or thinking about. Their great hype, reviews and marketing helped an original IP title have higher sales.
 

grandjedi6

Master of the Google Search
Lathentar said:
You realize when the marketing was just starting and the game was about to hit the videogame world was swamped with 'Bioshock - Best Game Ever' marketing and reviews. Thats all anyone was talking or thinking about. Their great hype, reviews and marketing helped an original IP title have higher sales.

I have severe doubts that Bioshock took any of Metroid's sales from it.
 

mugwhump

Member
It's really cool he gave us those SW sales.
Lobster said:
Did you just call SSX Blur trash???
Let us waggle him to death. :mad:

edit:
Linkup said:
That would fit the stupid characters info.
This guy too. :mad:

Everybody check and see if Bozon disliked BK's characters.

ethelred said:
Marketing isn't the issue here. It's actually a cheap copout.

Metroid Prime 2 was released in the tail end of a year that saw the release of a lot of high profile, competitive software aimed at the gaming demographic. The same cannot be said of Metroid Prime 3, which got its whole "Big Three" nickname precisely because it was one of only three notable, major hardcore games being released (and, of course, that number was eventually whittled down to two). It's still performed anemically. That's not really a good thing. The game has had a lot more breathing room, a lot more focus, and a lot less competition than its predecessor had. It also had a lot more of a positive reception critically and popularly. None of that has amounted to all that much.

Trying to lay the blame for all of this at the feet of "poor marketing" is an easy answer that attempts to elide what should be much deeper concerns about what this game's failure means.
Meh, you make some points there, but you ignore a lot of other ones, too.
GC in 2004 didn't even have a "big three," it only had a "big one," and that one was MP2, so they both had about the same amount of breathing room. MP3 was released in the summer, not the holidays, and we still don't have its december sales. GC in 2004 had a bigger userbase, was more readily available, and had fewer brand-new owners. MP3 did have to compete with bioshock/halo, but I'll admit MP2 went up against bigger games on the other systems. MP2 was also coming off the awesomeness of MP1, while MP3 was following the lacklustre MP2. And marketing is always, always relevant in the discussion of sales.
I really don't think MP3's relative failure tells us anything too significant about the Wii's userbase.
 

Ironballs

Member
grandjedi6 said:
I have severe doubts that Bioshock took any of Metroid's sales from it.

It was certainly a factor, but not that huge of a deal.

The biggest problem is that it's in gaming no man's land. It doesn't appeal to kids, it's not the point/ shoot/ get to checkpoint that the Halo/ COD crowd is used to, and chances are anyone that demoed it in a Gamestop probably played with their aim sensitivity set to "easy" shot a couple gel puffers, got lost and got bored.

Metroid's a game you have to spend a little time with because the heavy emphasis on solitude, atmosphere and exploration. Casuals aren't going to get instant gratification out of the game, so the lack of a killer marketing campaign coupled with shitty in-store demos basically sent it to die.
 

legend166

Member
Look, using the "these numbers are good for Nintendo hardware!" is an absolute cop out. Nintendo hardware isn't somehow adverse to selling 3rd party hardware. The GCN didn't sell 3rd party software, not because it was from Nintendo, but because it had horrible hardware sales. The Wii does not have this problem.

I don't know why 3rd party games don't sell on the Wii in the US. They seem to do it Europe. I think both partly Nintendo and the 3rd parties themselves are at fault.
 

Kintaro

Worships the porcelain goddess
Maybe the vast majority of people buy Nintendo systems just for Nintendo games? Barring super high profile releases like Guitar Hero and such. Who knows.
 

Lobster

Banned
Kintaro said:
Maybe the vast majority of people buy Nintendo systems just for Nintendo games? Barring super high profile releases like Guitar Hero and such. Who knows.

Not this generation. The vast majority of Wii owners bought it for Wii Sports. Its hard to deny that fact.
 

Kintaro

Worships the porcelain goddess
Lobster said:
Not this generation. The vast majority of Wii owners bought it for Wii Sports. Its hard to deny that fact.

Ain't denying that. But Wii Sports is a Nintendo game...so, it fits my point. =) Mario sold well last month and Zelda numbers are pretty damn good too. Smash Bros will sell truck loads and Mario Kart will sell as well. Wii Fit? Yep. All Nintendo games.

Then why the didn't Metroid sell?

Because it's Metroid? Possibly the least popular "big" Nintendo franchise out of them all? I doubt Nintendo was bitching about it's performance really.

Edit: The comments made on the latest 1up Yours really kind of fit my suspicions. They just care about the next big Nintendo game. It wouldn't surprise me to see most people feel the same way.
 

JJConrad

Sucks at viral marketing
I don't know why there is so much talk about 3rd party sales in comparison to other systems in here. Very few of the games listed even have a fair 360 or PS3 counterpart and since we don't know what their sales were for the ones that do, we don't know if these games sold better on any other systems. The only game that we can honestly that the Wii version sales are lacking is Madden.

Just like all systems, it is the hyped games that sell best. Unhyped 360 games don't sell too. It can be hard for a 3rd party to generate hype for their games with Nintendo's titles taking so much attention, but GH3 shows that it is possible. It's really no harder than any other system, it's just concentrated from one publisher.

MP3C sales are great for the series. It should blow past MP2E easily and probably end up not too far behind the first game. It may deserve more, but get over it. Go buy it a Christmas gift for a friend, if it bothers you so much.
 

D.Lo

Member
legend166 said:
I don't know why 3rd party games don't sell on the Wii in the US. They seem to do it Europe. I think both partly Nintendo and the 3rd parties themselves are at fault.
Because they're either niche, poorly thought out, or totally suck?

There has still yet to be a single AA 'hardcore' 3rd party game released on the Wii. The closest thing is Resident Evil 4, a port of a game that could already be played on the Wii. GH3 is also good, the first multi-platform where genuine effort was put in - and guess what - it sold very well despite having no history on the platform like other versions did!

I can't believe anyone seriously expects broken PS2 and PSP ports, poorly thought out marketing disasters like Dewy, hard-sell poorly positioned niche stuff like Z&W, rushed efforts like Sonic and budget crap like Carnival games to sell like mega-budget, polished, years in the making AAA super-games like COD4, Bioshock and Skate.

When the Wii receives a single 3rd party game as good (or at least as well done) as COD4, Bioshock, Assassins Creed, Lost Planet etc, and it bombs, then you can claim 3rd parties don't sell on it.

Until then there is no evidence.
 

EDarkness

Member
D.Lo said:
Because they're either niche, poorly thought out, or totally suck?

There has still yet to be a single AA 'hardcore' 3rd party game released on the Wii. The closest thing is Resident Evil 4, a port of a game that could already be played on the Wii. GH3 is also good, the first multi-platform where genuine effort was put in - and guess what - it sold very well despite having no history on the platform like other versions did!

I can't believe anyone seriously expects broken PS2 and PSP ports, poorly thought out marketing disasters like Dewy, hard-sell poorly positioned niche stuff like Z&W, rushed efforts like Sonic and budget crap like Carnival games to sell like mega-budget, polished, years in the making AAA super-games like COD4, Bioshock and Skate.

When the Wii receives a single 3rd party game as good (or at least as well done) as COD4, Bioshock, Assassins Creed, Lost Planet etc, and it bombs, then you can claim 3rd parties don't sell on it.

Until then there is no evidence.

I agree with this and have been pointing this out for a while now. There hasn't been a big name 3rd party game on the Wii yet. Once the Wii gets one of those games and it tanks, then we'll know, but right now there aren't too many compelling third party games out. Guitar Hero 3 shows that a good 3rd party game will sell.
 
That doesn't seem too bad for Fire Emblem, how does it compare with the first month of sales for FEPOR?

Trauma Centre bomba though :( (Yes I am part of the problem, I haven't picked up my copy yet, but I'm gonna do so soon!)

BTW, does anyone know how Geometry wars is doing on DS and Wii?
 

grandjedi6

Master of the Google Search
Nuclear Muffin said:
That doesn't seem too bad for Fire Emblem, how does it compare with the first month of sales for FEPOR?

Trauma Centre bomba though :( (Yes I am part of the problem, I haven't picked up my copy yet, but I'm gonna do so soon!)

BTW, does anyone know how Geometry wars is doing on DS and Wii?

Radiant has sold almost the same as POR did its first month
 

SantaC

Member
Ironballs said:
Then why the didn't Metroid sell?

when will people understand that metroid has never sold? It's never been a selling power along mario and zelda and people still expect it?!
 

AlternativeUlster

Absolutely pathetic part deux
I still can't believe Boogie sold that many copies. I thought it would only reach something like 40,000 copies.

I agree with ethelred about people who own a Wii should be concerned about the sales of third parties after looking at these numbers. Look at Carnival Games which probably made its money back after selling just 5,000 copies make huge profits while higher quality games just fizzle and sell like a small percent that Carnival Games did. I would think that a lot of them have broken even but I still believe that as a third party that the Wii is still the best investment for its low development costs but I think third parties need to come to account that probably 60% of the Wii buying public will only own a total of like 5 games (including Wii Sports mind you) and those 60% are buying games that aren't that epic to invest in heavy amounts of cash.

I am not in that 60% for I own 27 games for my Wii already so I am like probably in the 3% percent that will either own like 120 games before the end of the Wii cycle or sell his Wii for rent money.
 

elostyle

Never forget! I'm Dumb!
When making a podcast, telling everyone that you have to rush through it and really don't want to be there is terrible etiquette.
 

1-D_FTW

Member
schuelma said:
re: the mystery games


absolutely worthless hints

My vote is for Golden Sun. When I think of Nintendo franchises with stupid characters, Golden Sun is the game that springs to mind. Now throw in the rumors. I'd put money on this.
 

Varjet

Member
1-D_FTW said:
My vote is for Golden Sun. When I think of Nintendo franchises with stupid characters, Golden Sun is the game that springs to mind. Now throw in the rumors. I'd put money on this.
Sounds more like F-Zero.
 

1-D_FTW

Member
Does anyone care about the characters in F-Zero? I know I care even less about F-Zero characters than I do story in Mario games. That said, a return of F-Zero would be godly.
 

maxmars

Member
Target said:
Sounds more like F-Zero.

Well, to be honest a LOT of Nintendo franchises host stupid characters, including Mario. That definition does not help narrowing down the options. :lol
 

1-D_FTW

Member
maxmars said:
Well, to be honest a LOT of Nintendo franchises host stupid characters, including Mario. That definition does not help narrowing down the options. :lol

Definitely. The reason I choose Golden Sun is because I changed stupid to incredibly dull, boring, and generic. Those are all the same description, but I feel in Golden Sun's case, you can't over emphasize it enough.
 

Shikamaru Ninja

任天堂 の 忍者
Peer has always been a fan of F-Zero. People want SEGA involvement? Look at the crap the development team is churning out on the Wii. No thank you. Good luck trying to get back the original GX team to even work on the project.
 

Amir0x

Banned
Shikamaru Ninja said:
Peer has always been a fan of F-Zero. People want SEGA involvement? Look at the crap the development team is churning out on the Wii. No thank you. Good luck trying to get back the original GX team to even work on the project.

:(

F-Zero WiiX... my dreams are shattered... F-Zero GX is one of my favorite games of all time. A top five game!
 

LCGeek

formerly sane
Shikamaru Ninja said:
Peer has always been a fan of F-Zero. People want SEGA involvement? Look at the crap the development team is churning out on the Wii. No thank you. Good luck trying to get back the original GX team to even work on the project.

There's a difference between the teams making those sega games and the team that made F Zero GX. The possibility of the original GX/AX coming back to do it is low, but it's not like nintendo couldn't ask sega if they did another fzero to assemble a team like that as they did it for brawl.
 

thefro

Member
EDarkness said:
I agree with this and have been pointing this out for a while now. There hasn't been a big name 3rd party game on the Wii yet. Once the Wii gets one of those games and it tanks, then we'll know, but right now there aren't too many compelling third party games out. Guitar Hero 3 shows that a good 3rd party game will sell.

The only 3rd party games with > 80% composite scores

RE4: Wii Edition (port-up of a GC game that was ported to PS2, sold above Capcom's expectations)
Guitar Hero 3 (selling really well)
Zach & Wiki (no advertising/marketing, dumb name, Capcom couldn't even sell game to stores)
Madden 07 (did okay, on every platform under the sun)
Trauma Center Second Opinion: (remake of DS game, One of Atlus's best-selling games ever)

Nearly all the 360 million selling-games have > 80% composite review scores
 

Shikamaru Ninja

任天堂 の 忍者
The possibility of the original GX/AX coming back to do it is low, but it's not like nintendo couldn't ask sega if they did another fzero to assemble a team like that as they did it for brawl.

Problem is the revenue from F-Zero and Smash Brothers are two different things. Nintendo gambled big with F-Zero GX / F-Zero AX. The development team was composed of a huge staff and even several companies. All those cool CG movies and vocal tracks sure added to the atmosphere, but Nintendo now knows for a fact the franchise is undeserving of such a budget.

The cheapest thing and most realistic would be for one of Nintendo's small satellite developers or a small in-house staff to do a new F-Zero. But even that is hard to bet on.
 

GDGF

Soothsayer
Maybe one of the new games is Starfox Wii. It does have Slippy.

Hell, it could even be Starfox Adventures Wii. Mixed reviews, yeah, but it sold pretty damn well from what I remember.
 

avatar299

Banned
legend166 said:
Look, using the "these numbers are good for Nintendo hardware!" is an absolute cop out. Nintendo hardware isn't somehow adverse to selling 3rd party hardware. The GCN didn't sell 3rd party software, not because it was from Nintendo, but because it had horrible hardware sales. The Wii does not have this problem.

I don't know why 3rd party games don't sell on the Wii in the US. They seem to do it Europe. I think both partly Nintendo and the 3rd parties themselves are at fault.
It's not surprising. Half of the people on this board call the Wii their "Nintendo machine." The GC was really close to Xbox in terms of hardware, yet the Xbox spanked it in software, so the GC doesn't have an excuse.

It's not Nintendo hardware that's the problem. it's the people who buy nintendo hardware, play a game, then chuck it in the closet and go "nah nah nah I don't play my wii daily" on GAF while great games pass by.
 

EDarkness

Member
thefro said:
The only 3rd party games with > 80% composite scores

RE4: Wii Edition (port-up of a GC game that was ported to PS2, sold above Capcom's expectations)
Guitar Hero 3 (selling really well)
Zach & Wiki (no advertising/marketing, dumb name, Capcom couldn't even sell game to stores)
Madden 07 (did okay, on every platform under the sun)
Trauma Center Second Opinion: (remake of DS game, One of Atlus's best-selling games ever)

Nearly all the 360 million selling-games have > 80% composite review scores

I don't know what to say about the 360. It gets a lot of hype with its games. Moreso than any other system and despite what people say, it has a large number of big budget games. Something that can't really be said about the Wii. I really want to see some third parties put some real effort into making blockbuster games for it. There are a lot of reasons for this, but Nintendo needs to either start spending money on these games (even a low end port of CoD 4 would have been nice) or developing these kinds of games themselves. It's pretty obvious that the western devs are all about the power of the system and so that's where the big budget games are headed (PS3/360), that doesn't leave much for the Wii except low budget cash-in games. In my opinion, you can't blame the Wii audience for this.

Anyway, I never look at review scores, to be honest. As of now I own 16 Wii games and will buy at least three more before the end of the month. I''m definitely not part of the problem. :D
 
MOH2 should be selling way better than that. It's one of the most addictive games on the Wii.

Shikamaru Ninja said:
Peer has always been a fan of F-Zero. People want SEGA involvement? Look at the crap the development team is churning out on the Wii. No thank you. Good luck trying to get back the original GX team to even work on the project.


Umm that was AV the monkey ball team... trust me they aren't busy. lol.
 

Jiggy

Member
Shikamaru Ninja said:
Problem is the revenue from F-Zero and Smash Brothers are two different things. Nintendo gambled big with F-Zero GX / F-Zero AX. The development team was composed of a huge staff and even several companies. All those cool CG movies and vocal tracks sure added to the atmosphere, but Nintendo now knows for a fact the franchise is undeserving of such a budget.
Eh, I'd be hard-pressed to care if the presentational stuff was sucked out of GX--it was the gameplay and the blazing speed that made it awesome, through and through. Maybe I'm just being hopeful since GX was so incredible, but I'd like to think they have enough insight to think of reusing the same engine as before to simply design some new tracks and challenges; it's not as if GX doesn't already look better in motion than every Wii game so far.
 

Grecco

Member
Target said:
Sounds more like F-Zero.


Except FZero aint an "Old Franchise thats returning" We got Fzero on the GCn


You want stupid Characters?



cn22.jpg


Sup
 

grandjedi6

Master of the Google Search
The_legend_of_drtre said:
MOH2 should be selling way better than that. It's one of the most addictive games on the Wii.




Umm that was AV the monkey ball team... trust me they aren't busy. lol.

The Sega/Sammy merger restructured all of Sega teams alot, including AV. Plus Shikamaru Ninja is an authority on Development teams, so I wouldn't doubt him when he says the original team would be hard to form

avatar299 said:
It's not surprising. Half of the people on this board call the Wii their "Nintendo machine." The GC was really close to Xbox in terms of hardware, yet the Xbox spanked it in software, so the GC doesn't have an excuse.

It's not Nintendo hardware that's the problem. it's the people who buy nintendo hardware, play a game, then chuck it in the closet and go "nah nah nah I don't play my wii daily" on GAF while great games pass by.

It is never the consumers fault that a system has poor software sales
 

RBH

Member
Carnival Games' LTD of 300,000 might be one of the biggest mysteries of this gen so far.

I really have no clue how it managed to perform so relatively well with such little publicity/advertising.
 

Grecco

Member
RBH said:
Carnival Games' LTD of 300,000 might be one of the biggest mysteries of this gen so far.

I really have no clue how it managed to perform so relatively well with such little publicity/advertising.


Selling for what 19.99? For one helps.
 

grandjedi6

Master of the Google Search
RBH said:
Carnival Games' LTD of 300,000 might be one of the biggest mysteries of this gen so far.

I really have no clue how it managed to perform so relatively well with such little publicity/advertising.

Apparently you missed the flood of advertising on every single kid related magazine, website and television station

Grecco said:
Selling for what 19.99? For one helps.

Actually it was $40
 

RBH

Member
Grecco said:
Selling for what 19.99? For one helps.

I thought it was initially selling for 40 bucks?

If it did initially sell for $19.99, that certainly helps, but still, reaching 300,000 is just really bizarre even with the lower price point.

Take Two
and speculawyer ;)
should be pretty damn happy at least.


grandjedi6 said:
Apparently you missed the flood of advertising on every single kid related magazine, website and television station

Apparently so. :/
 
Top Bottom